Can an All-Loving God Create Someone for Hell? (Ft. @SmallSimpleScreens)

追加: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Hey everyone, welcome back to Let's Talk. I'd like to thank Arthur Pickerl for his donation to the channel via Venmo. I'd also like to welcome Luke Abrams as our newest channel member.

[00:00:09]Channel membership is a really easy way to support the channel while also getting small perks like early access to our videos. If you are gold membership or higher, make sure to send me an email so I can send you a signed copy of my new book, The Creation Delmo, that you can find on Amazon. The video you're about to watch is a really awesome conversation I had with Austin Falter from Small and Simple Screens. He read my book and wanted to have a conversation about it and some graphics that he brought to the conversation. I think you'll really enjoy it.

[00:00:42]Um, well, Hayden, thanks for hopping on and I'm I'm really excited to talk about your book, which I have right here. Um, I read it last month and then I got to spend time with you kind of asking my questions. Um, and since then I've been really obsessed with with the idea. So, first of all, how now that you've kind of been out there and sharing about it, how is it being received, have you had anyone kind of like counter punch yet?

[00:01:10]>> The only people that can counter punch are the people who are willing to commit heresy. And so, >> um, Catholics have a very difficult time with this. um they're probably the the most locked group because they actually have dogma that they are held to by an institution. Protestants, evangelicals have obviously the option to deny some of the attributes that lead to the creation dilemma, but they do so at the risk of being ostracized by their fellow believers, right? To to say that God is not all powerful or he's not unbound or to say he doesn't know the future, that causes problems. And 99.9% of the people that I talked to are not willing to alter those uh attributes. I actually just talked with uh my friend Taylor yesterday that his episode's going to come out next week >> and in two weeks and he is willing to alter those. He basically says, "I don't care what other people think. I'm going to do what what I think is right according to the biblical text." But um it's been wellreceived by Latter-day Saints. Um, but I have yet to hear a solve from someone that doesn't just like the book says that doesn't include altering the the classical credle view of God and his attributes.

[00:02:25]>> Sure. Um, and my favorite line of the whole book and I put it I I got my dude I devoured this thing. These are my notes in your table of contents. And then uh my favorite line of the book was if God is the uh is truly good, his goodness must be recognizable. If God truly loves, that love must be coherent.

[00:02:48]And if God is worthy of devotion, that worthiness must be able to withstand scrutiny. I think what this book did for me, especially kind of that that framing, it helped me realize that it's not just you you you get this idea that, oh, it doesn't really matter which God you follow, like you're all we're all going to and and it's kind of this ambiguous view. And obviously there's there's reasons that might not work because oh, how do we know what truth is and what scripture and different, you know, we can go down a lot of rabbit holes, but one of the ones I've never really thought was an issue is that like, oh, at least we all worship the same God. M >> um but this one at the heart it just shows like look there are some issues with the god that that people are worshiping and the constraints they've put on it through the creeds. What it did for me was realize okay maybe some of these creeds are as Christ said abominable. Um, so I it was really interesting to >> well the the the the reason in my in in from my point of view or in in my opinion the reason their creeds are abominable is because they are trying to figure out God without public revelation. Right? The whole point of the creeds is uh we don't have apostles anymore and so we need to figure out what we believe without direction from God. And they may say, "Oh, we were led by the spirit." But but it's funny because they they would tease us for saying that, you know, we're led by the spirit to know truth, right?

[00:04:18]>> But I would say that without I I mean, just look at the New Testament. What what are the purposes of Paul's letters?

[00:04:23]It's to correct the church who are falling away into heresy essentially.

[00:04:28]But the whole point with the with the um early church is the same problem they had while the apostles were alive. While the apostles were alive, people were teaching wrong things, believing wrong things. And the apostles were able to come in and say, "No, let me correct you. This is this is what you're doing.

[00:04:45]This is what you this is what God is telling me through public revelation to uh tell you to correct the church." And so my question is, if the church was falling away during the apostolic age, what are the odds that they're going to fall away after? And when I ask that question to believers, uh, I've never heard anyone say other give me any other answer than it's inevitable. And I'm like, that's the point. That's the gospel. That that's the restoration message is that they fell away and they didn't have apostolic authority to bring them back. Now, that being said, Catholics and Eastern Orthodox will say, "Oh, we have apostolic authority." But what they mean is they have bishops that were appointed by apostles who appointed bishops. Which is really funny because nowhere in the biblical text do bishops have the authority to call new bishops. That's a whole another issue.

[00:05:30]>> Sure.

[00:05:30]>> But the apostolic authority that we are talking about is not the same apostolic authority that they would claim today.

[00:05:35]>> Okay. Well, um let me share my screen here because I I want to go through this with you. So I trained up uh notebook LM on the creation dilemma because I'm a visual learner and I wanted to see the arguments. Um, and it was interesting.

[00:05:54]Some of the some of it it's just, you know, text on a screen, but other other parts of it I thought was really interesting. So, I'd love to go through this with you and just get the visual learner's guide to the creation dilemma.

[00:06:05]>> Yeah. This just so everyone knows, I haven't seen any of this before. This will be a a true reaction.

[00:06:10]>> Cool. Cool. Um, okay. Cool. So, first and foremost, most Christians would say that that God is perfectly good and and they would say that he wills the good of of each individual person, right? It sounds wonderful, but then when you say that, you have to take it to its logical conclusion. Um, so kind of explain that dilemma for me.

