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| No, it's not about God having an anger problem. It's about God loving and deeply caring for all creation. |
Most of us don't like to hear anything about God's wrath, but here's where I see our Creator having some serious outrage, as follows:
1. World Hunger
Please understand that I created a fertile earth with the capacity for producing plenty of food for billions of inhabitants. So I can't stand seeing children starving when I've made "every seed bearing plant and every tree producing fruit" available to satisfy everyone's needs. Yet some of you keep on feasting and "faring sumptuously every day" while others can never be sure where their next meal is coming from. This must stop.
2. A Polluted Planet
I gave you--as humans made in my image--a clear mandate to take good care of this precious earth. But you've exploited and wasted its resources on all kinds of stuff you don't need, then treated the planet, its soil, its rivers and oceans, and the atmosphere surrounding it, as if it were an open sewer in which you could dump all the carbon, coal and plastic waste you wished with no thought for tomorrow. You insist on having far more meat in your diet than you need (remember the seed bearing plants and the fruit producing trees I gave you for food?), resulting in vitally needed rain forests being destroyed largely to produce cheap grain for livestock to satisfy your cravings. This is only one of the human factors that contribute to the oceans becoming warmer and the ice caps melting, with all of the disastrous consequences that follow. But in your pursuit of ever more comfort, convenience and irresponsible consumption, you who are privileged refuse to take responsibility for being a part of the top 10% of the world's wealthiest people who keep creating half of the world's trash and pollution.
3. War
I can't tell you how I detest the warmongering going on all over the globe. For centuries I've had my prophets ramp up the "study war no more" theme in their preaching, and then made my shalom message abundantly clear through Jesus and his first century followers. Instead of taking up their swords, they laid them down and chose to take up Jesus' cross instead.
So hear me, the day of people arming themselves to carry out my will on earth is over. Done. There are no "just wars" of any kind I'm willing to support. They're all just wars, period--increasingly barbaric, callously murderous and unthinkably immoral. Remember, your enemies are not your fellow humans, but the dark forces that motivate people to bomb, maim and brutalize their fellow human beings. So never, ever engage in any of this heartless carnage and claim to be doing it in my name or for my sake.
4. Disparity Between Rich And Poor
Many of you pray every day that God's will be done "on earth as it is in heaven." Surely you know that where I have my headquarters there are no separate sections for rich and poor. And no citizens of my eternal kingdom will ever be enjoying all kinds of luxuries while others are begging for bread. So in order to get ready for how things are going to be in the future, you need to keep selling and giving away your surplus stuff, both for the sake of helping the poor and for the sake of freeing yourselves from the chokehold the god Mammon has on your life. Remember the rule about "You shall have no other gods before me?" It's in my list of Top Ten commandments.
5. Homelessness
In one of my first acts as Creator, I prepared a beautiful place, Eden, for humans to make their home and to take care of. And in the end, I'm seeing to it that all my people have a forever home where they can live in peace and safety. But today there is nearly one in ten men, women, and children on earth who have been driven from their homes by human-caused famine, war and other forms of violence And there are millions of others who live in shacks and in slums unfit for human habitation. There are also people being released from jails and prisons who can't find landlords who will rent to them. And rich nations are turning desperate people away from their borders. This is simply not acceptable.
6. Disunity and Divisions
The millions of you who claim to be children of Abraham keep dividing yourselves into liberals and conservatives, progressives and traditionalists, each assuming you are superior to those on the other side. I hate that. Again, in the after life there aren't going to be different sections for different sects of my people. Remember how Jesus prayed that all his followers would be one? I approve that message, and am grieved beyond belief at how people have taken things in such opposite, multi-splintered directions.
7. Torture and Abuse
It breaks my heart to see anyone, anywhere, at any time being physically, verbally, sexually or psychologically abused. I never created innocent children to be neglected and traumatized. Nor did I create women and girls--or boys--to be harassed, exploited and raped. And I never dreamed of parents being forcibly separated from their sons and daughters, or children and teens being used and abused as sex slaves or child workers. You'll never know how much all of that offends and angers me, not because I'm by nature vengeful or wrathful, but because I love and deeply care about all I have created.
