RE: What are the Characteristics of a NT Christian?
April 21, 2017 at 6:24 pm
(This post was last modified: April 21, 2017 at 6:25 pm by Neo-Scholastic.)
(April 21, 2017 at 12:49 pm)Grandizer Wrote:(April 21, 2017 at 8:53 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Our God grieves and suffers with us in our darkest hours. As far as I'm concerned any God that is powerful enough to raise the dead is sufficiently capable of releasing me from my personal shame and despair. That is why I trust Him with my life. I love Him because He loved me first.
I don't know that there is a God and that he grieves and suffers with us in our darkest hours. If there is a God who loves us, then I would expect him to demonstrate this love in a manner that is consistent with how we normally view love. I cannot reasonably consider it divine love when God allows all sorts of evils and sufferings to occur in this world. I can understand minor sufferings being consistent with a loving God, but not major evils and sufferings.
Sounds reasonable in the abstract. All I'm asking is for you to look at it from within the scope of your everyday experience. For whatever reason, there is pain and suffering in my life. I don't know why and I'm not sure it matters. What I do know is that I don't trust me to lift myself out of my own troubles all by myself. I've tried willpower and it didn't work. YMMV but sometimes it's more effective to surrender and call on someone strong enough to deliver me. Maybe it's not clear how His love works for the entire world. I only know how His love works for me.
