TE: God did have an idea of how things would play out; He expected His creatures not to sin, as all of the millions of worlds chose not to do, except for one.

There's a 1 in a billion chance.

MM: "He expected" and "chance" implies He didn't know. Did God know? What do you believe?

He knew there was a small chance that sin could arise.

TE: What you call "reckless" is a one in a billion chance, vs. what you prefer, which is something certain to be horrific.

MM: Jesus knew for certain, before His incarnation, that He would drink the cup of trembling - a horrific death. Knowing this He chose to go through with it. There was nothing reckless about it. Not knowing (an uncertainty) would have been reckless.

This has nothing to do with our discussion.

TE: He couldn't have loved us, because we didn't exist.

MM: I disagree.

You can love the idea of a person before (s)he exists, but not the actual person.

TE: Regarding the SOP quotes, I think you are interpreting them incorrectly.

MM: I disagree.

That's surprising. You disagree that you are interpreting the SOP quotes incorrectly?

The following is too clearly worded to misunderstand or require interpretation: "But the defection of man, with all its consequences, was not hidden from the Omnipotent, and yet it did not deter him from carrying out his eternal purpose; for the Lord would establish his throne in righteousness." (quoted above)

This can easily be interpreted as God's foreseeing the possibility of the fall, as opposed to the certainty to it. By the way, can you support this idea from Scripture?

TE: Not that God started in motion a chain of circumstances that would inevitably lead to sin.

MM: God created FMAs in spite of the fact He knew in advance exactly which ones would choose to sin. Knowing this ahead of time "did not deter him from carrying out his eternal purpose". Why? "For the Lord would establish his throne in righteousness."

If God set into motion a course of events that could only have one outcome, then He is responsible for that outcome. This would be far from establishing His throne in righteousness. It would be introducing sin to the universe, which is hardly the same thing.

TE: If God knows we will do A, we will do A.

MM: Amen! It is easy to love a God who knows the end from the beginning. I trust Him implicitly.

TE: ... we cannot do something different than that which is certain to happen.

MM: Cannot? I prefer will not.

"Will not" doesn't make the point clear. The point is that it is not possible for us to do something different than what the future holds, which negates free will.

TE: She uses the phrase "at the risk of failure and eternal loss."

MM: Can you support this idea from Scripture?

The Open View can be supported from Scripture. This is just an application of the same theme from the Spirit of Prophecy. Which statement she which endorses the Open View doesn't really matter. The important point is that her thinking her is in harmony with the Open View, of which there is ample Scriptural support.

If not, is it possible you are misapplying it?

If there were no evidence for the Open View in Scripture, but only in her writings, I would agree with this.


Does it really mean God didn't know in advance if Jesus would fail or succeed on the cross? Please support it from the Bible.

Again, this is just one aspect of the Open View. It is sufficient to establish the Open View from Scripture.

I've answered your questions and points here, but you've not realy come to grips with the vital issues, it seems to me, so I'll reiterate them here.

First of all, if God knew that Lucifer, or Adam and Eve, would sin (not could, but it was a certainty), then God becomes culpable for the existence of sin. After all, God could just as easily have chosen to create a different archangel, or different first humans, who wouldn't sin. This says unplesant things about God's character.

Secondly, the fact that before we make a decision regarding a future act that we will perform, it is certain what we will do means that we are not the ones who determine the future act that we will perform. That is, if the end is determined before we have any input, we have not determined that end. That may be difficult to understand. I'll try stating it in a different way.

If we assume that you cannot do something other than that which is certain to happen, and it is certain to happen that tomorrow you will eat pizza, it follows that you cannot do something other than eat pizza. Not simply "will not," but cannot not. One could argue that had it been the case that you would eat something else, then that would have been certain, but this is confusing cause and effect. If the outcome of a decision we will make is certain before we make the decision, then the outcome is not dependent upon our decision.

There, that was clear! I'll repeat it:

If the outcome of a decision we will make is certain before we make the decision, then the outcome is not dependent upon our decision.

