People Who Believe God Spared Them

[tednlou2]

For religious people, I understand the thinking that God is looking out for you.  However, I find it so offensive after a car accident, natural or man-made disaster when people say God saved them and must have a plan for them.  It is so offensive to the families who lost people.  We hear people say this all the time.  If you are sick and believe God gave you strength, then that is one thing.  To say God spared you for some bigger plan while letting others die is just a mental illness.

I was watching the "Today Show" this morning and this man made me sick.  I can't believe they didn't cut him off---they interrupt everyone else all the time.  This guy, and people like him, have to be so self-centered.

 http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/36775973#36775973

[Hellraiser]

For religious people, I understand the thinking that God is looking out for you.  However, I find it so offensive after a car accident, natural or man-made disaster when people say God saved them and must have a plan for them.  It is so offensive to the families who lost people.  We hear people say this all the time.  If you are sick and believe God gave you strength, then that is one thing.  To say God spared you for some bigger plan while letting others die is just a mental illness.

I was watching the "Today Show" this morning and this man made me sick.  I can't believe they didn't cut him off---they interrupt everyone else all the time.  This guy, and people like him, have to be so self-centered.

 http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26184891/vp/36775973#36775973

You have to understand something Ted, people of the scary religious sort think God is responsible for everything.  They somehow manage to think that when people are killed this is a good thing as they are going to heaven.  When people are spared this is also a good thing as God can do no wrong.  I just hate that this guy was in Mississippi, why couldn't he have been a Tennessean or Louisianian.  I don't find it offensive I just find it blatantly stupid.  If God was so wonderful why did he cause the tornado to destroy our feeble huts in the first place?

[skeebo1969]

  "I can't answer why those people were lost, but if they just cry out to him he'll help em."

  How are they suppose to cry out Mr. Preacher Man when they're dead?

 

[john33]

  If God was so wonderful why did he cause the tornado to destroy our feeble huts in the first place?

Couldn't say it better

[ds4146]

If you listen to the complete interview, he states that his injuries were three scratches on the thumb and carpet burn.....you have to wonder what the hell he was really doing under that table.

[mecch]

If true believers believe that God has a plan, well let em believe that.  In personal and social life, avoid them if it offends.  Its inexcusable at the level of government policy - if its set in accordance with "God's Plan". 

[bmancanfly]

What if the Lord was gunning for him and just missed?  This time.   

[Hellraiser]

What if the Lord was gunning for him and just missed?  This time.   

^ this man is a genius

[red_Dragon888]

What if the Lord was gunning for him and just missed?  This time.  

lol

Well, when grasping for straws anything is pausible.  I don't think they mean to offend just to justify why they lived.  In the end, they were just luckily to be alive and that is just that.  Fk everything else.

[GSOgymrat]

It all makes no sense whatsoever. When confronted such a situation I do what all true Southerns do, which is either smile or shake my head and say "Well... isn't that somethin'."

[red_Dragon888]

It all makes no sense whatsoever. When confronted such a situation I do what all true Southerns do, which is either smile or shake my head and say "Well... isn't that somethin'."

To each his own.  Besides, this is free advertising for his church.

[Hellraiser]

To each his own.  Besides, this is free advertising for his church.

You mean free advertising for the wreckage where his church used to stand.

[red_Dragon888]

You mean free advertising for the wreckage where his church used to stand.

lol,  Well, prayers alone wont rebuild the church.  It is now a Miracle site for the faithful and the charitable.

[Matty the Damned]

I'm always impressed  with the zeal the Almighty displays when laying waste to his most fervent believers.

Whether it's sending a tornado whizzing through the evangelical trailer parks of the Southern US or dispatching a tsunami to flush a couple of hundred thousand muslims out into the Indian ocean, his eye for the grand scale is to be admired.

Matty the Damned heartily encourages the preacher linked to in the OP to rebuild his church so Jesus has a clear target to aim for when next he wants to bring some of the saved home to their Eternal Reward.

Glory!

MtD

[anniebc]

I'm always impressed  with the zeal the Almighty displays when laying waste to his most fervent believers.

Whether it's sending a tornado whizzing through the evangelical trailer parks of the Southern US or dispatching a tsunami to flush a couple of hundred thousand muslims out into the Indian ocean, his eye for the grand scale is to be admired.

Matty the Damned heartily encourages the preacher linked to in the OP to rebuild his church so Jesus has a clear target to aim for when next he wants to bring some of the saved home to their Eternal Reward.

