Question for Christians

[HitchSlap]

If God told you to murder someone, would you? Why or why not?

This was brought up in another thread, and I think it deserves some serious discussion. Christians claim to have a personal and loving relationship with God/Jesus/Holy Ghost, and are instructed to communicate via prayer on a daily basis (without ceasing), and to cultivate a sensitivity to that still small voice of the Holy Spirit. Christians also claim that to not follow the will of God is a sin. So, my question is this; if during your conversations with God, and he instructs you to murder someone, would you?

Additionally, is one's willingness to commit murder as a direct order from God, directly proportional to their spiritual maturity and devotion?

 

[BelievingIsObeying]

If God told you to murder someone, would you? Why or why not?

This was brought up in another thread, and I think it deserves some serious discussion. Christians claim to have a personal and loving relationship with God/Jesus/Holy Ghost, and are instructed to communicate via prayer on a daily basis (without ceasing), and to cultivate a sensitivity to that still small voice of the Holy Spirit. Christians also claim that to not follow the will of God is a sin. So, my question is this; if during your conversations with God, and he instructs you to murder someone, would you?

Additionally, is one's willingness to commit murder as a direct order from God, directly proportional to their spiritual maturity and devotion?

No, because I will never kill intentionally.

 

[HitchSlap]

No, because I will never kill intentionally.

So you would disobey a direct order from God?

 

[BelievingIsObeying]

So you would disobey a direct order from God?

Yes

 

[HitchSlap]

Yes

Why?

 

[prov1810]

It's a loaded question because of the word "murder". You seem to be asking that if someone thinks they hear a voice from God telling them to kill a random person, would we consider this legitimate?

No.

There are extraordinary instances in the Bible where people were ordered by God to kill. There is the case of Abraham, who knew the command was authentic because the same Being who gave the order predicted and brought about the miraculous birth of Abraham's son.

There is the conquest of the promised land, ordered by a God who performed miracles through the man who led the people out of Egypt. This conquest came with plenty of warning and the Canaanites had every chance to flee. The goal was not to kill but to drive them out, as stated many times in Scripture. The land was God's to give and Israel's to have and these claims come from God, who proved Himself with mighty acts.

 

[BelievingIsObeying]

Why?

Because I don't think God would ever ask that of anyone, He is more than capable and should be the only entity to end a persons life. I wouldn't want to be killed, so I'm not going to kill anyone. I would rather spend an eternity in hell knowing that I never killed anyone than an eternity in heaven knowing I did kill someone.

 

[willlowbee]

I've been a member of Christian forums wherein Christians have answered questions such as that; would you kill if God asked you to? With, yes!
Those people scare me. And I feel sorry for their children.

What they seem to ignore is that God being God he wouldn't need a human hitman to do his bidding. He is the giver and taker of life.

Hitchslap, I don't think you can contain all Christians into one box. There are evangelicals, fundamentalists, zealots, ultra-right wing conservatives, and liberals.

For me of late, I've been committing to deep introspection as I find I have a lot of questions coming to light and thanks to many different posts in this forum, and for other reasons as well.

I found a website, Jesus Never Existed. It has a tremendous amount of information that seemingly is verifiable and I'm in the process of hoping to have enough days in future where I can dedicate my time to investigating the claims there.

I was intrigued by a Hitchens video I saw here and I've been looking into his lectures online as well.
I am starting to wonder if it is a matter of holding faith because I was raised in the faith and it therefore feels natural for me, and if that family tradition of commitment to the religion can withstand investigating objectivists scrutiny of everything from the origin of the Bible, to whether or not Jesus or even Paul existed.

It's a very interesting time really. Part of my gut feeling is that I am content in my faith. The other is this actual flutter in my heart when I go deep and think about what I've taken on faith as absolutely true for most of my life and that possibly being what atheists and others very often claim it is; fable, mythology, make believe, fiction, man made rubbish.

To answer your question then, while I was raised in the faith I believe the prayer without ceasing command isn't that we stay on our knees all our lives but rather we live a pious life wearing the armor of God and realizing we are always in communication with the most high because his kingdom is within us.

And this then means we are always afforded the opportunity to be in prayer, or communication, with his will and wisdom in all things at all times because his spirit informs us when we're open to it.
That gut feeling, or little voice of insight or conscience, for me, is God's inspiration giving guidance.

I also think idioms, parables, allegory, as others have also noted when I've browsed old threads here and people sharing their understanding of God, are what speak to us in the Bible. And so it's not so much what the scriptures say word for word but what they inspire us to see behind the words. Because God being universal and incorporeal would not speak so simply in human tongue when his is an occult or mystery tradition.

In order to find the way to Heaven one must follow the signs. God is more, at least for me, than what's on the page. Men printed the book but God lives in the white. Maybe atheists can not see that and maybe that's why they just don't understand. Because they take the Bible at its word. When it's far more that that.

 

[Tinker Grey]

No, because I will never kill intentionally.

So you would disobey a direct order from God?

