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Originally Posted by usgrant7
If you lived in a Kingdom with an autocratic monarch. And you had to go before him, because your neighbor and you had a dispute. You knew that he set the rules, he was the final judge, and if you violated any courtroom procedure, he would put you to death, on the spot. Would it be prudent to bone up on the rules? Ask some people who know how it works, to fill you in?
Or would you just walk into the court-room, give him the finger, and die?
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Are you really arguing that God is an autocratic tyrant, and we should worship him because he'll hurt us if we don't?
In your example, I'd probably do what I had to do. But I wouldn't worship him, or respect him, or love him. I'd hate him.
I refuse to believe that any God worth the name would behave like that. So therefore I'm willing to risk eternal (*)(*)(*)(*)ation in order to live a life of intellectual integrity, and not worship any God that behaves like that.
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If that same ruler, after observing your deed, forgave you and let your whole family live, and sent His only son to die in your place. Would you not be the slightest bit grateful?
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No, I'd think he was a nutcase. I didn't ask for him to kill his son. I was perfectly fine before; all I needed was to be left alone.
Further, I should be grateful because he set up these crazy rules, then in his great benevolence suspended them for me? That's like me kidnapping someone, terrorizing them and promising to kill them. Then I change my mind and let them go. Should I expect them to think fondly of me?
How about not setting up crazy rules in the first place?
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The thing created, can't possibly say to the creator: Why have you made me this way? Showing the utmost contempt, then bemoan his fate.
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So again, you're saying that "these are the rules", and I need to live by them and respect them.
I disagree. Sure, God, if He exists, gets to set the rules. But I don't have to embrace them. Just like I don't have to respect the autocratic king.
I've already explained that, if the rules are as you say they are, that I don't respect any God who would play shell games with people's souls.
Now, could I take the cowardly way out and do it God's way to avoid punishment? Sure.
But I prefer to live with integrity and accept the consequences, if there are any. God can make me suffer, if he wishes; but he cannot make me respect a God and a system that doesn't deserve respect.