zo: 1. God made everything out of nothing. He created the heavens and the earth.
jc: That’s reasonable, if you define “nothing” as what existed before “everything.” That is to say, there may have been a root material God used for creation, but it wasn’t “things” yet. I’d add too God not only created, but sustains. Ongoing power is needed.
zo: 2. God formed man out of dust, which was originally created from nothing.
jc: This is typical crude and juvenile Christian thinking, that has not incorporated science from its denial of the prophets. God initiated and guided life as it evolved on this world. Things didn’t just pop up. Planets don’t pop up. Biospheres don’t pop up. That was poetry, and it is amazing human minds try to make this poetry over into a literal event.
zo: 3. God is all knowing and omniscient and He knows everything from beginning to end.
jc: In a rough sense, yes, but creation is only great when the individuals are independent. If everything follows God’s Will, it is only God, not creation. In practice the lower souls rebel and the higher learn to love God and to discover and try to promote His purposes.
zo: 4. God knew from the beginning that mankind (Adam & Eve) would "FALL", and all people born would be in a fallen state, and yet He went forward with His creation.
jc: In Hinduism they teach men are arising from the animals, and this fits Christianity too. That is to say, the souls are on a path to greater purity, starting from an impure state. The difference, if I may be straightforward, is that Christianity enforces a one-life perspective, which is more natural to the human mind, as it dwells in the senses and does not see the soul as separable from the body. Religions told people what they like to hear.
zo: 5. God knew from the beginning which people would have their names written in the Lamb's Book of Life, and which would go to hell.
jc: Yes, and the religions gave not the slightest hint of how to strive for the salvation that is real. Judgment proceeds with humans totally uninformed about the basis of Judgment. In effect, as the proposition states, men are pre-judged, their minds judged not worthy to hear about the salvation that is real, and their hearts judged not worthy to strive for it. I think the situation is past the point of no return. It’s too late to try to give the true advice.
zo: 6. I (just like all other humans) never existed until I was born. Before birth I had no self-awareness, I had no ability to learn, no ability to do good or bad, no ability to go to heaven or hell, and yet before I was born, God "may have or may have not" written my name in the Lamb's Book of Life.
jc: So you say, but citing Hinduism again, no memory comes to the souls across lifetimes. Rebirth can even be proved, but it requires individuals with some experience of spirit, and the attendant concern, to see the proofs. No one has asked me about this evidence, but it is even written across this forum. Souls change slowly, and are born with traits rather than developing them fresh. Evil abides, and goodness too as it develops.
zo: 7. I had no choice to come into existence. I had no choice to be born. I come into existence from nothing, but where I finally end up is something God has always known.
jc: Yes, and from the wording of this postulate it seems you are unhappy in this instance. Unhappiness in the souls is one of God’s challenges, especially as they dislike the Good.
zo: 8. God created me and all other humans for His own pleasure, according to Revelations 4:11, (King James Version).
jc: That’s debatable. God is surely unhappy with man, so eager to destroy this planet. Humans are being carried, but from their greed this means much is being sacrificed.
zo: 9. Nobody existed before birth and nobody asked to be born and yet the majority of humans born into this world will be sent to hell to burn and be tortured for all eternity, and God has always known this, and yet He created us anyway.
jc: This is indeed the nature of Judgment. Yet isn’t it more shocking that humans are in such darkness they cannot be warned? They cannot be told the terms God might honor!
zo: Does anyone agree with the above information or can someone tell me where I've failed to state things correctly?
jc: Jesus said He would ease the burdens of man, and hell is only seen to be eternal torment by those outside of it. To those in it, it is a happier home than they have known.
