Expert: Phillip Senn - 5/30/2005

Question
It has been awhile since your last answer to my question.  To refresh your memory of our last exchange, I am pasting it here with my follow-up afterwards.

Before Adam and Eve partook of the forbidden fruit, what was God's plan for us?
Answer -
Genesis 1:26-28 spells out God's intent for us. He also had plans before the foundation of the world to bring us back into fellowship with Him through the sacrifice of His only begotten Son,having foreknowlege that we would sin, and had even created us with the capability to sin, but He didn't want us to sin (see Romans 8:20).

He called upon us to subdue and have dominion over His creation, yet He knew we would fail in that. But the greater glory is not our dominion over creation, but rather His dominion over ALL. He is able, even in spite of our failure, to glorify Himself through His Grace and Mercy being shown to us through His Son Jesus Christ. And that is what He did. He is soooo good.

With Love In Christ,
Phillip Senn

Phillip,

Another good answer. It sounds to me that what you are saying is that God set it all up so that we could have the experience of living in a sinful world and suffer from sin ourselves. If He truly loves us, this whole thing would have to benefit us in some way. How does it? Why couldn't we have all just lived in a blissful state in a Garden of Eden setting?
Answer -
Romans 8:20 tells us why God chose to do things the way He did. That the whole of creation would be subjected to Him, who deserves all of the glory and the honor. We, who have come to faith in Christ Jesus have a wonderful opportunity to be used of Him to bring glory unto His matchless name through being in subjection to Him. He alone is worthy of all praise and glory and honor. When we are not in subjection to Him, He deals with us as His children, bringing us into subjection for His glory and honor, and for our well being. He is the author and finisher of our faith, and as such, gets all of the credit for the glory that is afforded to His Name. That ultimately is His goal in all of creation. As I had said earlier, "It is all about Him".

With Love In Christ,
Phillip Senn

Phillip,

I think I must be missing something. It sounds like you are saying that the only reason God created us was to bring glory and honor to Himself. That makes God sound like an egotistical maniac who is insecure and unsure about himself. Why would a perfect being need to prove to anyone how glorious he is? This doesn't sound like the loving God of the Bible at all. I realize that everything we accomplish is because of Him and that we need to give Him all the credit. But that does not answer the question of why He created us and what His ultimate plan for us is. Do you know the answer? It has to be more than just giving God glory. Romans 8:20 only says that He had a reason, but doesn't explain what the reason was. Don't you think it would help us give glory to God if we knew the reason He created us and His purpose for our existance?

Answer:     The ultimate purpose of God is to glorify His name. If that makes Him seem like an egotistical maniac to you, apparently you have little understanding of God. Read Isaiah 43 to see what this King of Kings and Lord of Lords says concerning Himself and His glory. He says in His Word, "I am a jealous God". Again He says, "For mine own sake, even for mine own sake, will I do it: for how should my name be polluted? and I will not give my glory unto another"(Isaiah 48:11).

It is one thing to say you don't understand something about God... I don't fully comprehend all there is to know about Him. It is a much different thing to say that the attributes of that person (in this case the Lord) make Him seem like an egotistical maniac.

Perhaps you think more highly of yourself than you should. Should the vessel say unto the potter, "Why hath thou made me thus?" It is one thing to question the Lord about something. It is another thing to rudely assume that you know God better than He knows Himself and declares Himself to be.
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First of all, I want to thank you for your patience with my blunt way of expressing my questions.  I wasn 't trying to be rude to you or especially to God.  It was a sincere question.  I think I am just  questioning at a different level of depth than the questions you are used to.  If you will indulge me with another attempt I'll try again to more fully understand your belief of what the Bible teaches.

