Quote:If your dogma is correct in its assumptions, then God certainly does not respect your ability to disobey. The first four Commandments make that clear. There are only two options because there are only two outcomes: obedience and paradise, or disobedience and hell. There is a gun and it is pointed right at your face.
But that dichotomy is so uninteresting! It makes God look malevolent in that if we do not choose to follow "his game" then we are simply out of luck!
Why wouldn't God respect your choice? If you choose to not follow God, he will validate your decision by granting what you want--separation from him. He could not go against your will by automatically making you spend the rest of eternity with a relationship with him. Instead, he grants your wish in that you choose to not have a relationship. If he did otherwise, that would go against your will and this would be malevolent.
On another note, what do the first four commandments have to do with this argument? God was talking to the Israelites in that he had taken them out of Egypt and that they wished to enter into a covenant with him. God asked them if they wished to enter into the covenant in which they accepted. After they accepted, he proceeded on his end by providing his commandments (a portion of the covenant). God did not go against their will by forcing them to enter into a covenant, rather it was a conditional situation. In the same way, God gives us a conditional in that we can actively accept, refuse, or be indifferent to. He does not point a gun to our head.
Yes, I am a Christian on these forums. I am not here to judge or condemn, rather, I am here to debate, learn, and incite discussion. Yes, I think that my avatar is hilarious.
