Why did God create the world?

[Robert_Sock]

In Jewish mysticism, God created the world because God wanted to behold God. I believe we’re being used in this world to accomplish an unseen goal. I do believe we’ve been duped. One thing I feel certain, the world is not what it seems.

 

[buffalo]

Love.

God cannot deceive or be deceived.

 

[spockrates]

In Jewish mysticism, God created the world because God wanted to behold God. I believe we’re being used in this world to accomplish an unseen goal. I do believe we’ve been duped. One thing I feel certain, the world is not what it seems.

Sock:

If the world is not what it seems, then it must be what it does not seem. Please tell me what it does not seem to be, but is.

 

[Linux]

In Jewish mysticism, God created the world because God wanted to behold God. I believe we’re being used in this world to accomplish an unseen goal. I do believe we’ve been duped. One thing I feel certain, the world is not what it seems.

Why do you feel we are being duped?

 

[Robert_Sock]

Sock:

If the world is not what it seems, then it must be what it does not seem. Please tell me what it does not seem to be, but is.

I’m not sure. That’s why I’m asking the question. But if my spiritual insight is any indication, the world was created for a purpose that is beyond our comprehension. I do not believe that the world is real the way most people perceive reality. I believe the real purpose of the world is masked by what we perceive to be reality.

 

[cjforJesus]

I do not put much stock in Jewish mysticism,sorry.

 

[Robert_Sock]

Love.

God cannot deceive or be deceived.

God cannot deceive or be deceived, but Satan can.

 

[TheRealJuliane]

In Jewish mysticism, God created the world because God wanted to behold God. I believe we’re being used in this world to accomplish an unseen goal. I do believe we’ve been duped. One thing I feel certain, the world is not what it seems.

Someday, perhaps we will know that.



God does not “dupe.”

 

[Ophelia23]

God cannot deceive or be deceived, but Satan can.

True.

But God created the world. Satan did not. If we are being duped by anybody, it is by Satan; not by God.

 

[Robert_Sock]

Someday, perhaps we will know that.



God does not “dupe.”

“You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped; you were too strong for me, and you triumphed”
— Jeremiah 20:7.

 

[buffalo]

“You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped; you were too strong for me, and you triumphed”
— Jeremiah 20:7.

commentary - [7] Thou hast deceived: The meaning of the prophet, is not to charge God with any untruth; but what he calls deceiving, was only the concealing from him, when he accepted of the prophetical commission, the greatness of the evils which the execution of that commission was to bring upon him.

 

[CaptFun]

It was His pleasure to do so. And His generosity.

He decides to create many things which He finds good (and in His revelation to us He reveals that) then He creates PEOPLE in His own image. Breathing life into them creating living souls. That can consider Him, love Him back, love each other, enjoy His creation as children. Have children themselves. Use their knowledge and cooperation to build societies and rule over creation … until the time comes for them individually to grow old, “die,” and be changed as they enter the timeless world of eternity.

He made people to share His life with and be with Him for all eternity.

and to return to the beginning … It was His pleasure to do so. And His generosity.

“God is love”

"1 Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, (love) is not pompous, it is not inflated,

5 it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury,

6 it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.

7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never fails. If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.

9 For we know partially and we prophesy partially,

10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.

11 When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things.

12 At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.

13 So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but **the greatest of these is love.
**

Summary: I shared some things I do know. And confess that there’s MUCH I don’t. But we seek and find. And God is not devious about what His purpose was in creating the world freely. Our job is love God and one another. The love checklist is posted above.
While we will know God much better in the “next world” as Paul alludes to - we may never know all there IS to know.

Most of the time we enjoy God’s gifts without thinking of Him to thank Him. That said, "Thank you dear Lord for my sight, and taste buds, and ears to hear music, and the musicians you’ve created and given talent to … (here’s the baton, praise Him for what YOU are thankful for for the next “lap”).

 

[spockrates]

Sock:

I think the Jewish mystics might be onto something. At least, they have an understanding that has a parallel in Catholicism. God’s goal is to make us more like Christ (and so more like God). As we become more like God, I suppose God must see something of himself in us, something like the way a father sees (or hopes to see) something of the good within himself in his son as his son matures.



I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

(Philippians 3)

 

[R_C]

God cannot deceive or be deceived, but Satan can.

Forget about Satan, he’s nothing but a simple creature, a speck of dust in God’s creation.

If you refer to the world as in this planet we live in, the only answer can be: for the sake of mankind. Also, its natural beauty is a constant reminder of God, his personal signature, which we also find in the universe and in the infinitesimally small.

Sorry, but to me is quite simple: the earth is our home, the home that our Father created for us, his children, with room, food, and things for our growth and recreation.

 

[buffalo]

An important point - God is under no obligation to Reveal everything to His created. That is not the same thing as deception.

 

[Lancer]

Simply…you are wrong. But your inkling that the World is not what it seems (by intellect, reasoning, logic, and gut intuition) is right on target… Here is why…

"The world was created for the sake of the Church." CCC 760

What an Incredible, Powerful and Mysterious God we have…Yes, He gave and continually gives Himself to you and me…all of us…so that sinful us…can give ourselves…to Him…To the Father…Through Christ…In the (power of) The Holy Spirit. And he simply needed the World…to do this in His Church…which already existed in Heaven…before the World.

In jest I say…“do you like apples?”…You do!..good! “Well how do you like them apples?”
(paraphrasing from)*** Good Will Hunting***

Pax Christi

CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH (CCC)
SECOND EDITION (see 751-776…good read…a very good read indeed)
II. THE CHURCH’S ORIGIN, FOUNDATION AND MISSION

We begin our investigation of the Church’s mystery by meditating on her origin in the Holy Trinity’s plan and her progressive realization in history.

