Why should anyone even want a relationship with God?

[FallentoReason]

That's some pretty awesome stuff!

I know right? I guess gods have to share the immortality pie with jellyfish.

I'd like to see the universes jellyfish have created some day

What three things are we talking about exactly? Immortality(?), the creator of everything & the command to worship it?

Just those three, yes. I'm only attempting to narrow this down as when we began you stated that if there was a creator you;d worship it on the grounds of it's being a creator - nothing else was mentioned-. I doubted that this was true, and you, in your turn quantified my doubts. We had to keep adding things.

Ah I see, and you're right, I had more to add and you helped me get there.

I think those things are needed because they are the essence of what theistic doctrines say... especially that annoying worship me part...

The fear is where I suspected we would find ourselves eventually. Personally, I'm simply not afraid. On the next bit though, it was once the law to push the blacks to the back of the bus - and I don't get the rebellious attitude - just do it man. Here I again I doubt that this actually works for you.

That's interesting how you put it! I think I just had an epiphany and all of this actually comes down to the Euthyphro Dilemma! If what is moral is what God commands, then that means "rebelling against the system" (no matter how "good" or "bad" one might feel) should be considered the wrong action to take. However, if God commands something because it is good, then it means something about worship makes it the right thing to be doing. So, to answer our issue here we basically need to find an answer to the Euthyphro Dilemma, because that determines if * worshiping God* is the right thing to do.

Am I on the right track here?

[The Grand Nudger]

I bet you would, at least as much as I would like to see a universe created by a god someday.

Well, to be fair, I think we added things in the search that ended up being superfluous. All that was required in the end was fear.

If god commands something because it is good, then what is good would be independent of what he demanded or what he willed. May as well cut out the middle man.

[Drich]

Not nigh-impossible, plain old impossible. That's why there's a savior ya know.

So, by your own admission, Jesus is the solution to God's own problems. not ours.

So don't. Doesn't bother me. I find it interesting though that you waste your time bitching about it all. Seems to contradict your claim that your time is precious.

Making pithy internet posts takes much less time than a lifetime of dedicated spiritual slavery.

You have no clue what you are talking about.

I'm sorry, I'm not well-versed in logically-void nonsense.

You still can't answer the 'why' question. Please don't bother with "well, you have that choice" or "some don't". I'm asking, why should anybody want this kind of 'relationship'.

If you can't answer that, then your own faith has no basis.

I've answered this question several times now. We seek God to Love Him. Why would we want to love Him? Because we were designed to do so. Does that mean we all will? No, we have been given this life to choose whether or not to love Him. People substitute everything this world offers to replace the love of God, some are sucessful, but the vast majority can only ever to hope to find a tempory happiness, True Joy will allude them for their whole exsistance, save the one moment at their judgement when Christ shows them what they were meant for.. The knoweledge and subsequent loss of that love is what make eternal seperation akin to fire and brimestone.

I stopped fearing burning in Hell along time ago, but I can not fathom loosing the Love I know God offers us. That is why I ask if The descriptions of Heaven and Hell were somehow changed and Heaven was a firey pit, but God lived there, and Hell was what we know to be Heaven, but no God.. Would you still want to goto Heaven? (The Firey pit just to be with God?)

I did not ask this question for all of you to line up to choose Hell/Heaven without God. I know most of you want that anyway. What I am trying to illustrate is the bond or the want and desire for God's love and the extreme anyone seeking Heaven should be willing to endure to have it.

So short answer why would we seek God? Love.

[FallentoReason]

I bet you would, at least as much as I would like to see a universe created by a god someday.

Well, to be fair, I think we added things in the search that ended up being superfluous. All that was required in the end was fear.

If god commands something because it is good, then what is good would be independent of what he demanded or what he willed. May as well cut out the middle man.

I think the only way I would worship it is if our moral compass couldn't be trusted i.e. something is good because God commands it.

I'm glad holy books are a bunch of superstitions though.

