Could God have created a world that was not dependent on him?
No- because he is God, everything is dependent on him. A wolrd cannot exist that is independent of him.
Regarding sunday’s service – when I was young I used to see the promise of eternal life as bribery. Now I see those promises as putting the sufferings of this Temporary life in its true perspective but could use some help resolving this.
First, let’s define bribe. A bribe is “a gift bestowed to influence the recipient’s conduct”. I assume you mean that God is bribing us with the promise of eternal life. So he would be giving us a gift, eternal life, to influence our conduct. I assume you mean he gives us eternal life, so that we would choose to love him and obey him.
A couple of thoughts aobut this.
One, God does not need us to love him. A bribe is illegal because it is an attempt to influence a person of power. We have no power over God. He needs nothing we have. He does not need our love or our good works, nor our obedience. He needs nothing from us.
Furthermore, while he calls us to obedience, he does not hold eternal life over us, incase we don’t obey. Heaven will have some Christians who did not obey very well, and are unrewarded, yet are in the new heaven and earth.
Eternal life is a gift, given to desperate people to prove he is good and to allow us to experience his goodness. Obedience then brings reward, both for this world and certainly the world to come. Neither of these fits as a bribe because he has the power and we are the needy ones.
Did God know that Adam and Eve were going to eat the forbidden fruit before they did?
God, who knows all things clearly knew that Adam and Eve were going to eat this fruit. In fact Christ was chosen to enter the world and die before all things were created. 1 Peter 1:18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. 21 Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God. He knew that they would sin and prepared for it.
Why did God create Satan and allow evil? How does evil exist if everything God crated is good?
God created Satan as a good creature with the free will to sin. His decision to sin is generally thought to be described in Isaiah 14:12-14, in which he decides he wants to be like God. C.f. Ezek 28:12-18.
God allowed evil to exist because he wanted to give mankind freedom to choose to follow him or not. If he wanted a loving relationship with mankind, then he had to allow for evil.
It seems like there is no free will in heaven. Is this true? Will we have the choice to love God in Heaven? Will there be consequences to our choices? What makes Heaven different from Creation before sin entered it?
Heaven will be filled with redeemed and glorified people. People who have already made their choice and have now “seen God”. They do have free will, but they would never choose sin once they are redeemed, glorified and in His presence. There is no hint of people choosing anything but to follow Christ and love God in the new heaven and earth.
Heaven is different from the Garden in that Adam and Eve were innocent but not redeemed and glorified. They did not comprehend the full Goodness of God, that we will have access to, for to us, he will be the one who rescued us.
How do we as believers approach people who are blaming god for a tragedy in there life?
Weep with them and respond with compassion. Romans 12:15 Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.
Allow the comfort we have received from God to enable us to comfort others.
2 Cor 1:3ff Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.
In the midst of comforting others and loving them through tragedy, we can start to address the “why did God allow this?’ question. I want to approach this issue really seeking to understand why they are blaming God. So asking questions is really important. What did God do that you are blaming him for? Why is he responsible? Why must he give us something different? What right do we have to blame him? Or to demand a different outcome? Why does God owe us a life with no adversity? Is it possible God has a reason for allowing this? Does it help you to blame God? Etc.
I ask questions to help understand where people are coming from and to get people thinking.
One thing that has helped me is to understand that this response is often emotionally based and not at all logical. We as humans get hurt and we want to blame someone, and God is the likely target. As long as that explanation works for someone, it might be hard to convince them otherwise.
