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“God loves you anyway” – does He really?

syo

Well-Known Member
Just because you have hate in your heart for revenge against Hitler doesn't mean God has hate in His heart.
hate? revenge? what are you talking about? hitler lived a life of misery and he will live a life of misery in the afterlife. he will rip what he sow. what does hate and revenge have to do with hitler?
 

savagewind

Veteran Member
Premium Member
A person can strive to be with Jehovah. 1 Corinthians 6:17 John 17:21 1 Corinthians 6:15 Galatians 2:20 But it isn't the same as the love of God. They are different and it is silly to make them mean the same thing, imo.

God is love. God does not stop being that. But, a bad person cannot become a temple of God 1 Corinthians 3:16 and it is not because God hates the person. It is because God can not share in evil doings.

Obviously.
 

savagewind

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Jealousy is never good.
So? Why would anyone write that God is jealous? It seems that according to you, it is the same as saying God is bad. If you look up the scriptures it is Jehovah speaking of God's self as being jealous. And, that makes sense to you, which is funny, I think. If jealousy is always bad then God is saying, I am bad and my name is bad too.
 

savagewind

Veteran Member
Premium Member
hate? revenge? what are you talking about? hitler lived a life of misery and he will live a life of misery in the afterlife. he will rip what he sow. what does hate and revenge have to do with hitler?
What do you think about justice? A man lives some years making other people miserable and the penalty should be misery forever? I think that the loving thing to do to such a person is to treat him like the animal he is. Kill him. Do animals go to heaven or hell? They just die. Right? Game over.
 

The Kilted Heathen

Crow FreyjasmaðR
The word translated "jealous" in Exodus 20:5 is "qanna'" used only with regard to Jehovah.
And, as said, means "jealous", not protective or other some such interpretations. It's jealousy in regards to worship, which is pretty difficult to apply to another human. For example, if Norse myths were written in Hebrew and my gods fretted over foreign worship, it could be said that they were "qanna" of their people as well.

It's still a negative quality in that - while it's not in regards to romance or sexuality - it's still possession, and still born of a petty nature.

When humans spurned God's guidance in the beginning and broke his law, there was no basis to show mercy because they did not make a mistake due to some defect in themselves. They deliberately disobeyed because of a purely selfish motive.
While I am (for once) agreeing with your lot in that your god isn't all-loving, this is wrong. In order to act selfishly, Adam and Eve would have to have known what was right and what was wrong. They did not. You're reading their actions as though someone today would have done them, when mythically that's not the case. When they were questioned, then they did know that what they had done was wrong. But not before.
 

The Kilted Heathen

Crow FreyjasmaðR
Why would anyone write that God is jealous?
Because Yahweh is, and it's an honest representation of one's god. It's no different than me acknowledging that Loki, Thor, and even Odin (quite often, actually) can be self-righteous [REDACTED].

If jealousy is always bad then God is saying, I am bad and my name is bad too.
"I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things." -Isaiah 45:7

Situations like this - believe it or not - are exactly why the concept of "the devil" was created around 400 CE. Jealousy is a bad thing. I maintain that there is not one good example of jealous actions and emotions; either romantically, divinely, or materialistically.
 

savagewind

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Because Yahweh is, and it's an honest representation of one's god. It's no different than me acknowledging that Loki, Thor, and even Odin (quite often, actually) can be self-righteous [REDACTED].


"I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things." -Isaiah 45:7

Situations like this - believe it or not - are exactly why the concept of "the devil" was created around 400 CE. Jealousy is a bad thing. I maintain that there is not one good example of jealous actions and emotions; either romantically, divinely, or materialistically.
Wonderful. Someday, I might know what redacted really means.
 

The Kilted Heathen

Crow FreyjasmaðR
Basically a more "extreme" version of jerk, but jerk is way too tame for some of the things done. Odin and Frigga once toyed with a king in order to dispose and kill him. Thor once killed a dwarf for no reason at all. And Loki is just full of fatal mischief.
 

ThePainefulTruth

Romantic-Cynic
I believe I read once the Coptic word for God is gender neutral. But obviously, an omnipotent God can be all things at once. That is what is means to be omnipotent. God has no limitations so God can be every gender and no gender all at the same time. God can be an anthropomorphic type God as well as pantheistic type God all at the same time.

