THOUGHTS ON GOD

THOUGHTS ON GOD

By

Steve Boehne

Overall, I think that religion has done ok in controlling the actions of mankind.  However, how many wars have there been with millions of people killed because they were of a different religion?    Gee, can’t we even talk about our differences?  There are a few things about religion that annoy me. The thing is, I really don’t want to change anyone's elegance to their religion because I think that religion offers the best guidance to human behavior.  But do the different religions of the earth respect the rights of the other religions to believe differently than they do?  Obviously not, who is right?  What does God think?  Many people have a deep fear that even thinking thoughts contrary to their religion’s point of view is a sin. I can’t stand the idea of someone controlling what I think.  I just want to question things that don’t add up and I won’t accept the answer that I just need to believe. Why should you care about my thoughts on God?  Well, maybe it could just be interesting to examine some of what we have been taught. But, if what I write annoys you, Well,  just quit reading.

 As a child, my family was very religious; I learned my catechism and was confirmed into the Lutheran church.  I still feel a kinship to the Lutheran church.  It seems that the nicest, friendliest, most wholesome people are church goers.  Religion gives people social guidance with a wholesome approach to life, but I have come to question some religious teachings.  Just by observing people in the world, ancient and modern, it is so easy to see how certain religious beliefs just don’t make sense now.  For example: the origin of man:  Imagine you are the Wiseman, or village leader back in the first testament days.  Your people come to you asking; where did we come from?  Well, you’re the Wiseman, so you’re expected to have an answer.  Just as myths, theories and stories are created these days, you come up with the Garden of Eden - Clay of the Earth - woman from man’s rib story.  This story makes sense for those times.  Of course, you don’t know anything about microbiology or the possibilities of evolution so you couldn’t possibly offer a scientific explanation.  The way I see it, Evolution can be totally consistent with God the creator, it’s just not a seven-day project as described in the bible.  God in his great wisdom, created from the “clay of the earth” the first single celled animal, throw in a millennium or two plus the brilliant natural plan of evolution.  There we are; God created man through evolution.  God is the one who did it regardless of what some ignorant Wiseman said two thousand years ago and yet bible scholars study and promote every written word from the ancient stories. What about the 9,756,000 species of animals saved on the ark?  Where did the flood waters come from, where did they go?  What about the parting of the Red Sea?  Where is the tablet of the Ten Commandments? My problem with bible study is that no one is differentiating ancient stories with modern knowledge. Which stories should I believe?

Most religions are mutually exclusive, that is, they all believe that they are right, and all the others are wrong and furthermore all the others are going straight to hell.  Now let’s look at it from Gods point of view.

  You are God; you have created all things including man with many beautiful variations of race and skin colors.  You have created evolution to allow man to adapt to his environment so he can survive in the various climates of your planet.  Dark skin for hot, sunny locales, tall or short bodies as needed for survival, etc.  You created all these variations of man and you love them equally. 

 Now let’s take for example the pygmies living deep in the Amazon jungle.  Their wise men have imagined their own version of the origin of man.  In addition, the Pygmies have developed a set of gods, which they fear, and worship.  These gods were developed over time from natural aspects of jungle life and real fears.  Now since you are God, you know exactly what’s going on.  You don’t stress out over how each of your peoples of the earth perceives you.  After all, you created earth, wind, fire, humans and all things.  Just because your Pygmy has not heard the message of Christianity, you are not about to condemn him to hell.  Keep in mind that Christianity is only one of the many religions in the world, but we Christians want to save the pygmies and everyone else from eternal damnation.

Following this line of thought a little deeper; say that you, God, want the many races of people who have spread across the planet to know more about you. The problem is that there was no system of mass communication.  You may want to send some messengers. Since the people of the world are spread widely and speak many languages, you send many messengers named: Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, etc. etc, etc.  You wanted your messengers credible, so you made each messenger the same race as the people you were trying to contact and you have them speak the same language.  You gave each “messiah” essentially the same info. To preach about you; be good to each other, don’t steal, don’t murder, share your wealth and praise God, etc.  (I personally don’t think almighty God needs praise for an ego boost)  

Now God has done pretty well with the creation of the universe and man, but he blew it 

on the Messiah program, because he didn’t tell the Messiahs to let everyone know that 

they all represented the same God.  Consequently, for two thousand years and for 

Millenniums to come, the peoples of the world have been convinced that their Messiah 

and God are the true God and everyone else’s are imposters.  In fact, a big cause of 

war and genocide in the world is the fact that people perceive their god as different than 

other people’s god.

