What is a god?

[Daystar]

Daystar, if we assume the bible is a true account of God, then He 'steps into' human situations when He wishes e.g the flood, Sodom and Gomorrah etc. I cannot begin to grasp how He can 'hold back His hand' at some of the evil we humans perpetrate. Take the example of a child. I've read accounts of a child being abused who prayed to Jesus to help them and make it stop. (It didn't) An earthly parent could not sit back and watch their child being hurt against its will, so how can God?

First of all lets take the examples you mentioned. The flood and Sodom and Gomorrah. Why did God step in?

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I must admit that I find it so much easier, and find that it solves so many little problems to simply say that the Bible, how ever interesting and profound many find it, is simply not true.

When you believe that, all those niggly little problems simply evaporate like early morning mist on a sunny day.

Others, of course, may wish to disagree

Those with more knowledge on the subject, you mean.

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The problem of evil has been my biggest obstacle for the same reasons.

If I may, CR, I think that the problem there is that you look at evil backwards as far as mankind and God are concerned.

God can't simply remove evil at his whim because mankind is lord over their own planet under the influence of Satan. They have rejected God and chose evil. They continue to do that.

Mankind isn't almighty, your god is claimed to be so. Try your argument on kid cancer. Then kid cancer is not caused by what medical science finds but by the kid self (or even worse, by it's parents). That is both cruel and morally abject. Imho it is evil even to suggest so. On top of the cruelty is the negation of medical science and all of it has done to cure patients in the absense of an almighty god (if man can cure, what's holding back god?). Something to think about when you end up in some hospital and you are left to medical science, an event that will happen to most of us eventually.

This doesn't actually make any sense to me. Let me go over some points in response to what I think you are saying.

1. You say mankind isn't almighty but God makes that claim, which is true. God created man perfect to live forever in a paradise earth without sickness, age or death. But God also gave man this place to rule himself. The only stipulation really was that he (man) recognize that he needed God's protection and guidence. Man rejected that, choosing to judge for himself what was good and bad. All of the evil you see is a product of that.

2. Lets try my argument on kid cancer. A child has cancer which is a product of sin. Sin being the rejection of God by man and the results of that which are. Sickness, death, kid cancer. No protection from God. In other words all sickness is a result of that.

3. I don't understand why you would say: "Then kid cancer is not caused by what medical science finds but by the kid self (or even worse, by it's parents)." It doesn't make sense. Are you talking about natural selection? Survival of the fittest? What?

4. "On top of the cruelty is the negation of medical science and all of it has done to cure patients in the absense of an almighty god (if man can cure, what's holding back god?)." I don't know what you mean by the negation of medical science. Are you saying that the more science we have the more kid cancer we seem to have? Because I can see that. Are you saying that Pharmaceutical companies are not interested in curing cancer but rather treating it, because I used to work for one of the biggest in the world and I can see that as well. Are you saying that it all is just another example of man rejecting God?

To answer your question of what is holding God back, isn't it obvious? Man and sin. How do you expect God to solve the problem?

5. When I am in a hospital and medical science has done all it can, and I have been close a time or two, I know that there is something else beyond this life of sin. Of evil. You want to take that away from the child with cancer because you don't understand what is actually going on?

You don't know evil.