Why does a christian WORSHIP God?

[kidsagainstkows]

a few of my other topics have digressed into this so i thought starting a new one would be appropriate.

the God of the old testament endorsed many horrible things. among these is slavery (not indentured servatude), child rape, unjust legal systems, might makes right mentality, genocide, incestuous rape, and others. knowing this, and knowing that Jesus is an extension of the Jewish god, and knowing that god is the same now as yesterday and forever, why do you worship him.

that is to say, even if i believed that this god existed, i would rail against him. why on earth would any good and decent person not do the same.

 

[ephraimanesti]

that is to say, even if i believed that this god existed, i would rail against him. why on earth would any good and decent person not do the same.

DEAR ONE,

He Whom you "rail against" is the source of all that is Good in the universe. May He have mercy upon you and manifest His glorious Love to you in order that you may come to understand your misperceptions about Him and learn to love Him in return.

GLORY TO GOD FOR ALL THINGS!
ephraim

 

[kidsagainstkows]

he is also the source of all that is bad. did he love job when he destroyed everything he had just because he could? did he love every single person on earth when he murdered every single one of them in a flood (not counting Noah and fam of course)? this guy is not someone to be looked up to.

 

[freeport]

a few of my other topics have digressed into this so i thought starting a new one would be appropriate.

the God of the old testament endorsed many horrible things. among these is slavery (not indentured servatude), child rape, unjust legal systems, might makes right mentality, genocide, incestuous rape, and others. knowing this, and knowing that Jesus is an extension of the Jewish god, and knowing that god is the same now as yesterday and forever, why do you worship him.

that is to say, even if i believed that this god existed, i would rail against him. why on earth would any good and decent person not do the same.

God did not endorse child rape, give me a break...

Incestous rape? You mean Lot and his daughters? That was bizarre and weird, it wasn't that God endorsed it, it was that it just happened. Weird stuff happens in the world.

Salvation is not about following some written, codified rules of Law, but about the Spirit.

Hate to break this to you... but Adam's children were very incestous. Same with Noah's. Sick stuff we try and get away from... but that is because we *can* get away from. Context is everything in judgment.

 

[ephraimanesti]

he is also the source of all that is bad. did he love job when he destroyed everything he had just because he could? did he love every single person on earth when he murdered every single one of them in a flood (not counting Noah and fam of course)? this guy is not someone to be looked up to.

GOD'S BELOVED,

HE IS THE ONLY ENTITY IN THE UNIVERSE WORTHY OF BEING LOOKED UP TO!

His Love for us, His children, is so far beyond anything we can conceive or dream of that the most we can hope for in this life is a taste--a sample--of what eternity holds, when we will see and know and experience Him as He is.

My heart aches for you, my friend, as does Abba's, that you have been so blinded by hatred and misperception that your blindness is keeping you from experiencing His glorious Light and Love for yourself.

May God bless you and heal you of your pain!

IN HIS LOVE,
ephraim

 

[Jazmyn]

did he love job when he destroyed everything he had just because he could?

It was Satan who destroyed everything Job had, Job 1

did he love every single person on earth when he murdered every single one of them in a flood (not counting Noah and fam of course)?

"He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." (2 Peter 3:9)

God waited patiently for 120 years while the ark was being built, Noah warned the people all that time to flee from the coming wrath, but they scoffed at him.

And He gave them the way to salvation after Christ's crucifixion, "For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built." (1 Peter 3:18-20)

 

[Bible2]

Why does a christian WORSHIP God?

A Christian worships God because he is worthy of worship as the Creator and sustainer of all things in existence: "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created" (Revelation 4:11).

"In him we live, and move, and have our being" (Acts 17:28). "By him all things consist" (Colossians 1:17). So for a human to rail against God is as foolish as if a zygote were to rail against its own mother, the only source of its continued existence.

But unlike a mother, who does not have the right to kill her zygote, as the Creator, God has the right to do with his creatures whatever he wants: "Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?" (Romans 9:21-24).

the God of the old testament endorsed many horrible things

God has never endorsed anything that is unjust or morally evil.

And everything God himself does is perfectly just and right: "He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he" (Deuteronomy 32:4).

he is also the source of all that is bad.

God is not the source of anything morally evil: "Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning" (James 1:13-17).

did he love job when he destroyed everything he had just because he could?

