*Grace* According to JW's. Your thoughts will be appreciated.

by Lily Pie 272 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  tec

  You're hung up on the cause of emotions but failed to respond to what I said about that (or I missed it somewhere).

  Love causes love. Hate causes hate. Mercy inspires mercy. Forgiveness inspires forgiveness.

  A person who "loves" a serial killer might not turn them in to the police. The killer conquers all in that situation! That battered wife who "loves" their brutal mate might end up dead from protecting them from the consequences of their misdeeds. The dead wife is conquered by the "love".

  Now that would depend on your definition of love, as well as love for whom, wouldn't it? Not turning a serial killer in would not be showing love to any of his/her next victims. Nor is the battered wife helping or showing love to her husband by enabling his criminal abuse either - especially if there are children involved who might be hurt or learn TO hurt.

  Justice is a superior principle to LOVE and MERCY because JUSTICE always applies the rule: You should get what you deserve and never get what you don't.

  And who decides who deserves what? Who is actually qualified to first decide who is guilty and second decide what justice should be served for the crime? How many mistakes are made in the process that actually cause as much if not more harm?

  Mercy protects the innocent - for none of us are 'God'.

  ON WHAT BASIS does God so LOVE the world? How is that love justified by destroying the fairness of getting what you deserve rather than getting what you don't??

  My basis for love does not seem to be the same as your basis for love. Or does it, and you just don't face that part of yourself in these discussions?

  Lets take you as a father, for instance. When your first child was born, what did he/she do to deserve your love? Breathe? Live? Lay there and sleep and look beautiful? You loved, without any basis or fairness or merit or worth. You created that beautiful child. God created us - so why is his or anyone's uncaused love so hard for you to understand?

  Jesus did NOT deserve EXCRUCIATING death. Justice is violated. Justice is fairness, balance, reward for merit and protection of the innocent.You will not say how God justifies loving sinful wretches more than he loved his son!

  I won't say how God justifies loving sinners more than Christ because where does it say that? Jesus laid down his life out of love for his brothers and love for His father. He could have decided not to do so - he said so himself, it was his choice. But because of his act of love, how many love him? How many follow him, find strength in life and in faith?

  There is a reason for this: you don't understand it.

  I think I do. I think you would too if you took a moment to put it into perspective - as a father loves his child.

  Tammy
• 

  PSacramento

  Where did you come up with this... stuff? Certainly not the bible.

  If we are not born under Grace, when exatcly is it given to us?

  So you believe eternal life (salvation) is something you can lose?

  Yes.

  Have you personally ever heard of someone KNOWINGLY making this choice not to keep God's grace?

  If you mean knowing someone that undestood they were under God' grace and choose to blasphem the HS and "reject" God's grace?

  Yes.
• 

  Terry

  Tammy clues us:

  You're hung up on the cause of emotions but failed to respond to what I said about that (or I missed it somewhere).

  Love causes love. Hate causes hate. Mercy inspires mercy. Forgiveness inspires forgiveness.

  Tammy dearest, this is a Tautology. Circular reasoning; saying the same thing in different ways; redefining a condition and then using the redefinition as an explanation.
• 

  Terry

  A person who "loves" a serial killer might not turn them in to the police. The killer conquers all in that situation! That battered wife who "loves" their brutal mate might end up dead from protecting them from the consequences of their misdeeds. The dead wife is conquered by the "love".

  Now that would depend on your definition of love, as well as love for whom, wouldn't it? Not turning a serial killer in would not be showing love to any of his/her next victims. Nor is the battered wife helping or showing love to her husband by enabling his criminal abuse either - especially if there are children involved who might be hurt or learn TO hurt.

  Well, do we all get to make up whatever definitions we want so that we all have a private language that means whatever we want? Or, are we all going to use the same language?

  I notice you haven't actually defined anything but have merely begged my definitions to death!

  Must I do all the heavy lifting?
• 

  Terry

  Lets take you as a father, for instance. When your first child was born, what did he/she do to deserve your love? Breathe? Live? Lay there and sleep and look beautiful? You loved, without any basis or fairness or merit or worth. You created that beautiful child. God created us - so why is his or anyone's uncaused love so hard for you to understand?

  First of all, I wanted to be a father. I chose to be a father. I remembered my own childhood without a father and determined to be the father I had never had. My firstborn baby was beautiful and vulnerable and needed what I had to offer (and willingly.) I chose to define part of my purpose in living as the custodian of a new life. I sought to pass on to my child the values I cherished. I sought to protect as best I could from harm because each new life has within it it all the potential for greatness and possibilities for world repair that a doctor, teacher, artist and thinker can apply.

  I loved on that basis and not magically at all. My own father certainly didn't find that spark of magic "love" enough stay around longer than the 6 months it took for him to leave permanently!

  Things don't "just happen", Tammy.

  This world and the people on it aren't some fairy tale.

