Suffering

[Captain Scarlet]

Well if you do not think freedom of choice is important then you do not hold your freedom in high reguard. God did not create Satan He created Lucifer the most beautiful of all the angels and the most powerful archangel. Lucifer made Satan by his disobedience. God allowed him to do this because He wants all created beings to love Him with out being forced in any way (what kind of love would love be if forced, I say it's no love at all) then He allowed Adam and Eve to make the same choice. Freewill is one of the greatest gifts given to us by God, if He had not then we would be no more than puppets and I for one believe that to be a horrible existence. The reason God did not eliminate evil is so we could see the love He has for mankind the love He gives us in having freedom of choice. By the way if God had eliminated evil then where is there a choice.

And it gets worse. Don't know where to begin it's so bad. If forced love is no love at all your god does not love us. Did god not command us to worship him else he will punish us and our children. I think most reasonable people would think if an omnipotent being said that, he could probably follow through on it; I would feel compelled/forced to worship, believe or love. It gets no better in the NT when you are tortured forever becuase you didn't believe a bronze age Jewish orthodox preacher was really a god. Haven't generations of people been threatened and bullied and terrified into believing this? As for free will, can you be 'given' free will. If you didn't want free will (and a lot of folks do like choices made for them) then if you are given it, it is given against you free will. again you'd be forced to accept it. It is therefore a self defeating concept.