Actually, it was Satan who destroyed everything Job had. It was God who then restored everything back to Job, twice over: "So the LORD blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning: for he had fourteen thousand sheep, and six thousand camels, and a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand she asses. He had also seven sons and three daughters. And he called the name of the first, Jemima; and the name of the second, Kezia; and the name of the third, Kerenhappuch. And in all the land were no women found so fair as the daughters of Job: and their father gave them inheritance among their brethren. After this lived Job an hundred and forty years, and saw his sons, and his sons' sons, even four generations" (Job 42:12-16).

"Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy" (James 5:11).

did he love every single person on earth when he murdered every single one of them in a flood (not counting Noah and fam of course)?

When God killed people in the flood for their sinfulness (Genesis 6:5), that was not murder, but capital punishment (cf. Romans 13:4). "For the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). "The soul that sinneth, it shall die" (Ezekiel 18:20).

But God can also show great mercy toward sinners like us: "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement" (Romans 5:8-11).

 

[kidsagainstkows]

"God did not endorse child rape, give me a break..."

what was the story about the people who walked around the city walls for three days then they fell. i cant seem to find it but god tells the people to murder everyone, except the young virgins, whom they may do with as they wish. what does that sound like to you?

"It was Satan who destroyed everything Job had, Job 1"

Satan may have been the bullet, but god was the marksman. Lucifer got gods permission to do what he did and god when job asked why he found out it was just because god could

 

[Bible2]

god tells the people to murder everyone, except the young virgins, whom they may do with as they wish. what does that sound like to you?

Numbers 31:18 doesn't say that the Israelites could do whatever they wanted with the captive virgins. The Israelites could have waited until they grew up and then married them (cf. Deuteronomy 21:11-14).

 

[zaksmummy]

a few of my other topics have digressed into this so i thought starting a new one would be appropriate.

the God of the old testament endorsed many horrible things. among these is slavery (not indentured servatude), child rape, unjust legal systems, might makes right mentality, genocide, incestuous rape, and others. knowing this, and knowing that Jesus is an extension of the Jewish god, and knowing that god is the same now as yesterday and forever, why do you worship him.

that is to say, even if i believed that this god existed, i would rail against him. why on earth would any good and decent person not do the same.

The problem you have is that you are talking about a time in history about four to five thousand years ago and a completely different culture to the one you are in. You are thus judging this culture by your own cultural standards.

The story of Lot if you read it again you will notice that Lots daughters got him drunk so that he would have sex with them to perpetuate their ancestral line. At this time God had not given his Torah or Law to the people and so there was no laws against incest.

God gave his Torah to the Children of Isreal, the descendents of Abraham, Lots uncle about a five hundred years later.

When The Israelites went round Jericho, and they took the "young maidens", these girls were probably young teenagers. In middle eastern culture people - boys and girls got married from the age of thirteen. Thats why, even now in Jewish culture boys and girls undergo their bar/bat mizvot at the age of thirteen and are accepted as adults into the community.

Also God do not allow child abuse and so these would have been taken into the homes of the Israelites and treated kindly. Hence the commandments to care for the orphans and widows.

What makes you think that the Torah or law is an unjust legal system?, give examples and we can look at them one by one. Often the problem occurs because what you have in the Bible is Gods written Torah and what you need is to understand the oral Torah which accompanies its - this is held in the Talmud.

For many years I read the Old Testement and had the same thoughts as you about it - until I started to understand the Hebrew roots of christianity and have read some other Jewish book including the Talmud, and after this the Torah or Law makes so much more sense and it is quite obvious to me that God was trying to build a community of people who were holy, He says be holy as I am holy.

Hope this helps!

 

[heymikey80]

So the conclusion: if you're looking to be spoiled by things you like, that're innocuous, that don't change you for the better -- don't look to God. His power and holiness are inestimably great. That's not a great equation for niceties with corrupt, self-seeking creatures who can think of nothing more than themselves, who corrupt the very claim to enacting justice among themselves.

God's good. He's not safe.

 

[drich0150]

I could go point by point, but to the OP: Do you see a pattern of misunderstand developing in you other posts? Perhaps given your current level of understanding of the God of the OT it would be best to with hold your final judgment till you have a better understanding of Him.

