Counter handwave, any god that would do that is a jerk who doesn't deserve worship. (Actually like 99% of the shit most faiths deities do falls into that category.)
In the holy book, inspired by this god, he tells you he DOES deserve worship. Furthermore, were you to ignore his advice, he will punish you eternally.
Yeah, well, if that mf does actually exist, I'll feel real vindicated as I scream in agony for eternity, for holding the opinion that a God that needs to threaten me into worshipping him is not benevolent at all !
If I were god I might do all sorts of shit to test the supposed intelligence of my creations.
That might include including telling them "do some pointless thing, or else".
It might interest me to see if they're capable of reasoning or testing to determine that the task is pointless and the threat is empty.
Probably not, but its hilarious for them to think they matter to me; It's like a videogame to me.
It only takes 6 days for me to start whole a new game. I'm probably bored of it long before now or at least well ino my hundred and somethingth play-through light-years away. I prefer keeping the dinosaurs because they're way cooler than humans.