A plan born in the Father’s heart

“The eternal Father, in accordance with the utterly gratuitous and mysterious design of his wisdom and goodness, **created the whole universe and chose to raise up men to share in his own divine life,”**150 to which he calls all men in his Son. “**The Father . . . determined to call together in a holy Church those who should believe in Christ.”**151 This “family of God” is gradually formed and takes shape during the stages of human history, in keeping with the Father’s plan. In fact, "already present in figure at the beginning of the world, this Church was prepared in marvelous fashion in the history of the people of Israel and the old Alliance. Established in this last age of the world and made manifest in the outpouring of the Spirit, it will be brought to glorious completion at the end of time."152

The Church- foreshadowed from the world’s beginning

760 Christians of the first centuries said, **“The world was created for the sake of the Church.”**153 God created the world for the sake of communion with his divine life, a communion brought about by the “convocation” of men in Christ, and this “convocation” is the Church. The Church is the goal of all things,154 and God permitted such painful upheavals as the angels’ fall and man’s sin only as occasions and means for displaying all the power of his arm and the whole measure of the love he wanted to give the world:

Just as God’s will is creation and is called “the world,” so his intention is the salvation of men, and it is called "the Church."155
​

​

Loving the Church:
Spiritual Exercises Preached in the Presence of Pope John Paul II
(Ignatius, 1997).
Christoph Cardinal Schönborn

**The Church Is the Goal of All Things | Christoph Cardinal Schönborn
**

ignatiusinsight.com/features2005/schonborn_church_oct05.asp

Holy Father, my dear brothers,
The Church is as old as creation. In fact, in a certain sense, she is older than creation.** “The world was created for the sake of the Church”,** say the Christians of the first centuries. The Church Fathers even speak of the preexistence of the Church. In the Shepherd of Hermas, [1] the Church appears as an old woman: “She existed before there was a world, and for her the world was created.” “God created the world for the sake of communion with his divine life, a communion brought about by the ‘convocation’ of men in Christ, and this ‘convocation’ is the Church” (CCC 760). Finis omnium Ecclesia: the Church is the goal of all things. Some well-known words of Clement of Alexandria sum up this view: “Just as God’s will is creation and is called ‘the world,’ so his intention is the salvation of men, and it is called ‘the Church.’” [2]

**Let us conclude with some words from the Catechism: “The Church is the goal of all things, and God permitted such painful upheavals as the angels’ fall and man’s sin only as occasions and means for displaying all the power of his arm and the whole measure of the love he wanted to give the world.” [7]

PRAISED BE JESUS CHRIST!**

 

[Glacies]

The First Vatican Council (1869-70) convoked and presided by Pope Bl. Pius IX teaches that God created the world to manifest His goodness:

*“This one true God, by his goodness and almighty power, not with the intention of increasing his happiness, nor indeed of obtaining happiness, but in order to manifest his perfection by the good things which he bestows on what he creates, by an absolutely free plan, together from the beginning of time brought into being from nothing the twofold created order, that is the spiritual and the bodily, the angelic and the earthly, and thereafter the human which is, in a way, common to both since it is composed of spirit and body.”
*
St. Thomas Aquinas confirms that “He does not act for His own profit, but only for His own goodness.” (S. th. I:44:4)

 

[M_Hieronimi]

One problem with trying to realize God’s intention of creation by observation of the current state of the world is the fall of man and of course the fall of the angels. The world would be a q different place without the fall. All of creation is not obvious either. There are unseen realities that are beyond the human senses. God hasn’t duped us. We will be part of his kingdom if we believe in his son. There can be volumes of works dedicated to this, so suffice it to say it can’t be sufficiently covered in a couple of posts.

 

[CaptFun]

Simply…you are wrong. But your inkling that the World is not what it seems (by intellect, reasoning, logic, and gut intuition) is right on target… Here is why…

"The world was created for the sake of the Church." CCC 760

What an Incredible, Powerful and Mysterious God we have…Yes, He gave and continually gives Himself to you and me…all of us…so that sinful us…can give ourselves…to Him…To the Father…Through Christ…In the (power of) The Holy Spirit. And he simply needed the World…to do this in His Church…which already existed in Heaven…before the World.

Pax Christi

Thanks for posting Church teachings on this Lancer. Yesterday’s Gospel came to mind.
Mary and Joseph searching for Jesus and finding Him in the Temple (but searching 3 days elsewhere first!).

Does the Church say anything about this? < Might be the best question one in our seeking and finding our answers or insights.

What did Jesus say (about this)? Is another. Often the greatest human questions are taken up by Christ or taught somewhere in the Bible via God’s revelation to man.

 

[CaptFun]

Sock:

If the world is not what it seems, then it must be what it does not seem. Please tell me what it does not seem to be, but is.

I don’t know if you are being profound, obscure, sincere, or having a bit of fun spockrates … but I enjoyed the creative wordplay. If this conversation goes on between you and Sock I will find out whether that wordplay is more like Shakespeare’s, Lewis Carroll’s (Alice in Wonderland), or Abbott and Costello’s.

Meanwhile I’ll get serious and offer an answer to the last sentence, with an eye to learning more - not as the last word on the subject however.

This world IS a spiritual testing ground, though it does not seem to be at times to humans.

(I’m almost a-scared to offer more than this right now). :bigyikes: Though I don’t doubt God’s mercy and love for us all. :heaven: