Editor’s note – Few questions press on believers harder than why a loving God would create people He knows will reject Him. The author grounds her answer in free will and the nature of real love. We’re running this piece because it treats a hard doctrine – final judgment – honestly, anchoring each point in Scripture rather than sentiment.
God’s Purpose in Free Will
Why would God create people He knew would end up in Hell for rejecting Jesus? Because if He created only people He knew would love Him, we would be preprogrammed robots, guaranteed to worship Him. To have authentic morality, He created people with free will so they could freely choose to know and love Him or freely choose to hate and reject Him. That’s the reason love is meaningful, because it’s a free choice. Just because God knows each person’s choices doesn’t mean He coerces or forces their choices. God considers the possibility of rejection worth the possibility of genuine love.
Editor’s note – Free will doesn’t make God passive. He still calls, still warns, and still offers a way out to those who refuse Him. The question, debated by theologians through the ages, is not whether God is omniscient, but rather whether He operates through foreknowledge of the choices each of us will make when presented with evidence of a Creator, or through predestination, where He recognizes that we would never come to Him without His direct intervention.
The Situation
God is not responsible for anyone’s sin or condemnation. He is almighty God, the holy Creator and Judge, and people are accountable to Him. Scripture teaches this in the New Testament. Paul said it in the book of Romans.
For what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from His workmanship, so that men are without excuse. (Romans 1:19-20)
God wants people to love and respond to Him so He can accomplish His purposes for mankind.
I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say, 'My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.' (Isaiah 46:10)
God does have foreknowledge, but He doesn’t override mankind’s free will.
This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live. (Deuteronomy 30:19)
The God of the Bible continually calls those who reject Him to repentance, even those who ultimately reject Him. For instance, Jesus knew Judas would betray Him, yet Judas willingly betrayed Jesus for money. He wasn’t forced or preprogrammed to do it, and he was held morally accountable to God (see John 13:21-27).
When people sin, they offend God’s justice and are separated from Him. Because He is just, He must punish sin. Hell isn’t God taking out His wrath on unrepentant sinners; it’s a place He created for the evil, rebellious angels. People who ultimately reject His plan of salvation through His Son’s sacrificial death to pay for their sins end up there out of their own free choice. They are guilty because they refuse God’s truth and reject His Son. God never denies anyone His mercy and forgiveness through Jesus.
The Plan
God has had a plan from the beginning to pursue and redeem humanity back to Himself. God carried out His loving plan through His Son, Jesus Christ. He sent Him to earth to take the punishment people deserve for their sins. People who accept Christ’s love for them by repenting and making Him Lord of their lives are made right with God and will spend eternity in Heaven.
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. (John 3:17-18)
Editor’s note – John 3:17-18 is the sterner half of John 3:16: condemnation comes only when grace is refused.
Conclusion
God as Creator and Judge of the world had no need to create, save, or forgive anyone. He created human beings for His glory and to know Him. People aren’t puppets, and God doesn’t force people to love Him. His sovereign purposes will prevail, and human beings are genuinely responsible for their actions. People are free to love and free to rebel.
God will judge evil justly. Instead of leaving humanity helpless to pay the price they deserve for their rebellion against His holiness and justice, He gave His Son Jesus to bring them back into a good relationship with Himself.
The apostle Paul explained this situation with great clarity.
But God proves His love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)
A Word from the Editor
Hell was never God’s plan for people – Matthew 25:41 says it was prepared for the devil and his angels. In the view of “Free Will,” the door swings on human choice, not divine reluctance. Second Peter 3:9 reminds us God is patient, wanting none to perish.
Salvation – Eternal Life in Less Than 150 Words
Distributed by – BCWorldview.org
Editor Comment: The point is that love which cannot be forced was never love at all, and that truth answers the hardest objection unbelievers raise against God's character. There does remain the question of why God allowed sin into His creation in the first place (Lucifer to become Satan), and, for that, we will have to wait for the full answer on the other side of the grave.
This article appeared on Medium and is reprinted with modifications and by permission.