WHY SHOULD WE TRUST GOD?

[aapatil@cox.net]

WHY SHOULD WE TRUST GOD?
We trust God for the following reasons:1) He is meek and humble, and made the ultimate, and most painful and humiliating sacrifice on the cross to bring us eternal life, although we betrayed him through our sins. 2) He healed the broken hearted, forgave sinners and those who were killing Him without condemning them. 3) He fed the hungry and healed the sick. 4) In the beauty and harmony of His creation we see an infinitely intelligent and loving God. 5) He made us like Him by giving us the ability to unconditionally love others and be creative.
Sometimes, we doubt Him when we see pain, suffering and injustice. However, God had to allow pain and suffering, which is the result of sin in the world, because He gave us a free will so that we can choose love and have peace and joy for all eternity. The suffering of this world will be nothing compared to heaven for all eternity. Furthermore, He took the suffering of all of us on the cross so that we will repent for our sins and have eternal life. Sometimes our prayers appear to go unanswered. God however always does what is best for us in the long run, although it is not apparent to us immediately.

[Miles]

WHY SHOULD WE TRUST GOD?
We trust God for the following reasons:1) He is meek and humble, and made the ultimate, and most painful and humiliating sacrifice on the cross to bring us eternal life, although we betrayed him through our sins.

So, why should being meek and humble garner more trust than not being meek and humble? Thing is, god has made over half a dozen self-admitted mistakes. Should that instill trust? For a god, not in my book.

2) He healed the broken hearted, forgave sinners and those who were killing Him without condemning them.

He also had hundreds, perhaps thousands of innocent women, children, and infants killed for no better reason than that they existed

3) He fed the hungry and healed the sick.

All of them, and forever? Of course not. He may have did it once or twice for a few, but that was it. People have continued to go hungry and be sick for the hundreds of years that followed.

4) In the beauty and harmony of His creation we see an infinitely intelligent and loving God.

The beauty and harmony of the holocaust I presume, which in his intelligence and love saw fit to let kill 6,000,000 of his chosen people no less.

5) He made us like Him by giving us the ability to unconditionally love others and be creative.

And just like him, it's something we seldom practice. But at least we've gotten away from condoning slavery and killing practicing gays. Something that god, in his instruction book, says is just fine.


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[brunumb]

WHY SHOULD WE TRUST GOD?
We trust God for the following reasons:
1) He is meek and humble, and made the ultimate, and most painful and humiliating sacrifice on the cross to bring us eternal life, although we betrayed him through our sins.

I would substitute drama queen for meek and humble. The whole sacrifice on the cross and being dead for a few ours was totally unnecessary for a god that can do anything. That anything includes bringing us eternal life without going through the unnecessary and dramatic display of the crucifixion.

2) He healed the broken hearted, forgave sinners and those who were killing Him without condemning them.

On the other hand those that are unable to accept the validity of the story do get condemned. Meanwhile, the world is still filled with broken hearts waiting to be healed.

3) He fed the hungry and healed the sick.

He allegedly fed a few hungry. No big deal. ordinary people have been doing that for centuries. Ah, but he healed the sick you might say. Again, he allegedly healed a few blind people and some lepers. People having been doing that too. But the big question is, why didn't he eliminate leprosy altogether? Now that would have been more meaningful and more loving.

4) In the beauty and harmony of His creation we see an infinitely intelligent and loving God.

So intelligent that the only solution to ridding the world of allegedly evil people was to drown just about everything, including the beautiful plants and animals living in harmony and doing nothing wrong.

5) He made us like Him by giving us the ability to unconditionally love others and be creative.

Do as I say but not as I do might be more applicable. God only loves conditionally. If you don't love him and honour him you are no better than dirty rags and destined to suffer forever.

Sometimes, we doubt Him when we see pain, suffering and injustice. However, God had to allow pain and suffering, which is the result of sin in the world, because He gave us a free will so that we can choose love and have peace and joy for all eternity.

Sin or no sin, God can do anything which includes not allowing pain and suffering. A truly intelligent and loving being could easily solve that problem.

The suffering of this world will be nothing compared to heaven for all eternity. Furthermore, He took the suffering of all of us on the cross so that we will repent for our sins and have eternal life.

Wishful thinking at best. If he took the pain and suffering for us all why is there still pain and suffering?

Sometimes our prayers appear to go unanswered. God however always does what is best for us in the long run, although it is not apparent to us immediately.

If it is not apparent to us then there is no reason to think that it is true. Prayers go answered and unanswered with all the appearance of random chance or the application of confirmation bias. My pet rock is as reliable as God in that regard.

Ir seems to me that there is really no good reason to trust what anyone says about God.

[JehovahsWitness]

The whole sacrifice on the cross and being dead for a few ours was totally unnecessary for a god that can do anything.

Being able to do anything does not negate self imposed moral limitations; if a man can rape a woman and is able to escape the law, does that mean he should. God can indeed do anything, that doesnt mean he should.

