diasters

[Grace]

we have had so many disasters this year. Perhaps we need to look into Revelation and see what God says about this. I know that God is a loving and graceful God, but He is also Holy and can not look at sin. Let us face facts: we all have sinned and fallen short of the grace of God. The world has turned its back on God and His commandments. We take God out of our streets, courts, schools and ridicule any that dares to question this.
Do we expect God to treat any of us diffe4rently then Sodam and Gomarah?
God tells us in His Word, there will be earthquakes, disaters, famine, and birth pains.
Do you think God just might be trying to get our attention?

Yes, I have great compassion and cry over the lives lost, but the souls we must reach. "To live is Christ and to die is Christ."

 

[michel]

we have had so many disasters this year. Perhaps we need to look into Revelation and see what God says about this. I know that God is a loving and graceful God, but He is also Holy and can not look at sin. Let us face facts: we all have sinned and fallen short of the grace of God. The world has turned its back on God and His commandments. We take God out of our streets, courts, schools and ridicule any that dares to question this.
Do we expect God to treat any of us diffe4rently then Sodam and Gomarah?
God tells us in His Word, there will be earthquakes, disaters, famine, and birth pains.
Do you think God just might be trying to get our attention?

Yes, I have great compassion and cry over the lives lost, but the souls we must reach. "To live is Christ and to die is Christ."

Nice post, and you make some good points; I have just looked at your profile, and you do not mention any religious faith - though in your post you quote the bible.

Your comment:"Yes, I have great compassion and cry over the lives lost, but the souls we must reach. "To live is Christ and to die is Christ."

Confuses me a little; as far as I am concerned, thetears are for the relatives of those who have died; personally, iI rejoice for those who are now with God; many of them had a pretty awful existance on Earth......however, they will all be in a better place now.

I am not so sure that the preponderance of disasters this year is significant -I see it as being mainly 'nasty coincidence' - there have been disasters since the beginning of time; maybe we are just in a year in which the odds are against us. As far as us sinning is concerned, show me a human who hasen't sinned.........I don't believe you will find one; that's the point of life to make the attempt not to sin; not necesarilly to succeed.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Do you think God just might be trying to get our attention?

Nice God you have ...

Look at them, Gabriel. They're running around, drinking and fornicating just like before. It's about time to shake them up a little.

It's just a thought, YHWH, but what about a humungous neon sign in the sky saying "REPENT"?

Don't be such a whimp, Gabriel. Why be effective when we can be vindictive?

Wait ... I've got it ... let's slaughter thousands upon thousands of innocent people. Let the mothers see their children's heads crushed under tons of stone, let the fathers see their wives and children thrashing violently as they're sucked under by the tsunami - hell, this could be almost as much fun as the flood. And just for chuckles, if we time it right, we'll have the Muslims blaiming the western infidel, the Christians blaiming the queers, and the Jews blaiming the Reform Jews. I can hardly wait ....

YHWH, you're a genious.​

And this is "God just ... trying to get our attention". What a nice God, and what a lovely religion.

 

[michel]

Jay, that was quite an image!:biglaugh:


I think we need to understand that these disasters are man made, to some extent - the Earthquake isn't, of course, it is a natural process of "there isn't enough room for all this land" - but the Tsunami ? the Hurricanes ? Nature, with the help of mankind.

 

[Darkdale]

I agree Jay, if this was in fact the work of the Christian God, I count myself blessed that I reserve no worship for him. However, I think for our answers to these disasters, we should be searching science, not religion. While we my find symbolic meaning in disasters, the disasters themselves are natural occurences that happen as a result of a long chain of cause and effect, not the will of some spiteful deity. Man is not in need of salvation, and I, in my personal spiritual experience, have not found that gods to be judgmental in the least. Instead, the gods are our kith and kin, they share our trials with us as brothers and sisters. I do not see how anyone could look at the violence of nature as being the will of a loving god. I also do not see how anyone could look at nature, in modern times, as an expression of divine justice. While I believe in giving thanks to the gods for good times and requesting their strength in hard times, I think science has given us enough evidence to conclude that nature works according to its' own laws and for the promotion of it's own health and stability. Sometimes we find ourselves in the wake of its' corrections, but this is something we must observe with humility and not with a spirit of satisfaction at some gods judgment upon the world.

 

[Scott1]

Do we expect God to treat any of us diffe4rently then Sodam and Gomarah?
God tells us in His Word, there will be earthquakes, disaters, famine, and birth pains.
Do you think God just might be trying to get our attention?

Well, I do agree that God it trying to "get our attention", I don't agree that God uses disaster and death to do so. I believe God's grace in our lives is an internal influence, not external.