Even an omnipotent God has limitations. God can't be the Truth and a lie at the same time. In fact, I believe that God is the embodiment of Truth. And God must be able to limit Itself, since that's what it had to do to allow us free will, which is the ability to choose between good and evil without divine influence.
 

dfnj

Well-Known Member
Even an omnipotent God has limitations. God can't be the Truth and a lie at the same time. In fact, I believe that God is the embodiment of Truth. And God must be able to limit Itself, since that's what it had to do to allow us free will, which is the ability to choose between good and evil without divine influence.

You are projecting your own anthropomorphic limitations on God. An omnipotent God is not bounded by the laws of logic and language. An omnipotent God is multidimensional. There are plenty of space-time dimensions where God could be every possible way of being imaginable. God can be nothingness and everything all at the same time. God can destroy himself and then bring himself back into existence afterwards. God is both anthropomorphic God and pantheistic God at the same time. Anything less would not be the definition of omnipotence.

I think you are just being small minded. You need to think bigger thoughts like our Big Bang is the result of a star collapsing to a black hole in another previously existing space-time dimension. With trillions of black holes creating trillions of Big Bang Universes eventually over this wider expanse of time every possible quantum state comes into existence as God realizes what it means to be omnipotent. Of course, I have no way to prove alternate dimensions of reality actually exist other than making an ontological leaning argument using language semantics.

Over the infinite number of alternate Universes each of us makes every possible choice we can make where each choice is played out for the rest of our lives. Not only is each choice played out, but our choices are played out against every other persons every possible choice. Every quantum state must be realized. God's omnipotence demands every possible reality must be realized at some point over time. God's experience of time is much different than yours or mine. In one alternate space-time dimension you are a saint. And in another you are a serial killer. God's omnipotence has no boundaries.
 
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HeatherAnn

Active Member
“God loves you anyway” – does He really?
...According to what I’ve learned in the Bible, I don’t think so.
According to the bible, "God is love" so it's kind of strange to think that Love does not love.
"I believe in the sun when it is not shining.
I believe in love even when feeling it not.
I believe in God even when God is silent."

Consider: What is love?
To me, love is appreciating what is, while striving for what is best, through trial and error - active faith.
God/Intelligent Design has established a world and life for us in order to love and be loved - to strive for what's best.
This is unconditional - no matter what circumstance - or what sin/incorrect thought and consequent action - God is experienced within us as love - because through all of the trial and error - we are and do strive for what's best. Some people take longer to learn from trial and error - but eventually, there is learning because there is a law which I consider similar to "cause and effect" that ensures that we have plenty of opportunities to learn, no matter how many times it takes.
 

ThePainefulTruth

Romantic-Cynic
You are projecting your own anthropomorphic limitations on God. An omnipotent God is not bounded by the laws of logic and language. An omnipotent God is multidimensional. There are plenty of space-time dimensions where God could be every possible way of being imaginable. God can be nothingness and everything all at the same time. God can destroy himself and then bring himself back into existence afterwards. God is both anthropomorphic God and pantheistic God at the same time. Anything less would not be the definition of omnipotence.

I think you are just being small minded. You need to think bigger thoughts like our Big Bang is the result of a star collapsing to a black hole in another previously existing space-time dimension. With trillions of black holes creating trillions of Big Bang Universes eventually over this wider expanse of time every possible quantum state comes into existence as God realizes what it means to be omnipotent. Of course, I have no way to prove alternate dimensions of reality actually exist other than making an ontological leaning argument using language semantics.

Over the infinite number of alternate Universes each of us makes every possible choice we can make where each choice is played out for the rest of our lives. Not only is each choice played out, but our choices are played out against every other persons every possible choice. Every quantum state must be realized. God's omnipotence demands every possible reality must be realized at some point over time. God's experience of time is much different than yours or mine. In one alternate space-time dimension you are a saint. And in another you are a serial killer. God's omnipotence has no boundaries.

You completely ignored the statement that an omnipotent God (multi-dimensional or otherwise) can limit Itself. If It couldn't, It wouldn't be omnipotent.
 

dfnj

Well-Known Member
You completely ignored the statement that an omnipotent God (multi-dimensional or otherwise) can limit Itself. If It couldn't, It wouldn't be omnipotent.

Can God have a thought so complex that even She couldn't understand it? Of course She can. As I've said, the word omnipotent implies semantic ambiguity. A sort of non-deterministic finite state transition where an omnipotent God is ALL things at the same time. So there is no limit to how God can limit Herself. There is no reality God cannot imagine into existence.
 