1. World Hunger
Please understand that I created a fertile earth with the capacity for producing plenty of food for billions of inhabitants. So I can't stand seeing children starving when I've made "every seed bearing plant and every tree producing fruit" available to satisfy everyone's needs. Yet some of you keep on feasting and "faring sumptuously every day" while others can never be sure where their next meal is coming from. This must stop.
2. A Polluted Planet
I gave you--as humans made in my image--a clear mandate to take good care of this precious earth. But you've exploited and wasted its resources on all kinds of stuff you don't need, then treated the planet, its soil, its rivers and oceans, and the atmosphere surrounding it, as if it were an open sewer in which you could dump all the carbon, coal and plastic waste you wished with no thought for tomorrow. You insist on having far more meat in your diet than you need (remember the seed bearing plants and the fruit producing trees I gave you for food?), resulting in vitally needed rain forests being destroyed largely to produce cheap grain for livestock to satisfy your cravings. This is only one of the human factors that contribute to the oceans becoming warmer and the ice caps melting, with all of the disastrous consequences that follow. But in your pursuit of ever more comfort, convenience and irresponsible consumption, you who are privileged refuse to take responsibility for being a part of the top 10% of the world's wealthiest people who keep creating half of the world's trash and pollution.
3. War
I can't tell you how I detest the warmongering going on all over the globe. For centuries I've had my prophets ramp up the "study war no more" theme in their preaching, and then made my shalom message abundantly clear through Jesus and his first century followers. Instead of taking up their swords, they laid them down and chose to take up Jesus' cross instead.
So hear me, the day of people arming themselves to carry out my will on earth is over. Done. There are no "just wars" of any kind I'm willing to support. They're all just wars, period--increasingly barbaric, callously murderous and unthinkably immoral. Remember, your enemies are not your fellow humans, but the dark forces that motivate people to bomb, maim and brutalize their fellow human beings. So never, ever engage in any of this heartless carnage and claim to be doing it in my name or for my sake.
Many of you pray every day that God's will be done "on earth as it is in heaven." Surely you know that where I have my headquarters there are no separate sections for rich and poor. And no citizens of my eternal kingdom will ever be enjoying all kinds of luxuries while others are begging for bread. So in order to get ready for how things are going to be in the future, you need to keep selling and giving away your surplus stuff, both for the sake of helping the poor and for the sake of freeing yourselves from the chokehold the god Mammon has on your life. Remember the rule about "You shall have no other gods before me?" It's in my list of Top Ten commandments.
5. Homelessness
In one of my first acts as Creator, I prepared a beautiful place, Eden, for humans to make their home and to take care of. And in the end, I'm seeing to it that all my people have a forever home where they can live in peace and safety. But today there is nearly one in ten men, women, and children on earth who have been driven from their homes by human-caused famine, war and other forms of violence And there are millions of others who live in shacks and in slums unfit for human habitation. There are also people being released from jails and prisons who can't find landlords who will rent to them. And rich nations are turning desperate people away from their borders. This is simply not acceptable.
6. Disunity and Divisions
The millions of you who claim to be children of Abraham keep dividing yourselves into liberals and conservatives, progressives and traditionalists, each assuming you are superior to those on the other side. I hate that. Again, in the after life there aren't going to be different sections for different sects of my people. Remember how Jesus prayed that all his followers would be one? I approve that message, and am grieved beyond belief at how people have taken things in such opposite, multi-splintered directions.
7. Torture and Abuse
It breaks my heart to see anyone, anywhere, at any time being physically, verbally, sexually or psychologically abused. I never created innocent children to be neglected and traumatized. Nor did I create women and girls--or boys--to be harassed, exploited and raped. And I never dreamed of parents being forcibly separated from their sons and daughters, or children and teens being used and abused as sex slaves or child workers. You'll never know how much all of that offends and angers me, not because I'm by nature vengeful or wrathful, but because I love and deeply care about all I have created.
Wouldn't you feel the same?
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