Originally posted by npetreley:
Absolutely. And since we are no better than these scholars, and we must also put on our pants one at a time, let's also leave behind our illusion that God is obliged to live up to our personal criteria for being "good" or "loving" or "fair" or "just."
It is great to agree, even as we disagree. I personally have no illusion that God has to live up to my concept of good. Yet I feel without a doubt that God does live up to his concept of good. And that i am to look to him to determin what is good and what is not... I am not aware of any personal exemption that God has that allows him to do evil and call it good. He does not do evil, and he does not use evil and call it good.
I do not believe that God has one concept of good that applys to him, and another concept of good that applys to man. With God, i believe the concept to be either black or white, good or evil. It is his standard of goodness that he has called all men to.
There is not a concept of good as pertains to man and another concept of good that applys to God. What is good in heaven, is good on earth, and what is good on earth is good in heaven. The God of heaven is also the God of earth.
God is not obliged to live up to our standards, yet we are obliged to live up to his. We are to be immitators of Christ to the best of our ability. Save the person of God, there is nothing about God that we should not strive to be.
The life of Christ is our example, our living example. How many did Christ express a corporate lack of love for as demonstrated by the concept of predestination. He expressed indivigual indignation from time to time, but a corporate lack of love.. Never. Did he hate the Pharisees, why don't we ask Nicodemus and Paul....
Yet, predestination has God hating a major portion of those that he created while loving only the few.... Should we mimick Christ in actions such as these?? I think not...