A STUNNINGLY simple question about JOHN 3:16 "For God so Loved the world."

by Terry 384 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  AuldSoul

  Where could He possibly Justify (in the Judicial sense) letting off the wicked and excusing their crime?
  
  That IS my question, after all!

  Oh. I was confused, I suppose. If this was, in fact, your original question, it was buried under an enormity of other issues which have little or nothing to do with the question you are actually asking. I thought your question must have been one of these:

  On what basis did GOD SO LOVE the world? On what values contained by man, the sinner?

  What possibly JUST cause is there for God to LOVE what is repugnant to him?

  I ask again. ON WHAT BASIS can God be said to "LOVE THE WORLD"?

  Man is the sinner and does NOT pay. Jesus is perfect and sinless and DOES pay. JUSTICE? How? LOVE? On what basis?

  This new question is easy to explain. The verse you at first quote correctly holds the seed of understanding the answer to your question, if, in fact, you have narrowed your question down to this new one. God loved the world of mankind enough to pay for our sins. You ask, "Where could He possibly Justify (in the Judicial sense) letting off the wicked and excusing their crime?" The answer is, He couldn't, and the Bible never suggests that he could or did. The crimes had to be paid for.

  I'm sure you already know how the Bible says those crimes were paid for. Now, if your REAL question is in that jumble of poorly based, maundering questions you asked in your opening post, you need to firm your questions up a bit to get them answered. In the opening post you seem to be blathering against the concept of a loving or just God and appear to be disproving the possibility even as you ask (presumably believers) whether such love and justice is possible.

  Since you wish to use the analogy of human courts, does the responsible party always pay? If not, your analogy can be used to demonstrate the answer to your question just as easily as to demonstrate your dilema. For instance, if my young, inexperienced child damages someone's property, who pays for it? Is that just or fair?

  Your questions only make sense from the perspective of a cynical critic. You asserted an initial fallacious framework of thought within which your pejorative questions seem reasonable.

  It is just and merciful for God to determine what is a reasonable price for the damage done to his property and demand payment of that price. It is supremely merciful and loving for Jesus to willingly choose to pay the price and become our debt-holder, only to release us from obligation to that debt (as the only one who could do so) because of his fondness for us and his desire to see us achieve our potential.

  Where the price has been paid in sufficient amount to cover all damages in perpetuity, there is no more injustice in excusing the criminal or the crime and clemency (mercy) can, from that time onward, always be granted on that basis at the judge's discretion. From that time onward there is no longer any grounds on which to question whether the judge should or should not grant clemency in any specific instance.

  Now, if that IS your question, I hope I answered it fully. If you have a different question than the one about which you so recently wrote: "That IS my question, after all!" please clarify that question separately.

  —AuldSoul
• 

  R.Crusoe

  My point was about how, though killing seems the ultimate unforgiveable sin/crime, punishable by death or lifelong imprisonment in most societies, humans in positions of power/control utilies the self same actions to realise their desires via the use of others realities who strive to uphold the same values!

  And so dysfunction is passed on to their morality/reality whilst those issuing instruction remain distanced from this stark, dark reality!

  And all seemingly resting upon some foundation humans like to think of as god and his love?
• 

  AuldSoul

  Terry: The barber who cuts the hair of all people who don't cut their own hair. Can he cut his own hair?

  Yes, he can.

  The barber who ONLY cuts the hair of people who don't cut their own hair cannot cut his own hair. But a barber cutting the hair of people who don't cut their own hair does not preclude that barber from ALSO cutting his own hair. As can all individuals in the real world—where cold logic doesn't usually prevail—the barber can belong to more than one set. Can't he, Terry?

  For your sake, I so wish you could categorize and box up neatly everyone and everything; but it is the nature of reality that its constituents are not so easily taxonomized into single sets.

  —AuldSoul
• 

  R.Crusoe

  So do humans who, to establish their own reality use others as select victims, (albeit others who sincerely follow as believers into their crime and sin are duly punished for doing so) escape the intent of their own power and control, by the power and control of preserving a new reality deemed advantageous and more loving for those who survive, justify sacrificing the deluded, misled or deliberately dysfunctioned innocents, for the greater good get applauded for so functioning in gods image, who on a much larger scale appears to establish the slelfsame as his own reality?