 

[kidsagainstkows]

Numbers 31:18 doesn't say that the Israelites could do whatever they wanted with the captive virgins. The Israelites could have waited until they grew up and then married them (cf. Deuteronomy 21:11-14).

knowing what war is like... ya, probably waited until they were all grown up and married them, thats likely. (note the sarcasm)

 

[kidsagainstkows]

The problem you have is that you are talking about a time in history about four to five thousand years ago and a completely different culture to the one you are in. You are thus judging this culture by your own cultural standards.

The story of Lot if you read it again you will notice that Lots daughters got him drunk so that he would have sex with them to perpetuate their ancestral line. At this time God had not given his Torah or Law to the people and so there was no laws against incest.

God gave his Torah to the Children of Isreal, the descendents of Abraham, Lots uncle about a five hundred years later.

When The Israelites went round Jericho, and they took the "young maidens", these girls were probably young teenagers. In middle eastern culture people - boys and girls got married from the age of thirteen. Thats why, even now in Jewish culture boys and girls undergo their bar/bat mizvot at the age of thirteen and are accepted as adults into the community.

Also God do not allow child abuse and so these would have been taken into the homes of the Israelites and treated kindly. Hence the commandments to care for the orphans and widows.

What makes you think that the Torah or law is an unjust legal system?, give examples and we can look at them one by one. Often the problem occurs because what you have in the Bible is Gods written Torah and what you need is to understand the oral Torah which accompanies its - this is held in the Talmud.

For many years I read the Old Testement and had the same thoughts as you about it - until I started to understand the Hebrew roots of christianity and have read some other Jewish book including the Talmud, and after this the Torah or Law makes so much more sense and it is quite obvious to me that God was trying to build a community of people who were holy, He says be holy as I am holy.

Hope this helps!

Firstly, i would like to say that i can, in fact, judge other cultures by my standards. ive said this in other posts and i will say it again, wrong is wrong, no matter the time or place. was slavery ok until 1865? can we not judge that because it was a different time?

your right reguarding Lots daughters/Adam and Eve's kids/Noah's kids. God does not specifically endorse this aspect but he does force it to happen (whereas in evolutionary theory there is no incest as its bad for the species).

think about what your saying when you talk about Jericho. what if that was your thirteen year old daughter who had their parents murdered. the murderer took your little daughter and forcibly married her and consummated with her. that sounds like one of the most terrible things that a person could do, and i weep for you if you do not agree.

the unjust legal system i speak of is partially lev and deut. in these books things such as apostasy, teen rebellion, eating shellfish, and wearing a poly-cotton blend are all met with stoning.

i also speak of what many Christians believe now which is that all sin is equal, and that people go to hell as punishment for sins. in a fair legal system (lets use USA for example), different crimes are not equal. we have misdemeanors and felonies, and these have degrees of severity within them. the punishment also must fit the crime. in god's view it doesnt matter whether i murdered or jay walked, i get eternal damnation.

i hope i was able to clear up what i meant with my reply. it should be noted that i have read the bible and it is because of the bible that i do not understand. it is not from lack of study. i guess the whole "god is not the author of confusion" thing doesnt hold up.

 

[kidsagainstkows]

let me put it another way to see if i can get my point across better (parable time!!!)

im torturing your family.

one i give unending joint pain, this is so painful that on days, that family member cant get out of bed.

one i steal breath from, this person is often hospitalized because of this, and they can not do the things that other people can

i have made one quite literally pay with an arm and a leg, this person must watch healthy people and realize that he/she can not do the things that they can

the last one i just make feel like crap, i get into that persons head and tell that person that they are not good enough, that they are ugly, that they are worthless and they should kill themselves.

i could make all of this stop, and it would be easy to do. it would require literally nothing on my part, yet i choose to continue. am i a good person or a bad person?

 

[ebia]

a few of my other topics have digressed into this so i thought starting a new one would be appropriate.

the God of the old testament endorsed many horrible things. among these is slavery (not indentured servatude), child rape, unjust legal systems, might makes right mentality, genocide, incestuous rape, and others. knowing this, and knowing that Jesus is an extension of the Jewish god, and knowing that god is the same now as yesterday and forever, why do you worship him.

that is to say, even if i believed that this god existed, i would rail against him. why on earth would any good and decent person not do the same.

As I've said in the other threads, I think you are right to reject that picture of God, but that's not the picture of God I find in the clearest picture of God that we have - Jesus of Nazareth.

