Topic: Affliction / Suffering / Punishment

[lovetzatziki]

If you are willing to listen you can hear even the walls speak. There are a lot of people who are willing to listen locked on nut houses.

If you truly seek to know God's will for you, He will reveal it. Otherwise, we're just part of the big crowd: "seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand".

I think God is telling me there is no God.

Auto-suggestion is a strong thing. Children who are truly willing, believe in things such as the tooth fairy, the sandman, the easter bunny, santa claus, etc. It's not a virtue. Things should be obvious if God is God. Not left on our ability to hear / believe / etc. If God is God he can send the proper message that it is appealing to us to understand what he is doing. He should make us hear by His self-evidency , without us being forced to do so. If you can force yourself you can poop, you can hear and believe anything. Auto-suggestion.

I am not here for half-gods or half-truths. I am here because I want the truth. I am still waiting for the more spiritually experienced persons than me to post. Untill now sadly I am appearing to be the most experienced.

[lovetzatziki]

Do you really think that is how God works? .. Like in Job.

Whatever happens to you is part of "how God works".

I am speaking about you and what you believe and think. This worthless dogmatic and verse battling has often proove to be quite the diametrically oppose thing that people believe. Strange thing.. Some people just do it for the sake of argument. I am here for real and true conversation not for lousy verse picking and abstract situations.

Folks here have quoted scripture, you don't like it. Folks here have quoted from the Fathers, you reject it. Others have given other sorts of advice, and you refuse to accept it. People are trying to help, and you knock them back, criticizing what they say.

It's almost like you don't want to be helped.  

Quoted from the Fathers?!? Who? Give some examples. Some people are internet yahoos with no occupation that just like to fight on everything. I doubt that all people were trying to actually help me. If they were they would respond to my petitions as I asked them and have an actual conversation with me, rather than just some cherry verse nitpickings , and some quotes, whom I may not read them as they do. What is your problem after all. It is evidence that you don't follow the threads but insist on calling me on things based on ignorance(no fathers were quoted in anything). Are you a troll or something? I told you no "telenovelas" . My suffering is real. Some people just seem to be insensitive internet yahoos.

You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. No idea where you get this "telenovela" stuff from.

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

[LBK]

I think God is telling me there is no God.

    Yesterday upon the stair
    I met a man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

    When I came home last night at three
    The man was waiting there for me
    But when I looked around the hall
    I couldn’t see him there at all!
    Go away, go away, don’t you come back any more!
    Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door

    Last night I saw upon the stair
    A little man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

        (William Mearns, 1899)

[LBK]

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

Go back and read the posts yourself, in all the threads you've started, not just this one.

I'll say it again: You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. It's like you don't want to be helped.

[Romaios]

I think God is telling me there is no God.

Some people just love to tell that to themselves. Ps. 14(13):1.

I am not here for half-gods or half-truths. I am here because I want the truth. I am still waiting for the more spiritually experienced persons than me to post. Untill now sadly I am appearing to be the most experienced.

 

[lovetzatziki]

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

Go back and read the posts yourself, in all the threads you've started, not just this one.

I'll say it again: You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. It's like you don't want to be helped.

It's funny how you know all the good advice were given to me even quotes from the fathers(wow!) but are not able to even point to a concrete one. Troll alert?

[LBK]

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

Go back and read the posts yourself, in all the threads you've started, not just this one.

I'll say it again: You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. It's like you don't want to be helped.

It's funny how you know all the good advice were given to me even quotes from the fathers(wow!) but are not able to even point to a concrete one. Troll alert?

Nope. Just pointing out the obvious. You're making no effort at using what help people here have offered to you.

[lovetzatziki]

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

Go back and read the posts yourself, in all the threads you've started, not just this one.

I'll say it again: You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. It's like you don't want to be helped.

It's funny how you know all the good advice were given to me even quotes from the fathers(wow!) but are not able to even point to a concrete one. Troll alert?

Nope. Just pointing out the obvious. You're making no effort at using what help people here have offered to you.

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

[LBK]

Than please highlight what you consider the best advices to be and bring them here(quotes included). Other than that I would have the impression you are a troll.

Go back and read the posts yourself, in all the threads you've started, not just this one.

I'll say it again: You come here for help, people offer all sorts of advice, and you refuse to take it. It's like you don't want to be helped.

It's funny how you know all the good advice were given to me even quotes from the fathers(wow!) but are not able to even point to a concrete one. Troll alert?

Nope. Just pointing out the obvious. You're making no effort at using what help people here have offered to you.

