Someone asked me recently 'if God is omnipotent and knows everything why did He give us free will knowing what we would do to the world?' I think that's a pretty fair question, and I'm not sure if I am qualified to answer it, but I'm going to give it my best try. I encourage any of my readers who are better equipped to answer this to please put your opinion, or facts whatever the case may be in the comments to help us all gain a better understanding.
What I was told and what I believe is that God allowed us to have free will in order that we could choose to love Him. That's the simple answer but, I know some would ask (and the person who asked me the first question did) 'but if God is our Creator, couldn't He just make us love Him? Couldn't He have designed us so that we had to love Him?' And again, fair question. To answer this one I want you to remember that we were created in His image (Genesis 1:27), so this means we have qualities of God in us. One of the qualities I believe He gave us that was His own is a desire to be loved freely.
What I mean by that is God wanted people who would choose to love Him because love isn't genuine if its forced, or there's no other option. Love requires sacrifice, and in the case of our free will, the sacrifice we make to love Him is refusing the temptations of this world and keeping His laws to the best of our ability, knowing we have forgiveness through Jesus when we fail. By choosing Him and His laws over the temporary pleasures of this world we are then able to spend eternity with Him.
I would like to try an illustrate the fact that we too desire to be loved by choice rather than because they have to by an example from my teen years. This may not apply to everyone, but I know for myself and some of my friends at the time it certainly stands true. As a teenager I started to not accept my parent's love or advice as much, I took it for granted because they were my parents and had to love me. I lost how valuable their love truly is because I felt like they had no choice in the matter and instead searched for worldly fixes and boyfriends. I wanted the love of a boyfriend more than my parent's love because then that person loved me by choice and I desperately wanted someone to choose me. I think we all have that desire too, we want someone to choose us, that's why we date and look for companionship beyond our family who has to love us. Do you see the connection? God wants to be chosen too, He wants your genuine love even more than we want the love of someone choosing us. God wants your love so bad that He allowed His son to die for you so you could be together, that was His sacrifice for us, He allowed that to happen to Christ because He loves you and me too.
Deuteronomy 7:9
Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations,
Proverbs 8:17
I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me.
1 John 3:1
1 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
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