I agree with you, I think. Moreso, I don’t really have a problem with “requiring God to be the creator of evil”, because I don’t. The world is his, and all that is in it. Whatever he did, he did, without my consent or knowledge.
I don’t have to know the mystery of evil, I know of it’s existance, and my required response to it.
As to Calvinism, I’m a Calvinist, but I am currently re-evaluating exactly how much of what happens is “God’s Will”, and how much is “Free Choice”. I’m in the middle of an interesting book on the topic that has made me re-think my rigid adherance to the “God wills where I’m putting my soda can” theory.
It's either all of Him or it's none of Him because reality is defined as God's cognition of His creation.
At the moment of creation, there is not one second of any day of the week that was not set in place within the mind of God. There is no such thing as a "contingency plan" to God. What occurs is what was determined by Him from before the creation of the world simply because that's how He wanted it to go down.
Just because that thought is very nearly incomprehensible to us does not mean it is not true.
***As to Calvinism, I’m a Calvinist, but I am currently re-evaluating exactly how much of what happens is “God’s Will”, and how much is “Free Choice”. I’m in the middle of an interesting book on the topic that has made me re-think my rigid adherance to the “God wills where I’m putting my soda can” theory.***
I’m not sure just how many Calvinists would confess that God has a will of decree to such minutia. Probably some. I believe that there is much of what goes on in the world that falls under the realm of acting with the permission of God, i.e. his permissive will. The former seems to be more of the strawman construct of the opponents of Calvinism when they make man out to be a puppet in Calvinism.
In the sense of God is permissively willing to let me place my soda can where I will, I agree that God wills where I place my soda can. In the sense of God has determined by decree that every second of my life is determined, I would probably disagree. A lot of it is determined by how the question is phrased and what you mean when you say what you say.
I will say this: I have discovered that this libertarian free will which is the foundation of Open Theism & Molinism is not Biblically defendable. At least, not successfully.
For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
I think some things are in the free agency of man, meaning that while everything falls under God’s will, not everything is directly decreed — it simply naturally falls into his will in a mysterious way I really can’t explain.
However, some things are directly decreed, namely salvation and major world events.
I used to think all things were directly decreed until I thought about the free agency idea.
I may be wrong, and perhaps everything is directly and not just passively part of God’s will. Regardless, I do believe EVERYTHING falls into God’s plan. Nothing is out of it. The issue is...some is directly decreed, while some naturally falls into it (even our smallest choices) because of how God ordered the world. Thus, it isn’t so much an issue of his permissive will in which some things he leaves up to us.....as I do DISAGREE with that. I strongly believe God has a plan and a will for EVERYTHING. I believe that is what Scripture says. God ORDERS EVERYTHING.
Instead, it is that God’s overall plan is fulfilled through some things that are directly decreed and others that just “happen” to follow His will through a mysterious process that can’t really be explained but is NOT a direct decree all the same.
I hope this makes sense!
***I’m in the middle of an interesting book on the topic that has made me re-think my rigid adherance to the “God wills where I’m putting my soda can” theory.***
God doesn’t care where you put your soda can... but he knows where you put your keys :>)
Actually, God gives man a choice. The unsaved have a choice between sinning and not sinning. The saved have a choice between sinning, not sinning, and pleasing God.
The unsaved can never please God.