I’m not asking for God to stop all accidents. To stop people from feeling the pain of breaking an arm, or of unrequited love.
That’s much, much different than the suffering caused by starving to death over the course of a month or so because the crops have failed due to a drought, or being born with spina bifida or multiple scleroisis or things of that nature.
Logically, for a loving God, it should be enough for people to know the difference between “good” and “bad” and “happiness” and sadness."
Joy comes out of that.
We don’t need to be exposed to sheer unadulterated evil to know what joy is.
A gentle reminder that I decided it is best that we not respond to one another. I want fond remembrances of you. Keep in mind, I believe in evolution. I don’t believe that by next week one of my chinchillas will evolve into a unicorn while the other one evolves into an eagle. What!!! Then I must not believe in the power of nature or in evolution! (Isn’t that what you are saying when I point out observations of how God works…that if I don’t believe God works in the way you demand He works, I must not believe in God or the power of God?) In the same way, I must not really believe in the theory of evolution when evolution doesn’t work the way a non-believer of evolution demand that it work.
Having a strong scientific bent, I observe, and merely point out what I have observed. That is why it is best we part company. When I am speaking of what is we simply speak past each other when you begin talking about what it is you think that I am thinking. I am not thinking what you have determined for yourself I must be thinking. In other words, you are not speaking to me at all, but to some idea in your own mind of who you imagine me to be. And the person you currently imagine me to be is someone who thinks God is impotent. That is not me. It is why I elected not to respond to you to begin with, and that reason remains in play.
Sheesh. I ask a question in good faith. If God could have intervened to stop Hitler how would He not also have the power to intervene to stop these imaginary trickle down effects?
It is a difficult problem to resolve for those who think God interacts with our reality as it appears…random/capricious.
One of my favorite Bible passages is in 1 Kings. Elijah goes and stands on a mountain because the Lord will be passing by. Great events unfolded…but the Lord was not in any of them. He was found in a tiny whisper.
Likewise today we see people looking for God in the great world events surrounding Hitler, a fiery, roaring crash, a flashing bullet. The conclusion appears to be since God cannot be found in these events, He cannot be found anywhere.
Let’s not forget the tiny whispering sound or the ordinary life. Be still and know that I am God… Begin with knowing God loves you and He invites you into love as well. Start there.
And there’s a reason WW2 is taught as a vital event in world history, and there’s a reason why Hitler is viewed as a consequentual, notable figure in history. Not whatever God whispers in your ear or into your bowl of ice cream on a Friday night
Isn’t the entire basis of Christianity that God intervened in humanity to save it and performed miracles? Kind of weird how some Christians are so against the idea
In this thread, miracles not where I wish to start. As an analogy, in school we begin with simple counting before progressing towards calculus and physics. If we began with calculus, students would not understand it, and further, they would have no wish to then learn to count it counting was eventually going to lead to a level of math they would not understand.
The same with miracles. They are at a level that can barely be grasped, and we cannot grasp what lies beyond. And what I seem to be getting here is, Why start with love and a decade or more of seeking if it is only going to lead to what we cannot understand?
There is no point in telling of the miracles in my own life, because they have absolutely nothing to do with anyone else. Think of Peter walking on water. Does that event change a single instance in your own life? What about Lazarus who was raised from the dead? Does that event change a single instance in your life? Neither certainly changed anything in my life.
What changed my life? Learning to love God and learning to love others. That may have been what brought the miracles, as few as there have been. Think about it. If a miracle came to you in your life, what would you do until the next miracle happened? Quite a bit of time can pass between miracles.
Wouldn’t your questions be: Why not a miracle every day, every minute? Why not bigger miracles? Why not national miracles, universal miracles, why just personal miracles? Is life worth living without miracles? Anyway, I do not wish to talk about miracles. They lead into what we do not yet know. Let’s start with the basics and learn from there.
