The value of life?

[Just_me_Mike]

You've got it backwards. Anything god does is moral, by definition. He's not bound by our puny and backward ideals, such as not wanting to cause suffering. Everything god does is out of love, so if you die a slow, horrible, painful death, it's only because god is good and loves you so much.

While usually insightful, this isn't much help.
Are you good when you crush ants? Can I call my youngest son evil for killing a mesquito? Of course not, so for us to try and reason why a God would allow pain and suffering is not really possible, as I am learning. We may not like that he allows it to happen, and emotionally throw our moral fabric at God, but it does not prove that God is immoral because we define moral as "God allowing or not allowing this to happen"

 

[Kilgore Trout]

While usually insightful, this isn't much help.
Are you good when you crush ants? Can I call my youngest son evil for killing a mesquito? Of course not, so for us to try and reason why a God would allow pain and suffering is not really possible, as I am learning. We may not like that he allows it to happen, and emotionally throw our moral fabric at God, but it does not prove that God is immoral because we define moral as "God allowing or not allowing this to happen"

It depends, do I love ants? Does your son claim to unconditionally love every mosquito? If so, then killing mosquitos would be extremely evil.

 

[CarlinKnew]

Again so you are further defining moral now as watching a slow painful death. As earlier you pointed out that it is worse the a fast painful death.

A slow, painful death is an example of pointless suffering, as I've already said.

The question is not whether it is morally correct in my eyes or your eyes, rather who gets to define what is moral or immoral. And I would say again you believe what you believe because of what you have been taught. You are self righteous. Do you disagree?

As I've already said, we all define morality for ourselves. There is no objective morality. However, most of us would agree that pointless suffering is immoral.

Your statement about child death and torture and YOUR views on moral standards does not at all address the subject at hand. For all I know the parents of that child instantly turn to God for comfort.

It does address the subject at hand. You said there might not be such a thing as pointless suffering, thus implying that God has a reason for making people suffer. I say making someone suffer is immoral, regardless of God's supposed reasoning.

Your emotional plea does not work either when we consider the ant.

I would also be disgusted by someone torturing an ant.

It is epic and all to paint a horrible picture of a child going through this, but it merely confuses the subject at hand.

There's no confusion here, it's perfectly relevant. If God allows these horrible deeds to occur then he is immoral, for the same reasons you would call anyone else immoral for doing the same.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

It depends, do I love ants? Does your son claim to unconditionally love every mosquito? If so, then killing mosquitos would be extremely evil.

Where does it say God loves every human being? It doesn't

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Where does it say God loves every human being? It doesn't

"The world" doesn't include everyone?

 

[Just_me_Mike]

"The world" doesn't include everyone?

Well if it did then everyone would love God now wouldn't they?
Cain, Judas, and many others were not included in the word "world", so I guess the answer is no.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Well if it did then everyone would love God now wouldn't they?
Cain, Judas, and many others were not included in the word "world", so I guess the answer is no.

John 3:16

 

[Just_me_Mike]

John 3:16

Yes and?
If you are silly enough to read that one verse and conclude God loves every human being, I am wasting my time.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Yes and?
If you are silly enough to read that one verse and conclude God loves every human being, I am wasting my time.

Really - why?

Please elaborate.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

Really - why?

Please elaborate.

You wouldn't troll would you?:thud:

elaborate on what? You pointed out a verse in the bible, and it says certain information, and you have positioned yourself as to say the verse implies God loves every human being. It simply does not imply that. Or are we going to go around in circles with this?

 

[Kilgore Trout]

You wouldn't troll would you?:thud:

elaborate on what? You pointed out a verse in the bible, and it says certain information, and you have positioned yourself as to say the verse implies God loves every human being. It simply does not imply that. Or are we going to go around in circles with this?

How does god "loving the world" not mean god loves everyone. Please explain. Be specific. Or do you interpret it as god loves the planet earth?

 

[Enoch07]

Do yourself a favor and put Itwillend on ignore. He believes only a certain group of people are loved by God, and that the rest of us are cannon fodder.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

How does god "loving the world" not mean god loves everyone. Please explain. Be specific. Or do you interpret it as god loves the planet earth?

Well I thought I did, how can God love the world (every human) and not save or keep Cain or Judas? I will elaborate, but want to get past this point first.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Well I thought I did, how can God love the world (every human) and not save or keep Cain or Judas? I will elaborate, but want to get past this point first.

