An Exercise in Logic

The following "essay" comes from a discussion I recently had over with some people at the jCafe Forum. I've spent half a year just hanging out with them, but things took a more serious turn over the holidays when one of the members posted a more serious thread about stuff he was going through at the time. Maybe because we've all been laughing together, all of us have found the forum to be a relaxing place to go despite the rough stuff in our lives. Anyways, this topic came up as part of the thread and I wanted to post it here, because I believe its something a lot of us struggle with, saved or not. I haven't exactly asked his permission to post his portion of this on my blog, but I think he'll forgive me.
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HiddenKaos:

Thus far no one has explained to me how an all knowing all loving being would allow a being such as Lucifer to exist. Allowing free will is one thing, allowing a creature to exist AND allowing that creature to corrupt the being he made in his own image doesn't seem exactly benevolent to me. And if he is indeed all knowing, then one would have to surmise he saw the outcome and allowed it.


mbiogirlumd:

As for your point about Lucifer and God allowing evil in the world:

A lot of people get stuck on that point, and to be honest I can't really say there's any one particularly right answer, because that perspective of God usually comes from something you've experienced as well as from a logical point of view (at least it did for me, and for most of the people I've met). So I'll give you what I think is a logical reply, but I don't know if it will really do much for you. To know "why" someone did something is entirely different from feeling ok about it. So the best answer to your question may be "I don't know".

I don't know, but I can guess. The first problem is that God is a different kind of being than humans. He has to be, or else He is not "God". I'm used to thinking of people in shades of good or evil, and trying not to define them in absolutes because that is too simple for them. But everything about God is absolute, because He defines things simply by existing. That means that I can take some absolute concepts and use them as a basis for understanding, concepts like God is the moral standard by which creation is defined, that He is the Ultimate in Goodness, that He is the best of everything that exists and so is NOT selfish when it comes to expecting worship, that He defines the concept of relationship, all of that besides what you mentioned before. So then why did He make the world, or angels? He doesn't need it to exist, but I believe that He made the world as an expression of Himself and who He is, much like an artist paints a picture. If then He is the best of everything (which follows because He made everything), than everything in the world would not be able to help themselves, they would have to acknowledge it in response to His existence.

But if He left it at that, I think it would be too one-sided. A perfect world that can't help but praise Him and has no choice in the matter, all that proves is that He's more powerful than everything and can make puppets. It would be like listening to compliments on a tape recorder over and over again, with no meaning or relationship behind it. For God's worth to be truly displayed, something would have to have the ability to choose to say, "Yes, you are the best of everything." At that point, God being the BEST of everything starts to mean something, because the chooser has an experiential reason to decide between one side or the other.

That's why I believe He created us in His image. Aside from what He made us to do, we have the ability to know Him relationally, a side of Him that wasn't expressed entirely before we were made, and we have the ability to choose Him over all other things in existence as the best. That ability does come with some issues though. The biggest obstacle is that whenever humans are given a choice in something, we always use our experience to evaluate the options. Without experience or values or desires, there is no difference for us between two options and so no real meaning in choosing one over the other. We basically become cosmic coin flips if something doesn't give meaning to our will.

The downside of giving free will to created creatures is that they can also NOT choose you. Anything that is NOT God or from God, anything that goes against who He is will result in the opposite, what we call evil. If this world existed outside of God somehow, that wouldn't be a problem, but because everything that has been made was made according to His rules and along with His nature, NOT choosing to follow Him causes pain, horrible brokenness, and death. We experience it interacting with the world outside of ourselves (floods, famines, all the natural tragedies we can't control), when interacting with each other, and even within ourselves. We basically destroy ourselves by pulling ourselves apart: our physical matter is operating according to God's rules, but the rest of us isn't.

I agree that God knew that was going to happen if He created beings with free will. He has to be a being that exists outside of time, or else He isn't God, after all. I don't think it was a problem for Him, because there is are sides of Him that come out because of the situation. The fact that He can and does have the right to judge evil, for example, or the fact that He has an absolute hatred for sin. But the more important result of this situation is that God has the opportunity to demonstrate in action just how deep His love goes, and just how powerful He is. By allowing us to hate Him, and then doing everything in His power to change our minds such as becoming one of us and dying in our place, we now have an experiential reason to say "Yes, You are the best." Now we don't have to just take it as part of the way things are, now we can actually incorporate it as part of our experience and as such use it to give our ability to choose a meaning.

Of course Jesus dying and rising again doesn't stop all the pain in the world from occurring, and it doesn't stop people from physically dying, not yet anyways. A lot of people ask "Well, why doesn't He just stop everything that's wrong right now?" I think that it has to do with the fact that God wants to show another part of Himself, His power over all the damage evil does. We know that if there is a beginning of time, there's going to be an end. Until that end comes, God is working in the world in the lives of people to overcome evil and the destruction it causes. Will there be wars? Sure. And will people get hurt and die? Absolutely. We live in a world where we can still choose His way or our way, remember? But God is so powerful that no matter how bad it gets, He can heal, He can restore, He can protect, and He can triumph. So when everything is done at the end of time, God will of been tested and proven in all situations to be powerful, faithful, and I'll even say loving.

Looking at it from that point of view, that means that whether I like it or not God's main interest in me and the rest of humanity is not exactly ME. The whole point of history is for someone who is able to choose to willing say that He really is the best of everything, because He's given them an experiential reason to say so. I believe that because He is the best, He wants everyone to experience who He is, but because we must be able to choose He will not just let all of humanity go unpunished for rebellion. Otherwise He negates any meaning in condemning evil. On the other hand He is working to give everyone a chance to acknowledge Him at least once in their lives, and whether they do or not He's still sustaining the world and its rules of operation, allowing them to live.

---end of theology lesson---

To be honest, there are parts of this logic that I find very difficult. Just because I can put together a framework that makes sense doesn't mean that I like it, or that I really feel any better about my place in the whole thing. Really I'd much rather know if God cares about me as an individual, and if He really knows what's going on in my life and will do something about it. Even becoming a Christian doesn't change that, and personally I think that's fine. A God that doesn't let me experience who He is, is a God I can't trust.

There you have it. I would be interested in hearing the opinions of anyone who actually reads my blog on the topic. Putting all of that into words actually helped me as much as I think it helped Kaos out, at least he has something he can think about. Sometimes the overemphasis on logic in the scientific field can do some good in ways I don't expect, as long as I don't make it the end of all things.