[00:06:40]>> Yeah. So this is page one of of the book, right? It says that, you know, people are are told through hymns, through sermon, through through Bible study that God is good. That of all the things that are confusing about God, at least we can be sure about one thing and that's that God is good. That's that God actually wills the greatest good for every individual. I mean, can you imagine worshiping a god that doesn't actually will your your complete good?

[00:07:16]I I don't know I don't know of a person who doesn't think that their god wants the best for them and for everybody else except for the Calvinist. The Calvinist would say God actually wants to send people to hell. But th this book actually is not that effective against Calvinists because they just bite the bullet. And so this book is is actually to help people understand who are not Calvinist but who are still creedle in their in their view.

[00:07:38]that that they have the same problem the Calvinist does. The Calvinist just admits it. That's what this book is all about.

[00:07:45]>> Interesting.

[00:07:46]>> And so the in the intuition that you have here on the screen is exactly right. God is good. But then the question has to be asked. This is the first bolded question on page one. What does it mean for God to will someone's greatest good if he freely meaning he doesn't have to and but he but he still does creates them knowing with absolute certainty that their existence will result in eternal conscious torment. C can you say that God loves you if he creates you and that he knows you're going to end up that way and he didn't have to create you? What would be the more loving That's why the button analogy I'm sure it's gonna follow.

[00:08:22]Yeah. That's what the but the button analogy is so is so effective because it basically gets people to admit that they wouldn't do exactly what go what they think God is doing because it's not loving. So anyway, that's the >> what's interesting about this too is uh I I guess because I was raised Latter-day Saint, I never got to experience a lot of the problems that I know Christians have when they start to learn about heaven and hell and the and the what that um very black and white version of heaven and hell that that Christianity has inherited, what the implications are, right? But then I would meet people on my mission more recently. I've I've had friends where I've talked to this and then at the bless God summit I talked to Protestants uh a lot of Protestants over and over again. It's really interesting to realize like if if you have this version of heaven and hell that's where the dilemma comes from. I've never had to ask some of these questions because I I don't have those presuppositions. And so it's really cool that you're kind of bilingual and that you know the language and the and the dilemmas that they're the people are having already. And these are people in the pews who they've already been asking the questions. So, um, >> you don't have this problem, Austin, because you have the restored gospel.

[00:09:40]That's our claim is that the restored gospel solves all of these issues.

[00:09:44]That's not to say we know everything.

[00:09:46]But it is to say that it's obvious from early church history that they were trying their best, but they had some presuppositions, hard monotheism that led them in in the wrong direction. But we don't deal with that. Right.

[00:10:00]>> Right. Right. Well, this is uh this is the anatomy of initiation as uh as notebook LM puts it. This is your button analogy. And I want to know if you think this is a good diagram to show what's going on here.

[00:10:16]>> Yes. Let's see. Let's start at the top.

[00:10:18]You have a button. You push the button.

[00:10:21]Person is born lives. And you forno that they will have eternal ruin or eternal conscious torment. Good. Don't push the button. The person never exists. Zero loss to you or them. I will I will say you might get some push back in that yellow box because I've heard some people say that it's better to exist and go to hell than to not exist at all. So you might get some push back on that that they would say actually they are receiving a loss because they're not existing.

[00:10:46]>> But then this is I don't know if you have a slide on Judas. This is where the Judas Okay. So let's let's wait on that because I think that push back from them is solved or addressed greatly with the Judas analogy. Yeah, this is pretty good. If you press the button, person guaranteed. Yeah, I think that's good.

[00:11:05]>> Okay, let's get to Jud the Judas paradox. Here's what we got. Um, so the verse, and this is this is fascinating because anytime you talk to, in fact, this is why uh people in the comments thought that Jacob lost the uh the Trinity debate is because God logic is quoting scripture more than him. And so the the person who's quoting Bible verses the most uh is is the the person who wins apparently. Um and so I I love I love it when you you bring up this this verse here and it's really interesting what it teaches. So woe to the man to that man by whom the son of man is betrayed. It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.

[00:11:46]And I want to ask the audience just to look at that verse for a second and ask what's the most important word or group of words in there. And I have a suggestion.

[00:11:56]I think the words for that man.

[00:12:02]>> Okay. If >> those words were not in there, this verse wouldn't be very powerful to the argument. It would have been better for that man if he had not been born. ing Judas. So, what this tells me is that God knows it would have been better for Judas, not just better in general. Like, he didn't say, "Hey, it'd be better for everyone."

[00:12:24]>> He said, "It would have been better for Judas if Judas had not been born." And so, then I look at the creedle God and I say, >> "Well, if you willed the greatest good of Judas and you knew it would have been better for Judas if you had not created him, why did you create him?" It it's a contradiction I think in God's nature based on that scripture.

[00:12:43]>> Right. How does our paradigm solve this specific verse?

[00:12:48]>> Uh you want the Latter Day Saint solve.

[00:12:50]>> Yes. Yeah.

[00:12:51]>> Well, there's a couple ways to solve it.

[00:12:53]As a Latter- Day Saint, you can be an open theist, which means that it's uh God knows all things that are possible to know and the future is not possible to know because because the future doesn't exist yet. That's one way to solve it.

