(October 28, 2013 at 6:27 pm)Cinjin Wrote:(October 28, 2013 at 4:14 pm)GodsRevolt Wrote: It has to do with the relationship between the Creator and the created. God does not need us to be happy or content. But God, because of his position, knows what actions are best, and so doing actions that "please" God are actions that are best.
If you ask your child to behave in class and listen to the teacher, it makes you happy to hear that they have been doing so. But your happiness does not completely rely on your child's behavior in class. You ask your child to do this because you know it is best.
The analogy doesn't really work though. You are not asking your child to do everything in school so that the teacher will realize how amazing you as a parent truly are. Your god is. Essentially, he wants you to do everything so that other people will realize that he's so very cool. This is compounded when you realize that your god wants you to make EVERY action of your day have some kind of significance to his recognition.
It's ridiculous. The only thing that your god really teaches anyone is that he TRULY TRULY loves himself. I mean seriously, all evidence points to him being the evil vindictive queen full of vanity in a Disney movie...... <<insert billowing voice>> "THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BUT ME!! WORSHIP ME!! SERVE ME!! LOVE ME!! FEAR ME!!!!" (...or hey, don't and I'll just burn you forever)
I agree, the analogy falls short. All analogies ultimately do.
"God is the evil queen" but the evil queen did not create her subjects.
Not attacking here, promise, just acknowledging the limitation of analogies.
But I have to disagree with you on the idea that God wants us to do all things to his glory just to get others to acknowledge Him. God does not seek acknowledgement. That would be incredibly petty. God seeks genuine relationships. Not because he needs them, but because He knows their true value. In asking us to do everything to His glory does several things, and they are all relationship based.
When we act towards His glory, we improve genuine relationships around us, with the people who we see as friends AND the people we see as enemies.
When we act towards His glory, we improve our relationship with ourselves, more ready to admit fault and admit we need help to be better. That it is a worthy pursuit to try to be a better person.
When we act towards His glory, we improve our relationship with Him, the One Who knows what is best and forgives without complaint. The One Who knows us better than we know ourselves
". . . let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant to be an atheist." -G. K. Chesterton