 

[drich0150]

let me put it another way to see if i can get my point across better (parable time!!!)

im torturing your family.

one i give unending joint pain, this is so painful that on days, that family member cant get out of bed.

one i steal breath from, this person is often hospitalized because of this, and they can not do the things that other people can

i have made one quite literally pay with an arm and a leg, this person must watch healthy people and realize that he/she can not do the things that they can

i could make all of this stop, and it would be easy to do. it would require literally nothing on my part, yet i choose to continue. am i a good person or a bad person?

It would depend, did you do anything to procure eternal life for these people or are you simply looking to buy loyalty and affection from these people by giving them a life lived like others can enjoy?

If your job was to simply make this life as pleasant as possible and you had the means to do so, but did not pay or bribe people to like you, by giving them good health like other people, I'd say you would be a "bad person."

But if you goal was anything broader than the 70 or so years most people live, and your efforts in letting someone suffer, so another can live forever rather than die a second death.. I'd say, that It is better to let someone live in discomfort. even a full 70 years in torment, is a small price to save another from a second death..

 

[Jazmyn]

Firstly, i would like to say that i can, in fact, judge other cultures by my standards.

Worldly standards come from the surrounding culture.

Not all sin is equal, "Jesus answered, "You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.'" (John 19:11)

...but, "whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it." (James 2:10)

The seriousness of sin is that "..those who do such things deserve death.." (Romans 1:32)

We are all sinful, we need a Saviour, which is what God sent His Son, Jesus, to be for me and for you. He, the Almighty God, came down from Heaven and suffered and died for me, even though I am a sinner, so I might be healed, and have a personal relationship, and hope and joy and comfort and eternal life to be with Him, how can I call God evil. When I think of what He did for me, in spite of what I am. I cannot. ... how great is that love?

There is suffering in the world. This world is fallen. When Adam and Eve sinned, death and suffering entered the world. God came down to suffer for and with us,

"“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”" (Luke 4:18-21)

Jesus didn't ignore suffering, it is a common theme all through the Bible. He had compassion on the sick and the poor and the lost and the despised.

"“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you." (Matthew 5:3-12)

You really need to read the New Testament first, it will give you a better understanding of the Old one. We have to read the Old Testament through the lens of Jesus Christ.

 

[drich0150]

the last one i just make feel like crap, i get into that persons head and tell that person that they are not good enough, that they are ugly, that they are worthless and they should kill themselves.

If this person is getting this from what they think to be "God." They do not understand who or what God is. The (god) they are speaking with is not the God of Heaven. No matter how religious their experience maybe..

Or if you are simply stating that God could stop this persons torment, and it is His fault that He does not... Then again, you or whom ever doesn't understand who God is. He's not a genie nor is He an alternative to a HMO. You life doesn't get easier because you believe. It's not supposed to, no matter what prosperity gospel you have taken to heart.

God is not a cure all for this life.. This life is but a vapor, and in the fleeting moments that we have been blessed with, we are to simply make a choice as to what or where we wish to spend eternity.

We are not all going to be able to make that choice sitting in a 5th ave apartment eating the finest foods, not wanting for anything, nor are we guaranteed that we will be given 100 years to make that choice. We have only the guarantee of the last breath we took, and not another. For each breath after the first is a gift. This gift is to give us time to get to know God, and make a decision as to what to do with Jesus, the one they call Christ.

That is the meaning of your life, mine and all of the people between us.. This Life is not our final destination. The next one is. we are to spend this life in preparation for the next. Also know we will be held accountable for each breath spent here. If you haven't been a good steward of what you have been given then let Jesus's sacrifice fill in where you fall short.

 

[ephraimanesti]

the last one i just make feel like crap, i get into that persons head and tell that person that they are not good enough, that they are ugly, that they are worthless and they should kill themselves.

i could make all of this stop, and it would be easy to do. it would require literally nothing on my part, yet i choose to continue. am i a good person or a bad person?

MY BROTHER,

You have obviously been badly hurt and are in a lot of pain. Why not address the hurt and pain rather than wrongfully blaming it on God and, in the process of doing so, turning your back on the only viable source of healing available?

God is not the bad guy--try reaching out to Him!

A BOND-SLAVE OF OUR LORD/GOD/SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST,
ephraim