Hard Questions

You've known me for my whole life [basically], so you know I have GOT to be the one to ask the hard questions, so here I am to do just that: When god made Eve, he did so KNOWING she would introduce this sin and death into the world. If he did not know, then he isn't omnipotent, so I believe this man is simply stating that god could have stopped these bad things from entering the world and chose not to. Which seems to be true, he allowed eve to live knowing she would curse all of creation and he cursed ALL of creation for the actions of one.

I think it is a fair representation to reduce her paragraph to three questions. One, did God know Eve would sin and introduce death into the world? Two, why did God not stop the bad things from entering the world? Three, why did God curse all of creation for the actions of one?

One, did God know Eve would sin and introduce death into the world? 

Without debating the extent of God’s foreknowledge, I think it is safe to say that the vast majority of Christians understand the Bible to teach that God did know that Adam and Eve would sin and introduce death into the world. Let me give you a very small sampling of Scripture that supports this teaching.

Isaiah 46:8-11 ESV "Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors,  9  remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me,  10  declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,'  11  calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.

Acts 2:23 ESV this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.

Ephesians 1:3-6 ESV Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

A natural attribute of the God of the Bible is his knowledge of the future. I think these verses show that God certainly knew Adam and Eve would sin. It does not say that explicitly, but it is very easy to infer. These verses refer to the atoning death of Jesus as resolved by God before creation. This was not planned once Adam and Eve sinned. Therefore, if the atoning death of Jesus was resolved before creation, it entails that God knew Adam and Eve would sin. I do not write this lightly, but Jesus was as good as dead when God created humanity.

Two, why did God not stop the bad things from entering the world? 

This has to do with what I briefly mentioned in my original blog. “If God were to prevent children from getting cancer, God would be withdrawing our free choice and the steadfastness of His Word.”

The Bible repeatedly demonstrates that God holds humanity responsible for their choices. I think it is reasonable to say that there should be no responsibility where there is no real ability to choose for ourselves. The seriousness of our free choice to sin is demonstrated in the bad things God allowed to enter the world. These bad things reveal his righteous anger towards sin.

I think the question becomes why God couldn’t give people free choice and make them not able to sin. If he is all-powerful, he should be able to do it.

Alvin Plantinga thoroughly deals with this issue in his book God, Freedom, and Evil. Plantinga begins with a premise to the effect that God created humanity with free choice and the ability to sin for good reason, with no reason for creating us differently.

Plantinga first states what he means by free will. There are no preconditions or laws that determine a person will perform an action or that she will refrain from performing an action.

With that in mind, Plantinga now states his case. A world filled with humans who were truly free, meaning they freely could perform more good than evil, is more valuable than a world with no free creatures at all.

If God creates humans free, he is choosing not to cause or determine them to do only what is good. If he does, then they are not free after all because they do not do what is good freely. Therefore, to create humans capable of real moral good, God must create humans capable of real moral evil.

Then, it is also impossible for humans to be given freedom to perform evil and simultaneously be prevented from doing it. The fact that free humans do evil and literally suffer the consequences for it does not go against God’s goodness or His power. He could have prevented the occurrence of moral evil only by removing the possibility of moral good. God can do anything that is logically possible. This means that God can only create a world in which only one or the other is possible.

Three, why did God curse all of creation for the actions of one? 

The Apostle Paul addresses this question in Romans 5.

Romans 5:12-14 ESV Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned-- 13  for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.

The reason death entered the world is that all of humanity sinned in Adam’s sin. There are generally two ways of explaining our participation in Adam’s sin: “federal headship” or “natural headship.”

Federal headship views Adam as the representative of all of humanity. As our representative, Adam’s sin was recognized by God as the action of all of humanity, making death the penalty of everyone.

Natural headship views all of humanity as physically in Adam. Let me give you a biblical example. In Hebrews 7:9-10, the author of Hebrews explains that Melchizedek gave his tithe to Levi even though he was still in the body of his ancestor Abraham. Just as Levi was present in Abraham, we were all present in Adam, so God recognizes all of humanity as participating in Adam’s sin, deserving of the penalty of death.

Ultimately, the issue is that you and I have such a spiritual relationship to Adam that God recognizes us as participating in Adam’s sin so that we all deserve death. You might reply that if you were Adam you surely would not have made such a decision, yet we ratify his decision every day when we choose to sin ourselves.

The fact of the matter is that the world that was created is exactly the kind of world that God desired to create. There is no need for anything to be created differently. The Bible repeatedly affirms that the world was created good. Humanity was created very good, and, even after sin, we are still considered fearfully and wonderfully made. The purpose of redeeming a sinful world and humanity is in accordance with God’s good pleasure. Let me leave you with this thought. God was under no compulsion to give up his Son. We could and should all be dead, but God freely gave up His Son to die for our sins. The real hard question is why God would do that.

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died--more than that, who was raised--who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:31-39 ESV