I started this book with a short and philosophically insubstantial discussion about the nature of questions. Explaining the question; “What on earth is God doing?” has at its core all that I have attempted to cover and in truth, a lot more that I have left out.
The question “What on earth is God doing?” can be partially answered by describing the unfolding of the historical events that God directly involves Himself in and also the mechanisms that He has used within history. However, this answer is somewhat like the classic, but fictional answer, “42.” It is indeed an answer to a question, but is the question even the correct one to start with. Perhaps asking; “Why is God bothering to do all this in the first case?” is a far better question.
God is unmistakably working within His creation, but from our perspective, it is not immediately evident …show more content…
It is however not a requirement to do evil to know evil. We must, like God, experience or “know” its effect. It is insufficient to have mere knowledge of its existence.
The action of determining for ourselves what is right and good as if we were gods is what it means to “know.” It is to this that Satan referred in the garden. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:5) Man determined, for themselves, a course of behaviour that was directed away from God and in doing so would come to “know” evil. They would be allowed to experience its effect first hand. God did not cause evil but permitted His beings to choose and experience it.
Man’s decision to disobey God was an extreme affront to Gods absolute standard of righteousness and holiness. The depth of this affront to God was so unimaginably great that from His perspective, it may even have seemed reasonable for Him to destroy this aspect of His creation since it would no longer accurately express
The question “What on earth is God doing?” can be partially answered by describing the unfolding of the historical events that God directly involves Himself in and also the mechanisms that He has used within history. However, this answer is somewhat like the classic, but fictional answer, “42.” It is indeed an answer to a question, but is the question even the correct one to start with. Perhaps asking; “Why is God bothering to do all this in the first case?” is a far better question.
God is unmistakably working within His creation, but from our perspective, it is not immediately evident …show more content…
It is however not a requirement to do evil to know evil. We must, like God, experience or “know” its effect. It is insufficient to have mere knowledge of its existence.
The action of determining for ourselves what is right and good as if we were gods is what it means to “know.” It is to this that Satan referred in the garden. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:5) Man determined, for themselves, a course of behaviour that was directed away from God and in doing so would come to “know” evil. They would be allowed to experience its effect first hand. God did not cause evil but permitted His beings to choose and experience it.
Man’s decision to disobey God was an extreme affront to Gods absolute standard of righteousness and holiness. The depth of this affront to God was so unimaginably great that from His perspective, it may even have seemed reasonable for Him to destroy this aspect of His creation since it would no longer accurately express