Is Love of God Real?

by donkey 31 Replies latest jw friends

Evanescence

What hell? [I didn't expect someone here to beleive in hell - you don't really do you?] God laid this command upon Adam: “From every tree of the garden you may eat to satisfaction. 17 But as for the tree of the knowledge of good and bad you must not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will POSITIVELY DIE.” Not seeing any hell here - did I miss something [this is one the JW's got right - if you assume there is anything divine to the bible - I don't]
Yes I do believe in a hell, it is also mentioned several times in the bible.
Mathew chapter 24:51 Then the master will cut him in pieces and send him away to be with the hypocrites, where people will cry and grind their teeth with main
Matthew 22
1 And again Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying, 2 "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a marriage feast for his son, 3 and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the marriage feast; but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other servants, saying, 'Tell those who are invited, Behold, I have made ready my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves are killed, and everything is ready; come to the marriage feast.' 5 But they made light of it and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. 7 The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, 'The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore to the thoroughfares, and invite to the marriage feast as many as you find.' 10 And those servants went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good; so the wedding hall was filled with guests. 11 "But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment; 12 and he said to him, 'Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?' And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.' 14 For many are called, but few are chosen." Mathew chapter 13 Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples came to him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field." 37 He answered, "He who sows the good seed is the Son of man; 38 the field is the world, and the good seed means the sons of the kingdom; the weeds are the sons of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the close of the age, and the reapers are angels. 40 Just as the weeds are gathered and burned with fire, so will it be at the close of the age. 41 The Son of man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, 42 and throw them into the furnace of fire; there men will weep and gnash their teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. For more information look at this site http://www.catholic.com/library/Hell_There_Is.asp
Evanescence

Really; When I give my kids a choice of peanut butter or jam, I don't add, and if you choose peanut butter I'll punish you. If I did this I'd be an unfit father. Also I wouldn't leave important instructions for my kids written so mysteriously that they couldn't understand them - or would end up fighting over what I had said - but this is effectively what the loving god has done to us humans. I'm sorry but to me god seems to be the ultimate dictator - I'm sure Sadam "loves" his people, but obey or dies doesn't cut it anymore, not for Sadam, not for god.
Actually I still beleive in a divine being - I just cannot accept that he is as petty as the bible, and most so called chrisitan religions paint him. And if he is as described than I will stand up and be counted - I do not, could not love anyone who acts like this - not a human - certainly not a "God".

Oviously Peanut butter and jam is a trivial desition and does not do a good job in portraying this situation.
God doesn't want the bible to be complicated, but the bible has been written by all sorts of different people from approx. 2000 years ago and even later its a bit hard yes for us to completly understand for we do not think or write the same way people back then thinked or wrote.
God mentions that the path to heaven is narrow and hard to find while the path to hell is big and easy to find.
For example today we have such a huge divide in christianity which church is the true church? the original church that Jesus started? Remember the devil wants us to suffer the horrible fate so he would do anything possible to make things hard for us
But god doesn't want it to be complicated he sent out the holy spirit to guide us and to help us find our way to eternal salvation! god wants us to spend eternity with him, he doesn't want hell to be our fate.
As I posted earlier god cannot help you or communicate with you if you continue to be ignorant of him, if you thing god is just a big bully then pray to him, tell him why you think that way. you must look out for god's answer to your prayers and that means listening and being patient. do not block him out and say to yourself "God is never gonna answer my prayers he doesn't exsist if he does then he is a big bully!" as I said earlier and I repeat god cannot communicate if you block him out and shun him!
Evanescence
donkey

Know as in, a mental/logical exercise? You can't prove or disprove anything on this method; it runs into a dead end, which is how it was meant to be. Love doesn't really grow from a cognitive exercise.
Know as in, a personal experience or personal revelation? Yes, you can love God in this way. Which is what I think is what we are to pursue... something real, not technical.