  So is 'god fed morality', or gods love, simply a deliberate delusion sold all mankind as 'divine' and in fact a subliminal control model for the freedom and behaviour of the powerful and controlling to do as they will using R&F humans as sacrifices for their desires?
• 

  Deputy Dog

  Terry

  Among rational and logical humanity there exist reasons for showing mercy.

  Yes absolutely, and the biggest perhaps, is sin. Any rational human judge in encumbered by his own sin.

  Matthew 18:22

  Jesus *said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. 23"For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. 24"When he had begun to settle them, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. 25"But since he did not have the means to repay, his lord commanded him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all that he had, and repayment to be made. 26"So the slave fell to the ground and prostrated himself before him, saying, 'Have patience with me and I will repay you everything.' 27"And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. 28"But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, 'Pay back what you owe.' 29"So his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, 'Have patience with me and I will repay you.' 30"But he was unwilling and went and threw him in prison until he should pay back what was owed. 31"So when his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were deeply grieved and came and reported to their lord all that had happened. 32"Then summoning him, his lord *said to him, 'You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33'Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?' 34"And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. 35"My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart."

  What constitutes a just reason comes down to the standards of each judge and each court.

  We agree!

  Luke 7:47"For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little."

  God is not so encumbered, and owes no one. He gives His love freely. He is not subject to the law as a human is.
• 

  Terry

  Where the price has been paid in sufficient amount to cover all damages in perpetuity, there is no more injustice in excusing the criminal or the crime and clemency (mercy) can, from that time onward, always be granted on that basis at the judge's discretion. From that time onward there is no longer any grounds on which to question whether the judge should or should not grant clemency in any specific instance.

  The Topic question is simple.

  Getting people to answer it, is not.

  I've tried rewording it over and over. I've tried emphasising different contingent issues. Nothing has worked.

  I'll try one more time.

  Let us reboot. Pretend I haven't said anything at all up to this point. (You should find this extraordinarilty easy!)

  God so loved the world...

  To love is to place the highest possible value on.

  How could God place the higest possible value on man? God has a history of dealing with man. Within the set of dealings, God has condemned man, cursed him, punished him and killed him.

  Whence comes the love? What is it based on? How does God simultaneously hold opposite values without suffering cognitive dissonance?

  God is love. God is the highest possible value.

  God hates what is bad and loves what is good. No man is good.

  See the problem?

  There is no foundation laid in God's values to place the highest possible esteem upon man in view of God's dealings with him.

  That is PART ONE of the question. That is the simple part.

  The PART TWO of the question stems from that premise.

  How is it JUSTICE to condemned an innocent? (Jesus).

  How is it JUSTICE to free the guilty?

  God is a God of Justice in whom there is no injustice.

  See the dissonance?

  If you can't see the clash--you can't answer the question.

  Calling it "blathering" is a dodge.
• 

  Terry

  God is not so encumbered, and owes no one. He gives His love freely. He is not subject to the law as a human is

  God isn't subject to his own value system? God isn't the embodiment of His own Justice? God is above the law, when He himself created the law based on perfect understanding?

  How can this be true?

  The law only condemns those who cannot live up to it. God, by breaking (or stepping outside) of His perfect law becomes de facto imperfect as well.

  How does one transcend perfect behavior?

  We are back, yet again, to the question of basis.

  On what basis can God operate without adhering to the foundation of His own values as embodied in his commands?

  Love follows the thing loved. To love man is to follow the value of man to its logical conclusion. To love a man who possesses no inherent value is to destroy the value of love itself because it would be based on a mere nothing.

  This is simple.

  Or, so I thought!
• 

  AuldSoul

  Terry: To love is to place the highest possible value on.

  Well, at last. After all the bards have failed for millenia, of all people, you, Terry, have defined love! Thank you. The universe, and indeed myself as a part of it, owes you a debt of gratitude.

