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| Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > Questions about Christianity > How Can God Permit Suffering? | Forum Quick Jump
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 9/12/2002 5:22 PM (GMT -6) |   | How Can God Permit Suffering?
A world of free creatures requires the possibility that they will freely choose evil.
by Frederica Mathewes-Green
www.beliefnet.com/story/87/story_8787_1.html
When it hits home, we reel back. Thoughts explode in confusion: I trusted God, where is he? If he's all-powerful, why didn't he stop it? Maybe he doesn't love us. Maybe he is punishing us. Maybe he is weak. Are we really so alone and endangered? Can we not trust him? Are we so terrifyingly alone?
. . .
Edited by - Al2Si2H4O9 on 09/12/2002 10:39:35 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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barneebus
Registered Member
Date Joined Sep 2002
Total Posts : 14
| Posted 9/13/2002 2:42 PM (GMT -6) | | On the other hand, how can God permit pleasure? In a world so given over to evil, and so rejecting of God, why does he exhibit any kind of mercy and not destroy it all outright?
Why does he allow us to enjoy flowers and music and so on?
With the thoughts and hearts of men continually inclined towards evil, how could He send his own Son into this mess, especially knowing what the outcome would be?
-Bar
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 9/13/2002 4:15 PM (GMT -6) | | B -
I happen to believe that our human nature, created in the image of God, is very VERY special.
One could ask why God, in the OT, waited until the evil of some cities was "full" before bringing judgement on them. With that should be the question of what was so VALUABLE about the human freedom -- or even its potential -- that spared that potential "until..."
God can be glorified in our sufferings. The ultimate human suffering was Christ's. And in all that God can still be glorified. Glorified means that His Spirit acts in and through us (our humanity).
God's will in us, our nature and the communion with God that we were created for, can ONLY be grown in freedom. Like marriage; which is modeled after that divine relationship.
So, I'd look for the secret to the true nature of pleasure and wonderous myrth in the nature of our bearing God's image and our relationship with our Creator-Redeemer.
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