Tough Questions for Christians #13: Reluctant God

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According to most Christians, God is omnipotent. He knows all. He knows the past, the present, and the future. He knows the outcome of every decision anyone will ever make. In fact, the entire history of the world was known to God before he even created it.

He knew Adam and Eve would fall, and he knew that the ONLY way he could forgive sin would be if he sacrificed himself – to himself.

But he waited 4,000 years to do so.

As I see it, when you read through the Bible it’s a history of God doing everything he can to GET OUT OF SACRIFICING HIMSELF. He is a reluctant God.

When Adam and Eve sinned, God didn’t immediately offer himself as a sacrifice and take sin out of the picture, no – he did everything he could to try to civilize the world and then when that failed he just drowned billions of people.

Then you have the Tower of Babel, you’ve got the Israelites in slavery, God used the Kings, the Judges, and the Prophets, everything he can to try to get out of this. Then FINALLY he decides that nothing else is working, so he comes down in the flesh.

The day before he is to die, he goes and prays to himself and begs himself to get himself out. “God please remove this cup from me.” “Please, let me out of it, I don’t want to do this.”

If God already knew that the only way he could convince himself to forgive sin would be if he came down and killed himself for us, then he should’ve come down as Abel, the very first human born to Adam and Eve. He could’ve consequently been slain by Cain, and could’ve been “slain for our sins.”

There was no need, and no benefit to waiting 4,000 years and issuing laws that he’s just going repeal later.

If your God is not a reluctant God, why did he wait 4,000 years before coming down and offering himself as a sacrifice? Why not do it immediately? And why did he try so many other plans before finally deciding that the only way he could do it would be to come down himself? Why after he was here did he beg himself to let himself off the hook?

Why do you worship a reluctant God?

TOUGH QUESTION FOR CHRISTIANS #13:
WHY WAS GOD SO RELUCTANT TO SACRIFICE HIMSELF FOR YOUR SINS?

originally posted on YouTube at: www.youtube.com/azatheist

Tough Questions for Christians #6: God’s Failures

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In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth, the stars, the galaxies, and this planet. And on it he created all of the animals, the fish, the birds, and he created one man, and one woman. It was the perfect world, God’s perfect creation.

But Adam and Eve were thwarted by the serpent, and God’s perfect creation fell. God was thwarted right from the beginning.

Not to be outdone, God decided to try again, and for 1,600 years he tried to civilize his people. No churches, no schools, no tracts, no 10 commandments, no baptism. The people grew worse, and worse, and worse. Until eventually the “merciful God” decided to drown them all – all except Noah and his family that is. A total of eight people the “merciful Lord” decided to allow to live. He had failed again.

So God tried again, but he changed their diet this time. With Adam and Eve people were only vegetarians, but after the flood God said: “every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you.” But alas, still no schools, still no churches, still no one taught to read or write, still no 10 commandments. God failed again.

So at the Tower of Babel God dispersed humanity and sent them their different ways. He decided that since he couldn’t manage to handle everyone, he would focus on a small group. He focused his attention on the descendants of Abraham, and he failed again.

He couldn’t succeed with everyone, and he couldn’t succeed with the descendants of Abraham either. His chosen people were captured by the Egyptians and they were lead into slavery for 400 years.

God tried again. He rescued his chosen people from the Egyptians, started off toward Palestine, and he changed their diet yet again. No longer could they eat all meat, now they could only eat the animals or the “beasts” that “parted the hooves” and “chewed the cud.” Yet again he failed.

The people hated him. The people preferred the slavery of Egypt to the freedom that God had given them. So God kept them wandering in the wilderness for so long that most of the people he had rescued from slavery had died. Then he took them into Palestine and had them governed by judges. This too was a failure.

No schools, no Bible.

So God decided to try Kings, but the kings were mostly idolaters, and the chosen people ended up being conquered again – they were taken into captivity in Babylon. Yet another failure.

When the people returned, Jehovah decided to try prophets, but the people continued to grow worse and worse. Still no schools, no sciences, no arts, no commerce.

So God took upon himself the flesh. He was born of a woman, and lived among the people he had been trying to civilize for thousands of years. These people, following the law that HE had given them, charged this Jehovah-man, this God-man, this Christ, with blasphemy. They tried, convicted, and killed him.

The story as I’ve related it is true – according to the Bible anyway. How is it a sign of God’s success?

It says nothing for God’s success rate. It’s a history of failures upon failures. How exactly does this story, of God repeatedly failing, repeatedly trying to save mankind yet repeatedly failing to do so – how does it portray an example of a “perfect” God with a “perfect” plan?

It seems to me, more like the story of an extremely faulty God with a plan that just continues to go wrong. No matter what he does, everything just continues to go wrong.

Do you believe that the story of the Bible, with the repeated failures by God, is an actual account of a perfect being’s history?

TOUGH QUESTION FOR CHRISTIANS #6

IS THE BIBLE, WITH THE REPEATED STORIES OF GOD’S FAILURES, A TRUE HISTORY OF A PERFECT BEING?

originally posted on YouTube at: www.youtube.com/azatheist