Either god "loving the world" means he loves everyone, or it means something else. If you think it means something else, the just tell me what it is. Stop obfuscating the issue.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

Either god "loving the world" means he loves everyone, or it means something else. If you think it means something else, the just tell me what it is. Stop obfuscating the issue.

No disrespect intended, I could not tell if you were screwing with me or asking a quesiton. Can you blame me for think you out of all people would be pulling my leg:sorry1:

All I am saying is if anyone is going to study the bible you can't just look at a line and say explain that, without looking at the rest of the text. The line you are talking about would contradict many other lines in the bible, as I already indicated with Cain and Judas and many others not being saved. So the world can't mean all humans, or that alone means the bible is flawed.
Which would be OK with me that it is flawed, because I either let a thing stand on its own weight or fall.
More specifically, I can liken it too when I went to the beach, and looked out into the ocean. The ocean went on forever. Of course we know the ocean doesn't go on forever, but my sentence implies it.

Now please don't ask me exactly what it means if you don't really want to know, this thread was not intended to debate scripture. The verse you pointed out, I think by what I have said so far, I have made the argument that it could not mean all humans.

Let me know if we need to develop this further.

 

[Beaudreaux]

Do yourself a favor and put Itwillend on ignore. He believes only a certain group of people are loved by God, and that the rest of us are cannon fodder.

Why? He makes more sense than a lot of people on this forum. [cough]you![cough]

 

[Heneni]

If the streets of heaven is paved in gold (not that it is but lets say it is) it would be worth as much as tar. Or it simply is so abundant that it does not have any worth. In heaven there is no money system so things dont have a dollar worth. I think that on earth the value of life is different than the value of life in the spiritual realm. Here life has a value because our lives are spent in a certain way. Spend it wisely and its considered to be worth something, spend it unwisely and it is not considered to be worth something, but the worth is somehow always in the eye of the beholder and what they can 'get' from your life's 'spending'. In the spiritual realm life isnt spent. There is no getting old, no end to it. So how does god measure the value of life? I think from gods perspective we are always alive we just change location. Today on earth, tomorrow we die and we are in the spiritual world, to Him i think its just a matter of logistics really. So whether we live or die does not make us more or less valuable. So if god wipes out an entire tribe we might think he doesnt value life, but to him its just a change in the location of the spirits in those bodies.

I have a suspicion it was satan who put a value on a spirit force which is why Jesus had to randsom us. But does god see his son as more valuable than an ant or us? I think he does, and so i think he values life also in varying degrees, but i would think that the measure he uses to determine value is rather more complicated. I would say that if you can speak things into existance you dont sort of value what you speak into existance, cause its too easy to do and the point of speaking things into existance is not for value, but probably for a certain purpose. So god values life in a completely different way than we do. What god must value though, is love, because he is love. I think the value of life doesnt cross gods mind, i think the value of love does. And that is why david asked god to spare him from his enemies, because a dead man he said, cannot praise god. While he was alive he could show god love. So life is worth nothing without love demonstrated through that life. So its not the life that has value but the love of that life. Its not the bottle of wine that is valuable, its the wine inside thats valuable.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

If the streets of heaven is paved in gold (not that it is but lets say it is) it would be worth as much as tar. Or it simply is so abundant that it does not have any worth. In heaven there is no money system so things dont have a dollar worth. I think that on earth the value of life is different than the value of life in the spiritual realm. Here life has a value because our lives are spent in a certain way. Spend it wisely and its considered to be worth something, spend it unwisely and it is not considered to be worth something, but the worth is somehow always in the eye of the beholder and what they can 'get' from your life's 'spending'. In the spiritual realm life isnt spent. There is no getting old, no end to it. So how does god measure the value of life? I think from gods perspective we are always alive we just change location. Today on earth, tomorrow we die and we are in the spiritual world, to Him i think its just a matter of logistics really. So whether we live or die does not make us more or less valuable. So if god wipes out an entire tribe we might think he doesnt value life, but to him its just a change in the location of the spirits in those bodies.