[00:13:04]>> That's that's is that the multiverse theory? That that sounds awful lot like multiverse to me.

[00:13:09]>> Um I guess you could No, no, it's it's really not. It's it's there is one universe in open theism, but it's the idea that >> the future does not yet exist. like it's it's a linear like timeline >> that allows for agency because >> yeah open theism really actually solves a lot of issues but in my mind it causes some other issues and it also doesn't jive with scripture and words of the prophets in my opinion. Okay.

[00:13:40]>> I I >> What percentage of people would you say are open theist versus >> small small uh Blake Blake Osler fans?

[00:13:48]Love Blake. He's more intelligent than any of us. Very smart guy. Uh he I think I don't want to misrepresent him. So if he's in the comments, correct me, Blake.

[00:13:57]But I think he sees open theism as necessary to preserve agency.

[00:14:02]>> He would say that if God knows the future, then you can't choose any differently than what God knows. and therefore you don't have any actual free will. Like your your free will is meaningless if you have any.

[00:14:13]>> I would reject that and I have I have some other thoughts on if God can know the future or what that means for agency. But my solve for this while trying to hold on to or wanting to hold on to exhaustive or absolute fornowledge of God because I I think that's what the scriptures teach is that two two doctrines I think that save us here.

[00:14:34]It's that uh God doesn't create from nothing and in combination with that Judas or we all we consent to be here but also I hold on to the uh as far as I know in Christendom Latter-day Saint unique uh doctrine of eternal law that God is bound not just by logic like the creist don't have a problem saying God is bound by logic or he's bound by his nature but we would say he's actually bound by reality because he didn't create reality, right?

[00:15:08]>> And so my solve for the creation dilemma is that if somebody that potentially there is an eternal law that requires God to allow someone to enter into the creation process, even if he forn knows that they will be a son of predition, right? Because that's really all that matters because if somebody goes to even the Tstral kingdom, you could say, well, it doesn't matter if they went to hell first or if they went to Tstial Kingdom afterwards. But we do know like like Satan for example, right? Did God will the greatest good for for Lucifer? And if he did, then why would he allow Lucifer to enter into the creation process? Why not just leave him as an intelligence or not adopt him as a spirit child? Why give him a spirit body?

[00:15:49]>> Sure.

[00:15:50]>> So, so in what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to hold on to exhaustive fornowledge and I'm trying to hold on to God loves everybody and wants the best for everybody. And so to relieve God of the burden of the the moral issue of sending of sending people into the creation process knowing they're going to go out of darkness, I would say potentially there is an eternal law that requires him to allow them to do that.

[00:16:15]So >> shift him from it shifts him from creator >> yes >> to facilitator who must create >> or >> I would say yeah who must allow the individuals who want to enter into creation right because I would say they don't know like we didn't know where we're going to end up Judas didn't know Lucifer didn't know when he received a spirit body >> but I would say that that's actually the only answer right if if God knows the absolute future and he loves everybody, then he I I would argue that if he didn't have to, I don't think he should have let Judas go. I don't think he should have let Lucifer go cuz he would have said, "I know you want to go, but I know what's going to happen. I'm not going to let you do that. I love you too much." Cuz, right, we we would do that to our family and friends, right? If your friend wanted to, >> you know, do something horrible to themselves, you would try to stop them if you had the power to do so, >> right? So in order for God, if God's going to be all good and all loving, but also know the future, I think that eternal law actually solves this problem. And I'm not claiming that there is a public revelation that says >> that there is a law specifically about that, but I'm saying it's a theory within our framework that actually works. And so, uh, it it leaves God of that.

[00:17:30]>> That's interesting. Um, my favorite part of the book was right at the beginning when you defined Credle Christianity's version of of God and some of the traits that it must have.

[00:17:44]>> No, this is cool. Pillars >> because once you have the pillars um once you understand what those are, you realize, okay, the these are incompatible. I actually don't know if pillars are the right analogy for it or not, but um you can't have all of these things at once. And so let's go through some of these. So you've got pillar one, exhaustive fornowledge, absolute certainty of the future. That would be closed theism.

[00:18:14]>> Uh that's probably one way to say it.

[00:18:15]Yeah, just traditional absolute fornowledge. Exhaustive fornowledge, I think, is the right way to say, >> but it's not it's kind of the opposite of open theism.

[00:18:22]>> Yeah. God does know the future. Open theism says can't know it. Yeah. Got it.

[00:18:27]Um, pillar two is absolute power and freedom or unconstrained initiation. In other words, he can do all things but he is this the but he doesn't have to part as well.

[00:18:41]>> Well, this is a creedle view. Remember this is not our Oh, yeah. So, so yeah, the answer to the question is yes. He has the power to do it and there's nothing like forcing him, right? That's my sol my solve with this whole thing is I take away that freedom pillar and I say God is actually bound because that's our doctrine right and that solves the solves the issue but again you could take away exhausted for knowledge that also solves the issue >> you could take away or his goodness is what you say redefine into oblivion right >> well and that's what they do because they end up saying and this we'll see this in the James White and Jacob Hansen debate here this weekend that James will simply say you can't critique my God because he is the standard of goodness.

[00:19:23]So that you can't critique the standard.