Glory!

MtD

If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times..you will never get into heaven Matty....and if you did it would only be because the "Big Fella" loves your wicked sense of humor...I hope I'm with you when the time comes because I would certainly miss it..

Hugs
Jan

[red_Dragon888]

I'm always impressed  with the zeal the Almighty displays when laying waste to his most fervent believers.

Whether it's sending a tornado whizzing through the evangelical trailer parks of the Southern US or dispatching a tsunami to flush a couple of hundred thousand muslims out into the Indian ocean, his eye for the grand scale is to be admired.

Matty the Damned heartily encourages the preacher linked to in the OP to rebuild his church so Jesus has a clear target to aim for when next he wants to bring some of the saved home to their Eternal Reward.

Glory!

MtD

i get it.  Fuck'em all and let God decide. 

[ademas]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlBiLNN1NhQ

[Etay1207]

I watched the link of the today show.  It's really sad.  Why would God save him and not the mother with 2 children? Maybe she wasn't "saved from a devil's hell" so God doesn't like her. 

Being in the church I come across this way of thinking alot.  If someone doesn't get financing for a house they would say that it wasn't in God's will for them to get the house.  To which I reply, "No, you didn't get financing because your credit is bad and you have no money". 

A good friend of mine said that she was happy with two kids, but when she found herself pregnant a third time she realized it was God's will for her to have another baby.  Call me stupid! If you have sex with your husband, pregnancy may result!

[Matty the Damned]

I watched the link of the today show.  It's really sad.  Why would God save him and not the mother with 2 children? Maybe she wasn't "saved from a devil's hell" so God doesn't like her. 

Being in the church I come across this way of thinking alot.  If someone doesn't get financing for a house they would say that it wasn't in God's will for them to get the house.  To which I reply, "No, you didn't get financing because your credit is bad and you have no money". 

A good friend of mine said that she was happy with two kids, but when she found herself pregnant a third time she realized it was God's will for her to have another baby.  Call me stupid! If you have sex with your husband, pregnancy may result!

Reminds me of the sage words of Epicurus:

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?”

MtD

[leatherman]

Being in the church I come across this way of thinking alot.

Amen to all that Etay.

After 8 years in a baptist high school and 3 more yrs in a baptist college, I haven't gone back since. The hypocrisy, stupidity and irresponsibility of most "christians" was enough to make me know I didn't want anything more to do with their "religion" or any other.

[Etay1207]

Leatherman: I feel the same way. I would leave the church if it wasn't for the good music.  Have you ever been to a black church? There's nothing like it.  It's a party every Sunday morning!

[skeebo1969]

Have you ever been to a black church? There's nothing like it.  It's a party every Sunday morning!

  I have and it gives me a raging headache to be honest.  I've also gone on New Year's Eve, which was interesting.  Once the clock struck twelve I was on the floor.  The gun fire was so bad!  I do have a question for you though, why do the little old ladies say, "Weeelll", everytime the preacher ends a sentence?  What is that?  When I first started going I thought maybe they were bored and wanted it to finish as badly as I did....   I don't know what it's all about, but it  throws me off when I am trying to receive the message.

[Hellraiser]

  I have and it gives me a raging headache to be honest.  I've also gone on New Year's Eve, which was interesting.  Once the clock struck twelve I was on the floor.  The gun fire was so bad!  I do have a question for you though, why do the little old ladies say, "Weeelll", everytime the preacher ends a sentence?  What is that?  When I first started going I thought maybe they were bored and wanted it to finish as badly as I did....   I don't know what it's all about, but it  throws me off when I am trying to receive the message.

Frankly, "Amen" and "Hallelujah" get old so they had to add another phrase to spice up the mix a bit.

[tednlou2]

I was just reading about Joyce Meyer.  She is one of those pastors who beg and beg for money saying God will bless you.  This includes Paula White, Rod Parsley, Creflo Dollar (name says it all) and the pastor from Lakewood Church, Joel Olsteen.  I think they call it prosperity religion.  They are all living large like an episode of MTV Cribs with million dollar homes, NYC penthouses, private jets.

Joyce Meyer has her whole family on the church payroll.  Besides other homes, they have a huge compound.  Below is info on her and issues she's run into about the money and taxes.   

http://www.gospelassemblyfree.com/facts/falseprophets.htm

[Matty the Damned]

Hey don't shitbag Dr Dollar!