ThePainefulTruth

Romantic-Cynic
There is no reality God cannot imagine into existence.

There is one, where man has free will and knowledge of God's existence. If God came down and personally told everyone on Earth not to covet their neighbor's wife, and said, "I'm watching you", nobody would then do anything different than if nothing had happened?
 

Sleeppy

Fatalist. Christian. Pacifist.
So you would love them anyway and the title of this thread was either ill-conceived or slippery click-bait.

Now that that's clear, what would you like to talk about?

Parenthetically, asking whether or not "God loves you" is no less anthropopathic than is asking whether God likes pizza.

Malachi 1


It's a valid question. Misrepresentations of God have consequence.
 

Sleeppy

Fatalist. Christian. Pacifist.
I'm no scholar, and I could be wrong about this, but I don't think there's much in the bible to support the notion that the Christian God loves unconditionally. Rather, it seems to me that among the conditions He sets for His love is faith or belief in him, and possibly "good acts", etc. In short, His love is all too conditional, all too human, rather than godlike. That is one of the major reasons I do not find His existence credible.

Unconditional love is pretty nonsensical, and therefore actually pretty human.
 

dfnj

Well-Known Member
There is one, where man has free will and knowledge of God's existence. If God came down and personally told everyone on Earth not to covet their neighbor's wife, and said, "I'm watching you", nobody would then do anything different than if nothing had happened?

Free will is a delusion. Unless you have omnipotent powers to define what your choices are then you have no free will. We have no control over the list of choices we have to choose from.

Of course, if you believe in the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics then we have free-will over the larger multi-verse.
 

ThePainefulTruth

Romantic-Cynic
Free will is a delusion.

As it stands, a blind faith declaration.
Unless you have omnipotent powers to define what your choices are then you have no free will. We have no control over the list of choices we have to choose from.

That's my point. An omnipotent God can choose to share a portion of It's omnipotence by bestowing us with full self-awareness and the free will that enables.

Of course, if you believe in the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics then we have free-will over the larger multi-verse.

Actually, I believe the Multiverse and Copenhagen Interpretations are fading. I think the Transactional Interpretation is on the right track, and cosmologists are beginning to come around. Re: Ruth Kastner's Understanding Our Unseen Reality: Solving Quantum Riddles.(2015) TI explains all quantum weirdness, without no consciousness required. It's also much more intuitive.
 

Jeremiah Ames

Well-Known Member
Over the years I’ve heard a number of religious personalities from different so called Christian religions say that God loves everyone, He loves people no matter what. The last time I heard that was very recently.

I understand that from the perspective of people who don’t like to obey anything except their own whims it must be cool to belong to that kind of religion. The ideology of “do whatever you feel like and God will love you anyway” makes things easier, doesn’t it?

But from a Christian perspective, it doesn’t make any sense. Christians base their belief in the Bible, and the Bible contains a number of laws and principles that God himself requires people to follow. If it wasn’t important how people behave, He wouldn’t have bothered in the first place.

So, for example, does a person who is violent towards others, a person who steals or someone who commits adultery deserve to be loved by God? If they are not obeying God’s commands, then they don’t care about Him, so why would he care about them?

One can talk about forgiveness, which is mentioned frequently in the Bible, but forgiveness applies when people repent and stop doing whatever they were doing wrong. If someone acts against God’s principles, apologizes and then goes back to doing the same thing, would it make any sense for God to overlook their behavior and just love them anyway?

According to what I’ve learned in the Bible, I don’t think so.

I can’t agree.
God IS love. God IS mercy.
He does not think like us. We like retribution, and getting even.
If God had those characteristics, he would not be God, because He would not be love.

The rules you speak of, determine who will be in God’s eternal kingdom. While on earth, free will requires evil to exist.
But we will be separated upon death. Matthew 25:32. The separation will be based upon the rules.
 

Hockeycowboy

Witness for Jehovah
Premium Member
First Letter of John. In chapter 4, verse 8. It does not say that
God is a lover, but God is love. A love called agape, which is a
purely other-directed love, a love that seeks no response and demands no return, a love centered totally on the beloved. The damned cannot cause God not to love them; they cannot make God be not God.

Mt 22:36
"Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?"

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment." "The second is like it "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."




Mt 18:21
"I do not say to you seven times," "but seventy times seven."
Unless you think this was an order to offer 490 pardons before calling it quits, it is a command to forgive without limit.
You are Catholic, right? So, what's Hellfire all about, then?
 
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