Question: If God is perfect and his creations perfect, why did he fail several times? He had to impose suffering upon the human race because Adam and Eve defied him by eating of the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Failed! He had to flood the planet 1,600 years later wiping out all but eight humans. Failure! He had to confuse human language after Nimrod and the Tower of Babel incident so that they could not effectively communicate with each other. Failure! How is this a track record of a perfect being?
“As for God, his way is perfect: The LORD’s word is flawless; he shields all who take refuge in him.” -Psalm 18:30
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. God created the seas, animals and humans. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good [Genesis 1:31]. Already, this tells us that his creation was perfect. God didn’t ‘impose suffering’, and in fact, God told Adam and Eve not to touch this one specific tree. “but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die[Genesis 3:3]. God knew what the tree would do and how sin would enter the world, but without this tree, we would not have the freedom of free will. When sin entered the world, suffering, pain and death also entered.
When God flooded the earth it wasn’t because of His failure, it was the failure of mankind, who sought the desires of their sinful ways rather than the desires of God’s righteousness. The world became corrupt by violence and sexual immoral and not just by humans, but all creatures as well. God sent the Flood as a judgment on mankind’s wickedness. The city’s of Sodom and Gomorra were burned to flames because of incest, perversion and men sleeping with men. “In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire. [Jude 1:7]” The Lord did not wish for this to happen, but this is what sin and free will created, so He had to put an end to it. Thus, creating the flood and starting over.
“But the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower the people were building. “Look!” he said. “The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them!7 Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.” In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city. That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world” – Genesis 11:5-9
God seen what the people in this city were doing, building a way to get to heaven. This is not what God wanted for his creation. He wanted everyone to multiply, be fruitful and explore the earth, instead, everyone joined together to build the tower. Their hearts and minds were confused, which God knew. So, God created different languages to separate everyone so they can scatter around the earth, rather than stay in one place. God’s actions shows us how loving, caring and powerful he is, because the earth still exists despite how much evil exists!
Additional Resources:
- http://creation.com/noahs-flood-why
- http://www.gotquestions.org/animals-destroyed-Flood.html