Well, although this is clear, it's not completely accurate. "Outcome of a decision" is a bit misleading, since it implies that what will happen depends upon our decision. It should really read, "If an event which appears to be the outcome of a decision we make is certain before we make the decision, then that event was not, in actuality, dependent upon our decision." This logic could be applied to any event. The logical conclusion is that no events are dependent upon our decisions.

What this means is that we do not really have free will, only the appearance of such. Free will would necessitate the ability to either eat or not eat pizza. But if it is certain we will not eat pizza, clearly it is not possible that we won't. Please note that this lack of ability is based on logic, not some physical reason.

Deja vu, eh? It's been good. Thanx.

I knew you were going to say that.

TE: I knew you were going to say that.

MM: Does that mean I didn't have a choice? Ha! Just kidding. What else is there to discuss?

If you wish, you could address the following question. Given that God knew Lucifer would sin (not could, but would), why didn't God create a different being, like another Gabriel, who wouldn't sin?

This is the biggest weakness I see in the position you advocate. That is, I see no answer to this question which doesn't, by implication, make God's character to be unattractive. To say that God did so to establish His thrown in righteous is simply sidestepping the issue, which is that God, under your perspective, could have simply chosen to do things a little differently --i.e., not create Lucifer -- and the universe would never have known sin, but instead, He opted for a universe with sin. Hard to see how God looks good in this scenario.

Hello. I hope you don't mind if I add a comment or two in passing. I've got so much going on now in my life that I won't be able to read your relpies so you'll want to direct your replies to the readers rather than me.

God created all intelligent life with the possibility that the created entity might disobey. His forknowledge that one particular one would make that choice re-inforces in my mind the idea that God is love and that he forces no one to serve or love or obey him. God only accepts 'free will' offerings that come from the heart.

Also, God doesn't either create or not create a created being with free will based on the choices that created being would make, and did make in the case of Lucifer.

TE: ... why didn't God create a different being...

MM: You believe God foresees all options, all possible outcomes, right? That He doesn't know in advance exactly how each FMA will behave in the future, right? So, do you think God foresaw all FMAs sinning and not sinning? Or, did He only see the ones sinning and not sinning that did end up sinning, and all the other ones He only foresaw not sinning?

If God only foresaw the ones sinning and not sinning that did end up sinning, why, then, did He go ahead and create them? If He didn't know in advance which way it would play out in the future, why, then, wouldn't He go ahead and create them? He could hope they wouldn't end up sinning, right?

If God foresaw the possibility of all FMAs sinning and not sinning, why, then, wouldn't God go ahead create them? He could hope they wouldn't end up sinning, right?

However, if God foresaw the possibility of all FMAs sinning and not sinning, and not just the ones that did, why would He run the risk of creating any of them? It doesn't make God look good if He chose to create them if He wasn't certain they wouldn't sin, does it?

I happen to believe, based on the inspired statements, that God did indeed know in advance exactly which FMAs would sin and that He chose to create them anyhow. Why do I think He created them anyhow? Why didn't it "deter" Him from creating them? The inspired answer is simple - "for the Lord would establish His throne in righteousness."

"But the defection of man, with all its consequences, was not hidden from the Omnipotent, and yet it did not deter Him from carrying out His eternal purpose; for the Lord would establish His throne in righteousness." (Ibid)

Why not? Wouldn't it have been better for God to have created another Gabriel instead of Lucifer, and avoided all the pain and suffering that results from sin?

When God thought about creating the covering cherub, surely he was limited in thinking of only one possibility, was He? That is, there were a billion possible covering cherubs He could have created. Why choose one that He knew would sin as opposed to one who wouldn't? It's not like God could only think of creating Lucifer, is it?

MM, I'm not sure what you're wanting to know, but I'll try to address your concerns by stating what I think took place.

I think that love involves risk. To create beings that could love, one must create beings with free will, since love involves free will. Free will involves the possibility of rejection. So God created beings knowing it was possible that they would reject Him.