[00:19:26]So whatever God does is good. But then it's like, okay, but your God who apparently well actually they would they would actually say he doesn't love everybody, >> but your God creates some humans for the purpose of going to hell. Like how is that good in any sense of the word?

[00:19:42]Anyway, it'll it'll be fun. We'll see that in the debate and they'll argue over that. But yeah, that's what they have to do is they have to redefine or appeal the mystery um to try to preserve the word good because they they don't want to drop that God is good, right?

[00:19:56]>> Um so that that I guess pillar five was the willing to goodness of all. That's one. Pillar three is creation x nilo. So this this is God.

[00:20:07]The reason this one is important, correct me if I'm wrong, is that it puts the moral weight of creation on God.

[00:20:14]Because now you have if it's wrong to have pressed the button and God's the one who is the creator pressing the button, now all of a sudden it's not just like we it adds moral weight to that decision. Is that >> Yes. Yeah. You'll remember in the book it says that creation is the first moral act. Most people when you bring up the Christian dilemma, they'll say, "Oh, but somebody chose the person chose to go to hell." And what you what the response is, and I say this in the book, is that you're assuming that the first moral act of this whole situation is the person choosing.

[00:20:49]>> And it's actually not. The first moral act is God choosing for that person to exist >> without without their will in the credle view.

[00:20:55]>> Yeah. Without consent.

[00:20:57]>> Yeah. So, and then uh pillar four would be the the eternal hell, irreversible conscious loss.

[00:21:04]>> Yes.

[00:21:05]>> Um and that's another pillar you could remove if there was a different view of hell. Does that solve things?

[00:21:11]>> Uh not really. The the most common one that I get is annihilationism, which means that >> you're there's going to come a point whether you suffer in the next life or whatever, you will be annihilated.

[00:21:24]Meaning you will cease to exist. you won't be you won't have a consciousness.

[00:21:29]You you will you will just be gone. And so uh that's one solve. I don't really like that solve because to me that's utilitarianism. That's God saying, "Okay, I know I'm going to annihilate you in the future, but I'm going to use you for my purposes while you're on earth." That's kind of like that's kind of like the u Calvinistic God except for he doesn't annihilate them. He just lets them suffer forever. But he uses them for some greater good. And that's a whole another chapter in the book. Um, I guess you could be a universalist, but then that kind of defeats the purpose of sin and and the Christian message. That really doesn't work. Um, so it's hard it's hard to it's hard as a as a creedle Christian, it's very difficult to take any of these away because that's the point of the book is once you take it away, you're no longer defending the creedle god. You're now defending some heresy.

[00:22:17]>> And you can can you get each of these from like the affanation creed and from the Yes, Westminster.

[00:22:25]>> I would say, >> yeah, within the first four or 500 years of Christianity, uh, po in the post-apostolic age, you can get all of these that are still >> Yes, >> that would be really interesting to me to see mathem where where did we get these?

[00:22:40]>> Well, it was they were developed over time, >> right?

[00:22:44]>> But you can probably point to where it's fair to say that they were solidified very very easily, actually. probably within the Eastern Orthodox or the Roman Catholic Church.

[00:22:54]>> Okay.

[00:22:56]All right. Uh we have the metaphysical collision. So when you have all five pillars standing together, it breaks.

[00:23:05]>> Mhm.

[00:23:07]>> It breaks. So here's what here's how it explains it here. And let's see if it did. Okay. Fore known ruin plus unconstrained initiation from nothing cannot equal omni benevolence.

[00:23:20]Why?

[00:23:22]>> Because let me see if I can do it before here >> again. It's because uh if you really w the good of every person, you wouldn't even create that person knowing they would go and ruin, right? Yeah, >> it seems like on everyone's basic moral intuition, I mean, I have clipt Austin after clip after clip after clip of me asking people about the button analogy before they really know where I'm going, they're just acting on their moral instinct, they're like, "No, why would I press the button if I knew they were going to go to hell?" I'm like, "Exactly."

[00:23:59]>> So, would it be loving to press the button? No. Would it be good to press the button? No. So, how can you then just ignore what your God is doing if it's not good for you to do it? How is it good for God to do it? Unless you want to say, like James White will say, that you can't you can't judge God. And that's ultimately what they uh once they realize kind of what's happening, right?

[00:24:22]It's because it's kind of a trap. I'll be honest, like the button analogy is a trap to help people understand like your moral intuition is real and it's actually a good way uh to understand what is right and wrong. And then people would say God writes it on our hearts or whatever.

[00:24:38]>> But oh yeah, go ahead.

[00:24:41]>> Here I mean I'm I'm just really uh I like this page the way that it did this because here are the pillars that set the stage. Mhm.

[00:24:50]>> Um and then it's like you can't have both of these things now. If this is your framework, you either choose eternal hell is the way that it is >> or you know fornown ruin or you choose willing the good of people like you you can't have both. What do you think of the the visual here?

[00:25:09]>> Uh I like it. I like it a lot. Yeah.

[00:25:11]It's basically showing and it's kind of here on the bottom. I like that that little paragraph there. about it and I think it might that might take it that might have taken it straight from the book. Um, but it's it's the idea what I think this picture is showing is that if you can't reasonably say that freely and knowingly creating someone knowing their outcome is eternal conscious torment. You can't call that good.

[00:25:39]That's why it's saying it's you can't have both at the same time, >> right? So yeah, you can alter pillar four or you can redefine pillar five or again you can take pillar one, two or three.

