God Talk

For various reasons, the topic of God has been prevalent (especially when I was approached by two people today representing Campus Crusade for Christ, unsolicited) and Matt posed a question to me that I had never thought of before...

If God does exist, why does God have to be a benevolent god?

This provoked a series of questions in my head, of which the summary is thus:

If God has a side of benevolence, why not malevolence? If God is infinite, shouldn't God have an infinite array of emotions? Isn't it allowed that God be kind one day, sarcastic the next, bitter and resentful toward's God's creation the day after, etc., etc.?

If God is instead above such...base human emotions, then shouldn't God be above all emotions? If that's the case, then why would God even care what one insigificant creature thinks or acts at any given time on one of billions upon billions of planets? Wouldn't God just be an absentee diety that chooses to intervene if God felt like it?

Not that it matters to me anyways, since I don't believe that God exists. But a God with many emotions, particularly one with a sense of humour, would probably be infinitely more fun.