If God were good, He would wish to make His creatures perfectly happy, and if God were almighty He would be able to do what He wished. But the creatures are not happy. Therefore God lacks either goodness, or power, or both. This is the problem of pain, in its simplest form.
Our design is...only to discover how, perceiving a suffering world, and being assured, on quite different grounds, that God is good, we are to conceive that goodness and that suffering without contradiction.
With every advance in our thought the unity of the creative act, and the impossibility of tinkering with the creation as though this or that element of it could have been removed, will be more apparent. Perhaps this is not the 'best of all possible' universes, but the only possible one.
-The Problem of Pain Chapter 2 Divine Omnipotence
Without free will, without the option of selfishness, without pain, without brokenness there can be no love from me to You.
This universe certainly isn't the best of all possible You could have created but it is the only possible for me to express my love for You. Perhaps that in itself makes this universe the best of all possible. With the impossibility of You tinkering with the creation as though this or that element of it could be removed so that I am given the ability to express my being however I choose within the confines of the laws of the universe You have set in place it allows me the opportunity to both bless and curse my brothers along with hopeless obedience towards You or blatant blasphemy to Your face.
Yet, because of my selfish nature though I attempt to bring only blessings to my brothers and only obedience towards You I am faced with my broken insufficiency daily.
If your thoughts and passions were directly present to me, like my own, without any mark of externality or otherness, how should I distinguish them from mine? And what thoughts or passions could we begin to have without objects to think and feel about? Nay, could I even begin to have the conception of 'external' and 'other' unless I had experience of an 'external world'?
You may reply, as a Christian, that God (and Satan) do, in fact, affect my consciousness in this direct way without signs of 'externality'. Yes: and the result is that most people remain ignorant of the existance of both.
-The Problem of Pain Chapter 2 Divine Omnipotence
Without the external world as is, without the freedom to manipulate my environment within the confines of Your laws of nature I wouldn't be able to express both love and hate, blessings and cures, obedience and defiance. I wouldn't be able to discern which thoughts and ideas are my own and which thoughts and ideas are my brothers.
Still, You and the enemy both have the ability to express thoughts and passions to be directly. Because of this it is difficult, sometimes seemingly impossible to sort between You, him, and myself. Do I have free will or are the thoughts that I think are mine actually Yours or Satan's implanted?
When I make the choice to follow You is that my own thought or did You affect my consciousness without a sign of externality? I know I couldn't choose You on my own. I am too sinful. I am too selfish. I am too weak.
God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.
Ephesians 2:8-10
Jesus I cannot boast about my salvation. It is only by Your grace. I cannot even say glory to me for I have chosen to follow Jesus. It is by Your grace that my consciousness has chosen to follow.
I am a sinner If its not one thing its another, Caught up in words Tangled in lies
You are the Savior And you take brokenness aside And make it beautiful, Beautiful.
All Sons & Daughters - Brokenness Aside
Jesus, take my brokenness aside and make it beautiful.
Make me beautiful.