To begin with you need to understand that I understand that we need to give all the glory to God as Jesus showed by His example in giving glory to the Father.  Taking all the scriptures you refer to in context, the commandment to glorify God is intended to prevent us from relying on our own understanding or other gods.  That is why He is a jealous God.  You mentioned that believers have an opportunity to give glory to Him.  I would agree.  In the Sermon on the Mount, He admonished His listeners to be a light to the world that those who would see their light, whould glorify Him.  This is a way we can assist Him in drawing others to Him.  The whole purpose of giving glory to God is to keep ourselves in subjection to Him and exposing others to His light and truth.  The more we understand His creations and works and live accordingly, the more we can glorify His name.

This is all true, but doesn't answer my original question.  Perhaps you don't know the answer, and that's okay.  I just want to make sure you have the opportunity to understand and answer it if you do.

The Bible clearly teaches that God is the perfect example of unselfishness, love and charity.  He loves us more than we can comprehend.  Yes, as far as we are concerned, it is all about Him, but as far as He is concerned, it is all about us.   With that in mind, how does our living in this sinful environment benefit us?  Why didn't He set it up so that we all could live in a blissful state in a Garden of Eden setting?  This is not a question about who gets the glory.  That question is already settled and we both agree.  This is a question about why we were created in the first place.  Certainly God didn't have to prove to Himself how great He is.


Answer
You have made some assumptions that I believe need some correction. God, indeed, has shown himself through Scripture to be the ultimate example of love and charity. These attributes do not prevent God from having other attributes as well. One would be judgment upon the sin that prevents His creation from bringing ultimate glory to His name. Perhaps my answer had some wrong information in it also, for it is not we that have opportunity to glorify His name, as much as we have opportunity to be used of Him to bring glory to His name. He is the one that glorifies His name, and He does so through those of us that believe on the name of the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

All that we see in creation is a manifestation of God's Eternal Power and Godhead (Romans 1:20). They certainly existed before the creation. God's ultimate goal, as I understand it, was to glorify His name through His creation. That would include man/woman as He declared they should be created "in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth".

Perhaps you have a differing concept of God's ultimate purpose. I have noticed there are many questions concerning His purpose for man since "The Purpose Driven Life" by Rick Warren has come into print. One can never realize their ultimate purpose apart from a proper relationship with God. That ultimate relationship is secured through faith in the Son of God, who "died for our sins according to the scriptures; And ... was buried, and that ... rose again the third day according to the scriptures..."

Again, you seem to think that God wanted us to live in a sinful society. That is not the case at all. As I previously answered, it was not God's will that "any should perish, but that all should come to repentence". That is God's will also, but would have never been necessary, had man not sinned in the Garden of Eden. "But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in  Christ Jesus: That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus" (Ephesians 2:4-7). Notice the ultimate goal is to show the exceeding riches of His Grace in His kindness toward us. Again, it is all about Him receiving the glory that is due to His matchless name.

Everything He does is to bring glory to His name, even the mercy and grace that so many speak about. But few want to realize that it is also about making manifest His person, which also is great in Glory through His Son Jesus Christ. He even will destroy the wicked who do not believe on the name of the Son of God. They are already condemned because they have not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God. Why would this be true? Because as Jesus said, "Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light". That light, which is in Christ Jesus, is God's manifested glory. It is the same light that glowed around Moses as he descended from the Mount with the tablets. It is the same glory that was present as Jesus met with Moses and Elijah.

Yes, from eternity, God has one ultimate goal, as I understand it. That is to glorify His name through all of creation. That doesn't make him egotistical. It does however show Him to be a jealous God, who said, "For mine own sake, even for mine own sake, will I do it: for how should my name be polluted? and I will not give my glory  unto another."

Again, His ultimate goal, in His creation, is to reveal HIMSELF. That, in itself, will declare His glory. Everything we can know about God, He has declared it in His Word. We simply have opportunity to receive what He says, or reject it. It appears that you have accepted some of God's revelation of Himself, but I know that none of us will be complete in our knowlege of Him until we see Jesus face to face, and "we shall know, even as also we are known".

With Love In Christ,
Phillip Senn