Re: Natural Evil

Perhaps it applies there, but that wasn't my intent with the question.
So, are you suggesting that there was something of God that wanted the
experience of suffering, loss, and death? :-)
My question really had to do with the idea of omniscience. If that is
really a 100% certain attribute of God, with God's knowing beforehand
every detail of the course and outcome of this time-constrained and
process-oriented creation, then I just have to ask, what's the point? On
the other hand, everything about this Creation seems to cry out
"options!", "novelty", "branch", "diversity", "uncertainty",
"surprise!". That suggests to me that these elements (ingredients?) are
perhaps of interest to the Creator, which reads in turn on the idea of
omniscience. The course of Creation would manifest none of those
meanings to one in the total know. Moreover, it seems to my human way of
thinking that it would be pointless to set a time-constrained Creation
into motion if the outcome was already known. Why bother? JimA

D. F. Siemens, Jr. wrote:

> Jim,
> As I see it, your question applies to YEC, where the question has to
> arise, "Why did God take six days instead, as Augustine thought, of
> creating instantaneously?" The best answer to your question from a
> sane view of science that I have found is from George L. Murphy. His
> The Cosmos in the Light of the Cross, 2003, has a blurb that reads, in
> part: "George Murphy finds understanding in the theology of the cross,
> with a God who becomes a participant in the universe and thereby
> shares the suffering, loss, and death that are part of the worldly
> experience." He applies it to ecology, evolution and bioethics. His
> chapter, "Christology, Evolution, and the Cross," pp. 370ff in Keith
> B. Miller, ed., Perspectives on an Evolving Creation, 2003 (which is
> less expensive) also presents the argument. I won't try to summarize
> it here.
> Dave
>
> On Thu, 30 Sep 2004 16:40:34 -0700 "Jim Armstrong" <jarmstro@qwest.net
> <mailto:jarmstro@qwest.net>> writes:
>
> Just for sake of discussion - if God has that level of knowledge
> and understanding and control, why do you think he did not just go
> directly for the bottom line in Creation instead of putting a
> time-constrained process-oriented creation in place? JimA
>
>>
>>With the omniscient God there is no such thing as "dumb luck". No volcano
>>erupted in the Garden because God knew what he was doing. To Him natural
>>processes are predictable so that, for example, he could have the wind
>>blow at the right time and with the right velocity to roll back the waters
>>of the Red Sea so that the Israelites could cross on dry ground. We are
>>confident that when we pray, if it is God's will, he can keep natural
>>disasters away from us without changing the laws of physics even though
>>such events happen at other times and places.
>>
>>Gordon Brown
>>Department of Mathematics
>>University of Colorado
>>Boulder, CO 80309-0395
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
Received on Fri Oct 1 00:42:49 2004