My last one for the night.................... this is from my private blog and gives you an idea as to what goes through my head

Epicurus made the assertation that If God is all all powerful and all loving then evil would not exist, because

an all power God could stop evil and an all loving God would want to stop evil. However, evil exists therefore God is either not all power or not all loving. Think about that......

So there are two main theodicy camps for this. The first is the free will camp which basically argues that God created us with the ability to chose and we can chose either good or evil and allows us to freely do things that are harmful. (Its very Armenian in thought progession). I really struggle with the concept of free will because of one simple and basic concept. The ability we have to choose. Doesn’t the ability to make a choice imply that we can somehow choose God and salvation? IF so, doesn’t that imply we have some active part in our salvation and would that not constitute “works” on our part and diminish the totality of grace? Does that not also then lead us down a path where our salvation can be questionable based upon whether or not we did our part correctly?

How frightening that would be to come to the end of your life and having to wonder where you will spend eternity!

Conversly the second theodicy is the Sovereignty camp. This argument is basically that God gets all the credit for good and we get all of the blame for the evil, but that God uses all for His glory. (Calvinistic in thought progression) From a preliminary perspective it seems very agreeable especially since I tend be very Calvinistic in my theological views. So here is what I struggle with on this side of the fence. Too much semantics. People on this side want to argue the differences between what God ordains, authors and allows, but still does not answer the question of why evil. If God is sovereign creator over all then doesn't that imply that He created evil too? For what purpose? On the sovereignty of God side, the belief is held that all things occur because of God decided that they would. Thus saving grace comes from a decision that God made for the individual and then caused that individual to accept it. None of which could have happened if God had not allowed it. However, if that is the case, then everything has already been determined we have no choice in any matter. Now think about that implication. For your entire life you have sought and desired to own a BMW convertible. You work hard, you do everything scripturally right yet that BMW is just out of reach. One day that BMW is parked in your driveway and you have the ability to have it fulfilling your every desire but in order to that you must break the law by beating up the guy who dropped it off. Scriptually that is a sin. Now based upon the Sovereignty of God theodicy, 1) God gave you the desire for the BMW. 2) God did not bring about that BMW through obedience. 3) God did bring about the BMW 4) God determined that the only way you could have the BMW was to beat the guy up. For what purpose do these things happen?

Why are we given desires? Whay are they not fulfilled? Why are they used to put us in juxtaposition with beliefs? God ordains it, He allows it, He writes the script. Why? Why even bother trying to minister, or do anything because it has all been pre decided anywa? What is the point? For His glory? What does that really mean? If there was some guy walking around who had control and he arbitrailiy subjected his people to such treatment, he would be deemed a mental case. I mean seriously who does God need to show off His glory for? Are He and other dieties sitting around trying to see who is the most popular or most magnificant?

I don't get it! If you read the Book of Job it seems that God is really twisted and egomanical. Which brings me to a question. Does scripture really say that God is all loving? (I think the powerful part is pretty clear - everything, even Satan has to report to Him). I'm not sure that I can stomach either picture of God.

I know I probably border on heresy but only because I am willling to voice thoughts that I am sure many have had before me. Besides Martin Luther was once considered a heretic.




MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 2009
Life

Days like today make me want to dive head first out of an airplane or take an S curve on the back of a bike doing 110 mph. I am not afraid of dying, but I am terrified of growing old and looking back upon my life and seeing not LIFE but existence. Decades spent conforming to the expectations of all around until there is nothing of me left. That is what I have nightmares about. I choose to live, to drink deeply from the cup of vitality and know what it means to be given over to that which calls me. To be so absorbed into the spray from the sea, or the flight of an eagle that I weep for joy, to dance in the wooded areas in the golden time between twilight and night. I want to run across an open field in a game of tag with my lover, to be caught and pulled down among grass and to make love for hours. I want to step out of time and to lie naked under the stars on the high desert or on a mountain top on a moonlight night. I will choose to allow the tides of emotion and passion be my compass and risk being shipwrecked on the high seas over following the well worn path of complacency. I would rather have my heart so full of wonder and ardor that it bursts or to also endure the wretchedness of pain to the point of being crushed, than to float along experiencing neither.
When my time comes to pass from this existence to the next, let God judge those choices for I am ready to stand for them, and let those who are left here be the ones to debate on whether or not it was a "right life".
But in the end I pray that none may say it was a life not lived, a life wasted on compromise and reget. Instead I hope for a celebratation of a life that was sucked dry of every wild and impossible passion and dream.