(January 17, 2016 at 9:53 pm)Cecelia Wrote:(December 7, 2015 at 1:38 pm)Lek Wrote: Why would God help us do something which he has told us not to do? We rely on God's help to do his will, not to go against it. When we do evil, we are refusing God's help.
Then God did nothing to end slavery (he approves of it in the bible) ending the treatment of women as property (he's a big fan of that in both testaments) and still does nothing to stop children from being raped in his own churches.
What a guy. Are you sure you're not worshiping Satan?
God ordered all kinds of harsh practices in the old testament. People were objects of his wrath. He wasn't always very pleasant in his dealings with humankind. The thing is that those who believed in him and followed him are at peace with him right now. After the establishment of the new covenant, when Jesus had taken on God's wrath for us, we were no longer under his wrath. Since he commanded us to love our neighbor as ourselves, he couldn't have condoned the type of slavery which we had in this country. I would assume that the slavery referred to in Paul's epistles was voluntary slavery, in which a person would voluntarily give himself over to slavery. In exchange, his physical needs would be taken care of by the owner. It was a very common practice and worked quite well for many. The bible always tells slave owners to be kind toward their slaves and treat them well. It may have been cultural at the time that women were legally property, for non-christians as well, but neither Jesus or any of the new testament writers ever referred to women as property. In fact there numerous women addressed in the bible who were instrumental in the workings of the early church such as Phoebe, Euodia and Syntyche. As far a children getting raped in his churches - God's church is the "Body of Christ", which consists of the total of the followers of Christ. I couldn't say whether or not a certain congregation or denomination is part of his church. Anyway, he doesn't stop children from being raped in homes, schools or wherever. He also doesn't stop murders, robberies, beatings, wars and so on. Of course, he doesn't make people commit those sins; he commands us not to do them and he gives the task to his followers to spread the gospel of love. If everyone loved his neighbors as himself then he wouldn't commit these type of acts toward them.
