KNOW YOUR FAITH, LIVE YOUR FAITH,TEACH YOUR FAITH!

If God, in His foreknowledge, knows that such a person will reject Him and go to hell, then why does He create them in the first place? To understand the answer to this question, it is recommended to two videos beforehand: “If I am predestined to bad/good works, why does God judge me?” and “Why does a loving God send people to hell?”  

Back to the main question: we must state that it is built on a wrong assumption, but first, let us entertain the possibility of God not creating people that will go to hell. What would the consequences be? Let us imagine a person called A. Person A will go to heaven, so he was created. Person A would have begotten Person B, who, out of his own free will, would have rejected God and therefore, would have gone to hell. Hence, God intervenes and chooses not to create Person B. Instead of Person B being alive, he is now non-existent. Let us now take this scenario and expand it to all families on earth because, in all families, there are obviously people that choose to reject God. Thus, what is the consequence? Ultimately, it is the end of life itself. This intervention, that we seek, would destroy humanity. God, the Life-Giver, is not giving life, but ending it!  

Second, let us go back to Person B: if Person B would have existed, he would have begotten Person C. Person C was going to choose God and therefore enjoy God for eternity in heaven. However, she unfortunately doesn’t exist because Person B, her father, was never created! She therefore suffers the unfair consequence of her father’s actions. Not only that, but she suffers the consequences of actions that never actually took place because her father never existed! Is this fair in any way? Again, we find ourselves messing with life itself. 

Here is a third example: imagine a teacher that taught certain students the past year and now, he is teaching them once more this year. Since he knows his students well and knows also the content of this year, he decides, in the beginning of the year, who will pass and who will fail. What do you think of that? Unfair, right? 

This is exactly the wrong assumption mentioned earlier: this entire idea is founded on God being unfair because it implies that God judges that we will be evil even if we did nothing wrong and He never actually gives me the chance to live life. But God is Fair! When He judges someone, He judges him on what he did and didn’t do. When we stand on judgement day, God’s judgement for every one of us will be so fair that we will not be able to argue since His judgement is perfect! Therefore, because God is fair, He gives everyone their opportunity. Moreover, for those who are struggling, He comes and tutors them and gives them all the help that He can offer for them to pass. This love of God is expressed in Revelations 3 where He was speaking to the lukewarm Laodicean church. After rebuking them for their evil, He says this: “20  Behold, I stand at the door and knock [that is the door of the heart]. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. 21  To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.” God knocks at the door of the heart until repentance is achieved. He then grants me the immense blessing to sit on His throne. This is our Loving and Just God. As explained many times before, God gives us the free will and the freedom to love Him back. God is Love. We ought to love Him back. 

At last, let us go back to the example of Person A begetting Person B, the one that supposedly chose to go to hell. We have to understand that the relationships that we have here on earth are meant to mirror the relationship within the Holy Trinity. Through certain of these earthly relationships, we learn to love. But by love, we mean the sacrificial love, the one where we learn to sacrifice ourselves like God said: “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”  Based on this, we need now to understand the sacrificial love within the family: how a father or a mother learns to love through begetting children. We are transformed into God’s image when we learn love and patience by serving our children. By cooking, by washing them, by healing their wounds, by being anxious for them when they are young… we learn to love. Love is about sacrificing our own pleasures for theirs and our own energy for their comfort. This is why St. Clement of Alexandria says the following: “They surpass most, who without pleasure or pain, have disciplined themselves by marriage, by the begetting of children, and by care for the household…”  

We see great examples in the Bible as well. For instance, in 2 Sam, chapters 15-18, we see an amazing example of love when Absalom, the son of King David, betrays him and declares himself king. How does king David react? He is patient with his son and he wants to win him back. When Absalom died, king David wept. Then he said: “O my son Absalom–my son, my son Absalom–if only I had died in your place! O Absalom my son, my son!” If only I had died in your place?! What great love! We find the same attitude in Luke 15 when the Father is waiting for his prodigal son. Although in this parable, the father is God the Father, as earthly fathers have explained, we need to imitate this love. And God doesn’t overlook this love. Indeed, He rewards every father and mother that love or is learning to love in this way. Therefore, if Person B is not created because he is going to hell, his father, Person A, doesn’t receive the just reward that would await him. Again, we find ourselves spoiling the whole concept of life!  

Remember, know your faith, live your faith and teach your faith, and glory be to God forever, Amen