Yes

Rather odd for someone with your handle.

 

[PrayerandPeace]

God wouldn't ask me to do that. No ifs, ands or buts.

 

[LovebirdsFlying]

I don't believe God would tell me to murder. Kill, maybe, but not murder. There is a difference. If I understood God to order me to kill someone, first I would make sure the message came from God, since we are told to try the spirits to see whether they are of God, and then I would do it.

My family comes from an area of the Appalachian region where snake-handling services are fairly common. My father told the story of a man who visited one of those services and refused to pick up a snake. A woman from the congregation rebuked him. "Do you mean, if God told you to pick up a snake, you wouldn't do it?" The man replied, "Yes, ma'am, I would. But He didn't, and I ain't."

That pretty much sums up my view on God telling me to kill. If He did, I would, but He didn't, and I ain't.

 

[HitchSlap]

Because I don't think God would ever ask that of anyone, He is more than capable and should be the only entity to end a persons life. I wouldn't want to be killed, so I'm not going to kill anyone. I would rather spend an eternity in hell knowing that I never killed anyone than an eternity in heaven knowing I did kill someone.

But I'm not asking if you think God would or wouldn't ask you to do something you consider wrong, in my hypothetical, I made it clear that you knew for 100% certain (As Abraham did with Isaac) that God was asking you to murder someone. The question is, would you obey, or disobey his command?

Again, I'm not asking what you think God may or may not ask of you, but if you would follow his command to murder if you knew for 100% certain this was God's command?

 

[willlowbee]

The psychopaths that hijacked 4 planes on 9-11-2001 heard God's voice too.

 

[HitchSlap]

It's a loaded question because of the word "murder". You seem to be asking that if someone thinks they hear a voice from God telling them to kill a random person, would we consider this legitimate?

No.

There are extraordinary instances in the Bible where people were ordered by God to kill. There is the case of Abraham, who knew the command was authentic because the same Being who gave the order predicted and brought about the miraculous birth of Abraham's son.

There is the conquest of the promised land, ordered by a God who performed miracles through the man who led the people out of Egypt. This conquest came with plenty of warning and the Canaanites had every chance to flee. The goal was not to kill but to drive them out, as stated many times in Scripture. The land was God's to give and Israel's to have and these claims come from God, who proved Himself with mighty acts.

No, it's not a loaded question. I clearly stated in my hypothetical, that you knew for 100% certain God commanded you to murder, would you?

Either, you, A follow his command, or B, disobey his command.

Why?

 

[HitchSlap]

I don't believe God would tell me to murder. Kill, maybe, but not murder. There is a difference. If I understood God to order me to kill someone, first I would make sure the message came from God, since we are told to try the spirits to see whether they are of God, and then I would do it.

My family comes from an area of the Appalachian region where snake-handling services are fairly common. My father told the story of a man who visited one of those services and refused to pick up a snake. A woman from the congregation rebuked him. "Do you mean, if God told you to pick up a snake, you wouldn't do it?" The man replied, "Yes, ma'am, I would. But He didn't, and I ain't."

That pretty much sums up my view on God telling me to kill. If He did, I would, but He didn't, and I ain't.

Thanks for your honest reply.

To follow up, why would you commit murder?

 

[HitchSlap]

The psychopaths that hijacked 4 planes on 9-11-2001 heard God's voice too.

How do you know they didn't?

 

[LovebirdsFlying]

Thanks for your honest reply.

To follow up, why would you commit murder?

Again differentiating between killing, which He might command, and murder, which He would not, I would obey His command because even if I don't understand why, I believe He has his reasons for what He tells us to do. As children, we don't always know why our parents tell us to do something, but our parents expect obedience anyway, right? We don't have to know, right at the moment, why God wants us to do something. I've found it usually becomes clear later. And if I never understand it in this life, I believe I will in the next.

 

[prov1810]

No, it's not a loaded question. I clearly stated in my hypothetical, that you knew for 100% certain God commanded you to murder, would you?

Either, you, A follow his command, or B, disobey his command.

Why?

A Christian would not be given this command. Our lives are to be characterized by peace. The New Testament could not possibly be more clear on this.

I am a member of a charismatic church. We believe that God communicates with people, but we believe that even when this does happen it's being processed by our minds and we might not get it all right. I have attended Protestant and Catholic charismatic services and I know how we think. The idea that someone would say, "God is telling me to kill" - that is just bizarre. I and everyone I know would report him to the police.

 

[BelievingIsObeying]

But I'm not asking if you think God would or wouldn't ask you to do something you consider wrong, in my hypothetical, I made it clear that you knew for 100% certain (As Abraham did with Isaac) that God was asking you to murder someone. The question is, would you obey, or disobey his command?

Again, I'm not asking what you think God may or may not ask of you, but if you would follow his command to murder if you knew for 100% certain this was God's command?

Again, no I wouldn't.

 

[BelievingIsObeying]

Rather odd for someone with your handle.

Anything except killing. I don't even kill ants or spiders or anything intentionally anymore.