by greendawn 65 Replies latest jw friends
Kate, God has been good to me too, BUT that doesn't change the atrosities that happen to innocent people everywhere. I am not thinking of myself, only the innocent who don't deserve the suffering they go through.
From the scripture you posted....God has declared us all evil with some good in us. That is how he thinks of us?
Hellrider:You'd do that to your adult children?
Methinks they'd turn around and ask "who made you God?" and tell you to p*ss off!
Hmmm - sounds familiar...
I for the life of me cannot understand how someone can leave the JW's and adopt the same thing of a slightly different flavor.
There is more difference between JWs and authenitc mainstream Christianity than night and day. You can't even compare the two. The theology and interpretation does not even come close to having the same flavor.
JWs; work your way to a relatiosnhip with Jehovah but you can never work enough and you will never know how he feels about you. Love is conditional and dependant on your performance.
Authentic mainstream Christianity as in adhering to the Nicene Creed; the relationship is a free gift, as is salvation, there is nothing you can do to earn it. God loves us unconditionally. Our only responsibily in the relationship is to accept the free gift, God does all the work.
From the scripture you posted....God has declared us all evil with some good in us. That is how he thinks of us?
According to the Bible;
Why Israel is hated and God's love for them;
Deuteronomy 7:12-14 It shall happen, because you listen to these ordinances, and keep and do them, that Yahweh your God will keep with you the covenant and the loving kindness which he swore to your fathers: and he will love you, and bless you, and multiply you; he will also bless the fruit of your body and the fruit of your ground, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the young of your flock, in the land which he swore to your fathers to give you. You shall be blessed above all peoples: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattle.
Jeremiah 31:3 Yahweh appeared of old to me, saying, Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love: therefore with loving kindness have I drawn you.
Our assurance of the perpetuity of God's church, and her continued increase from age to age, rests not on the stability of human counsels, but on God's everlasting love for her. What he has undertaken, self-moved, for the manifestation of his own glory, he will carry on to perfection FBN
Ezekiel 16:8 Now when I passed by you, and looked at you, behold, your time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over you, and covered your nakedness: yes, I swore to you, and entered into a covenant with you, says the Lord Yahweh, and you became mine.
Hosea 14:4-5 I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely; for mine anger is turned away from him. I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.
Zephaniah 3:17 Yahweh, your God, is in the midst of you, a mighty one who will save. He will rejoice over you with joy. He will rest in his love. He will rejoice over you with singing.
Jesus the Saviour then comes to BE love incarnate;
Matthew 5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
John 13:34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
John 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
John 15:9 As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.
Romans 5:3-5 Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering works perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope: and hope doesn't disappoint us, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
2 Corinthians 13:11 Finally, brethren, farewell. Be perfect, be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace; and the God of love and peace shall be with you.
Ephesians 2:4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
Ephesians 3:17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that you, being rooted and grounded in love,
Ephesians 3:19 and to know Christ's love which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Revelation 3:19-20 As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, then I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with me.
This is just a little bit of the love that God has for us according to the Bible. We are sinners. God knew that this would happen so He planned ahead of time to sacrifice His own Holy Son, because He loves us that much.
The King of Kings died for us, that is how the story goes. I am not saying you should believe it, but I had to answer the question, this was as simple as I could make it. Yes, we are evil, the blood of Jesus makes us white as snow.
Ephesians 1:3-7 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
Once we believe in a creature called Satan, we have to accept that the god of the Bible created him and is therefore capable of creating creatures with the potential to practice evil.
Mmmm... but the Bible might just be another book telling us that culture's history, and the mythologies arising from that culture's experience with and rationalisation of postive and negative non-material entities. And other culture's will have different stories telling their experience and rationalisation of postive and negative non-material entities. And they are all equally right, and equally wrong, more or less, but document there is something out there.
So 'Satan' is just our name for a concept or cultural memory, and if the basis of the concept or cultural memory is tangibly real, even if non-material, it no more means the Bible's rverese story is true than that of other cultures who would also have their concepts or cultural memories validated.
And Sinter Klas is coming on his white horse, and his Zwatre Pieten will grab the false ones, Father Christmas and Snata CLaus and Kris Kringle and the rest of them, and put them in scaks and beat them with sticks, and all their followers too, and be taken to Sinter Klas's castle in Spain and sold as slaves.
Gyles:
Aye. In some cultures they have Jini/Genie.
What I personally find interesting, from an anthropological view, is the commonality of expression.