[The Grand Nudger]

@ Drich

I do not seek god, I was not designed to love any god, there is no choice here - as that would imply options - and your nonexistent god is incapable of providing any, I require no substitute or replacement for this god business - as it was never an actual article to begin with, the happiness I find (however I find it) is as permanent as your own in that we are both mortal, "true joy" has been exceedingly simple for me to come by, and you don't have the power to dictate what I was "meant for".

Now that I've handled that......

@ FTR

I'm gad too, in some ways. In others, meh, magic and spirits and all that would be pretty damned cool. I'm wondering what about this whole moral compass and divine command business would be capable of compelling worship. Doesn't work for me, but you're of the opinion that it would work for you. Why?

[FallentoReason]

I'm wondering what about this whole moral compass and divine command business would be capable of compelling worship. Doesn't work for me, but you're of the opinion that it would work for you. Why?

Because I'm wired that way biologically -- the urge to do "good" -- where "good" seems to be in most cases the thing that helps us survive better. Therefore, if I knew 100% that my moral compass isn't compatible with the commands of God, then I would have to follow the commands while ignoring my moral compass in order to achieve this "good standard" of morality, assuming God knows best and his commands really are the best way.

[Drich]

I'm wondering what about this whole moral compass and divine command business would be capable of compelling worship. Doesn't work for me, but you're of the opinion that it would work for you. Why?

Because I'm wired that way biologically -- the urge to do "good" -- where "good" seems to be in most cases the thing that helps us survive better. Therefore, if I knew 100% that my moral compass isn't compatible with the commands of God, then I would have to follow the commands while ignoring my moral compass in order to achieve this "good standard" of morality, assuming God knows best and his commands really are the best way.

What if you are trying to read your "moral compass" Next to something that creates it's own strong magnetic field? (Popular culture/western soceity.) For even if soceity throws your compass off a few degrees then it will take you in a direction that God is not.

[The Grand Nudger]

It hardly matters which direction one goes when one is trying to reach a place that is non-existent Drich.

@ FTR.

Being "wired" to do good compells you to worship? Just compels me to do good...

I think you're muddying the difference between a god that commands things -because- they are good (in which case he is middleman, and can be circumvented) and a god which commands thing that are good -because- it commands them (in which case good is arbitrary - not, in my estimation, worth seeking on those grounds).

Neither of these hypotheticals compel me to worship either god in any case. Here's the long and short of it FTR, I don't think that you and I are so entirely dissimilar (of course I don't think that Drich and I are all that different either) and so when you tell me that such and such would compel you to worship and these things seem insufficient (especially as they simply hang as assertions - no elaborative effort involved) I start to think that maybe you haven't thought it through all that well - and if you had- you might realize that you aren't giving us the whole story. Know what I mean? Imagine the single-most abhorent thing you are capable of. The divine command god could make this "good" by it's say-so. You're telling me that you would capitulate and fall to your knees? I think you've shortchanged yourself. The god that commands things -because they are good- has no insurmountable advantage over you in this regard, and I doubt that you would argue that being a middle man is, in itself, worthy of worship. In each case I have a very strong suspicion that an "or else" modifier must be added. If this modifier is required, it matters very little to me whether or not the god in question is of the divine command or the middle man type - the threat erodes all pretense of being worthy of worship. Sure, it may punish you for your rebellious nature (and to be frank, there isn't anything you can do about this whether or not it would punish you), but this makes it less worthy of your adoration - not more-so.

"Do this because I say it is good, fuck your compass, and if you don't I'll hurt you."
or
"Do this because it is good, fuck your compass, and if you don't I'll hurt you."

[downbeatplumb]

I saw in his hand a long spear of gold, and at the iron's point there seemed to be a little fire. He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart, and to pierce my very entrails; when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also, and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God. The pain was so great, that it made me moan; and yet so surpassing was the sweetness of this excessive pain, that I could not wish to be rid of it. The soul is satisfied now with nothing less than God. The pain is not bodily, but spiritual; though the body has its share in it. It is a caressing of love so sweet which now takes place between the soul and God, that I pray God of His goodness to make him experience it who may think that I am lying

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecstasy_of_Saint_Teresa

Nuff said.

[The Grand Nudger]

Sounds like 'ole Saint T needed someone to smack her around a little bit to get her rocks off.