I have a suspicion it was satan who put a value on a spirit force which is why Jesus had to randsom us. But does god see his son as more valuable than an ant or us? I think he does, and so i think he values life also in varying degrees, but i would think that the measure he uses to determine value is rather more complicated. I would say that if you can speak things into existance you dont sort of value what you speak into existance, cause its too easy to do and the point of speaking things into existance is not for value, but probably for a certain purpose. So god values life in a completely different way than we do. What god must value though, is love, because he is love. I think the value of life doesnt cross gods mind, i think the value of love does. And that is why david asked god to spare him from his enemies, because a dead man he said, cannot praise god. While he was alive he could show god love. So life is worth nothing without love demonstrated through that life. So its not the life that has value but the love of that life. Its not the bottle of wine that is valuable, its the wine inside thats valuable.

Thank you for your perspective. There is truth to what you say, as far as I am concerned. I don't see a conceivable way to define moral fabric, or value when trying to understand God. I just don't know if it is possible. Suffice to say Love is a good start.
However that is where all the divisions come from, because we as humans define what Love is, and according to our definitions, Love can not equal a God that allows bad things to happen.
I'll keep thinking about it though.

 

[Heneni]

Thank you for your perspective. There is truth to what you say, as far as I am concerned. I don't see a conceivable way to define moral fabric, or value when trying to understand God. I just don't know if it is possible. Suffice to say Love is a good start.
However that is where all the divisions come from, because we as humans define what Love is, and according to our definitions, Love can not equal a God that allows bad things to happen.
I'll keep thinking about it though.

I think that god always recompenses those that suffer due to the choices he has made for them. But we suffer for our own choices as well. We reap what we sow, we dont have to reap suffering, but if we sowed it we will reap it.

Jesus never sowed hate and yet he suffered hate. That was suffering due to gods choice for jesus and therefore jesus was the better off for it. God allowed bad things to happen to jesus because that was HIS choice for jesus. That is what i would call god allowing suffering. But for the most part god is not allowing suffering of the human race, we are simply reaping what we sowed. If he is allowing anything he is allowing that which naturally occurs anyway...sowing and reaping. If he did not allow sowing and reaping he would not be love. If we sowed good and never recieved good it would be unfair. Unless it is gods choice for us to suffer then he rewards us for that suffering completely disproportional to the suffering. Fair doenst come into the picture. Paul said that his momentary afflictions, and they were horrible afflictions were nothing to be compared to the glory that he would recieve.

God is not responsible for the suffering in the world unless he has designed such suffering, and if he did the reward for such suffering is not comparable to the suffering experienced.

Most of the suffering here on earth is due to humans reaping what they sowed.

Natural disasters are simply earths way of maintaining herself. God would not be love if he did not make us a planet that would sustain itself. We just dont know how to live in harmony with it.

Heneni



Heneni

 

[Just_me_Mike]

I think that god always recompenses those that suffer due to the choices he has made for them. But we suffer for our own choices as well. We reap what we sow, we dont have to reap suffering, but if we sowed it we will reap it.

Jesus never sowed hate and yet he suffered hate. That was suffering due to gods choice for jesus and therefore jesus was the better off for it. God allowed bad things to happen to jesus because that was HIS choice for jesus. That is what i would call god allowing suffering. But for the most part god is not allowing suffering of the human race, we are simply reaping what we sowed. If he is allowing anything he is allowing that which naturally occurs anyway...sowing and reaping. If he did not allow sowing and reaping he would not be love. If we sowed good and never recieved good it would be unfair. Unless it is gods choice for us to suffer then he rewards us for that suffering completely disproportional to the suffering. Fair doenst come into the picture. Paul said that his momentary afflictions, and they were horrible afflictions were nothing to be compared to the glory that he would recieve.

God is not responsible for the suffering in the world unless he has designed such suffering, and if he did the reward for such suffering is not comparable to the suffering experienced.

Most of the suffering here on earth is due to humans reaping what they sowed.

Natural disasters are simply earths way of maintaining herself. God would not be love if he did not make us a planet that would sustain itself. We just dont know how to live in harmony with it.

Heneni



Heneni

Well Heneni, the bigger point here is many and I are wondering what a little boy did in thailand that is being used for sex until he dies. What did he sew, to reap such a reward? Is he paying for something his mom or dad did? or some other distant relative? Is that how God works?

That is where most people have a valid problem with the God of the bible. I feel I am en excellent student of the bible, and belive in God, but I want to address these issues with honesty, and it doesn't get more honest and real than thinking of that child being used as such.
Which is why the thread is titled as such... So the point we are all at in this thread, is how can God be good and watch this happen...