As most of you probably know from me mentioning it so many times, I debate with atheists a lot on facebook. One of the biggest complaints I hear about God from atheists is if God is love, why does he allow evil? Aside from all the links posted, I say he does because he will not interfere with our ability to have free will. Whether he or the devil nudges us to do something, it still comes down to our choice. This is all evident throughout the bible. He gives us free will because he wants us to willingly choose him instead of choosing for us. Thoughts anyone?

The problem is that good and love and all those positive attributes/words that you can come up with have their opposites.... and not only do they have them, they NEED them. Without bad you can't have good. Evil is required to exist to allow for good things to be noticeable.

I can't claim something is good if there is no bad to counter-act it.

I find only an element of that as true. I do agree with you that to everything good there is something evil, but I don't think its law, just Satan trying to take the good that God does and tries to distort it. Ultimately it comes down to choice.

because he can... its not like he is limited to just doing good things everyone including the devil can do good and bad things and allow either to happen. Although there are times when good things are not really good they are just a form of deception but no one will know till they figure out if its good or bad.

This is like saying if the devil is evil why does he allow good things to happen? Either way its a one way question, only you can decide what is perceived as love & hate, good or bad.

People learn from their mistakes... If that were not the case and there was no bad or evil in this world then that means we would all be perfect just like god.

Hoochman : without evil what could you compare good things to that would make them good? Nothing... therefore the thing you are attempting to call good is simply neutral.

There MUST be opposition in all things.... otherwise there is no choice or conflict.... and without choice there is no purpose.

When you don't have a brain, your perfect there is no right or wrong. Take a rock or or any kind of non-living object. It does not have a choice, instead its choice is decided upon things that might have a brain or that might create some conflict.

The only way to be perfect is either A) don't have a brain or B) be in absolute control of everything. And since god gave us free will that means its out of his jurisdiction to allow only good things to happen when there are TRILLIONS of elements on earth that counter react with one another whether good or bad

Sunshine wouldn't matter if it wasn't for rain.
Thats all I can think of.

If all that's true than how was God still good before Satan came into play.

what makes you think Satan was the first evil being in the universe? Evil had to exist for Satan to be able to choose to be evil in the first place....

Evil has not always been there. It is just an option to choose when you have the free will to choose any course you want. All it is is rebelling against God. Satan is the example. God gave him free will and he chose to rebel against God. The whole sin nature thing does not apply to him as he is not human and is not bound by our weakness. He does it anyway.

In order to have a choice evil must exist.... or there is nothing to choose.

I would say it is the other way around. Evil exists as a choice and it exists because people are making the decisions to do evil. This is the great mystery.

here is a more concrete example to help explain how your theory makes no sense.

Let's say I have an apple and an orange to pick from. Apples are good, oranges are evil. According to you, I can choose an orange instead of an apple even though it doesn't exist until after I choose it. So, I see the apple but decide on the orange. That makes no sense.

It could go both ways but geo's way makes a bit more sense and this is why... What if your in heaven and you disagree with god or do something evil in heaven? You can't really disagree with him because he has already judged you. Unless there is something that mentions you can go to hell after getting into heaven. A perfect and peaceful realm can ONLY exist when there are no choices, no disagreements, and you are a sheep of the creator. By sheep I mean there is nothing to dispute; no ifs, ands, or buts you do as he says or the whole judgement process of getting into heaven would be completely pointless.

"In order to have a choice evil must exist.... or there is nothing to choose."

Well 'evil' can be replaced with 'God'. This is all like saying evil has no existence of its own, it's really the absence of good. Cold does not exist. Cold is the absence of heat. Darkness does not exist. It is the absence of light. Well all those can be reversed and cancel each other out. But when evil is the absence of God it can’t be a “thing” that was created but rather it's a choice of free will. To give us this choice, God didn't create evil, but rather only allowed for the absence of Himself. Well we call the absence of dirt a hole but the hole can’t be separated from the dirt. But if you put the dirt back in, it's no longer a hole. Similarly, if you put God back in your life, it's no longer evil.

God created evil by giving man free will. Just like when someone makes a gun its an element of evil the only purpose of a gun is to kill just the the purpose of a choice is to disagree.

Even if you have god in your life that does not mean evil disappears in fact there is probably just as much evil around you then ever before when you have God in your life.

I can worship the devil but that does not mean it will eliminate peace in my life. Just like when you have God in your life it does not eliminate evil.

The good thing about not having a religion is you are your own god, the only right or wrong is made up in your own mind not based on anothers system. This makes you neutral you are neither good or bad because you are your own deity.