[00:25:51]>> Yes.

[00:25:53]>> Um okay this one this one's fun. So the failing brace one this is when people that now will try to counter the argument and you gave in your book was it four or three?

[00:26:07]>> Um four. So yeah, it is free will, greater goods, the mystery, and the um uh uh oh, what is it called? The shoot, it's chapter eight, the permission permission argument, >> right?

[00:26:24]>> And so all of these arguments are things that they throw at this, but then you realize, okay, that this is why they fail. So this is the flaw here >> is the timeline disconnect. Walk me through this one.

[00:26:36]So basically when after you give the button analogy and you say well if you're not going to press the button h why is God pressing the button? Almost always again 99% of the time the response is well what do you what do you mean how is God responsible for what we do? We choose to uh go to hell. And uh this is actually just a reiteration uh of what I said before is they point to the human rebellion as the first point of uh a moral act, but it's actually the creation. It's point A. So people point So this is a good graph.

[00:27:15]People point to point >> they point to here and they're like because this causes >> Yes.

[00:27:20]>> whatever. And you're saying no, no, no, no. God made the first moral decision.

[00:27:25]>> It's exactly right. Yeah, that's a really good picture actually.

[00:27:27]>> Cool.

[00:27:29]>> Yep. That's that's perfect. And it and it really just sets the stage of realizing >> I mean it really holds a lot of weight when you say God didn't have to do this and he did it anyway.

[00:27:41]>> I mean that's if that's not Calvinism I don't know what is like the most consistent creedle Christians are the Calvinists. They just bite the bullet and say you can't judge our God and he does these things and we call them good even if it means sending people to hell.

[00:27:57]>> Okay. Yeah. Greater good defense. This is a good one.

[00:27:59]>> So, second one, uh, the greater good defense, but the flaw is that it becomes utilitarian because the the the greater good is saying, well, it it's better for some people to go to hell in order to have that maybe the opposition so that people can learn or this and that. There's reasons and it's good. It it glorifies God to send people to hell type of thing, right?

[00:28:21]>> That's exactly right. Or without these people existing and going to hell, there's some other good that we're going to miss. And God in his ultimate wisdom is going wants the maximal goodness and that includes sending some people to hell. And I'm just like, can your God really not figure out a way to find a maximal goodness without sending people to hell? Um I just had my conversation with my Protestant friend Taylor. He's a very smart guy, very genuine, >> and uh this this was kind of the defense that he went to. He he turned the button analogy around on me and he said, "What if I told you that I gave you a button and if you pressed it, there would become there would be a world where only uh there would be people who would go to hell and who would go to heaven but that's the only possibility like if you there is no other option." And he was basically saying in a way that God is bound. But he was saying, "Is it not better to let these people go to heaven as the greater good even if we have to sacrifice these people?" It's kind of like the trolley analogy. And you know what I told him?

[00:29:27]>> Yeah.

[00:29:28]>> I said, "Taylor, >> if even one person was going to be used so that others could go to hell, I wouldn't press the button because how sick of me. I I'm God. I'm an all powerful, unbound God that can create from nothing. Can I not find a better way? Can I not create a system in where nobody goes to hell if I'm all good, all powerful, all knowing? And uh anyway, it's it was a good episode.

[00:29:55]>> Would you say this is the strongest of the >> four?

[00:30:00]>> Um >> I mean, you'd have to sacrifice some things to to believe in this one.

[00:30:05]>> Uh tell me what you mean by that.

[00:30:07]Sacrifice what?

[00:30:08]>> Like like to say, you know, there is purpose in the greater good. You do have to sacrifice the the you have to redefine omnienevolence a little bit, right? Uh quite a bit.

[00:30:21]>> Yeah. This one probably you could say is the most convincing.

[00:30:25]>> Okay.

[00:30:26]>> Um because I think free will can be pointed out very people usually drop the free will once you once you explain it to them like it doesn't matter if we chose it. God knew, right? And then he still created us. So that one's pretty easy. The mystery uh argument that I'm sure we'll get to isn't convincing to anybody. The permission uh argument is just a reiteration of the free will argument essentially. So yeah, great greater goods for the believer for the creedle believer it probably is the one that keeps them believing is that God's and and kind of combined with mystery God's way are higher than our ways and if he needs to send people to hell I just don't understand it and I know he's all good. I mean it's page one of the book that's all it is.

[00:31:08]So, the the the mystery argument is, well, we we just don't understand. It's a mystery to us. Who are we to judge God's ways? What I thought was interesting about this one is is >> some things aren't a mystery, right? And and proof of that is when you give people the button analogy, right away they can just >> knee-jerk answer that question. Yeah.

[00:31:30]>> And and so there's some intuition there that it's just not a mystery. And so I if I remember correctly, the solve here is like if there is these things that kind of teach us what good is and then we can't go and apply them to God, we know there's an issue there.

[00:31:46]>> Yeah. You're you're retreating from the word good. It's kind of like uh I know you're based. It's kind of like uh and and actually I assume you're not going to release this before the debate. Are you're not going to release this?

[00:32:00]>> No, it won't be done before before the debate. Yeah.

[00:32:03]>> Okay. Let me let me say this then. I've been talking with Jacob Hansen about the debate because I have just connections here or interactions with Calvinists.

