Why is scripture so fuzzy about heaven and hell?

[ozso]

The love of Christ IS saving you from the judgement of God, the "weeping and gnashing of teeth"

Good grief I give up. You've talked about how miserable you are, and I think maybe this is a reason why.

 

[Jamdoc]

Good grief I give up. You've talked about how miserable you are, and I think maybe this is a reason why.

Yeah, and atheist friends of mine think I'd be happier when they also believe there is no judgement.

Point being, your world view aligns with theirs in that regard.

But I'd still be miserable.
Being a cripple has that effect.
Pain and disability don't exactly bring joy.

 

[ozso]

Yeah, and atheist friends of mine think I'd be happier when they also believe there is no judgement.

Point being, your world view aligns with theirs in that regard.

Hardly since my view is the joy of loving Christ and being loved by him is my motivator. I once started a thread asking people if they would be a Christian if there was no heaven or hell. Because I would still love Christ and want to follow him even if there wasn't either. I think loving Christ even if you don't think there's an eternal torment hell, is a test of true love.

But I'd still be miserable.
Being a cripple has that effect.
Pain and disability don't exactly bring joy.

Does your relationship with Christ bring you joy?

 

[Jamdoc]

Hardly since my view is the joy of loving Christ and being loved by him is my motivator. I once started a thread asking people if they would be a Christian if there was no heaven or hell. Because I would still love Christ and want to follow him even if there wasn't either. I think loving Christ even if you don't think there's an eternal torment hell, is a test of true love.



Does your relationship with Christ bring you joy?

It used to, but when every prayer is answered no, it becomes strained.
There's only so many times you can ask for a fish and get a serpent instead and shrug it off.

Maybe you're just blessed, I certainly am not.

Heaven being extremely vague and to the best of my knowledge focusing on doing something I hate doesn't help.

 

[Hmm]

Heaven being extremely vague and to the best of my knowledge focusing on doing something I hate doesn't help.

Heaven is bound to bee vaguely described, isn't it?, because it's something that's beyond our personal experience, even though we may get glimpses of it.

But given that it's vague, if you believe it's focusing on doing something you hate, why not change how you think of it? Thoughts are things and have a very real effect on the way we feel.

 

[Jamdoc]

Heaven is bound to bee vaguely described, isn't it?, because it's something that's beyond our personal experience, even though we may get glimpses of it.

But given that it's vague, if you believe it's focusing on doing something you hate, why not change how you think of it? Thoughts are things and have a very real effect on the way we feel.

Because what the bible does describe of it, isn't very joy inspiring.
To be honest, I had more joy in the Lord before I actually read through the bible and studied it. When I just relied on what pastors told me. You know, Pastors tend to skip the harder stuff to absorb in scripture. Oh I was able to accept ECT and hell quite readily, God's wrath quite readily. Those are not entirely difficult concepts to absorb and most pastors will talk about them. They treat it as a hard topic, and while I may not like it, I understand it. God is within His rights to judge however harshly He wants for sin. The only difficult subjects regarding ECT specifically, are Romans 9, where some people are basically designated, created for the purpose alone, of being subjected to God's wrath, so that He can display it. ECT is easier to absorb when people have the free will to accept Christ and avoid it. But Romans 9 appears to support Calvinism, which predestines some for wrath, and there are other supporting verses to that concept, such as John 6:44, and God hardening Pharaoh's heart in Exodus. Then it becomes a harder concept... and the book of Joshua which I mentioned before where God instructed the Israelites to commit genocide, even of small children. That's hard to stomach.
But it is biblical and teaches that God is absolutely sovereign, even if it means the wholesale slaughter of children. It is what He commanded.
Matthew 22:30 might as well be a murder weapon on me, before I knew that one.. you know, I held out hope, that if I didn't find someone in this life, I could ask God and He'd provide in the next.
Doesn't seem to be the case.
The more knowledge I have of the bible, the more or less resigned I feel to it all, not joyful. Resigned. "He does whatever He wants, we just have to live with it"
The one thing that is supposed to offer hope being vague like that.. is the coup de grace.
Especially when the one definite "you will do this" activity is something that I despise doing and always feel like I'm just doing it out of obligation like there might as well be a gun to the back of my head.

I never even liked singing happy birthday.... to myself.

 

[Hmm]

I never even liked singing happy birthday.... to myself.

You reminded me of this where Mr Bean writes a birthday card to himself!

 

[ozso]

It used to, but when every prayer is answered no, it becomes strained.
There's only so many times you can ask for a fish and get a serpent instead and shrug it off.

Maybe you're just blessed, I certainly am not

I doubt I appear blessed by worldly standards. I've always been a total social misfit due to autism or something else like it. Have no friends at all. Have never had a girlfriend. I live in a ratty old residential hotel in a room not much bigger than a jail cell with just a small sink. I've worked as a security guard for 33 years because it's the only type of job I can handle because I don't really have to do anything and I'm left alone. But from my perspective God has taken good care of me. There are better people in worse circumstances.

Heaven being extremely vague and to the best of my knowledge focusing on doing something I hate doesn't help.

I don't understand what you mean.