  We do things and feel things BASED ON something.
• 

  tec

  Tammy dearest, this is a Tautology. Circular reasoning; saying the same thing in different ways; redefining a condition and then using the redefinition as an explanation.

  Terry, love, I said it in a different way because you did not seem to respond to it the first time around. You still have not said what you think of it.

  Must I do all the heavy lifting?

  You would like my definitions of love? Here they are, and there is more than one kind of love. For all intents and purposes, when I speak of loving neighbor/enemy, I am speaking of a brotherly love.

  Brotherly love - love for friend and foe as fellow human beings making their way through this world - hoping that everyone finds peace in this world, and hopefully the next - wishing no ill will on anyone (if someone does something wrong to me or someone else, then hope above all else that this person can stop what they're doing, repent, and find the same peace that I have found).

  This love has no conditions other than the fact that I have first been loved by my father in heaven - me being no better or worse than those around me. This love does not judge, nor wish harm, nor wish for anything other than that everyone comes to find peace and contentment themselves.

  Romantic love - this love is conditional and it IS based on your ideas of merit and values warranting it. (also a good dose of lust for your partner helps, but also tends to wear off at times) Combine this love with the brotherly love above, and you have a better chance at success, imho. People can and do walk away from romantic love, though.

  Parental love - This love is harder to define, and it varies depending on the person, I suppose. Most of us love our children unconditionally, and will try to help them no matter what kinds of terrible things they might do... but we will also discipline them, hopefully to THEIR benefit - but often enough we have no idea what we're doing.

  You yourself said on another thread (when someone asked you) that if your son was a rapist, you would be terribly hurt and disappointed, but that you would still love him.

  Okay... so there are my definitions. Doesn't make them right, but now you know where I'm coming from.

  Tammy
• 

  tec

  I loved on that basis and not magically at all. My own father certainly didn't find that spark of magic "love" enough stay around longer than the 6 months it took for him to leave permanently! Things don't "just happen", Tammy. This world and the people on it aren't some fairy tale. We do things and feel things BASED ON something.

  I'm not really sure what you're trying to say. You loved your first child based on the possibilities that he/she represented? Or you wanted to give a child love, and guidance, so you chose to love the child? I don't think either of these are bad reasons, or invalid in any way, but they're not the same as what I thought you were saying earlier - that we love based on the merits and values that someone shows us.

  I never thought that much when my son was born, or even before he was born. When my son was born, I just loved him - it was overwhelming, I couldn't take my eyes off him for the six days we were in the hospital. I wasn't thinking about his potential, or anything like that. Just that he was so beautiful... and mine. I wanted him for selfish reasons, mind you - I wanted someone all my own to love, and I wanted someone all my own to love me as well.

  But I don't think the world is a fairy tale, Terry. We hurt each other every day. Fathers abandon their sons to the hurt of their sons, as you've said, or pretend they don't have daughters (I never knew my father until I was eleven - he never made an excuse, even when others had told me he didn't know, he owned up to it that he always knew - I do remember him crying beside me when he thought I was asleep that first summer I spent with him - even then, I knew it was guilt, and perhaps also love for this kid who loved him anyway)

  But love and forgiveness heal people, Terry. I've seen and experienced that. So it is my experience that (here I am about to repeat it yet again!) love does beget/cause love. Same with forgiveness and mercy... or hate and war. No, I don't think showing love to someone will mean that everyone will show love in return, or to someone else. But I'm not responsible for their response. I'm responsible for mine.

  Tammy
• 

  Terry

  GRACE is kindness, forgiveness and imputed righteousness shown by Almighty God toward those who do not DESERVE it.

  If God were willy nilly about whom He kills and who He gives a pass then NO REASONS would be necessary in executing His willy-nilly sentence.

  But--God DID GIVE REASONS.

  He also gave laws and consequences based on BEHAVIOR.

  Suddenly none of that matters.

  Why?
• 

  tec

  But God does still ask something of us, Terry. He asks us to believe in his Son - who in turn tells us to love one another (enemies and all), and to show mercy and forgiveness to all.

  We haven't done anything to deserve His forgiveness or grace or love. Christ did it FOR us, out of love... which should in turn inspire us to do as he asks of us, whether another person 'deserves' it or not.

  Tammy
• 

  PSacramento

  But--God DID GIVE REASONS.

  He also gave laws and consequences based on BEHAVIOR.

  Suddenly none of that matters.

  Why?

  It still matters, it matters a great deal what we do, it just that, in regards to his love and salvation, what we do is NOT as vital as WHY we do it.

  God knows US, God knows that we can do the greatest of good for the worse of reasons.

  Paul tells us that NOTHING that we do makes us worthy of God's grace, it is freely given because we can't earn it.

  Because we don't have to earn God's love, like my children don't have to ear my love, what we do, we do out of love.

  Not for recompense, not to balance out the books against our sins, not to look good for God, not for boasting, but out of pure love.

  Doing good for goodness sake is one of the easiest way to understand grace but it doesn't explain the motivating FORCE and that force is LOVE.