Prove God
October 12, 2007
What the Church says: God is. He just exists. There is no ‘definition’ of who He is and His ways are supreme, righteous, and warrant no challenges; after all, the Bible says that we should only test the Lord in our tithes and offerings. God does not have to prove himself and, in fact, to do so would be to challenge who he is. That being said, the Bible itself proves the existence of the Almighty anyways so why question who He is?
What they say: How can you use the book that publishes God as the creator to justify who he is; moreover, how do you prove ‘God’ with… ‘God?’ Specifically, the Bible is the one that establishes God as the Judeo-Christian entity that we have ‘accepted’ and now ‘challenge,’ but in order to validate it’s claims, the Church tells us to…look…in…it. Moreover, if I created a text that established that Muskucs exist in captivity and that for proof of their existence, I ask you to look to my writings…which first establish their existence and nature…have I not then created for you a circular logic that will only leave you at step one over and over again?
But say we accept the writings of the Bible on the character of God; not accept who He is perse, but rather what is written in the Book. How, then, are we supposed to ‘accept’ this version of God when what we see in our world totally contradicts the existence of a benevolent deity? We are supposed to accept that God is loving when children are being abused and killed daily; we are supposed to believe that God answers prayers when our mothers, fathers, and spouses die of cancer. We are supposed to accept that God exists in a world full of suffering, pain, evil, and despair. Because this book tells us. And never mind that we can’t question why or how He exists in such a state of contradiction, but that we should walk in faith. Seems all too self-fulfilling for the prophets and a cop-out for modern man.
What I say: When you were born, the hospital created a record of your birth and issued your parents a birth certificate which they used to obtain a social security card for you. When you hit adolescence and needed your driver’s permit, you had to provide these things to the DMV as proof of who you were. Did they ask you to prove who you are? Moreover, did they ask you to perform selfless acts of love to prove that you are a loving person? Or to save a child from a murderer’s hands to prove that you are merciful? Did you have to do anything more than present these papers backing up your claims of being ‘you’? Why, then, do we ask the same of the Creator? He cannot be just as we are? Are you any more of a John or Jane because you can perform spectacular sights on command; more specifically, are you defined by what you do rather than your inherit nature or being? Yet we as the inferior man presume to put standards on the superior God?
At the point where we grant that what the Bible teaches is accurate, we grant that God is. Why? Because that is what the Bible says. We cannot take parts of the Bible to suit our needs; it’s an all or nothing deal. Why? Because the Bible says! At the very minute that we concede the Bible, we concede God; or rather, the idea of God– not necessarily the Judeo-Christian God. Meaning, we concede that there is a God so the next step is to determine who He is. Moreover, is he the God represented in the Bible, the Qur’an, or the Torah? Yet how can we question who he is when we have already accepted that the Bible is an accurate source? It would seem the paradox that we created would lead to the assumption that there is no answer and/or that God is a nice idea albeit an illusion.
But the ‘logic’ does not have to be so circular; we go to the Bible and hear about this ‘God’, we read further to find out more about this ‘God’ and who He is, we become to know ‘God.’ The issues in the whole ‘prove God in relation to the world’ debate, is not whether or not he exists (that is for another debate), but that his existence contradicts what is written about him and the way the world operates. However, they also use this contradiction to then say that He does not exist which doesn’t work because in order to initially say that He contradicts the nature of the world, we have to concede who he is! It’s like law: you cannot establish motive after the fact.
Semantics and logic aside, we should not be challenging the ‘who’ of God, but rather the ‘why.’ Why do we deserve such a merciful Father? Why is He always in our court? Why does he love me uniquely? It would seem that in light of the world, why is God still the unchanging lover that He is?
Again, I would like to note that this is but the mere tip of the iceberg, but that it is also from my stream of consciousness alone. Til next post…
Tags: question, God, prove, Judeo-Christian
Good God!
September 19, 2007
Free will is not mutually exclusive with the omniscience of God; God’s foreknowledge does not force me to do or not do an action (after all, I don’t have the same knowledge so how do I know I am doing that which is ‘preconceived’). I know and egg will break if I drop it, but does my knowledge of this make it any more possible or impossible? Measuring determinism to knowledge is like measuring carrots to tires– two separate entities…
God does not have to prove Himself; He would not be any more ‘God’ if He did one more miracle than He already has or chose not to make the rain stop. Just as I can’t be anymore ‘Jen’– I just am and there is no one like me, God just IS. The real issue should not be if God is possible, but if an actual creator exists (then….lol….look around…it’s apparent)…
The president met you four years ago…once. He sees you again and remembers your name. Do you feel special?
God knows your name, the number of hairs on your head, the intimate thoughts in your head, and has your name engraved on the palms of his hands. He has promised men in exchange for you…how much more special do you feel?