Like I said....as long as these emotions exist for some mythical fictious creature named God it's perfectly fine.
But if it is for some imaginary friend its screwy.
jimakazi

and throw them into the furnace of fire; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.

Really, seems hard for people to weep if they are in a furnace - literal?
43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father
Are we to take this litterally too - souldn't like these guys are burning coz we know how the sun shines - it's on fire! or is "shining like the sun" not litteral.
Anybody, for example a human phycopath that wll delibrately burn someone - let alone a "loving" god that will cook people in hell is not fit for worship. It's akin to supporting a dictator like Saddan Hussain becasue you fear for your life. To think that people should obey God out of fear of hell because of some inconsistant passages in the bible seems unreasonable. Yes INCONSITANT as why didn't God mention hell in Genesis - slip his mind did it - not important information?
You don't like the peanut butter example - why? How is what god did any different - oh thats right his test was don't eat from the tree, and the result was death - stake a lot higher - and yet why did he alow Satan to test them.
There may be problems with what the JW's teach - BUT - this is not one of them.
Evanescence

Are we to take this litterally too - souldn't like these guys are burning coz we know how the sun shines - it's on fire! or is "shining like the sun" not litteral.
Anybody, for example a human phycopath that wll delibrately burn someone - let alone a "loving" god that will cook people in hell is not fit for worship. It's akin to supporting a dictator like Saddan Hussain becasue you fear for your life. To think that people should obey God out of fear of hell because of some inconsistant passages in the bible seems unreasonable. Yes INCONSITANT as why didn't God mention hell in Genesis - slip his mind did it - not important information?
You don't like the peanut butter example - why? How is what god did any different - oh thats right his test was don't eat from the tree, and the result was death - stake a lot higher - and yet why did he alow Satan to test them.
There may be problems with what the JW's teach - BUT - this is not one of them.

what the scriptures paint is imagery, as I said earlier the way people think back then is not how we think today, they do not get all logic and look at scientific explanations.
The righteous shining of light does not mean burning. Shining like the sun sybolises light, happieness, holyness, joy, light colours sybolises these things while black and dark colours sybolise depressing, sad, gloomy.
God does not want us to worship him because they fear hell, when you become christian and grow you will learn to overcome this fear of hell *although some still struggle at times* and worship god out of love not fear.
This is different to Saddam people are only obeying Saddam out of fear.
We honour and worship god with love.
Hell is only reserved for those who reject god.
Evanescence
donkey

God does not want us to worship him because they fear hell, when you become christian and grow you will learn to overcome this fear of hell *although some still struggle at times* and worship god out of love not fear.
This is different to Saddam people are only obeying Saddam out of fear.
We honour and worship god with love.
Hell is only reserved for those who reject god.

OK lets rewrite that as follows:
My imaginary friend does not want us to worship him because they fear hell, when you become a believer and grow you will learn to overcome this fear of hell *although some still struggle at times* and worship my imaginary friend out of love not fear.
This is different to Saddam people are only obeying Saddam out of fear.
We honour and worship our imaginary friends with love.
Hell is only reserved for those who reject imaginary friends.
Seem cuckoo yet? The rewritten piece is actually as accurate as the first piece though...but societal conditioning over which imaginary friends are acceptable changes the level of acceptance if you phrase it using different linguistics.
funkyderek

God hates sending people to hell, he does what he can to save us,

Well, as long as he's doing whatever he can. Maybe if he keeps trying he can figure out a way.
(A hint if you're reading, God: If you don't want people to go to hell, they don't have to go. You're omnipotent, remember!)
andy2tanx

