Let's look at this imperfect God of the Abrahamic peoples from a different perspective.
This God sacrifices his son for the sake of the world, and since his son is Him, it's really self-sacrifice. I'm not sure why he needed to do that. He's God, so he was capable of opening the gates of Heaven on his own. But okay.
The Bible is full of words about his jealousy, wrath, and vengeance. He tells man not to be like him in these ways, then condones stoning and gives forth a list of people that should be killed. But then his Son comes along, and we are freed from these old ways so that "Thou shalt not kill" becomes the supreme law. Good call, God. Laws should change with the times, and compassion is admirable.
He drowns the world in a flood, but he saves some righteous people. He later sees what he has done and vows not to do it again. So this is a god that can regret and learn from his mistakes and learn better judgement through experience.
If you apologize, he'll forgive you, as long as you're sincere.
If you come to him, and seek him, he will accept you and give you unconditional love, even if you err, provided you are trying, because he does not expect perfection. He tells us to love. Jesus said that the greatest commandment was to love God, with the second greatest being to love your neighbor.
If you call upon him, he will listen to your prayers, giving you strength, courage, protection, whatever he can, within reason. He can be a good friend.
If you're a good person and you do good in the world, he will bless you--even if you have to wait til you're old and gray for that happy ending you deserve, like in The Color Purple, or until you're dead and go to Heaven. He rewards people for doing good.
God preached a fair bit of intolerance, but then his son Jesus began encouraging tolerance--and yea, God saw that this was good. It's good to change for the better. Sometimes the best thing to do is change your mind.
If you do wrong, he punishes you. There has to be some justice, some repurcussions for a man's actions, after all.
He recognizes the innocence and sacredness of children.
He is a Creator.
He takes full responsibility for his actions and offers no excuses, but does try to explain them. One of my favorite stories of gods taking responsibility is the story of Aries and Aphrodite, who are caught in the act of adultry by Hephaestus; undaunted by their shame, they name their daughter Harmony, who becomes the apple of her father's eye.
He can show mercy.
He acts as our judge in the end, judging us by the summation of our lives rather than this or that, and encourages us not to judge others, as we don't know them as He does. Both God and Jesus were anti-hypocrisy.
He wants us to realize that we are naturally sinners and accept that we are not perfect.
God wants us to have faith. Jesus once praised a Pagan's faith, incidentally. She was Roman.
He encourages people to give to the poor, to be faithful to their spouses, to work hard but observe a day of rest, to tell the truth. Don't kill, don't steal, don't waste.
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. - Ephesians 5:1
This God sacrifices his son for the sake of the world, and since his son is Him, it's really self-sacrifice. I'm not sure why he needed to do that. He's God, so he was capable of opening the gates of Heaven on his own. But okay.
The Bible is full of words about his jealousy, wrath, and vengeance. He tells man not to be like him in these ways, then condones stoning and gives forth a list of people that should be killed. But then his Son comes along, and we are freed from these old ways so that "Thou shalt not kill" becomes the supreme law. Good call, God. Laws should change with the times, and compassion is admirable.
He drowns the world in a flood, but he saves some righteous people. He later sees what he has done and vows not to do it again. So this is a god that can regret and learn from his mistakes and learn better judgement through experience.
If you apologize, he'll forgive you, as long as you're sincere.
If you come to him, and seek him, he will accept you and give you unconditional love, even if you err, provided you are trying, because he does not expect perfection. He tells us to love. Jesus said that the greatest commandment was to love God, with the second greatest being to love your neighbor.
If you call upon him, he will listen to your prayers, giving you strength, courage, protection, whatever he can, within reason. He can be a good friend.
If you're a good person and you do good in the world, he will bless you--even if you have to wait til you're old and gray for that happy ending you deserve, like in The Color Purple, or until you're dead and go to Heaven. He rewards people for doing good.
God preached a fair bit of intolerance, but then his son Jesus began encouraging tolerance--and yea, God saw that this was good. It's good to change for the better. Sometimes the best thing to do is change your mind.
If you do wrong, he punishes you. There has to be some justice, some repurcussions for a man's actions, after all.
He recognizes the innocence and sacredness of children.
He is a Creator.
He takes full responsibility for his actions and offers no excuses, but does try to explain them. One of my favorite stories of gods taking responsibility is the story of Aries and Aphrodite, who are caught in the act of adultry by Hephaestus; undaunted by their shame, they name their daughter Harmony, who becomes the apple of her father's eye.
He can show mercy.
He acts as our judge in the end, judging us by the summation of our lives rather than this or that, and encourages us not to judge others, as we don't know them as He does. Both God and Jesus were anti-hypocrisy.
He wants us to realize that we are naturally sinners and accept that we are not perfect.
God wants us to have faith. Jesus once praised a Pagan's faith, incidentally. She was Roman.
He encourages people to give to the poor, to be faithful to their spouses, to work hard but observe a day of rest, to tell the truth. Don't kill, don't steal, don't waste.
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. - Ephesians 5:1
No comments:
Post a Comment