forces of good and bad

i agree with you. this is why i don't go with the christian perception of "god". this is because he creates alot of atheist. i am not one, but i just don't believe in the christian god. for everything good there is something evil. good and evil have and will always exist, no matter what side you chose.

I believe that there is both good and evil in the world and the reason that both of these things exist in the world is because of the original sin of Eve in the Garden of Eden. I don't think that God necessarily allows evil, however, because of the fact that we are all descendents of Adam and Eve, we are human and that does mean that we are not perfect as they were not perfect. Without the forces of good and evil in the world, I don't think that life would really be something that was worth living.

Nice topic! To answer your questions our world is balanced, good and evil works side by side. That is why you see bad things happening over and over. Also from what i have learned, God doesn't make everything right for you. He/she gives us the opportunity to make things right. So then it is up to use how we use the opportunity. So, God allowing evil is a way to make us worthy of living. :]

Maybe Satan's role is one of contrast, so people can compare and learn from the experience. Like you yourself said, opposites and next to each other too, for comparison.

Yeah that's good question. Questions like that can lead us to the truth. Although i have my own belief based on the bible, but I understand why you feel that way as I do feel the same thing. But at the same time, I just have to accept that reality that things have to be this way to end all the evils in the world. Not the quick and easy way we want it too. I want the easy way also but there's nothing we can do but just try to accept it.

if i remember correctly, MAN was created by GOD in his image so that man can worship Him, must have gotten lonely after an eternity already creating the other things. but if he made man and commands them to automatically worship him then it is not much different from building robots programmed to do just the one thing, can get pretty boring in a heartbeat, so in order to make things more interesting, HE conjured up the premise of Free Will in Man, maybe to test himself on his ability to make others love him or choose not to. Like a challenge, love me or love me not..must choose but disappointingly Adam chose to disobey him by eating the fruit from the tree spurred on the the serpent aka devil.( humans faling miserably on the first test of free will) maybe things will get boring for God himself if the devil is not in the scheme of things to stir up trouble. God needs the devil to continously test his greatest creations, us humans with free will to choose good or evil, black or white or even grey..no devil , not interesting, since we have been given free will, it means that God himself is not in total control over our choices, We are ! so that makes the devil relevant to God's design and to remove him may place God at a disadvantage of not knowing for sure because his official tester , agent provocateur, temptor is not in the scene to cause trouble and to prove the point that not all will freely choose to ove and honor Him but some will choose to betray him in exchange for carnal pursuits.It is A Game for HIM !