God’s Love
September 18, 2007
What the Church says: God is love. He is omnipotent (all-powerful), omnipresent (everywhere), and omniscient (all knowing). God is merciful, forgiving, and is the father of all. God loves all his children. All who follow him will go to heaven; sinners go to hell.
What they say: How can God be so loving and there are children dying, wars, and unjustified homicides? What kind of ‘love’ promotes war and chaos? What kind of ‘love’ allows for such a place as hell? After all, if he forgives all our sins, why the need? If God is all-good, he wouldn’t allow this state of being we call civilization. If God is omnipotent, he would not allow the bad that which he knows we are going to do. If he were omniscient, he would know to stop us or change our actions before they do ‘wrong’ or ‘bad’. **An aside: some say there is no right and wrong even. This will be discussed in later posts.
What I say: God loved us so much that he gave us free will. Think about it: did you like it as a child when your parents did not let you do that which you wanted to do? How beneficial would it have been if they decided to make all your decisions for you unto adulthood? What is it we are taught? That we need to make our own mistakes in order to be a better person? Why is this same concept not applied to the father-child relationship that is God and man? God allows us to be who we want to be in order for us to grow. We can’t know that we need him til we need him; we can’t know that the blindness that is ignorance is a crutch until we find out for ourselves. Who wants a forced love?
So if we have this free will, how can God control us? Is this not the antithesis of free will? How does a master control his slave if he has freed his slave? He has no more control over this fellow man than the next master. If we are going to use a vacuum test for every quality of God, we have to use it for the non-quality. Think about it: if God controlled us at all times, how is he loving us? How is he letting us be who we are. Moreover, God wouldn’t have to love us as then we would be nothing more than robots that he controls– toys to play with. It defeats the purpose of a loving God, a Father, a reason for life.
God is not fair– he does not have to be– he’s just. A judge may send away his only son to imprisonment for life for killing a man, but that does not mean that he loves his son any less. Is it fair that he has to send away his only son? Some would not think so; moreover, he would not think so. Is it just? The law is the law; a judge cannot deny that which has been established by the lawmakers. Why is God not fair? Because it would contradict his very nature. It would mean that he would have to intervene and control our every move; sure, not all of us are killers, rapists, or child molesters, but then we are presuming to set standards on what is a greater or lesser evil. If God has to intervene in instances of ‘greater’ evils, why not ‘lesser?’ To control us would to kill our nature and our very being. It would eliminate our identity. By not being ‘fair’ by our standards, He really is being fair by a universal standard: is it not more fair to allow us to be who we are and to be afforded the glory of God and Heaven than not? Relativity tells us that there can not be a standard of what is and is not fair so how can we hold anyone let alone God accountable to a dynamic illusion?
God’s knowledge of what I am going to do does not make him any more or less loving. Jesus wept. Is it not the natural reaction of a parent to weep when their child has gone against what they have taught them? Just because God does not do anything in our eyes, does not mean that he is not doing anything at all. He can cry right along with us, can he not? But actually, God does not have to react at all to be more ‘godly’ than he already is. He does not have to prove himself. Do you have to prove who you are to your parents on a daily basis? To your wife? Perhaps your kids!? Why then does God have to repeatedly prove himself to us? Why does he have to be a good guy for our viewing pleasure and to appease our logic? Where does it say in any book anywhere that God must do xy and z in oder to prove that He is who we know him to be? Since when did we set the standards of the Almighty?
We bitch and complain that God is not loving by not stopping baby killers and child molesters. We argue that he isn’t loving because he does not give them their just deserves. Yet we don’t like the idea of hell? We don’t like the idea that God would set up a place to punish the very beings we despise because said place is also a contradiction of his loving nature… Remind me again…what is fair? …But wait, is God throwing people in the lakes of fire without warning? Does he hold a random lottery where he decides who will go and who will stay? Is there no forewarning of the consequences to come? Then how is he bad? How is he not being just, fair, or even loving? He loves us so he sets up a place where we can live in eternal happiness. Would you be happy forever with the sinners of the earth? You don’t seem very happy now…
Until next time: I have not even touched the tip of the iceberg of what ‘I say.’ Stay tuned for the cluster fock that is my mind.
Tags: God is love, free will
Nazarene
September 15, 2007
Why, Nazarene, do you help these men?
They forget you, curse you, and use you
Their faith without works, carpenter-
When did they help you win?
They listened to your words
But they did not care for a Jew
As you were crucified.
They listen to my words- light;
They kill, steal, lie, and turn from you.
What smooth talking ways do you have?
With your do’s and don’ts and trying to do right?
Come on down here, Nazarene
Take your children home.
Do you think they’ll remember you?
Not with me here to cause a scene.
Tags: Jew, crucified, Nazarene
Bible vs. Man
September 12, 2007
Let’s take an aside guys and examine this ‘religion‘ we are talking about.