And after thinking about it, if God gave us free will then that means each and every one of us are a deity. If you believe in only love or only hate, its a paradox because it means both good and evil have to exist at the same time. But if your neutral that means your not good or evil because you are the creator of it and you can control the very definition of either term.

This is why I don't follow any religion, if there is a god he gave us free will for the fact that ONLY YOU can decide good and evil, not by a book or by what someone else tells you is good or evil. It's in your heart. God did not give people a heart and brain for nothing he wants us to be are own person and not create religions because religions only promote hatred towards others with difference of opinions. And since people disagree with one another they go out and start a religion pointing fingers telling anyone who does not follow them is wrong; which ironically makes them wrong because they are not using the free will god intended us to use (the free will in are own hearts and minds not in someone elses).

"This is all like saying evil has no existence of its own, it's really the absence of good."

AAAHHHHH, tRIUNE took what I was going to say. LOL. But I would like to add to what tRIUNE says. What he is saying is that evil does not exists as a thing or a substance. It does not exist independently. So God cannot create evil. It's not a thing. Augustine gave an argument about evil having no existence. (referenced to Augustine's Confessions)

It is better to be incorruptible than corruptible.
If something is completely corrupted so that it is now incorruptible, then we have two choices to make about its current state: (a) it exists and is better than it was before because it is now incorruptible. Or, (b) it does not exist.
(a) is absurd because complete corruption cannot make something better than it was before.
Therefore, (b). Something that is completely corrupted cannot exist. So, evil is not a substance (it has no existence).

Augustine, however, does not say that evil is an illusion. There is evil in the world. Augustine describes evil is a perversion of good. God is ultimately good, and everything is created by God as being good. When angels and humans have free choice, they can choose to either follow God or disobey God. Choosing evil, according to Augustine, is the choosing of the lower good when the higher good should be chosen.

He gave an example that as a kid, he used to steal pears with his friends from his neighbor's orchard. What he revealed is that he stole those pears, not because he was hungry, not because he was poor, but because he wants to act as friends to his friends--to be able to enjoy with friends. He said that he would not have stolen those pears, if he were to do it alone. Being a friend is a good thing, but at this situation, when it came down to not stealing from the neighbor and being a friend, not stealing is the higher good than being a friend, for stealing will be an evil act, even if it means that it is being a friend. It is a privation of good.

We do need to have a reminder, that we would not know what God thinks, why He would allow evil to happen (other than the fact that we are corrupted by sin)? We need to remember that God is sovereign and He is in control. Look at the story of Joseph, he was sold into slavery by his brothers, and suffered so many trials in his life in Egypt. In the end, he became second-in-command in the kingdom. His brothers were afraid of him to take revenge on them, but he said this in Genesis 50:20, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for GOOD to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives."

Even for Christians, when bad things happen to them in their lives, He promised in the Bible: "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28)

I highly recommend all of you to watch this 1 hour message by R.C. Sproul, who was a philosophy professor and is a Reformed theologian, pastor, and founder of Ligonier Ministries. Here his topic is "WHAT IS EVIL AND WHERE DOES IT COMES FROM?"
http://www.christianity.com/ligonier/?speaker=sproul1

That apple orange example doesn't make any sense as your trying to make an example of immaterial using material objects.

"The good thing about not having a religion is you are your own god, the only right or wrong is made up in your own mind not based on anothers system. This makes you neutral you are neither good or bad because you are your own deity.

And after thinking about it, if God gave us free will then that means each and every one of us are a deity. If you believe in only love or only hate, its a paradox because it means both good and evil have to exist at the same time. But if your neutral that means your not good or evil because you are the creator of it and you can control the very definition of either term.

This is why I don't follow any religion, if there is a god he gave us free will for the fact that ONLY YOU can decide good and evil, not by a book or by what someone else tells you is good or evil. It's in your heart. God did not give people a heart and brain for nothing he wants us to be are own person and not create religions."

This relation to God can be worded a bit differently. When God's Spirit resides within you He convicts you of good and evil and the choice is still yours to make, only the Bible was written to explain those convictions so that God is glorified, not yourself by your own definition. God says "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it? I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings" (Jeremiah 17:9-10). I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them (Ezekiel 36:26-27). When He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you" (John 16:13-14). The Bible is not a list of man made rules it's the word of God. I don't know of any other ideology that teaches of God Himself residing within you. Of course, evil is still present in the world, but God is the opposite of evil. When He resides within you then you are no longer evil. 'If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold all things have become new' (2 Corinthians 5:17).