Is God good?

[scotty]

Originally Posted by Timmy

. But does it justify interfering with Pharaoh's "free will"?

This question was answered earlier by mizpeh

24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

It really gets me sometimes that people think God is this all loving and forgiving and everything should just be so, so. Like salvation comes for free. These verses are God's way of saying "if you insist on continously sinning then I will give you over to it" What destroyed the Egyptians is the fact they knew of God and still refused to serve. A father will only bail is son out of jail so many times before he finally just leaves him in to hopefully make him understand. Serving God would mean the Pharoh would have had to give up a tradition of rulership, gold, treasure, power. God in his forsight knew that would never change, it hasn't to this day.

People like to hold on to the scripture of Gods love and mercy, but shun the words of "true and rightous judgements". They often don't like to look at Sodom and Gomora, the plagues of Egypt or the husband and wife that drop dead at the diciples feet for lying. We were created by Him, for Him. Yes you have free will, worship and exalt Him and be rewarded with everlasting love and grace, or turn away from Him and die. Its not rocket science.

[Timmy]

Let me see if I understand, now. Every Egyptian family was evil. Besides the taskmasters, there were farmers, merchants, tradesmen, artists, servants, teachers, etc. Mothers and fathers, and their children. All wicked. All deserved the boils, the lice, etc. And all deserved to find their oldest children dead in their beds. OK.

And none of that would have happened if their king had just let Moses' people go to make sacrifices in the wilderness, three days' journey. (BTW, is lying not wicked? Oh, not when God tells you to lie. OK.) And he would have let them go, if God had not interfered. Pharaoh would have done the right thing, but God made him do evil. God made Pharaoh do evil! So that He could perform these wonders. So they would know that He was God. So He could punish the wicked Egyptians. OK.

Do I get it, now?

[scotty]

Originally Posted by Timmy

. Every Egyptian family was evil. Mothers and fathers, and their children. All wicked. All deserved the boils, the lice, etc. And all deserved to find their oldest children dead in their beds. OK.

And none of that would have happened if their king had just let Moses' people go to make sacrifices in the wilderness, three days' journey. (BTW, is lying not wicked? Oh, not when God tells you to lie. OK.) And he would have let them go, if God had not interfered. Pharaoh would have done the right thing, but God made him do evil. God made Pharaoh do evil! So that He could perform these wonders. So they would know that He was God. So He could punish the wicked Egyptians. OK.

Do I get it, now?

In a nutshell , , , yes. (ooooo that burned didn't it, if not , it will)

Bro. why are you looking past the obvious, they refused to serve God. period. I don't care if they never enslaved the Jews. I don't care if they treated the Jews like kings!!!!! THE EGYPTIANS DID NOT SERVE GOD!! Good works will not save you. How many good people do you know right now but are not saved, you think they will go to heaven because they are good people?? If so I would like to see the scripture supporting that theory.. There is a lady living next door to me and my wife, nicest lady you would ever meet, has been a wonderful nieghbor. Think she is good and worthy of heaven?? Guess again!! She is atheist. (we are working on that little problem)

The Egyptians worshiped false gods, that was their evil. Even if Pharoh had of let the jews go, he was wrong, and no matter what the people of Egypt done everyday, they worshipped false gods. period. There fore God did not make Pharoh do evil, He gave him over to his evil(which is scripture)(see prior post).


Oh and another thing, me and my wife have lived good lives, we fear God and do our best to walk in his light. We have never raised a hand to anyone much less enslaved anyone. So please Bro. Timmy, enlighten me, did we deserve to loose our 18 yr old daughter in a car accident? I don't think so, but I don't question the will of God.

If the judgement of Egypt upsets you, by all means , don't read the book of Job.

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Timmy

OK, what is the Bible definition of these terms?

Evil

There are two kinds...morally and physically. Physically generally refers to calamity or unfavorable events....tornadoes for example. God is said to be the creator of good and evil

Isa 45:7 I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.

Yet God is not morally evil

Man does evil because his heart is evil and he thinks of evil things continually. This is to cause mischief. It's usually for selfish reasons.

