Hi mrsnacks,
What I understand is that this present age is was never God's intention to bring the vast majority of mankind into the knowledge of the truth. Everything that is happening, every single interaction we have, is part of God's plan/purpose to develop all of the unique people we have in the world. So the whole world, that incliudes all of Christianity go about there lives exactly according to the purpose of God, but are blind to the truth. This age is for mankind to learn by having an experience of good and evil. The exception to this is the few God has specially chosen to prepare for a certain purpose.
When God begins to open the eyes of one of His chosen, I believe He works through everything in our lives to transform us exactly as He wants us, and at the pace He chooses.
This is part of the Lake of Fire article on free will part c. This article goes a lot into the experience that mankind is having now.
http://bible-truths.com/lake15-C.html --------------------------------
THE PURPOSE FOR WHICH GOD CREATED EVIL
This is all the strange work of God. There is no free will about it. We are all born out of a dark womb into the natural light of day, but this too is but a parable. We must be “born again” out of spiritual darkness of this age into the glorious light of the Sun of God. It is a painful journey, and requires an experience of evil to accomplish.
“It is an experience of evil Elohim [God] has given to the sons of humanity to humble them by it” (Concorant Old Testament).
Now we can easily understand what is being said in this verse.
This “experience of evil” is not the purpose or goal of human existence, but this is indeed the process by which God is bringing His Sons and Daughters into glory! Most translations have hidden the meaning of this verse of Scripture. The translations just couldn’t believe that God would do such a thing. They see it all around them. They see it in thousands of Scriptures, but they just couldn’t bring themselves to come right out and say it, as God obviously has stated in the original Hebrew of this verse.
“It is an EXPERIENCE of EVIL that God has given to the sons of humanity to HUMBLE them by it.”
And to this agrees the rest of Scripture:
“For ALL his days are SORROWS, and his travail [experience] GRIEF…” (Ecc. 2:23).
The destiny of the human race is indeed GLORIOUS, but the journey is filled with evil and sorrow. This not to say that there are not many beautiful and good things in life, but for most the misery far far outweighs the pleasurable.
Do not be deceived: when Jesus said—“…I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10), He was surely not speaking about this life, now, in the flesh! Contrary to the evil teachings of prosperity ministers, Jesus never promised us LARGER HOMES AND GREATER MATERIAL POSSESSIONS after we start following in His steps.
Jesus said that if we leave our parents, families, houses and possessions for His sake that we would receive a hundred fold of parents, families, houses and possessions NOW. But He was not speaking of receiving back NOW, these same PHYSICAL parents, families, and possessions, but rather the families and possessions we would receive NOW would be SPIRITUAL.
Does anyone really believe that if we leave our PHYSICAL PARENTS that He will give us another, different set of PHYSICAL PARENTS? Well, yes, I guess there are those who are so spiritually ignorant that they might really believe that they will receive a brand new set of BIRTHING PARENTS to take the place of the ones they left. However, the truth is: “…the words that I speak unto you, they are SPIRIT…” (John 6:63).
God created man in a “marred” condition, but God’s plan has no mars whatsoever. It was not wrong or a sin for God to create mankind in a “marred” condition. It was a perfect plan. It is now and always will be a perfect plan.
God has always worked all things after the counsel of His Own will. His plan needs no midstream adjustments, corrections, or refinements. It cannot be improved upon. It cannot be added to or detracted from. IT IS PERFECT. GOD IS PERFECT. ALL WILL TURN OUT PERFECT. WE ALL WILL BE PERFECT BECAUSE GOD WILL BE “ALL IN ALL”! I believe it. I hope you do too.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
mercy, peace, and love
Kat