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

People have offered all sorts of help and advice. It's not their fault you refuse to use it.

[TheTrisagion]

FWIW, I was sincerely trying to address your questions until it became clear that you are more interested in pushing your personal agenda and mocking theism in general.  At that point, there really isn't much more to talk about because that topic doesn't really interest me.  If I wanted to do that, I would go to an atheist forum. 

[hecma925]

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

 
You should take your own advice.

[lovetzatziki]

FWIW, I was sincerely trying to address your questions until it became clear that you are more interested in pushing your personal agenda and mocking theism in general.  At that point, there really isn't much more to talk about because that topic doesn't really interest me.  If I wanted to do that, I would go to an atheist forum. 

I didn't meant you. LBK, podk.... in the most. And I am serious. I am sorry your theism is being tested and it seems to fail. That is what is going on in here. Not here to mock anyone and anything. I am just hurt.

[lovetzatziki]

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

 
You should take your own advice.

I was being sarcastic. That was his advice.

You realise that to me and to anyone who is losing faith this things lose value : bible, fathers, priests, etc. I already said I read the Bible the fathers, church history, dogma, maybe way too much. I was reading some patristics the other day but I cannot believe their claims anymore and this is not what I think life is. And if I look at their lives they were not immaculated virgins not even after their "pious" times. As regarding priests I already expressed my impossibility to see my priest, not that I had an actual priest-confessor, because I used to confess rarely and to different priests. To me the Christianity of the last century is outdated and already. I always thought this way. I could never fully embrace and entirely believe all the claims of our religion. There are just a lot of things that are very bad.

[Mor Ephrem]

I think God is telling me there is no God.

    Yesterday upon the stair
    I met a man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

    When I came home last night at three
    The man was waiting there for me
    But when I looked around the hall
    I couldn’t see him there at all!
    Go away, go away, don’t you come back any more!
    Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door

    Last night I saw upon the stair
    A little man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

        (William Mearns, 1899)

How lovely! 

[LBK]

I think God is telling me there is no God.

    Yesterday upon the stair
    I met a man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

    When I came home last night at three
    The man was waiting there for me
    But when I looked around the hall
    I couldn’t see him there at all!
    Go away, go away, don’t you come back any more!
    Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door

    Last night I saw upon the stair
    A little man who wasn’t there
    He wasn’t there again today
    Oh, how I wish he’d go away

        (William Mearns, 1899)

How lovely! 

We aim to please. 

[Nikolaos Greek]

You suffer because you are a sinner or to become better so all justifiable. God exists. Did Theotokos had a life full of comofrts? No, she was living poor.
Evil get more good in their life? Happiness which is empty... I think you stil lthink the hapiness of the world is good. And yes... They feel happy but for thigns that are bad, while we have always to fight. Jesus said that the door is too small and full of hardnesses. The Holy spirit brings hapiness yes. Social hapiness is soemthing we Christians chase not because it ahs no meaning to ourselves. We chase it only for others, not us.
God is perfect, yet while He love us with all our wrongs we still don't liek Him while He is perfect. But God will never become like what we want Him, we will become like what he want us to be.
Bad things= no God, it seems like this I am blind= light does not exist.  I don't think it is true God does not exist.
Well then seems you think you have no sin. And loo kyou want hapiness of the world. Well, God loves you. He is doing a bad job? We do a bad job by doing and saying things as you say now. And yes I ahve turned against God too. How fool I was... . God loves me without end and I turned against Him. But I could not stand all the bad things and turned to Him. Not because He didn't want to help He elt all that but ebcause I left from Him. Awayi could not stand alone nor anyone else can.
If we were puppets then why would we do what we want and not what He wants?
Hmm...  I think I answered to most of your questions posted.


Brother one lst thing if it is for you to see light I hope you see it while I lose it. I would prefer both of us to see it,w  but if it is let it be, Take the light and see God as He is and not as you want Him to be.

[orthonorm]

I'm sure it sounds trite, but you really have no idea what is going on in the long term.  We don't understand why God allows the things to happen that He does.  If we could understand Him, He wouldn't be God.

Brother this is not trite at all. This is about the most vulgar, insulting, and pointless apologetic ever. Congratulations.

Have you learned nothing in my absence? I figured perhaps my light shone too brightly as to blind you to the truth, thus I hid away hoping the dimmer glow of others would have a chance to allow you to see the beginning of the way of out of the newage darkness which surrounds you.

Oh well.

[orthonorm]

Also, what Job said to his wife:

If we have received good at the hand of the Lord, shall we not receive evil?