God's actions, on the other hand, were not done out of capriciousness or mischief. They were done for the cause of a greater moral end. In the cases discussed here it was for His chosen people, to protect them and to bless them.

In some cases God brought actions against them...it was still for the same moral cause for a different end...to correct them.

God does not do evil. He does justice and righteousness.

Man does things because he wants to sin. He does things for selfish motives. He does things out of malicious intent...on whims. Man does thing "evil" NOT out of a sense of righteous justice...that is evil.

God's actions on Pharoah were for the benefit of Israel and all the posterity that would learn from those that oppose God.
Gen 6:5 The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Jer 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

God knows all the hearts of men. He knows what is really in them and He knows if they have faith and if they will convert.

God is Holy which means He is separate from fallen creation. God is not a man that He should lie....so He is also not a man that he should fornicate or commit anything else that is an attribute of the fallen human nature. The Law is made for man. Nobody can judge God but even if we could we have to look at intent. We'd have to understand what HE understands and know what HE knows.

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Timmy

Let me see if I understand, now. Every Egyptian family was evil. Besides the taskmasters, there were farmers, merchants, tradesmen, artists, servants, teachers, etc. Mothers and fathers, and their children. All wicked. All deserved the boils, the lice, etc. And all deserved to find their oldest children dead in their beds. OK.

And none of that would have happened if their king had just let Moses' people go to make sacrifices in the wilderness, three days' journey. (BTW, is lying not wicked? Oh, not when God tells you to lie. OK.) And he would have let them go, if God had not interfered. Pharaoh would have done the right thing, but God made him do evil. God made Pharaoh do evil! So that He could perform these wonders. So they would know that He was God. So He could punish the wicked Egyptians. OK.

Do I get it, now?

They worshiped and served false gods. They did not regard the one True God that created them.

BTW the idea of lying and not telling the truth with God is also found in Mal 3 where it says God can not change. Trinitarians try to use this erroneously to show that God can't become the Son (as in modalism)...though that is shooting themselves in the foot since they teach God became a man.

This verse is NOT meant to mean God can't change like that. It's talking about His promises. God promises something and does NOT go back on it. If God says something, what He says is the truth. When God promises something....whatever HE promised was not a deception.

So how did God lie?

BTW how do you know Pharoah would have let them go? How do you know Pharoah would have done the right thing? God can not make anyone do good or evil. All God can do is something external to us and we react to it. Our reaction is of our own volition. Pharoah COULD have let the people go regardless. What did God do? GOd did not change Pharoah's person...He did not control Pharoah the person. HE controlled His creation and Pharoah reacted.

God did not make you or I be saved....Instead God did things that we reacted to in the right eway....others reject God despite what good HE does for them. But if God could make everyone do good or evil then everyone would be saved right now. We would all be as Holy as He is, for God is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. God can't FORCE us to do anything. He can't make us believe or not. He can't make us be righteous or not. That is our choice. But He can try to influence us externally

[Timmy]

Thanks for your thoughts, everyone. I understand what you're saying. It's still hard for me to reconcile the severity of God's judgments with His goodness. And with logic, for that matter. He performed the wonders in Egypt to show that He was God, and the prove His power (besides the judgment aspect). If that was part of His reason, and especially regarding the Egyptians themselves, was He expecting them to repent of their ways, and start serving Him? Did the wonders serve their purpose?

I'm not sure how the Egyptians were expected to know that the Israelites' God was the real deal, until it was pretty much too late. First, there was the trick of Aaron's rod turning into a snake, but Pharaoh's magicians copied that one (and many of the plagues, too -- that's pretty weird, right there). Aaron's snake devouring the others was impressive, but, uh, couldn't that just be because Aaron was a better illusionist (from the Egyptians' point of view)? Then with each of the plagues, things got more and more interesting. One might imagine God asking "Do you love me now? No?" WHAM! Another plague. But it wasn't even that fair: He didn't give them a chance to repent. He didn't even give Pharaoh a chance to repent and let the people go. He kept hardening Pharaoh's heart!

Each of these nations and cities that opposed Israel had their own history. Each generation grew up believing what their parents taught them. How could they be expected just to drop the worship of their gods in favor of the Israelites' God? I don't recall the Israelites even trying to evangelize them much, if any. Most often, it was brutally conquer first, ask questions later.

