Originally posted by JesusIsAliveokay i'm bak is guy just says to much bullshit for me to take
You do not have the authority to take a life as God does. You are comparing sunflower seeds to pumpkins and cornstalks. God has the [B]right to take life you do not. If you had the right to take a life you could murder someone just because and not be punished for it. God takes lives all the time and He has never been arrested and thrown in jail for it. Do you know why? (I think you know why.)I never claimed to have the right to take life. But if taking life is evil, then it is evil regardless of who does it. So it doesn't matter if a mortal human being or an all powerful deity do it. It's the same action, done by different people.
It's still an evil act (if it is deemed evil in the first place).
But taking life is not evil if God does it. Again, you need to have a shift in your thinking. God is not held to the same constraints that humans or animals are held to. God is above all, His authority transcends all authority. For example, in society the Supreme Court is the highest judicial court in the land. The buck stops with them. With one rap of the gavel they have the power to decide someone's life....Now, back to God. God is superior to the Supreme Court. With one act of His will God has the power to decide the fate of the entire universe....
Do you follow me?
If you can understand the purview (in terms of extent of power) of the Supreme Court then you should see be able to understand God's range, sweep, and scope of divine right and privelege as King and Judge of the universe. It is much more transcendent and lofty than the measly Supreme Court of the United States.
Giving birth and creating life and the planet that that life lives on are totally different. God has created within His creation the capacity to reproduce. Humans do not create life they reproduce life (there is a great difference between the two).
Understood.
But even If I had the power to create life from nothing, what gives me the right to deem this new life to suffering or death? Would it still not be cruelty either way, or would I somehow be exempt from cruelty because of my status as a creator?
Suffering was introduced by Adam and his descendants (i.e. us) not God. God put Adam and Eve in a pristine environment, surrounded by every possible amenity that would secure and maintain their highest good, welfare, benefit, and blessing. Through one man's selfish, foolish, sinful action all of that was lost/forfeited in exchange for death, scarcity, disease, lack, pain, natural disaster, etc. You keep putting the blame in God's court but it belongs in ours. We--just like our great ancestor Adam--continue to sin instead of obeying God. Then we wonder why we keep reaping death, pain, disease, lack, etc.
Or lets put it this way:
If I take organic or inorganic materials, and create an artificial being (let's say like Frankenstein), and this being has feelings, responses, all the possibly human and animal like qualities I can mimic for it.
It's an artificial intelligence, but with emotions and conciousness nonetheless.
Would I somehow have the right to kill or torture the living being, simply because I created it ?
You would have the right to do with your frankenstein whatever you wish just like God. The difference between you and God is that you are not love, righteous, good, loving-kind, by nature so you probably would harm your own creation. God does not do this. But again, God does on occasion move in judgment for the good of all and take life just like in the flood. Here is the thing that gets glossed over and ignored time and time again: people seem fixated on only the moment that God must execute judgment, but compeletly ignore all of the love that He extends repeatedly before moving in judgment.
God's nature is to extend mercy not administer punishiment. But what people do is ignore, spit on, and trample on God's patience and love until He says enough. The last thing that God wants to do is judge you or anyone else but He will eventually. Don't think that just because God is slow to anger that He will fail to do what He must do. All throughout the Scriptures there are accounts after accounts of God sending prophets to warn nations of of their rampant, repeated, shameless sins, and God's impending judgment. Why doesn't God just judge them without protracted, repeated warnings? God is waiting for the sinner to repent and turn to Him just as in our day and time. Why doesn't God just hurl a fire ball towards the earth and end it all? God is long-suffering not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. God doesn't want one sinner to die and go to Hell for eternity. He wants everyone to repent and be saved.
In actuality, people reap what they sow and then blame God for it. They lie, steal, cheat, or give the devil a place in their lives then when something bad happens, they point their boney little finger at God and blame Him for their stupidity. [/B]
so let me get this straght i know it was way pages back but your saying that if we follow god and completely obey him in every way we will live forever and never suffer? okay then i gotta ask since i'm assuming you follow god in every way (except ignorance) have you ever suffered?
and did you know that during the years jesus was arround there are only 2 mentions of him by any historians, one of which was proven to be a fake as he wasnt even in the same country as jesus and the other only had one sentance in which it mentons Christus which could be really anyone