MtD
(Who thinks Creflo A. Dollar is the dog's bollocks)

[skeebo1969]

Frankly, "Amen" and "Hallelujah" get old so they had to add another phrase to spice up the mix a bit.

Gotcha..  I used to attend this church with my first ex-wife.  While I didn't go all the time, I swear when I did the surmon was always against me. To make matters worse, after the minister delivered his  surmon and had everyone fired up and ready to kill me, he would stare at my ex's ass (she had booty) as we left.  Talk about a powerless feeling... shit almost made me wanna smoke crack!!

[Rev. Moon]

I was just reading about Joyce Meyer.  She is one of those pastors who beg and beg for money saying God will bless you.  This includes Paula White, Rod Parsley, Creflo Dollar (name says it all) and the pastor from Lakewood Church, Joel Olsteen.  I think they call it prosperity religion.  They are all living large like an episode of MTV Cribs with million dollar homes, NYC penthouses, private jets.

Joyce Meyer has her whole family on the church payroll.  Besides other homes, they have a huge compound.  Below is info on her and issues she's run into about the money and taxes.   

Religious leaders taking advantage of their position?  Unheard of! Quelle horreur! 

Just ask Reverend Moon.

[leatherman]

but it throws me off when I am trying to receive the message.

and amen to that Skeebo!
lordy, if my nice quiet fundamental baptist and methodists were too much for me (no shouted "amens" in my church, thank you), I just don't think I could take the pentecostals or a black church. i expect religion (if there's any truth in it) to be serious and cerebral, so no hootin' or hollerin' for me.

of course, I don't begrudge anyone their religious views though. If the party every Sunday morning gives you comfort and peace, Etay, then more power to you. Having lost two partners (and as I recently mentioned to you, almost upon the 2nd anniversary of Jim's death), heaven knows I've spent a lot of time wondering about the afterlife and trying to find peace and solace for my own soul.

And so I label myself an agnostic. If I can't shake my christian upbringing, I can at least put it into it's proper perspective. God isn't too blame for anything that happens in my life (be it deaths, tornados, or winning the lottery) nor does he answer any of my prayers (aren't all prayers simply requests of the almighty motivated by selfishness?) My life is simply what it is, and it's mine to live. If I live it waiting/hoping for a mystical father figure to solve my problems, that's time that I should have been working on my own solutions to my problems. As I often tell people it takes hard work and patience to change things in your life. Sitting on your duff hoping god fixes it or blaming god when it all goes wrong, doesn't move your life forward and garners nothing but negative feelings.

To say God spared you for some bigger plan while letting others die is just a mental illness.

I totally agree. according to this guy, god's bigger plan is for him to just talk on TV (to spread the word about hell) rather than actual "do" anything like feed the homeless, adopt those orphaned family members, clean up the rubble (as evidenced by his clean clothes) or anything like real "christian" acts.

[skeebo1969]

  Unheard of! Quelle horreur! 

Hey!! stop with the Nazi rhetoric!!!  besides spell check says you spelled it wrong!

[Merlin]

Maybe Dean and Sam in Supernatural knows why? Even the Angels there are rebelling. 

[tednlou2]

I've talked about the family member who I believe is actually a Lesbian and trying to pray the gay away.  Last summer, she and I got into a huge fight about gay marriage.  Anyway, I posted the same video and remarks on my facebook page that I posted here.  Below is her response to me and my response to her.  Did I go overboard?  She brings up my nephew who recently ended up in the hospital with a cracked skull after a tree limb fell on him.  She was trying to make an emotional argument with me where I would be forced to say, "No, God wasn't watching out for him."  Also, notice how she says she didn't watch the video.  She, and others like her, want to believe what they believe and not look at anything that goes against that. 

Her Reply on Facebook:

God has spared me from alot! I am forever thankful to him for all he has done for me in my life. I did not watch the video so I cannot comment on that. Nobody knows why some people die and others live. That is where our faith comes into play. Just like Gregory, you can't tell me that God didn't have his hand on him the day the tree swing broke...

My Reply:

Melissa, you are right. No one knows why some people live while others die. It all comes down to luck. It is offensive to say God spared you for some greater purpose while letting some little girl get crushed by a car. When people say things like this, they are basically saying God didn't care about the girl but I must be special to Him.