The Bible says man is inadequate and needs Jesus to enter Heaven.
The Bible says that man cannot accomplish this by his own merits.
The Bible says that man must be a servant to others and give up of himself.
The Bible says that man cannot succumb to the desires of the flesh.
The Bible says that man cannot do many things that contradicts his inherent desires.
Man is selfish.
Man is inherently programmed to look out for number one.
Man desires worldly things, lusts for the opposite sex, and covets that which is not his.
Man will always adhere to the survival of the fittest; that’s just their way.
Man is prideful.
Man will not be told that they cannot do something.
Man always looks for the spotlight.
Man always looks for an easy out.
If man is inherently selfish, and man is inherently prideful, why would man write a book that states they cannot win? A book that states that they cannot do anything on their own merits and that they must succumb to others? Why would man write a book that contradicts their very nature? Why would man voluntarily make things hard for himself? It makes no sense! The Bible is a book that man could would not write. But we are told that it is God-breathed; that the words are spoken by God to man, transcribed to paper.
Of all the religions in the world, why would man choose the one religion that states beyond a doubt that there is not one single thing he can do on this earth that will guarantee him eternal happiness? Not one thing apart from accepting Christ and becoming a true believer. But alone, man can do nothing. Man is selfish! Given a state of total anarchy, man will look out for himself! Why then, write this book that tells man to serve their brothers, give of themselves, and be the good Samaritan? Given the choice, man would inherently want to let the next guy be the charity giver, lol.
Man’s very nature contradicts everything the Bible asks of man. Maybe religion is not supposed to be easy, but given the opportunity to write such a ‘manual to man,’ would man really restrict himself so voluntarily?
Translate God
September 11, 2007
No matter what they say, the church says, or I say, what God says will always be questioned…I wonder why…
He Already Answered
September 10, 2007
What the Church says: God answers prayers. In fact, where two or more come together in agreement by prayer, He listens and answers. God provides. In fact, while you are not to test the Lord your God, you can test him in your tithes: that if you give your 10%, He will increase it 30-60-100 fold. You hear that every time the offering plate is about to be passed; after all, it’s true. Moreover, God would not let you go without; he clothes the naked and feeds the hungry. The church says, God listens. And God answers prayer.
God’s answer does not necessarily have to be an affirmative one either; He can say no. It may not be the answer you want or like, but it is an answer.
What they say: Answers?? When?? How?? If God answers prayers, why are there still children dying, hunger, and war? What happened to that raise at work I prayed so hard for? Why did my only child die of cancer when she was only 12? How did God answer me when I am left with more questions than I started with? I asked for a cure. I asked for a better job. I asked for a new home. I asked for my rapist to be brought to justice.
God does not answer prayers; I can’t even be sure he listens. How can no be an answer to someone asking for their mother, spouse, or child to be spared from pain and even death? How can this God of love who listens to prayers and loves his children answer no? God doesn’t answer no. He just doesn’t answer at all.
What I say: Ever read the books of Job, Isaiah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Haggai, Malachi, Matthew, Romans…the Bible? Modern man has not proposed any questions that God hasn’t already heard or even answered before. In Job He really puts the tester to the test, in Isaiah He tells you just how much He has given you and up for you, in Nahum He tells you that the guilty will be punished, and in Habakkuk onward, He tells you about the wealth He can and will bestow on you if you follow and love Him. He promises to take care of you.
But yet nowhere in the Good Book does God say anything about being a genie from a lamp who will grant you unlimited wishes til your heart’s content. You asked for a raise so God gave you a new job opportunity. You asked for your child to be spared from pain so He took her to be with Him. You asked for your mother to live and she now has life eternal.
Did you ever ask someone a question only to have another one thrown at you? Annoying as it was, did you get the message? Just because the answer is not the one we wanted, does not mean it was necessarily the wrong one. God did say that you could test him in your tithes, but he does not say that it’s the next Wall Street: invest in me as my stock will always increase in value for you to cash out for a nice sum soon. Malachi tells us that God was trying to bring the descendants of Jacob back to Him; that God would show them the truths He already promised his children and that if they followed the ways He set forth, He would do the same for them. Pastors and religious leaders tend to embellish the riches that God promises. God doesn’t command us to tithe so that He may pay dividends on those tithes to support you. He asks us to tithe so He can keep you blessed.
Who hasn’t seen the email about the little boy wanting a dog from a farmer and chooses the runt with a gimp leg because he, having problems with his legs himself, can relate to the young pup? It is meant to stir the emotions of the heart as most cannot resist the innocence of a child, but it also shows that life is all about perspectives/relativity: what is disregarded by one, may be golden to another. A millionaire can ask God for a raise and find a lousy $100 bill in the gutter and scoff, but let a homeless family of four find that same $100 bill and they are in heaven. While not every case has a definitive upside, why can’t we trust the all-knowing favor of God?
