Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: jrossi@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (The Electric Sol) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Why Does God Hate Me? Message-ID: Date: 7 Dec 89 07:29:14 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Jet Propelled Lab - Pasadena CA Lines: 63 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article jhpb@lancia.garage.att.com writes: >>The difference between your two robbers is that one of them is repentant. If >>this is truly the case, he will be saved. The unrepentent bank robber faces >>the same fate as the unrepentant gossip, the unrepentant liar, and even the >>unrepentant pretty-good-guy and the unrepentant everyone-thinks-he's-a-saint. Most of the non-Christians I know ( myself included ) don't consider themselves saints, but are of the "I'm only human, I make mistakes" variety. Most of us are aware of our self-centeredness, and we try to overcome this by simply being aware, and pursuing virtue as its own reward. We don't think of ourselves as saved, nor delight in the implication that we have been spared the grisly fate that awaits those who think differently than we do, but rather, in complete honesty, feel that there are contradictions inherent in Christian thought in regards to Heaven/Hell. For me the idea that all of History is a ghastly acting out of souls arbitrarly being cast to flames, or spared, paints a picture of God that is too cruel to bear. It dosen't make sense to me. If it is true, then God must hate me. I must be one of those objects of wrath he created just to sit there and focus His magnifiying glass on. Even if I were somehow to "save" myself, there are many friends and family that I love, and care about. Somehow I can't see myself flying off to eternal peace, while they writhe in eternal agony. Its incomprehensible to me that a loving God is into all of this. Now of course, this could all be erroneous thinking, and me being man, cannot comprehend the ways of an almighty God, and am truely evil, even in my stumbling ignorance and honesty, in which case, I will be duely punished for that which, while I'm unconcious of it now, truely am, evil. The Calvinist would say I was created this way, and there's nothing I can do about. God hates me, and there's nothing I can do about it. The Free-Willers would say that I am somehow making a choice; that I am rejecting God's "Free" gift of salvation and therefore deserve what I get. So either God hates me from the beginning, or he hates me for rejecting his religion. Does God really hate me? Or does He love me? If he loves me does he continue to love me after I have died and gone to hell? -jrossi@jato.jpl.nasa.gov "Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils -ames!elroy!jato!jrossi is still choosing evil." -Cptn. Trips **********************STANDARD DISCLAIMER****************************** [This is an area in which Christians vary. We've had discussions in the past about whether God hates people or not. While there are certainly Biblical grounds for saying that God hates sinners, my impression is that most Christians prefer the formulation that he hates the sin and loves the sinner. If this is so, it's not entirely accurate to say that he hates you because you reject him. Rather, he is simply unwilling to override your choice, since that would negate your existence as an independent being. Again, there are varying concepts of hell. A common concept these days is that God doesn't intentionally create torments for those that reject him. Rather, its nature follows from the fact that it is a place filled with people who reject God. --clh]