If you watched the video, he didn't say God spared him to feed the poor or adopt the orphans. He said it was to warn people about the fires of Hell. I don't even want to bring Greg into this, but since you did-- what do you say about another kid who died from a tree limb? She wasn't worth saving? God needed her in Heaven? I just find it very self-centered and an insult to families who weren't as lucky. If God really has a hand in these things, why didn't we see people survive the fall from the Twin Towers on 9/11? Why didn't we see people survive jumping out of the windows? It is one thing to believe God has given you strength to get through something. It is ridiculous to believe God spared you when you would have died if He hadn't intervened.

[jkinatl2]

I have scaled WAY BACK on getting into religious arguments. I mean, I can more easily argue Star Trek - even when what is canon and what is not is unclear.

As wonderful and loving and compassionate and giving as many humans are, we certainly have invented a slew of total motherfuckers for Gods. I mean seriously.

You want to see the most realistic portrayal of God on television? Watch Teletubbies reruns. Where they show the sun (God) as a baby. Laughing, shrieking at odd intervals, being cranky for no reason. That capricious sun-baby? Yeah, I went to his church for fifteen years. That's the real deal.

Screw all that. Be nice to one another. Do good things because they are good things, not to hold off fire or earthquake, not to win a spot in some celestial choir. Be a good person because it's the right thing to do, because if you do it for Heavenly Reward or approval, then you are a psycho-sociopath.


What happens after we die is anyone's guess. I am not arrogant enough to presume that nothing else exists, that our energy defies Newtonian Law and simply disappears. I also spend precious little time pondering what golden chariot I ride through what field of grapes or whatnot. My little monkeybrain can no more adequately ponder what lies beyond than it can contemplate the capricious universe that so gleefully kills the best and the brightest when they are in full bloom, leaving us dregs to look after the place.

I find my comfort, what little I have, in knowing that I love as well as I can, I do not good than harm on a given day, and that this Universe is far too intricate for me to understand the scope of it's tapestry. I do not confront nor do I deliberately engage the spiritual, the religious, whomever. I have my own fictions to defend. I just do them, more or less, in the privacy of my own black heart.

[Etay1207]

Skeebo: they yell back at the preacher in alot of black churches. I guess blacks are a little more vocal. Black pastors look for the feedback from the congregation and when people don't yell in agreement it is seen almost as disrespect. It's a cultural thing. Y'all whitties just won't understand. Hehe

I, myself, am agnostic. I didn't know it until I read a book on agnostics a few years ago. My beliefs are much closer to the agnostics than to the Christian. Even though agnostics are christian. They just aren't brainwashed by the Catholics. Oops, did I say that? That's another reason why I attend the church I do. Even though my church is  Christian, we are allowed to question the Bible when it doesn't make sense.

[MarkB]

The Damned One has the goods on the Epicurean Riddle, although his quote is closer to David Hume's formulation of it (see William Hart Evil: A Primer (2004), pp. 28-9).

I also like the oft-quoted "Since the Bible and the church are obviously mistaken in telling us where we came from, how can we trust them to tell us where we are going?"

 

[skeebo1969]

Skeebo: they yell back at the preacher in alot of black churches. I guess blacks are a little more vocal. Black pastors look for the feedback from the congregation and when people don't yell in agreement it is seen almost as disrespect. It's a cultural thing. Y'all whitties just won't understand. Hehe

  To be honest I think it's my lack of understanding of religion period, or it could be that I just can't take something seriously without proof.  When I went to the whitey cracka church someone got pissed at me because I started joking around with some water by the door.  Here it is my first time there and I see everyone dabbing their finger in this little pool of water.  When it came to me I just plunged both my hands in acting like I was going to wash them.  My mother, who had just completed her classes to convert from Baptist to Catholic, looked at me with pure horror... people around me were grabbing fake beads and crap, kissing their kids head... all this over some water with dead skin cells in it. WTF!!??

  Then there was the Pentacoastal.. pentacos ta.. pentagrama.. fuck some kind of church here by my house.  My wife, who is religious, wanted to find a church she could attend regularly so I said I would go.. like an idiot of course.  Fucking people looked like they were crossbred for God knows how many generations, and this was very easy to see when the preacher talked because they would rock back and forth mumbling something I couldn't understand...  The place scared the shit out of me and I fully expected Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre to come busting through the wall at any minute.