An honest appraisal of the situation to be sure, but this says more about the quality of character of Job than it is does of his Maker, something which seems to be missed by nearly everyone who reads the book of Job. Job is about as ambivalent portrait of God as there is in the entirety of Scripture.

Not that I will ever see the reply, but what is the general scholarly consensus nowadays when the story of Job took its general shape?

Ever see The Tree of Life? For my money one of the best treatments of the text.

Hope you are well.

[orthonorm]

I think God is telling me there is no God.

Some people just love to tell that to themselves. Ps. 14(13):1.

Seems to be an honest admission of the status of one's relationships to all persons is the first step to any meaningful relationship.

I've sat in cult meeting with many people who often talk about God telling them there ain't no God.

Gotta love the logic of that. Sometimes God does say just that. Many persons do. This is the language of frustration in a relationship, not necessarily the end of it.

God's freedom cannot be chained by the endless demand to be present. Just cause Saints and Goofy 70s-80s Evangelic pr0n in hindsight see God there all the time, doesn't mean it was so when God wasn't.

[TheTrisagion]

I'm sure it sounds trite, but you really have no idea what is going on in the long term.  We don't understand why God allows the things to happen that He does.  If we could understand Him, He wouldn't be God.

Brother this is not trite at all. This is about the most vulgar, insulting, and pointless apologetic ever. Congratulations.

Have you learned nothing in my absence? I figured perhaps my light shone too brightly as to blind you to the truth, thus I hid away hoping the dimmer glow of others would have a chance to allow you to see the beginning of the way of out of the newage darkness which surrounds you.

Oh well.

welcome back orthonorm.

[hecma925]

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

 
You should take your own advice.

I was being sarcastic. That was his advice.

You realise that to me and to anyone who is losing faith this things lose value : bible, fathers, priests, etc. I already said I read the Bible the fathers, church history, dogma, maybe way too much. I was reading some patristics the other day but I cannot believe their claims anymore and this is not what I think life is. And if I look at their lives they were not immaculated virgins not even after their "pious" times. As regarding priests I already expressed my impossibility to see my priest, not that I had an actual priest-confessor, because I used to confess rarely and to different priests. To me the Christianity of the last century is outdated and already. I always thought this way. I could never fully embrace and entirely believe all the claims of our religion. There are just a lot of things that are very bad.

If you don't like the Christianity of the last century, I would agree with you, having grown up in Pentecostal churches.  Orthodoxy is far more ancient than that.  From your post, it seems that you have never developed a relationship with any priest.  Are you expecting more from the faith than you put in?  Although reading is all well and good, it doesn't replace living the faith every day.  If you aren't willing to deny yourself, pick up your cross (whatever it may be), and follow Christ every moment, I can't justify your lack of faith.  If I kept going down the road I was heading, I would be an atheist.

[lovetzatziki]

Perhaps they have offered nothing new. I am sure making a lot more effort than you, if I look at your last posts 90% were trolling and arguments to persons. Bored a lot? Troll a lot? Please don't use your bored time on me and my threads than. Go read the Bible, the Fathers or go see your priest .

 
You should take your own advice.

I was being sarcastic. That was his advice.

You realise that to me and to anyone who is losing faith this things lose value : bible, fathers, priests, etc. I already said I read the Bible the fathers, church history, dogma, maybe way too much. I was reading some patristics the other day but I cannot believe their claims anymore and this is not what I think life is. And if I look at their lives they were not immaculated virgins not even after their "pious" times. As regarding priests I already expressed my impossibility to see my priest, not that I had an actual priest-confessor, because I used to confess rarely and to different priests. To me the Christianity of the last century is outdated and already. I always thought this way. I could never fully embrace and entirely believe all the claims of our religion. There are just a lot of things that are very bad.

If you don't like the Christianity of the last century, I would agree with you, having grown up in Pentecostal churches.  Orthodoxy is far more ancient than that.  From your post, it seems that you have never developed a relationship with any priest.  Are you expecting more from the faith than you put in?  Although reading is all well and good, it doesn't replace living the faith every day.  If you aren't willing to deny yourself, pick up your cross (whatever it may be), and follow Christ every moment, I can't justify your lack of faith.  If I kept going down the road I was heading, I would be an atheist.

Yes I expect more. The whole, full and perfect experience of life and the whole Universe, not some exclusivist 'it is true because we say it' club. The world is full with such "messianic" figures as the christian church, as christ, christianity, islam , judaism, etc.

What does it mean to you to pick up your cross and follow Christ in every moment? What will that result in (concrete and palpably speaking) ?