QUESTION

[DAVID SERVING JESUS]

Why do you think God gave man the privilege of choice - choosing whom we will serve.

[HOPE - Psalm 43:5]

And I quote:

"God could have programmed man to meet His eternal desire and purpose for creation; to receive man's love and worship, involuntarily. However, the God who is love (I John 4:8) and desired man's voluntary love and obedience (I John 4:16; Rev. 4:11) willingly risked the rejection of man's love, by virtue of the same personality that could choose to love Him or not love Him. Love that loves when there is a chance of rejection is true love. That was God's love.

But love knows what it is to set limits in the relationship for the best interest of the other person. God planted a wonderful garden and allowed man to have free access to all it's fruit and beauty, with the exception of one tree - the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This was the only limit God set on man - but it was a token of His love and the vehicle by which man could choose to return that love back to his Creator."

~Tracy~

[Angie/Shinetoday]

An idea to think about..why did God even create man? He had Heaven and a lot of angels there as the Bible says. Yet, what couldn't those angels do that God was hoping to do or get when he created man? If we take a close look at angels..we learn more about them and what they can do..The Bible tells of messenger angels..it tells of the 2/3 of Heavens angels. So we learn angels can be messengers,they can think..and be deceived and lied to and tricked as the 1/3 fallen angels. Yet, God could love the angels but nowhere is it found that the angels are capable of love and especially loving God. Man was created with freewill to choose. Man is capabable of love and given the Bible to show how much Gods son loved us to die for us..and even if you were the only one He would have died just for you. Maybe God gave us freewill to see if we will love him in return. If you look at a persons lifetime..70-100 years...It's such a short time out of eternity and maybe God is testing us to see if we will follow Him or not and the end result is either everlasting life or everlasting damnation..knowing this the choice is not hard to love God who first loved us. It's our human nature to rebel and especially against God if we don't understand His love for us and how much so.. God tells us He loved us before we were ever born, in the womb and during this lifetime and hopefully everlasting. He also tells us He knows when we sit down and when we rise, He says He knows the number of hairs on our head..He left us with an instruction manual(the Bible) so we could find the answers in life..If this isn't enough to show He is a very caring and loving Father who watches us constantly..He sent His only begotten son to earth to die for us so that we might live..and even if you were the only one, He would have died on that cross just for you.. In the end, on our day of death...even then it is between our creator and ourself only...We Christians are blessed with the gift of being loved and being able to return that love to our creator and it's not even hard to choose whome we will serve. Amen

[Audrey Dawson Watson]

All the comments that have come before, I am in total agreement with, however their is one aspect of Mans free will that we seldom explore. In the beginning when God created Man, God breathed into man his own Spirit. Because of that one act of Love, He made man to be as He Himself, Sovereign: One that exercises supreme authority within a limited sphere. God made Man Sovereign over the earth, the animals, the fowl of the air and the sea, however he did not give Man authority over Man, That was His; All Power belongs to God.

On that faithful day in the garden, the Women followed the Lead of the Serpant eating the fruit, giving him authority over Woman, who intern excercised her authority over Man by then giving the fruit to Man who followed her lead; all this done after God, Who is the I Am, had told them they would surely die. This indeed was the first act of authority over Man for which God punished the Man for harkening to the voice of Woman and punished the Woman for hearkening to the voice of the Serpant who at that time was a upright beast such as Man which caused them both to be out of order by usurping authority over Man.

You see, can we really say they had choice? Knowledge did not come until after they ate from the tree. There is but one way, and that way is making Christ Lord of your life, Placing confidence in man can destroy you.