Christian responsibility to beg for mercy (Jesus Christ, Earth, gospel, Kingdom)

[angellous_evangellous]

Originally Posted by nightwolf

Should he step in and save a world that cares less about him and his rules?

Yes! That's why we pray for the kingdom to come! How could we even entertain the thought that God should leave the world as it is! How inhumane and intolerable it is to all people to detroy themselves in madness when you can effortlessly heal them! Who in their right mind would wish for their own destruction?

He gave us life, he already done us a huge favor, now we blame him for everything? There we go pointing the finger! Where is God? He is watching as we give into sin and waiting for that moment when he will come to get his people. We cause our problems, not God.

No huge favor to be born into an evil world. No thanks.

[angellous_evangellous]

Originally Posted by nightwolf

Where is God?

If you can adequately answer this question, then you've truly accomplished something.

My answer is that God is in the same place today that he was when Jesus was crucified.

He is watching as we give into sin and waiting for that moment when he will come to get his people. We cause our problems, not God.

In ethics, there is something called an obligation ethic. The premise of the ethic is quite simple:

We are obligated to assist others on a sliding scale based on the effort or risk that it costs us wieghed against the benefit that the other person receives from our actions.

For example, if someone is drowning and we could quite effortlessly throw them a life preserver, we are greatly obligated to do so - even if they want to drown. We can assume that a person who is healthy does not want to die, and we should help them be restored to health because a normal person desires to care for their body.

God, who could give unimaginable benefits to everyone could effortlessly heal humanity. Withholding his healing to the masses is comparable to us sitting and watching the whole world drown, while we sit comfortably on the shore with plenty of life-saving equiptment - unwilling or unable to help our fellow humans. In either case, withholding life-saving devises in unethical and inhumane.

[angellous_evangellous]

bump*

[evearael]

God, who could give unimaginable benefits to everyone could effortlessly heal humanity. Withholding his healing to the masses is comparable to us sitting and watching the whole world drown, while we sit comfortably on the shore with plenty of life-saving equiptment - unwilling or unable to help our fellow humans. In either case, withholding life-saving devises in unethical and inhumane.

Good and evil are the natural products of free will. The opposition of good and evil causes struggling. Without struggle, there is no spiritual growth. I don't want to see God intervene and end all evil in the world... I want to see humans rise to the occassion and do it themselves. It is within our grasp, all we need is the will.

[angellous_evangellous]

Originally Posted by evearael

Good and evil are the natural products of free will. The opposition of good and evil causes struggling. Without struggle, there is no spiritual growth. I don't want to see God intervene and end all evil in the world... I want to see humans rise to the occassion and do it themselves. It is within our grasp, all we need is the will.

If we have to rise to the occasion and do it ourselves, what does that say about God? Why should we be responsible to end suffering by great effort while God can end it effortlessly?

I completely disagree that we need a struggle between good and evil for growth. It is possible to struggle for good things only. It is tough to learn things, but we could enrich ourselves only with the good if evil did not exist - and good can exist without evil. To conclude otherwise is the worst kind of dualism.

[evearael]

what does that say about God?

He is a good parent. There comes a time when a child must stand on their own. Children will stumble, children will fall, children will tumble, but without these experiences they never learn to walk on their own two feet. These struggles are a spiritual growing experience, however painful, and they make us stronger if we can only see it.

Why should we be responsible to end suffering by great effort while God can end it effortlessly?

Ecclessiates 3:9-14:

9 What does the worker gain from his toil? 10 I have seen the burden God has laid on men. 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. 12 I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. 13 That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil—this is the gift of God. 14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him.

[sojourner]

If we can't trust God to end suffering here, why on earth should we entrust him with our future?

We humans (especially Americans) see suffering as the absence of God. Perhpas we should be looking for God within the reality of human suffering, not outside the realm of human suffering. I believe that God is most available to us in our suffering, and God, having suffered on the cross, stands with us in solidarity in our suffering.

Because we cause the suffering! Not God! We are so fast as humans to point the finger and blame this person and that, and we refuse to point the finger where it belongs, at ourselves. God does not want us to suffer, he wants us to live by his rules!

Huh? We don't always cause suffering! sometimes we are quite simply victims. What about people who are born with birth defects through no cause of their parents? What about those who are mentally ill, through no cause of their own (drugs, stress, etc.)? Humanity just suffers. We always have. If we're looking to end suffering or to blame it on someone or something, we're looking in the wrong place for peace and happiness.

[angellous_evangellous]

Originally Posted by sojourner

We humans (especially Americans) see suffering as the absence of God. Perhpas we should be looking for God within the reality of human suffering, not outside the realm of human suffering. I believe that God is most available to us in our suffering, and God, having suffered on the cross, stands with us in solidarity in our suffering.

Compare to post 5 and 6.

I appreciate your insights, but it does not address the question.

God is not ending suffering now, so why should we entrust him with our future?

Suffering for growth and solodarity is not a good enough reason for evil to exist.

[evearael]

God is not ending suffering now, so why should we trust him to end suffering in the future?

He has given us the means. It is our responsibility to use them.