  My wife eventually found a church of her liking.  It's one of those open denomination churches... you know the "if I had a hammer I'd swing it in the morning" and "I'm leaving on a jet plane" type places.  Preacher tells some stories from the bible with his own little twist... it's all good to her and stuff I just don't really get.  While I do feel at peace in the place, I only attended one service and that was about 2 years ago.  My wife, on the otherhand, attends service every Sunday.

   I am more of a spiritual person.. if I want to be close to my God on a Sunday morning I'll go down to the water with my fishing pole.  As the sun comes up and beams down on my skin I'll catch my first fish... and just maybe.. maybe mind you, if God exists he'll watch me rip the gills out of the fish while it'still alive with a joyous look on my face.  Can I get a big AMEN?!?!
 



 

[tednlou2]

  To be honest I think it's my lack of understanding of religion period, or it could be that I just can't take something seriously without proof.  When I went to the whitey cracka church someone got pissed at me because I started joking around with some water by the door.  Here it is my first time there and I see everyone dabbing their finger in this little pool of water.  When it came to me I just plunged both my hands in acting like I was going to wash them.  My mother, who had just completed her classes to convert from Baptist to Catholic, looked at me with pure horror... people around me were grabbing fake beads and crap, kissing their kids head... all this over some water with dead skin cells in it. WTF!!??

  Then there was the Pentacoastal.. pentacos ta.. pentagrama.. fuck some kind of church here by my house.  My wife, who is religious, wanted to find a church she could attend regularly so I said I would go.. like an idiot of course.  Fucking people looked like they were crossbred for God knows how many generations, and this was very easy to see when the preacher talked because they would rock back and forth mumbling something I couldn't understand...  The place scared the shit out of me and I fully expected Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre to come busting through the wall at any minute.

  My wife eventually found a church of her liking.  It's one of those open denomination churches... you know the "if I had a hammer I'd swing it in the morning" and "I'm leaving on a jet plane" type places.  Preacher tells some stories from the bible with his own little twist... it's all good to her and stuff I just don't really get.  While I do feel at peace in the place, I only attended one service and that was about 2 years ago.  My wife, on the otherhand, attends service every Sunday.

   I am more of a spiritual person.. if I want to be close to my God on a Sunday morning I'll go down to the water with my fishing pole.  As the sun comes up and beams down on my skin I'll catch my first fish... and just maybe.. maybe mind you, if God exists he'll watch me rip the gills out of the fish while it'still alive with a joyous look on my face.  Can I get a big AMEN?!?!
 



 

AMEN!! 

[alliance]

AMEN Skeebo.

this dont look like a bad fishin hole to me, although Im not sure how welcome I would be:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7ZT5sajkys
God is trying to tell you something

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsvK8WCPj1Y
Miss Celies blues

two of my favorite songs. . .

[Matty the Damned]

Spiritual people. Ick. Almost as grating as the fat goth chick who likes to leave the impression she might be bisexual by telling everyone she meets that she has "her own sexuality".

This sort of stuff might seem innocuous or even enlightened but really it's not much different to what the lunatic in the OP is spouting.

At least he has the wontons to wear a label.

MtD

[skeebo1969]

Spiritual people. Ick. Almost as grating as the fat goth chick who likes to leave the impression she might be bisexual by telling everyone she meets that she has "her own sexuality".

This sort of stuff might seem innocuous or even enlightened but really it's not much different to what the lunatic in the OP is spouting.

At least he has the wontons to wear a label.

MtD

  Or almost as bad as one of those rare, judgemental atheists with a mental cross to bear.  I'll be honest, if I was highly educated like you I would be pissed to.  I mean all the education in the world didn't stop you from being stuck here in front of a terminal daily having to deal with us less thans..  This has got to be a serious blow to your ego.... but hey go ahead, you can talk in the third person now.

[Jeff G]

ummm ... Don't look now but Jesus is coming .

[veritas]

http://www.healingsounds.com/samples/goldman.jonathan_print_divine-name_foreword-intro.pdf


I wouldn't stop taking my meds.

v

[Hellraiser]

 Or almost as bad as one of those rare, judgemental atheists with a mental cross to bear.  I'll be honest, if I was highly educated like you I would be pissed to.  I mean all the education in the world didn't stop you from being stuck here in front of a terminal daily having to deal with us less thans..  This has got to be a serious blow to your ego.... but hey go ahead, you can talk in the third person now.

Let's leave the ire directly squarely at the religious where it belongs.

[Moffie65]

ummm ... Don't look now but Jesus is coming .

......... and boy is she Pissed!