Now this leads me to Gods involvement with the details of man’s behavior.  How could God allow all this murder and genocide in his name? Maybe he doesn’t care?  He definitely doesn’t intervene.  This is my biggest beef with religion.  How deep must anyone bury their head in the sand to allow them to believe that God micro manages their life, their food, their luck, their safety, their health, or their happiness?  About thirty years ago I watched on a TV news show where a deranged gunman had entered a Catholic school and killed many children.  The news reporter interviewed one of the child survivors who told the horrific story of how his friends had been murdered, and then sobbing, he thanked God for sparing his life.  Well what about the poor murdered kids?  Did God choose them to die?  I don’t think so.  Did God pick out the surviving kid to save? 

 Truly devout Christians are not singled out and protected by God and yet they continuously thank God for their food and ask for his protection. (What about gods people of other religions?) There must be many instances where the most deserving Christian missionaries and parishioners have died under horrible circumstances, maybe even while praying in church.  I don’t believe in thanking God for the food that I am about to eat while others starve, or asking God for anything while others receive less.  I don’t believe God is involved at that level.  God is not monitoring the evil deed doers of the world and preventing them from doing their harm.  There is untold suffering in the world and I cannot believe that God allows it or disallows it.  He is just not involved.

I see God as kind of like a guy sitting out on a lawn chair in the back yard on a summer day watching bugs toiling at life.  He may see a butterfly sitting on a flower become overrun by black ants and devoured.  The black ants may in turn be wiped out by a calamitous attack of red ants.  God does not judge which bugs are the good guys, which live or die.  Nor does he lift a finger to give them food or shelter.  Does God squirt them with the water hose just for entertainment?  Are natural disasters Gods doing? 

 We are absolutely no different than bugs or any other form of life on Earth.  We certainly don’t act differently.  Will God judge the murders, the Hitlers, even the petty thieves of the world any differently than the ants?  Or does he just watch mankind as we would watch bugs in the back yard?  I don’t know.  It seems that the human species is really no different than any other species of predator in the world.  We don’t think that God judges the murderous lions, alligators, and sharks of the animal world.  Why is the human species any different?  Will the murderers, Hitler’s and Putin’s of the world pay a price dealt out by God?  I hope so.  I personally get a great deal of solitude believing that the bad guy will eventually pay a price, but what is the evidence other than our own actions to punish these evil doers?

I guess you just have to believe, but I dislike the word believer, because it automatically implies that there must be some doubt about the idea.  If someone asks; how old is that person?  If I absolutely know, I will say he is 40 years old.  If I were guessing, I would say: I believe he is about 40.   Many people have put their blinders on tightly and stare ahead down the straight and narrow path to avoid critical thinking. “Blind faith” is surely the safest, least stressful path.  

I don’t know exactly about life after death.  I don’t buy into the forgiveness theory because I don’t see how the human species has done anything differently (more wrong) than any other species.  I certainly hope Hitler is not “forgiven of his sins”, even if he “found God”.  I kind of like the reincarnation theory. You know, the one where you keep doing life over again until you get it right and then you earn the privilege to go to heaven.  I also appreciate listening to the different mediums speak to our deceased loved ones.  Most mediums seem to be deeply religious believers in God, but they have a different take on the whole life after death issue.  I suppose that I personally have developed my own open-minded religion.  I believe God will be there for me regardless of whether I am Christian, Jewish, Muslim or what ever.  I can’t believe that God would choose one of his peoples for heaven and leave all others to languish in hell.   I don’t know whether I will do a few more life times before going to heaven or not, but whatever God’s plan is, man is not in charge regardless of what has been written by opinionated wise men, so why worry about it?

Now, aren’t you glad that you are secure in your religious beliefs and don’t get these weird ideas!