(March 10, 2015 at 3:58 pm)rexbeccarox Wrote: OK. So that means it was God's will Ted Bundy did his thing... and Jim Bakker... and the Spanish Inquisition... and rape, murder, torture... all God's things. And all of this in reply to a thread entitled, "Christians, Prove Your God Is Good".
Riiiiiiight.
Yes, those are all God's "things," though if we are to believe what the Bible says, He takes no pleasure in them:
Ezekiel 18:32
"For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies," declares the Lord God. "Therefore, repent and live."
But this information is there, and cannot be denied:
Ezekiel 5:9-10
And because of all your abominations, I will do among you what I have not done, and the like of which I will never do again. 10 Therefore, fathers will eat their sons among you, and sons will eat their fathers; for I will execute judgments on you and scatter all your remnant to every wind.…
And what happened? Indeed, parents ate their own children when Nebuchadnezzar lay siege to Jerusalem due to famine.
But what is the end result? If everyone is saved, and granted eternal life in paradise, then what right do we have to complain? Pain is temporary, and "through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God." (Acts 14:22)
These things are intended to make you fear the Lord, to tell you that He doesn't tolerate evil, and it will be severely punished.
Proverbs 9:10
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom...
If you think of it in terms of a righteous God wanting to create independent sentience, it makes sense. How else can we be free-thinking beings if we aren't well-acquainted with both ends of the spectrum in all things? That is why you see the duality in everything: light and darkness, wet and dry, pain and pleasure, good and evil. Things must be experienced to be defined, and in order to be righteous ourselves (which is the whole point, that is, to be made into the image of God), we must experience unrighteousness first. That is the purpose of evil.
I've said before it isn't a palatable truth, but it is still the truth.