'Hell is only reserved for those who reject god.' So, I don't believe in any sort of god. I have no proof it exists. I have never spoken to any sort of deity. And said deity has never bothered to speak to me. As a result, I can't think why I would want to acknowledge the existence of a god, let alone love it. By your previous statement, that means I am condemned to spend eternity in hell, right? In fact, to add insult to injury, you claim 'Really we are the ones that send ourselves to hell by rejecting gods grace.' Therefore, my future demise and descent into the depths of hell, to suffer eternal fiery torment, is all my fault!! Get real. You cannot possibly meant that. I mean, religion has resulted in some REALLY stupid things being said and done on this planet, but your statement that those in hell (which doesn't exist) have sent themselves there is total hogwash. And quite disturbing too. Surely, if there is a hell, it should be reserved for priests who interfere with children and the types who plant bombs on buses....
jimakazi

Hi Evanescence
I checked your profile but no Bio. Whats your story?
Are you an Ex JW that converted to Catholicism? If so I'd be interested to know why.
My children are going to a catholic school [thjey are baptised], and my wife is catholic [born and bred so to say]. What I find interesting is she doesn't believe in a litteral hell [even though this is part of her faith]. I have attended mass with her and the kids a couple of time and find the traddition / ritual to be a nice change from what i'd experienced as a JW.
One defination of faith I looked up once was: belief without evidence. To have faith in this modern world is a rare thing, it can be defended, it can be domonstated, but by defination, it cannot be proved.
My personal belief is that if a divine being, or creator exists, and that he would is somewhat less petty than what is portrayed in the bible, certainly not a dictator, and no phycopath.
On subject of the bible I think the polite thing to say is that it's not well understood. Some of it may well be divine [round earth, hanging on nothing was an advance concept] but I think there a fair mix of human influecne - could every thought the prophets and co put to writing be inspried, or were some just bad dreams. Did they sometimes elaborate or exagerate - point is we don't know. I think people can take the bible far to literally, or put meanings to it that are open to interpretation. Given this I'm not going to attribute god with burning people - I don't understand why Jesus said what he did - but it's incompatable with my view of god. If I'm wrong I guess I will have a warm after life.
Evanescence

'Hell is only reserved for those who reject god.' So, I don't believe in any sort of god. I have no proof it exists. I have never spoken to any sort of deity. And said deity has never bothered to speak to me. As a result, I can't think why I would want to acknowledge the existence of a god, let alone love it. By your previous statement, that means I am condemned to spend eternity in hell, right? In fact, to add insult to injury, you claim 'Really we are the ones that send ourselves to hell by rejecting gods grace.' Therefore, my future demise and descent into the depths of hell, to suffer eternal fiery torment, is all my fault!! Get real. You cannot possibly meant that. I mean, religion has resulted in some REALLY stupid things being said and done on this planet, but your statement that those in hell (which doesn't exist) have sent themselves there is total hogwash. And quite disturbing too. Surely, if there is a hell, it should be reserved for priests who interfere with children and the types who plant bombs on buses....
"Diety has never bothered to speak to me" Are you sure about that? God is trying to talk to you but will you listen? I am bacically saying that we send ourselves to hell if we chose not to believe god. God really loves you all, whether you believe in him or not, it will not change the facts. Know that he is there to ease your brokenheart from the damage the Jehovah's witness did to you, The parable of the prodical son shows that god is willing to welcome you with open arms. The story jesus said about the 99 sheep and the one going astray shows that god really wants you back. The shepherd left the 99 to look for the 1 sheep! this shows that even if a sheep is lost god will do anything he can to find the sheep! But as a lost sheep will it let god lead him back or will he continue to hide and refuse to listen to the shephard? If a sheep continues to run away then it is bound to venture in hells grounds and will be eternily lost by the shepherd, the shephed would be sad and grieved that the sheep left him. See the sheep chose to run away by his own free will and the shepherd did everything he could to lead it back.
(A hint if you're reading, God: If you don't want people to go to hell, they don't have to go. You're omnipotent, remember!)
God does not want to take away anyones free will, he will not force us to like him. I understand the pain the ex-jws have gone through in the Jehovah's religion. Just note that I am only expressing my point of view so please do not get upset. My comments are not there to harm you. Evanescence

Is Love of God Real?

Share this