 

[Jamdoc]

I doubt appear blessed by worldly standards. I've always been a total social misfit due to autism or something else like it. Have no friends at all. Have never had a girlfriend. I live in a ratty old residential hotel in a room not much bigger than a jail cell with just a small sink. I've worked as a security guard for 33 years because it's the only type of job I can handle because I don't really have to do anything and I'm left alone. But from my perspective God has taken good care of me. There are better people in worse circumstances.

For me, the kicker was asking to be healed of one autoimmune disease, and getting another.

Job wished he'd never been born
Elijah asked God to kill him.

I understand them both.

 

[ozso]

For me, the kicker was asking to be healed of one autoimmune disease, and getting another.

Job wished he'd never been born
Elijah asked God to kill him.

I understand them both.

I've never expected anything from God other than being fed and clothed. I've never expected him to heal me of my neurological problems. But I feel he has accommodated them. I'm not homeless like others whose brain doesn't work right.

 

[Jamdoc]

I've never expected anything from God other than being fed and clothed. I've never expected him to heal me of my neurological problems. But I feel he has accommodated them. I'm not homeless like others whose brain doesn't work right.

There's just a lot I can't do, and very little I can do a lot of the time.
read the same book on repeat I guess.

 

[ozso]

You reminded me of this where Mr Bean writes a birthday card to himself!

I can relate to Mr. Bean. Except I would never put myself in the social situations he does.

 

[ozso]

There's just a lot I can't do, and very little I can do a lot of the time.
read the same book on repeat I guess.

I used to know a C-5 quadriplegic. Broke his neck in a trampoline accident when he was 17. He was extremely thankful that he could breathe on his own instead of needing a respirator.

 

[Jamdoc]

I used to know a C-5 quadriplegic. Broke his neck in a trampoline accident when he was 17. He was extremely thankful that he could breathe on his own instead of needing a respirator.

MS is a degenerative disease. You don't just have this bad thing happen and you just stay there and thankful it isn't worse.
You have this thing, and know it WILL get worse over time, and even when you go into remission, you recognize that you are worse off than you were last year, and the year before that.
I suppose like our bodies in general, but just more exaggerated.

It can be hard to tell here how often my fingers don't want to listen to my spine anymore and I backspace a lot to fix typing errors that just pile up, but I notice over the last few years how much worse that has gotten, steady decline.
and having to give up things you used to enjoy doing. I used to enjoy playing guitar.
I can't do it anymore, between that and the psoriatic arthritis that often causes my hands to be too inflamed for activities like that.

 

[ozso]

MS is a degenerative disease. You don't just have this bad thing happen and you just stay there and thankful it isn't worse.
You have this thing, and know it WILL get worse over time, and even when you go into remission, you recognize that you are worse off than you were last year, and the year before that.
I suppose like our bodies in general, but just more exaggerated.

It can be hard to tell here how often my fingers don't want to listen to my spine anymore and I backspace a lot to fix typing errors that just pile up, but I notice over the last few years how much worse that has gotten, steady decline.
and having to give up things you used to enjoy doing. I used to enjoy playing guitar.
I can't do it anymore, between that and the psoriatic arthritis that often causes my hands to be too inflamed for activities like that.

I'm sorry you have to endure that. I don't mean to sound unsympathetic if I have.

 

[Hmm]

I'm sorry you have to endure that. I don't mean to sound unsympathetic if I have.

You haven't and I'm sure @Jamdoc doesn't think that either.

Life can be really tough and we need a God who is a Comforter. Categorically getting rid of the herectical notion that He is a Torturer is the minimum prerequisite it seems to me.

 

[Jamdoc]

I'm sorry you have to endure that. I don't mean to sound unsympathetic if I have.

It's understandable. It's the internet, not everyone knows what each person is going through
we all have crosses to bear.
but as my point was earlier. It is a cross to bear, not "living your best life now".
So while I don't just cheer and praise because the Lord is on the Throne and is Glorious, because I mean, despite those two realities, I still suffer, so Jesus being glorious doesn't mean everything is great for me.
so I guess I'm just... supposed to live vicariously? Is that the trick?

 

[Hmm]

so I guess I'm just... supposed to live vicariously? Is that the trick?

I think the trick is trying to find God where we are now. It's easy to say I know but people have found God in the most terrible.of places, in concentration camps and in the midst of constant physical pain. Mindfulness/Christian contemplation can help with the latter.

 

[Jamdoc]

I think the trick is trying to find God where we are now. It's easy to say I know but people have found God in the most terrible.of places, in concentration camps and in the midst of constant physical pain. Mindfulness/Christian contemplation can help with the latter.

You can find God, but He can ordain things that make you wish you were never born.

 

[Hmm]

You can find God, but He can ordain things that make you wish you were never born.

As you probably know, I don't believe in such a God. I know you've quoted passages that suggest He is but I believe al these have alternative meanings. I don't want to go through them one by one because I'd have to do a lot of study to do that but also I doubt it would make much difference anyway. We tend to believe in the God that benefits us the most, ironically even if it's one that makes us unhappy. There are hidden pay offs to being unhappy - we don't have to take the risks that happiness inherently brings with it for instance. I'm not saying that you don't have real problems to deal with btw.