LOVE your ENEMIES: where Jesus goes wrong (page 8)

Terry

Learning about loving your enemies will give you insight into how God can love you. Something Terry seems to have a difficult time with.

I have difficulty with representing the words of either Jesus or Jehovah as actual inspired text!

My difficulty proceeds from the nature of the unreasonableness in portraying God's "values" as either Divine or in terms of Justice.

What VALUES can we learn from studying God's JUSTICE?

In the Law of Moses we have like for like or a balance between the injury inflicted and the punishment exacted.

This is understandable and can be viewed resonable by even ordinary people for everyday life.

Indeed, the Laws of Hammurabi are the same (and older, by the way.)

Where the problem becomes evident is when we are given JESUS as a SUPERIOR teacher of a morally better code of LOVE YOUR ENEMY.

Now, you say we are to gain insight into how God loves us (we are God's enemies).

Okaaaaayyyyyyy.......

But, now....God is going to reward His enemies (those who violate his values) and not destroy them.

The reason for this change is.......wait for it.........wait for it............JESUS suffered IN OUR PLACE!

He gets destroyed and we don't.

Why? Because he DOESN'T violate Jehovah's Values.

Jesus isn't an enemy of Jehovah. Yet, Jehovah treated him as an enemy (letting him suffer and die.)

Jehovah grants reward (life/not death) to enemies (i.e. Grace.)

And you wonder why I'm having a hard time?

If the Good suffer and the Bad are rewarded........and you call this GRACE (underserved kindness/unmerited favor) I call it: FLIP-FLOP LOGIC.

No wonder MARCION rejected the Old Testament God as a completely different God unworthy of worship.

Who wouldn't prefer the FLIP-FLOP LOGIC God who embraces his enemies??

Only problem is.......it is the same God!

PSacramento

Terry,

Is the issue you have reconciling the OT and NT God or the whole notion of Grace? or both perhaps?

little witch

A most interesting post, and one to think on heavily.

Jesus didnt always turn the other. He told off the "authorities" of his own peeps on more than one occasion, and even did what in this day and age would have constituted disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, and possibly battery and assault! (read cleaning the temple) because what He saw as injustice.

Contridiction, or further study?

Terry

Is the issue you have reconciling the OT and NT God or the whole notion of Grace? or both perhaps?

There is no coherent set of values on display to believe in.

Is it that God has absolute values which must be absolutely followed or you die? (Adam and Eve)

Is it that God punishes in excess of the crime? (Offspring of condemned Adam and Eve.)

Is it that there is a balance to reward and punishment exactly corresponding to merit and injury? (Law of Moses)

Should we feel the same about horrible serial killers as we do for newborn babies? (Love your enemies)

What set of values does either God or Jesus have?

What is the point in loving an enemy in the first place? Evil is wrong; why "value" it?

You get the point.

Since there is NO one author to the Bible it really comes across as a mess if you want to determine a consistent set of Just Values.

Terry

Concerning the Doctrine of Grace (there are several, by the way) I am convinced it was merely an unworkable attempt to patch together a

Grand Reason why the supposed Messiah, Jesus, was allowed to die.

It is a deus ex machina, if you will.

It is Monday Morning Quarterbacking.

little witch

He must have caused confusion from the start cause he got the death penalty for his views. On some level this person Jesus, could be tempremental and stand up for his cause, and yet be in the spirit of forgiveness. I struggle with this daily as a follower of Christ. I am intrigued by everyones posts, and by the original post.

I intend to study this more, get into the layers. Like cake, not onions btw. Tee Hee Hee

Lw

Terry

Muslims believe the mind of Allah is unknowable and that their God is capricious, cruel and unpredictable.

This would appear to apply to the Christian God as well.

The fact that the Christian god has been represented as "loving" and kind and forgiving is totally at odds with his past actions toward mankind.

The cobbled-together explanation for what Jesus is supposed to be is irrational in terms of either Justice, Fairness, Law, Love or common sense.

So then, on what basis can we explain it?

"For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son......." doesn't make sense because God has NO REASON for this love!

The World consists of all sinners.

On what basis did God love sinners?

The same sinners were executed for those sins on the basis of God's pure values and intolerance for evil.

Are you telling me he loved the world of sinners while he was drowning them?

designs

Blub blub 'I love you man' blub blub

From the theological age of beating on a log around the campfires at night.

T-Duality

Aahh

myelaine

dear Terry...

Jesus said love your enemies and pray for them...not give your life for them. He said this because in times past people had heard or were taught to hate their enemies. It is important, I think, to note that Jesus said that we are His friends if we know about His business...we are no longer enemies of God...thus He died for His enemies and at the same time only for His friends.(the 2 thieves hanging next to Him are an example of this)

I am a survivor of many years of childhood sexual abuse and I forgave my dad in order to move on and live as a survivor not a victim. my love is not perfected in regards to him in that I haven't ever prayed for him...but I don't hate him at all.

..."For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son......." doesn't make sense because God has NO REASON for this love!"...

until Jesus came into our sight...we had no reason to believe there is a loving God...someone there that "exists" with love towards us...Almighty God couldn't simply step in and show Himself in our sinful world from the beginning...but He had a plan for when the time was right...that is the reason for His love.

love michelle

xo

designs

Michele, why.

Western Christianity takes a very skewered middle ages view of the human condition. 'God couldn't' or doesn't because of X you have to admit leaves a dry taste in many mouths.

Maybe, just maybe, this westernized philosophical take needs to be revisited.

LOVE your ENEMIES: where Jesus goes wrong

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