  Cannot someone love something that COULD be, rather than something that currently is? Cannot someone love an idea or a potential reality so much that they are willing to sacrifice for the mere hope of it? Is it then possible to love the possible even while despising and being dismally disappointed in the current reality?

  If so, I fail to see your point entirely. If not, I think reality bears out many exceptions to your peculiar sort of blindness. The Bible sets forth exactly that as the explanation for God's apparent dual dealing with mankind. Does it not?

  I think you wish to insist that there be cause for love when love does not ever necessarily find basis on anything external to the person who chooses to express it. Their choice can be "based" on nothing more substantial than a hope. However, in this case, the Bible explains that God knew some would become worthy of that love—that is, that there would eventually be a basis for that love.

  I don't see dissonance in God's regretful distaste for what humanity has done and has become expressed right alongside love of what they might do, what they might be. Weekly, I see many, many examples of similar love from parents expressed toward miscreant children that they hope to correct.

  I see dissonance in your body of posts on this forum. I see a confused and bitter man trying to set rational parameters and a precise framework for the "appropriate" expression of an emotion. Who ever made you arbiter of the "appropriateness" of love? You are free to judge whether you believe the judge has judged fairly, has shown mercy appropriately, has loved wisely . . . but in this case you disavow the judge prior to rendering your verdict and would base your verdict, in part, on your judgment of the nonexistent judge.

  See the circularity of logic? If you can't see the clash—you shouldn't blather such questions. You might invite inspection of whether your premise is well founded. In this case, it is grossly lacking. Love is not so constrained as you would have it be.

  —AuldSoul
• 

  AuldSoul

  Terry: Love follows the thing loved. To love man is to follow the value of man to its logical conclusion. To love a man who possesses no inherent value is to destroy the value of love itself because it would be based on a mere nothing.

  Once more you except potential value from your equation. What a man is and what a man might be are not one and the same. It is entirely possible to love intensely what a man might be and at the same moment despise intensely what a man is.

  Is that not true? Is a man's potential "mere nothing" if one possesses the ability and insight to unleash said potential in another?

  I agree that God is not encumbered as man is, simply because God is not limited to our capabilities and bound to our perceptions. These are not laws God made for all of reality, these are our bindings, our limitations. God constrains himself, but he is of a different nature than man. You don't like that, since it puts God outside your capacity to fairly judge, but that is the way it is.

  If you believe in the God of the Bible, you also accept that this God does not answer to you and that your ability to perceive is limited to the perspective of a single human mind which cannot possibly encompass that which you seek to judge, much less judge God fairly.

  But, you don't suffer such belief, do you Terry? So, why would anyone waste their time trying to open your eyes or answer within your peevish, unreasonable constraints? Could it be that we would-be answerers choose to endure your insults out of a hopeful love for your potential value, given the obvious current lack of basis? I think so.

  Is that an injustice? Perhaps in your mind, it is. Poor thing.

  —AuldSoul
• 

  journey-on

  Here is the way I look at John 3:16 now. I think there are keys (certain scriptures, etc. that hold answers) and this is one of them.

  When one attempts to look at things too literally, the part of your being that is connected to the spirit atrophies and it becomes

  difficult to understand that which is outside the mundane.

  God = The Eternal One, The Creator, Pure Consciousness, Spirit

  World = Manifested Creation, Matter, God's Masterpiece

  Only Begotten Son = Part of God and Part of the World just like a child is part Father and part Mother.

  The Eternal One loved His Creation so much that He wanted to experience this World of Matter personally,

  so He arranged a Way for this to be accomplished and to experience the Human Condition personally through

  this Son who was born of Spirit and Matter. He gained understanding and wisdom of Mankind's plight as man

  struggles through Life separated from God by the Gift of Free Will. Man must find his own way here on earth.

  This free will is what gives man his individuality, otherwise, he would just be a robot doing whatever its creator

  programmed him to do.

  The Cross is a mystic symbol, a key, that represents a holy balance of opposites, earthly and celestial (spiritual). It was

  likened to a ladder whereby one could reach God. By being "nailed to the Cross", the Way was opened up for

  Man to be able to eventually experience God's realm of Pure Consciousness, Light, and Love, as He experienced

  earthly life through his Son.