Christ teaches us that God "makes His sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust" (Mt 5:45) Our dissonance with nature is a reminder of our mortality.... and instead of trying to use this to "scare" others into repentance (lest you get more replies like that of Jayhawker), I pray you learn to embrace the divine mercy of God and reflect upon this as a personal call to repentance.

Peace be with you,
Scott

 

[michel]

I agree Jay, if this was in fact the work of the Christian God, I count myself blessed that I reserve no worship for him. However, I think for our answers to these disasters, we should be searching science, not religion. While we my find symbolic meaning in disasters, the disasters themselves are natural occurences that happen as a result of a long chain of cause and effect, not the will of some spiteful deity. Man is not in need of salvation, and I, in my personal spiritual experience, have not found that gods to be judgmental in the least. Instead, the gods are our kith and kin, they share our trials with us as brothers and sisters. I do not see how anyone could look at the violence of nature as being the will of a loving god. I also do not see how anyone could look at nature, in modern times, as an expression of divine justice. While I believe in giving thanks to the gods for good times and requesting their strength in hard times, I think science has given us enough evidence to conclude that nature works according to its' own laws and for the promotion of it's own health and stability. Sometimes we find ourselves in the wake of its' corrections, but this is something we must observe with humility and not with a spirit of satisfaction at some gods judgment upon the world.

I couldn't agree with you more; I don't think I would be too awed by God (Who I know is full of Love for us) if he behaved in the way you have destroyed.

However, I think for our answers to these disasters, we should be searching science, not religion. While we my find symbolic meaning in disasters, the disasters themselves are natural occurences that happen as a result of a long chain of cause and effect, not the will of some spiteful deity

Is spot on;As I said, I cannot see man as being responsible for earthquakes; now as to the weather, the jury is out on that one.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Jay, that was quite an image!:biglaugh:

I find it rather sad, if not disgusting, that you find the image funny. I find it dangerous.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Well, I do agree that God it trying to "get our attention", I don't agree that God uses disaster and death to do so. I believe God's grace in our lives is an internal influence, not external.

Christ teaches us that God "makes His sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust" (Mt 5:45) Our dissonance with nature is a reminder of our mortality.... and instead of trying to use this to "scare" others into repentance (lest you get more replies like that of Jayhawker), I pray you learn to embrace the divine mercy of God and reflect upon this as a personal call to repentance.

Peace be with you,
Scott

A beautiful response.

 

[michel]

I find it rather sad, if not disgusting, that you find the image funny. I find it dangerous.

I only found it funny in the way I would a caricature; I could not take your scenario seriously .

Would it be less sad to you, if I sat here and cried at the thought, or that I saw it as an 'idiotic image' ?

 

[Darkdale]

Is spot on;As I said, I cannot see man as being responsible for earthquakes; now as to the weather, the jury is out on that one.

As regards the weather and global warming, a few things would need to be proven before I would be willing to find man responsible. For example, water temperatures have risen and fallen by 1 to 3 degrees for as long as we can estimate. If man was responsible for the 1 degree raise in water temperature over the last hundred years, wouldn't the effect be much greater and more accelerated? In other words, if the raising of water temperatures is a natural phenomenon, then if there were some additional motivation to this process, wouldn't the results be more extreme? Should the water temperatures be five degrees warmer instead of 1? 1 degree and even 2 degrees warmer seems to be "natural" and if it is being accelerated, where is the proof? How can we determine how long it took for water temperatures to rise in the past? I'm not sure we have enough scientific evidence to make an informed judgment.

I am one of those that believe that we are in fact damaging the planet, but only insofar as we are polluting our air, land and water. There is still a lack of evidence to prove that we are responsible for the weakening ozone and we have no way to know if this is something that weakens and strengthens over time. As I understand the ozone is created by an interaction between sun and atmosphere, I’m not certain that we have developed anything powerful enough to truly affect that relationship.

From a conservative environmentalist point of view, we should be focusing our energy on cleaner air, water and land for the sake of our own health and the health of the animals we share the planet with, along with the trees and such. I believe that the global warming argument is alarmist in nature and that the arguments for it are feeble at best. Yet, I don't think anyone can deny that our air, our land and our water, while being better off than they were fifty or thirty years ago, are NO WHERE near as clean as they ought to be, given the current technology at our disposal.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I only found it funny in the way I would a caricature; I could not take your scenario seriously .

Would it be less sad to you, if I sat here and cried at the thought, or that I saw it as an 'idiotic image' ?

