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B.--Your teachers then believe that God is the Author of sin.
A.--No, that is strange.
I quite thought they did, but I find that they resent the
accusation.
B.--You can see that this resentment is a quibble. If "all" includes sin, and if Satan DID
EXACTLY what God planned he should do, you are on the horns of a dilemma, for:--
(1). Sin being in essence disobedience (I John 3: 4), it follows that if Satan "did exactly"
what God planned, he "obeyed", and consequently Satan never sinned. But
Scripture declares that Satan did sin from the beginning; that he was a liar, and
a murderer, and a slanderer.
(2). If on the other hand you admit that Satan did sin, then seeing that you hold that God
created Satan to sin, then God must be the sinner, the liar, the murderer, the
slanderer, the tempter and exciter of disobedience, which is utterly abhorrent
even to recite.
The law of Moses reflects the mind of God, and you may read in Exod. 21: 28, 29
words which will give Scriptural direction in fixing responsibility:--
"If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die; then the ox shall surely be
stoned . . . . . but if the ox were wont to push with his horn in time past, and it hath been
testified to his owner, and he hath not kept him in, but that he hath killed a man or a
woman, the ox shall be stoned, and the owner also shall be put to death."
Concerning the creation of man Scripture says:--
"God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions" (Eccles. 7: 29).
and the case is parallel with that of Satan.
With your view concerning sin and its relation to God, can you believe that God could
ever use such words as those of Gen. 6: 5-7:--
"And God saw that the wickedness was great in the earth, and that every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it REPENTED the Lord that
He had made man on the earth, and it GRIEVED Him at His heart. And the Lord said, I
will destroy man whom I have created . . . . ."
A.--No, I am afraid I cannot.
B.--Would you not rather expect to read that as sin manifested itself in all its
hideousness, so God would rejoice at the way in which that essential element to His full
manifestation was progressing; that He would commend Satan for doing his work, nay
His work, so well, that as this pestilence spread, so the coldness of His creatures would
be set aside for the warmth of a united family, and His own distant creatorship be
exchanged for that of a loving Father? But what is the fact? God "repented", God was
"grieved", God said, "I will destroy". Sin ends in death. You are transferring the glories
of redeeming love that operates in spite of sin, in order to glorify this hideous monster.