Saturday, June 9, 2012
Friday, June 1, 2012
They Don't Want to Go Backwards
Biblical Heritage Center Blogs: Nuns push back against Vatican
But it's like this: Just as you can change your job if you don't like it, there are other Christian denominations to switch to.
The Real Truth about the Middle East
Expose: Kosher Consumers Supporting Israel Boycotters - Op-Eds - Israel National News
Israel is the only Middle East nation that wants peace.
Friday, May 25, 2012
The Next Life
The Bible is very fuzzy on the subject of an afterlife. I have looked for the afterlife in the Old Testament and there doesn't seem to be a belief in one until we hear Daniel say: Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. An earlier possible reference to an afterlife is in Isaiah: Your dead will live; Their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, For your dew is as the dew of the dawn, And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits.
Most of the information about a potential afterlife is found in the Apocrypha and New Testament. There are various accounts of whatever it is and do not seem to me to be factual but in the form of parables which were used to teach ideas. If you understand how they were used, they cannot contradict each other in any factual way.
The concept of an afterlife was developed from the time of Daniel and had blossomed by the time of Jesus. Does that mean it isn't true? It seems to me that when God hears his people yearn for something, He listens. That doesn't necessarily mean that He will do it but it doesn't mean He doesn't care, either. As I pointed out in some recent writing I did somewhere, if God answered every prayer, the world would be in chaos.
I believe in an afterlife. What will happen there I can't say. My hope is to meet my Creator. I want to tell Him how wonderful many things have been in my life and to thank Him for giving me the joys that were not owed to me. To me it seems that all He wants is to be acknowledged and thanked and the rest will come naturally.
I know many people who don't even set aside a moment for God. Many think humanity has moved past the need for a Creator. Others are just so busy with their technologically-infected lives that they can't spare a moment for such a trivial thing as life. If they can't spare a moment for the One who provided such a wonderful world, what are his feelings toward them?
We really don't understand the afterlife other than to know it apparently was meant to be the future for Adam and Eve who chose to eat the fruit of the wrong tree. The tree of immortality and the joy of the Garden were passed by in favor of trying to be godlike. We are not godlike. We are humans and we often make bad decisions.
Here is my personal view of the afterlife. Someday I will die. I will be dead. Many will be dead. When the correct time comes, God will begin calling the names of those He determined to be suitable to be in his Presence. There will be many names He will not call. Those will have lost all memory, all joy, all consciousness forever. Those whose names He calls will arise from death and be in his indescribable Presence. I don't pretend to be able to imagine anything beyond that. There are other things I think would be suitable to do with the worst of the people who lived, but I am not God and you should be glad of that.
Most of the information about a potential afterlife is found in the Apocrypha and New Testament. There are various accounts of whatever it is and do not seem to me to be factual but in the form of parables which were used to teach ideas. If you understand how they were used, they cannot contradict each other in any factual way.
The concept of an afterlife was developed from the time of Daniel and had blossomed by the time of Jesus. Does that mean it isn't true? It seems to me that when God hears his people yearn for something, He listens. That doesn't necessarily mean that He will do it but it doesn't mean He doesn't care, either. As I pointed out in some recent writing I did somewhere, if God answered every prayer, the world would be in chaos.
I believe in an afterlife. What will happen there I can't say. My hope is to meet my Creator. I want to tell Him how wonderful many things have been in my life and to thank Him for giving me the joys that were not owed to me. To me it seems that all He wants is to be acknowledged and thanked and the rest will come naturally.
I know many people who don't even set aside a moment for God. Many think humanity has moved past the need for a Creator. Others are just so busy with their technologically-infected lives that they can't spare a moment for such a trivial thing as life. If they can't spare a moment for the One who provided such a wonderful world, what are his feelings toward them?
We really don't understand the afterlife other than to know it apparently was meant to be the future for Adam and Eve who chose to eat the fruit of the wrong tree. The tree of immortality and the joy of the Garden were passed by in favor of trying to be godlike. We are not godlike. We are humans and we often make bad decisions.
Here is my personal view of the afterlife. Someday I will die. I will be dead. Many will be dead. When the correct time comes, God will begin calling the names of those He determined to be suitable to be in his Presence. There will be many names He will not call. Those will have lost all memory, all joy, all consciousness forever. Those whose names He calls will arise from death and be in his indescribable Presence. I don't pretend to be able to imagine anything beyond that. There are other things I think would be suitable to do with the worst of the people who lived, but I am not God and you should be glad of that.
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Is Organized Religion Evil?
Not per se. God is a wonderful being. To believe in God is a wonderful thing. To wonder about God is wonderful. The organized church is not so wonderful a lot of times. That doesn't mean it needs to be done away with. Any organization starts going downhill the moment it is created. It is up to the people of that organization to build it up more than it is torn down. Two major organizations that come to my mind are NOW and the NAACP. Both of these organizations had aspirations and lofty goals and were also wonderful when they began. Unfortunately, organizations have to have the means to function and attaining their needs sometimes causes the organizations to lose their sense of direction. NOW has certainly lost theirs. Churches also do this. My belief is that churches should be local just as government should. If they need help they can call neighboring churches. But don't join up with 5,000 churches and have a head office. That's the beginning of the end. Certain people love power and will do a lot of acting and lying to get it. From a distance they may seem to be doing well but things are prone to happen behind the backs of the people. How about those Crusades? How about the radical Muslim leaders? The American government, as well, was set up to honor local governance. The federal government wasn't supposed to do much - protect us from foreign countries and settle disputes between states and commonwealths and ... oh, that's about it - but look at the American government now. It's absolutely nothing like it began. This is not progress. It is loss of liberty. The American government should go back to its roots and let the states and counties and cities decide their matters. In the same manner, the little country church outside of town shouldn't be regulated and taxed by the home office. This takes a lot out of the entity of a neighborhood, friendly, free church where people are supposed to come together for one purpose - to be thankful to God, not to see what they can get. Nothing is wrong with a little bit of organization. It should be limited, though. The rest is about trust and relationship.
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