Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” … Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. The Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord (Gen 6:3, 5–8).
The thing is, mankind has been given the allowance by God who created us to be able to choose evil. I know a lot of people will criticize freewill, but then they would not know what to offer in its place. One of the reasons why bad things happen is because there are over 7 billion people on the face of the earth making decisions — and sometimes those decisions, those choices, are often going to go against others’ decisions. God did not create us as robots who cannot do but exactly what they have been programmed to do.
God allows choices because He is going to judge everything in the end — “So then each of us will give an account of himself to God” (Rom 14:12). “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil” (2Co 5:10). “You who are young, be happy while you are young, and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth. Follow the ways of your heart and whatever your eyes see, but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment” (Ecc 11:9 NIV).
Furthermore, God will judge everyone in righteousness, and therefore, His judgments will be true (Acts 17:30–31).
God gave mankind rules by which to live, and they are not burdensome (1Jn 5:2–3; Psa 19:7–14). And He also gave us the ability to choose whether or not to comply with His rules. And again, this choice has been afforded to everyone.
Going back to the very beginning of everything, God gave Adam and Eve the ability to choose, and because of what they chose — and despite Eve being deceived by Satan, mankind’s adversary (Gen 3 and 1Ti 2:11–15) — we bear the consequences but not the guilt of their sin (Rom 5:12).
We must have a God-given, fixed standard so that we may know why we need forgiveness so much. God’s law is not to pat us on the back and tell us what fine fellows we are. God’s law is given to provide a proper shape for our repentance. In moments like this, we are aghast, but our “repentance” is formless and void. We need the shape of God’s holy Word so that we know how shapeless we have become. (Doug Wilson).
The apostle Paul, carried along by the Holy Spirit of God (2Pe 1:21), put it this way:
But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully, realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted (1Ti 1:8–11).
“Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!” (2Co 9:15; and see Jn 3:16; Eph 2:8–10; 2Co 2:14).
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