[Miles]

The whole sacrifice on the cross and being dead for a few ours was totally unnecessary for a god that can do anything.

Being able to do anything does not negate self imposed moral limitations; if a man can rape a woman and is able to escape the law, does that mean he should. God can indeed do anything, that doesnt mean he should.

Glad to see you agree that there are moral limits that can be applied to god. Limits such as: refraining from having innocent women, children, and infants killed (1 Samuel 15:3). And not decreeing that practicing homosexual males must be put to death (Leviticus 20:13). AND, punishing people for the sins their great-great grandfather committed against god (Deuteronomy 5:8-10).



Bad god. Verry Baaaaad!


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[Purple Knight]

This is a big issue for me too. The biggest one, perhaps.

God does trick people. Some people say he can't lie but he can definitely trick. And he has no love for gentiles.

I don't see why I should have zero problems with the idea that God is the God of the Chosen People and that's very very clear, but oh look now here's Jesus you can be saved too.

And I'm not saying it's wrong to do this, but to me it plays out like a big trick to get all gentiles to go to Hell by accepting a religion - agreeing to be judged by a religion - where they are sinful and the wages of sin are hell and death.

Just imagine for a moment that there really is an afterlife, and judgment is simple: If you lived rightly by your own ideals, you at least continue to exist in some fashion or get a reward or are reborn or something. So you die, and the afterlife comes, and you are asked which spiritual figure you believe in, who do you accept? So you say, I am a Christian, I accept Jesus. So now you have accepted, wanted to be judged by, the Christian religion, and you have selected a game you cannot win. You have selected a set of rules where you cannot get the reward unless someone saves you from the rules because you're guilty of breaking them. And only now you find out that nobody can save you from the rules you impose upon yourself.

I can't imagine a more perfect set-up to make sure gentiles go to Hell if this really was what judgment was like.

The bottom line is, trust is earned. If we're to take the Bible as true, the Chosen People have every reason to trust their own God, but others don't necessarily have such a reason, especially those whose races have hurt the Chosen People, because God is not too keen on individualism and will punish you for what Adam and Eve did. Not only that, God has a history of taking revenge against the Peoples of those who hurt His People.

As long as we're making Pascalian wagers on things, and assuming the afterlife, the one I might make is, holy carp, what if they all exist, and it's just, you have to let them in? The one I definitely wouldn't let in is the one that rages against people for things their ancestors did (especially if I have the guiltiest ancestors) and verifiably only loves the People that my kind have hurt the most. That seems like asking for trouble. That doesn't mean I don't need to help make up for those wrongs, but I also don't need to burn for them if I don't have to.

[Purple Knight]

Glad to see you agree that there are moral limits that can be applied to god. Limits such as: refraining from having innocent women, children, and infants killed (1 Samuel 15:3). And not decreeing that practicing homosexual males must be put to death (Leviticus 20:13).

And if God doesn't share our morals (in which these things would actually be bad) there's not much of a foundation there for any trust. Maybe there are good reasons for these things, but that doesn't change the fact that from my perspective, they look evil, so there's just not going to be the kind of trust, with a reason (thread title: "Why should we trust God?") that's being asked for.

You can choose to believe God exists, and do what he says because he is very powerful, hoping to miss out on punishment, but that's not quite the same as trust.

[brunumb]

The whole sacrifice on the cross and being dead for a few ours was totally unnecessary for a god that can do anything.

Being able to do anything does not negate self imposed moral limitations; if a man can rape a woman and is able to escape the law, does that mean he should. God can indeed do anything, that doesnt mean he should.

So you equate God/Jesus contriving to have people crucify him in order to provide forgiveness with a man choosing to rape a woman. You are in no position to determine anything about God's alleged self-imposed moral limitations. If it was possible for God to forgive without the crucifixion charade where he had to have human beings essentially murder him, then I know what I consider the better option. But then I wouldn't shun people and pretend it was an act of love either.

[brunumb]

And if God doesn't share our morals (in which these things would actually be bad) there's not much of a foundation there for any trust.

Are we not allegedly made in God's image and do we not get our moral directions from God? If God fails to meet our standards with his "Do as I say, not as I do" sort of morality, then trust just flies out the window. We are really just putting our trust in the humans who created this deity and they were clearly flawed.

[JehovahsWitness]

The whole sacrifice on the cross and being dead for a few ours was totally unnecessary for a god that can do anything.

Being able to do anything does not negate self imposed moral limitations; if a man can rape a woman and is able to escape the law, does that mean he should. God can indeed do anything, that doesnt mean he should.

Glad to see you agree that there are moral limits that can be applied to god. Limits such as: {snip} ...

Did I say self imposed or "miles" imposed?

Unless you are claiming to be God, your list of what he should or should not do, does not constitute more than your opinion. I presume if the God of the bible does exist, he has taken note of your input and dares to disagree.