So how did God lie?

I was referring to the premise Moses gave Pharaoh: let his people go three days' journey, to offer sacrifices to their God. But the real plan was to escape, forever, as we know now. Was that not a lie?

BTW how do you know Pharoah would have let them go?

Exodus 4:21 And the LORD said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go.

How else can this be understood, but that God did something to Pharaoh to prevent him from letting the people go? There would have been no need to "harden" his heart, if he wouldn't have let them go anyway.

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Timmy

I was referring to the premise Moses gave Pharaoh: let his people go three days' journey, to offer sacrifices to their God. But the real plan was to escape, forever, as we know now. Was that not a lie?

I see...you are assuming that by not telling them God KNEW ahead of time Pharoah would reject their request, ultimately leading to Israel leaving Egypt behind was God lying? NOr does this statement mean "and we don't intend to return"...Mount Sinai was about three days journey from Egypt

That's not a lie.

Exodus 4:21 And the LORD said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go.

How else can this be understood, but that God did something to Pharaoh to prevent him from letting the people go? There would have been no need to "harden" his heart, if he wouldn't have let them go anyway.

God's acts upon Egypt hardened his heart. Some peopel harden their hearts at what God does and others soften them....even Israel hardened their hearts

Pharoah hardened his heart out of bitterness of what God did...taking Israel out of Egypt. Israel were the slaves and were the ones building Pharoah's kingdom. All work stopped when they left. This no doubt made him bitter against Israel and God as evidenced by his attempting to over take them on the way out of Egypt

[OneAccord]

Is God good? Jesus answered that question: "...there is none good but God..." That is answer enough. Anything beyond that leads us to question God, His righteousness, His mercy. Why question His goodness, His methods? Just be thankful that He is and be thankful He has shown His goodness to us. His ways, I believe we are told, are past finding out.

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by Praxeas

...Pharoah would reject their request, ultimately leading to Israel leaving Egypt behind...

So that's why Israel didn't come back? You mean they would have returned after the sacrifices, if Pharaoh hadn't kept rejecting the requests to go on a three days' journey? I think God knew the real plan (escape forever), all along. In fact, He foretold it to Abraham.

So why did Moses tell Pharaoh they wanted to offer sacrifices a three days' journey away? Why not tell him they wanted their freedom?

If my son asked one evening if he could go to a friend's house to watch a movie, but after the movie he was really planning to spend the night there, leaving that detail out, I'd have called that a lie.

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by OneAccord

Is God good? Jesus answered that question: "...there is none good but God..." That is answer enough. Anything beyond that leads us to question God, His righteousness, His mercy. Why question His goodness, His methods? Just be thankful that He is and be thankful He has shown His goodness to us. His ways, I believe we are told, are past finding out.

I am not claiming that God is evil, just asking what we can learn about that question in the Bible. If we cannot determine whether He is good from what He does (i.e., cannot determine whether His actions are good or evil), then I guess you're right. All we have is the explicit statements like the one you point out. In other words, it doesn't matter what He does: it's all good, by definition. Slashing pregnant women, in the right situation and for the right reasons, is good. Killing children is good, if it's for the purpose of proving that He is powerful (that is one of the reasons given).

As for showing us His goodness, you have a point, there. But again, if we are to believe that it was His actions that, say, kept us from serious harm in a car wreck, why can we not conclude the opposite when He doesn't protect us? We say, "Isn't God good" when nice things happen. But nobody's allowed to even consider that He may not be good, if our child is killed, or if we lose our house to foreclosure, or etc. etc. If a human knows to do what is right, but does not, we say he is evil. Can't say that about God, of course. He is sovereign. His ways are not our ways. He knows better what we really need. Etc.

BTW, I don't blame God for such bad things, either. Don't misunderstand me. My only point in all this is that it seems like a gigantic double standard. God gets a free pass, no matter what. And I am also not saying that if a man were to kill some kids, to prove that he could and to punish their parents for something, it wouldn't be an evil act. It definitely would be. And yes, I know. That man isn't God. That's my point! Man does something awful like that, it's an evil act. God does the same thing, it's good.