[00:32:11]So, I'm just helping him prep. And one of the things that I think he's going to do, and I hope he does, is he's going to basically show James White that when he says, "You can't criticize my definition of good," which is whatever God does.

[00:32:27]>> What he's doing is like when when you ask uh maybe someone more left-leaning like, "What is a woman?" And they say, "What do you mean?" Like a woman is anyone who decides they're a woman. And us conservatives are say, uh, that doesn't make any sense. You're not defining the word. You're actually saying the word doesn't have a definition. It's whatever that person wants. That's essentially what they're doing here is they're retreating from the word so that they can define it however they want, which includes God knowingly, freely creating people knowing they're going to go to hell.

[00:32:59]It's it's it's just like the what is a woman question. And so anyway, I I hope Jacob uses that because we know that James White is not a a progressive in any way. And and that'll be a good way to show that you're just retreating from the definition of the word to create your own to create a definition of the word that applies nowhere else, right?

[00:33:20]Like if I started create, let's say I let's do this. Let's say that I started breeding dogs and uh let's be YouTube friendly, but like I was going to do bad things to these dogs. people would say that's morally wrong.

[00:33:34]>> Like if I if I had a plan to do horrible things to these things that I'm creating or or facilitating to create, uh that's bad. But when God does it in the Calvinistic view, it's we have to call it good. This is Isaiah. Is it 5:20 where he says, "Woe unto them who will call evil good and good evil."

[00:33:55]>> It's exactly what this is, >> right? Interesting. Okay. Um so that's number three.

[00:34:02]And then the fourth solve must be permission.

[00:34:05]>> The illusion of permission. So, uh I don't fully remember this one. Is this the informed consent >> issue or is this something else?

[00:34:14]>> This is the idea well well kind of the the rebuttal I'll try to give the steelman of it is they would say well God doesn't will bad things to happen to people but he permits it to happen. And the argument in the book is essentially that permission loses its meaning or it simply means choice when you have the power to do otherwise. Right? We would say we we permit something to happen if we don't have power to stop it. So here let's let's let's read this bottom paragraph. Permission only has moral weight when you lack the power to stop an outcome. When an agent possesses absolute power to prevent a scenario, the absolute knowledge of what will happen permitting tragedy is functionally identical to initiating it. So, it's it's basically uh this is kind of like I said, it's kind of a recap of the free will argument, but said in a different way. Well, it's like if if if you're a parent and you can see and know that your kids are going to do something that's going to get them hurt and then like you just let it happen. You let you let them touch the stove.

[00:35:18]>> You're going to be responsible.

[00:35:20]>> That's on you. Like come on. Cuz you obviously know what's going on.

[00:35:25]>> I just saw a real the other day uh tragedy. This kid is playing in the front yard. He's probably four years old by himself and he runs out in the street and get hit get gets hit by a car and you know all of the comments say, "Where are the parents? Why is a fouryear-old out in the yard by himself?" They blame the parents because the parents had the power to stop it, >> right?

[00:35:47]>> And that's and and that's where the moral weight lies. It's not with the child. It's with the person who had the power to stop it. And that in this scenario is God. So, they didn't just permit, right, >> that to happen, but they allowed it and even initiated it by letting him be in the yard.

[00:36:04]>> Okay. Um, all right. Let's let's see. We got a few more here. So, this one, system failure, why these defenses break, and it's just kind of a summary slide. So, here's your four creedle escapes.

[00:36:18]And here's the reason it doesn't work.

[00:36:21]Free will becomes uh ignores precation initiation.

[00:36:27]Greater good collapses into utilitarianism and people become disposable.

[00:36:32]>> Uh divine mystery empties the word goodness of all recognizable meaning calling good evil evil good and permission morally empty when the permitter has full power to prevent the outcome.

[00:36:44]>> This is a great slide. This is a perfect summary of all this.

[00:36:50]>> Uh and then what is this one? Metaphysical pressure points. Yeah, this these are possible solves. So, this is chapter six, I think. So, I I do the first three um rebuttals. I do free will, greater goods, and mystery, and then I go into this, and then I give the permission one. So, I think this is chapter six.

[00:37:09]>> Okay. So, you're And this this is saying the if you move some of these pillars out of the way, here's some ways that it it can be solved.

[00:37:17]>> Um open theism, you explained to me. Um, if you revise absolute power and freedom to remove freedom, now you've got a constrained God who has to create, for example.

[00:37:27]>> Yes.

[00:37:28]>> Creation X and Hilo. If that isn't there, now you can have your your first estate where you choose to come down like in Latter Day Saint theology, eternal loss. What's this one?

[00:37:40]>> Universal salvation, meaning everybody's saved. There's no hell. You just take hell away. Oh, if you take hell away, then you you get you you get universal salvation, which is uh sounds like Satan's plan. So, that's not >> Yeah. Yeah. He wants everyone to be saved regardless. So, yeah, that's Yeah, that one doesn't work for any of us.

[00:37:57]>> Okay. And then perfect goodness, which leads to moral skepticism and divine command theory. Okay. Walk me through that one, too.