You're probably correct. My complaint was thoughtless. I apolologize.

 

[michel]

You're probably correct. My complaint was thoughtless. I apolologize.

That was kind, thank you.

 

[Draka]

Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) is what was found to break O3 (ozone) into O2 and just O. Therefore breaking up the ozone and weakening it. Even though the U.S. stop producing CFCs in 1996 doesn't mean that a) all countries have, and b) that it still won't take decades for the ozone to reconstruct itself from the damage already inflicted and still in the atmosphere. Also, with the sheer amount of pollutant gases still being dumped into the air and held under the ozone and reflecting the heat back to earth that it bounces off from the sun...this attributes to the greenhouse effect. Which can cause polar and glacial melting. Therefore adding more freshwater to the oceans and decreasing it's salinization. This is what creates problems. The actual temperature variances may not be seen for quite sometime. So in effect...we DO help out nature in these catastrophies.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Therefore adding more freshwater to the oceans and decreasing it's salinization. This is what creates problems.

As an interestin aside, the last time this happened it appears to have set in motion a series of events that led to the extinction of afarensis and the eventual rise of homo sapiens. The dialectic is an awesome thing to behold.

 

[Draka]

As an interestin aside, the last time this happened it appears to have set in motion a series of events that led to the extinction of afarensis and the eventual rise of homo sapiens. The dialectic is an awesome thing to behold.

Yep. In short, the Earth is comprised of balances...we disturb those balances and throw them out of alignment and hence throw weather into turmoil...and then have the gall to blame "god". We, as the human species, seem to find it hard to take responsibility for our own involvment in tragedies.

"For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction" This is just earth reacting to our treatment of it.

 

[Darkdale]

As an interestin aside, the last time this happened it appears to have set in motion a series of events that led to the extinction of afarensis and the eventual rise of homo sapiens. The dialectic is an awesome thing to behold.

I'm curious; if this happened 3 million years ago, what do you suspect caused it, given that some assume that the current ozone depletion is caused by Man? (Volcanic eruptions maybe? or would have have caused an opposite effect?) Also, how did this process make homo sapiens more adapt to living in those conditions than the Australopithecus Afarensis? And if we have evolved with an adaptive advantage for enduring such conditions, is there any reason to fear that we couldn't survive it again?

(lots of question, sorry, but I'm only mildly educated on this time period)

Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) is what was found to break O3 (ozone) into O2 and just O. Therefore breaking up the ozone and weakening it. Even though the U.S. stop producing CFCs in 1996 doesn't mean that a) all countries have, and b) that it still won't take decades for the ozone to reconstruct itself from the damage already inflicted and still in the atmosphere. Also, with the sheer amount of pollutant gases still being dumped into the air and held under the ozone and reflecting the heat back to earth that it bounces off from the sun...this attributes to the greenhouse effect. Which can cause polar and glacial melting. Therefore adding more freshwater to the oceans and decreasing it's salinization. This is what creates problems. The actual temperature variances may not be seen for quite sometime. So in effect...we DO help out nature in these catastrophies.

What evidence, if any, is there for the premise that there is enough chlorofluorocarbons in the atmosphere to sufficiently brake down the ozone in the way that it is currently being broken down, or if it has stopped braking down, caused the original depletion in the first place?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I'm curious; if this happened 3 million years ago, what do you suspect caused it, ...

The Isthmus of Panama.

 

[fromthe heart]

we have had so many disasters this year. Perhaps we need to look into Revelation and see what God says about this. I know that God is a loving and graceful God, but He is also Holy and can not look at sin. Let us face facts: we all have sinned and fallen short of the grace of God. The world has turned its back on God and His commandments. We take God out of our streets, courts, schools and ridicule any that dares to question this.
Do we expect God to treat any of us diffe4rently then Sodam and Gomarah?
God tells us in His Word, there will be earthquakes, disaters, famine, and birth pains.
Do you think God just might be trying to get our attention?

Yes, I have great compassion and cry over the lives lost, but the souls we must reach. "To live is Christ and to die is Christ."

I have to think God knew of the things to come because when He created it all He knew what would transpire in each day,life and thought of all He made. The signs we ARE to watch are well stated so I feel it's not just that we're having a bad year it's just that it's come time in the changes of our planet for these things to take place.

Rev.3:5 says though that 'He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment: and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before His angels.....souls we must reach and tell them of the truth could be lost and the blood of them will be on our hands...we must reach out to all and let them know of the love that is there for them and that this is not all there is but there is much to come.

Good post Grace.

 

[Darkdale]

The Isthmus of Panama.

I had to google that. But yeah, that makes sense.