But what about all the ‘anyones’ that were destroyed at the time of Noah’s ark? None to perish. They were all pre-Abraham, the father of all Israelites. I wonder if they, being a part of God’s 'illustration', had a free pass? Do they go to Heaven? Certainly God wouldn’t create people for the sake of sending them to eternal damnation just to prove His point?
Then there's Judas Iscariot. Someone had to be ‘the one’ to betray Jesus so the whole sacrifice of the truly perfect Lamb could take place. A pass? I want to think 'maybe' but really I think not. Or was he part of the Jewish chosen people?
I think again about the foreknowledge of God. Just like in the case of Judas Iscariot, He (God) knew in advance that Pharaoh would be a control freak and so took advantage of that knowledge and used it for an opportunity to show the Israelites that He really would deliver them. Pharaoh was an Egyptian and therefore not one of the ‘chosen’ ones of God. Did Egyptians back then even have a chance at Heaven? They surely are part of the ‘anyones’.
Honest questions. Fair questions, I think. What do we do with them? Personally, I wrestle with and through them. I always try to come back to the things I know about God. He is love. He is good. He is holy. His motives are pure. But my thoughts don't stop rolling.
Instead of taking things out of context, we might need to just go back to the beginning. Adam and Eve were the first people. Ever. Their first two children were Cain and Abel. First children ever. I think sometimes I get hung up on thinking that what's told to us in the Bible could be the whole story...the only things that happened ever. But when I stop to think about it, or listen to other people way wiser than me, I realize that just because everything in the Bible is true, does not mean that EVERYTHING that ever happened is in the Bible. Light bulb moment.
And we need to remember that in Old Testament times, people lived for hundreds of years. With that in mind, we are able to realize that there were more than Cain and Abel....and with decades (centuries?) spanning over those times the children were being born. As "wrong" as our brains make it out to be, they (Adam and Eve's offspring) had to have been reproducing among themselves or the human race would have stopped at Cain and Abel. Genesis 5 goes into great detail of Adam's descendants.
This means that the original people, God's people, some of them eventually evolved into being those very enemies of God...but I don't believe that means God made those enemies for illustration purposes. What I think it does mean is that some of Adam and Eve's descendants exercised their free will in not believing the truths passed along in conversations throughout the generations.
And then when more people DIDN'T believe God's truths than DID believe, thankfully there was still Noah...Genesis 6:9 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on the earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God.
As far as the people pre-Noah....the very first people on earth actually walked with God. See Genesis 2-3. Surely they told their children about that. Word of mouth. The very first witnesses! History began. But eventually, some didn't believe.
Free will.
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