[00:38:04]>> Okay. Well, per uh denying God's perfect goodness. Um I'm not sure that any of us want to this. I actually don't go over this in the book, >> so I'm actually surprised it put it in here, but uh I would say that if you want to remove God's moral goodness, he just becomes a tyrant. He just becomes a dictator. Not worthy. This is chapter nine. He becomes maybe not worthy of worship because he's doing horrible things, which is funny because that's how I see the Calvinist God >> is he's doing things that are make him not worthy of worship. So moral skepticism meaning like should we really trust God or God's whatever God says is good. That's divine command theory anyway.

[00:38:44]>> Okay. Um and here's our last slide and this is just uh I suppose giving permission based on kind of your last chapter of look you you can embrace a version of God that doesn't have these issues and it's found in the restored gospel. to exactly right like for those Protestants, evangelicals, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox who are watching this video, and I hope it's all of them. Why do you feel tied to believing in things?

[00:39:15]I guess Catholics and Eastern Orthodox would hold to the church. I understand that argument, but especially if you're Protestant, evangelical, like my friend Taylor even, >> he says, "I'm not held to any particular creed or even confession." And so my invitation is to realize you don't have to accept this God that has been the traditional classical view. And I would pause it like you just said that the restored gospel of Jesus Christ uh as taught in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the most coherent structure or version or understanding of the biblical God that we have. That and people are going to get mad at me saying this and they I would just argue they don't know what they're talking about.

[00:39:56]Our version of God, our understanding of God is more biblical than any other denomination or church or however you want to say it.

[00:40:07]Uh perfect being theology, you guys.

[00:40:09]Hard monotheism. Uh it's not taught in the Bible. It's not taught. It doesn't teach that God is being itself. It doesn't teach that God is one being and three persons. Those come in after the apostolic age where uh the councils try to get together and figure out what they believed based on presuppositions. And it's just not what the Savior taught.

[00:40:28]It's not what the apostles taught. But our claim is that God has once again called apostles on the earth today to reveal the true nature of God. And that's how we get the Godhead model.

[00:40:42]>> Well, uh you're going to get backlash for this. Uh you're you're going to have people kind of coming at it. I I understand that um one way that we can help you and support is number one buy the book because you want to read the book, but also everybody who buys this book, please leave a review on Amazon because when the haters come, uh we want to make sure that that our boy Hayden has a nice buffer of those five star reviews uh on this book here.

[00:41:10]>> Awesome. Thank you. Yeah, and thanks to anybody who uh who buys the book and uh yeah, it's just it's been great. It's been a a good little journey. This all started because I had a debate. I I had a formal debate on this topic and I thought this why can this not and realize the book's not long, right? You saw it's about I think it's 70.

[00:41:30]>> If I can if I can read it, you can read it.

[00:41:33]>> Yeah. It's it's meant to be able to be read in an hour or two. But it has I I'll tell you it has a lot of information, but it gives you the overview without being overly wordy.

[00:41:45]Right? I didn't want to write a 150 page book just so it could be 150 pages and a bunch of fluff. Like I wanted it to be short and to the point so that anyone could pick it up. So anyway, I appreciate those who who get it on Amazon and I appreciate Austin for talking with me about it.

[00:41:59]>> The last thing I'd love for you to just outline for me is Okay. So, what are the traits of God that you hold to um that are compatible? What are some of those just core traits? U because I know we listed them before.

[00:42:15]But some of them are are incompatible.

[00:42:17]So give me give me your view of of God.

[00:42:22]>> Okay. So I would in my personal view I believe God has exhausted fornowledge.

[00:42:26]So I'm accepting pillar one completely.

[00:42:29]Latter-day Saints can reject pillar one and I think there's problems with that but they're free to do so. I reject um pillar two. The first half I I reject um well let me say it like this. I'm okay saying that God is all powerful, but I mean something different than what the credists mean.

[00:42:47]>> They mean God can do anything that is logically possible or within his nature is how they would say it. And I would say that even saying within his nature is kind of a way to say that he there are some things he cannot do.

[00:43:04]>> I think that's another way to say that he's bound, >> right?

[00:43:07]>> There's an eternal law somewhere that he might be bound to.

[00:43:10]>> Yeah. Let me give you an example. Um, I ask the question often like why doesn't God just force people into heaven? And the common answer is, well, like God wants or like love requires mutual agreement. M >> and to me when you say love requires to me that sounds like a like binding God by an eternal law. It sounds like there's a law out like can God create a love that is not mutually exclusive or mutual mutual and they would probably say well no that's a logical contradiction but I don't think it is. I if I'm all powerful why could I not create a universe? So I would say for pillar two I believe God can do all things that are possible and that he is bound by eternal law but that he lives the eternal law perfectly. That's why we can have faith in him is because he is the perfect moral standard example for us even if morality is outside of himself.

[00:44:10]Let's see uh creation from nothing. We obviously reject that outright. Um, and I would tag on to this the premortal existence that that we have all existed forever that that that's actually the only way that we can have true free will is that uh we've existed forever because in for example like in the atheist view I think the most consistent atheists will say that we actually don't have free will because we were caused by something out of our control. So in our view, if you want to be logic logically consistent, even credle Christians would would have to say that they don't have free will because they were caused by something out of their control. Now I used to say that in the creedle view, God the father is the only one who can have free will because he's eternal. But I've actually come to realize that that's not true. Even God in the creedle view doesn't have free will.

[00:45:02]And the reason we can know that or the way we can know that is by asking the question, is it possible for God to sin?

[00:45:13]Is it possible for God to lie? Is it possible for God to do something wrong?

[00:45:19]Or is it is it possible for God to error? And the answer is always no. He cannot lie. He cannot do wrong. He cannot error. And here's my concern with that. If you let it's not that you can and you won't like that's our position.

[00:45:36]>> But it's if you cannot God doesn't have a choice. God must do that which is within his nature.

[00:45:47]So how can you be free if you can only do one way? Does that make sense? So I I'm now I'm coming to understand that even the credle god doesn't have free will based on their own standard. The credist don't have free will on their standard. It's only in our view that God can sin but he won't. And in our view that we are eternal, therefore we were not created by something outside of ourselves or we were not created by something out of our control. So Latter-day Saint theology, people want to laugh at us as a religion. It's much more robust in the free will category or theology. Uh it solves all those problems.

[00:46:27]eternal hell. Uh let's let's make something clear here. Latter day saints do believe in an eternal hell. This is outer darkness. This is where uh some people will go Lucifer, Satan, and his followers from the premortal life. Um now, let me just clarify something. A lot of Latter-day Saints will say, "Yeah, but for most people, you know, there is no hell. like either we just go we go to the one of the kingdoms even the celestial kingdom but the celestial kingdom is heaven >> and it's like when's the last time you read DNC 19 >> what did the savior say about those who don't repent >> they must >> suffer even even as I suffered right >> yes and then go read DNC 76 and what does it say about the people in the tstual kingdom where do they go first it says they will be thrust down to hell there are quotes I have a whole powerpoint maybe one of these days we can talk about it >> sent to me I I Just looking at it this week and it was fascinating.

[00:47:21]>> Yeah.

[00:47:22]>> Oh, it's the quotes are just wonderful from Joseph and other other prophets who have said, "No, like if you don't repent, you're going to go to hell for probably a thousand years and then you will be given one last chance to accept Jesus Christ. And if you choose to repent and accept him, then you will enter into the celestial kingdom. And then there will be some people who will just say no thanks for whatever reason."

[00:47:42]I couldn't imagine why they would.

[00:47:44]>> But those people will remain in call it eternal hell, outer darkness. So I've often said that like, yeah, I don't really believe in hell because the credle view of hell is so different than what we believe about it in my view that I just like I don't think it's helpful.

[00:48:02]U but I think the weakness there is that like we no we do actually believe in hell. And I just don't really understand I I couldn't pull that quote out and and explain it to someone. And so that that's where I've been. And I know we had a discussion about this at the at the event.

[00:48:18]>> Yeah. Well, I would I would just say because I used to say that too, probably as a missionary, >> but it's like what what are the implications of saying we don't believe in hell?

[00:48:28]Why? Why is Jesus Christ important?

[00:48:30]>> No judgment. There's no >> Yeah. If there's no hell, >> I I don't need Jesus if there's no hell.

[00:48:35]And the answer is you do need Jesus. And the only way you're going to get into any of the kingdoms is if you accept him. Even if you don't outer darkness which is hell essentially.

[00:48:45]>> Okay.

[00:48:45]>> So all of those realize that pillars 1 2 3 and four like I gave my understanding of them from a lottery saint perspective. I think that with an understanding like I just have proposed that actually allows us to preserve pillar 5 which is you actually can say that God is omnibent. You can say that he wills the greatest goods of of every person and that he does all that he can.

[00:49:08]This is chapter uh 8 in the book. He does all that he can to save people and unfortunately some people will turn against him and he has no way to uh he has no power. He actually permits it because he doesn't have power to change otherwise.

[00:49:26]>> Awesome. And that's the most important thing. You start the book there with God is good. We all know God is good. Like that that makes sense. And you kind of end the book there as well. um but but in a way that all the other attributes now can be cohesive with that. We don't have to redefine goodness.

[00:49:46]>> Um so I appreciate the book. It was wonderful for me as someone who I I consider myself more of a lay man in this space, but I love it and I want to understand. And so the way that you laid out the arguments, the analogies, um each individual definition just helped me kind of now I can have these conversations and know what's going on in the conversation. So I appreciate what you're doing.

[00:50:11]>> Well, thank you. And I would just invite you obviously and anyone who's watching, don't use this as a cudgel. Don't use this as I'm going to own my credle friends. I'm not saying you would do that, but but I could see someone trying to use this because cuz guess what? In in my opinion, this is the strongest argument against the creedle god. I I I don't I think there are other metaphysical trinity arguments. We can talk about the history, but this is accepting everything that the c classical view accepts and showing why it's incoherent. It's an internal critique. I I am giving a a solve, but the critique actually doesn't use any Latter-day Saint doctrine. realize that's why we talk about creation x and why are we talking about that if we're latter- day saints? Well, it's because we're trying to use their system to show why their system >> it is incoherent. That's why the pillars must break. So, don't use this to own them, but use it to start a conversation about what is the true nature of God and can you really call God good and what does that mean for a believer who maybe hasn't thought about this before.

[00:51:12]>> Awesome. Okay. Well, thanks Aiden.

[00:51:14]Appreciate what you do and I want to come tableabling with you. So, we need to we still need to find a time for that.

[00:51:19]>> Anytime. Come down to Phoenix and we'll we'll do it.

[00:51:22]>> Okay, sounds good.