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From: aeq@pucc-h (Jeff Sargent)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: The end of it
Message-ID: <1644@pucc-h>
Date: Tue, 8-Jan-85 11:13:52 EST
Article-I.D.: pucc-h.1644
Posted: Tue Jan  8 11:13:52 1985
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From Dave Martindale (watcgl!dmmartindale):

> you seem to be saying that you are
> not a good Christian because you are unable to love your enemies, and
> because of that God/Christ will not like your or approve of you (even
> though He accepts you), and thus you don't "deserve" any liking or
> approval from ordinary humans, and thus won't receive any.

Actually, what I think I was trying to imply was that if God doesn't
like me, who will or can?  (The way it really works, as I know but don't
really entirely believe, is that if I don't like me, who can?)

> Human being simply *are* more tolerant than you give them credit for.
> They are quite capable and willing to love someone *even if they aren't
> perfect*.  More precisely, there are certainly people out in the world
> who will not write you off simply because you don't love your enemies.

Perhaps my own intolerance is showing....  I get quite annoyed with people
like myself with lots of needs, imperfections, incompletenesses.  Sometimes
I work at caring for them anyway, but I am not always or even often pleased
about it (though they seem to be; my acting skills carry me through again!).
And there are certainly people whom I know who do not write me off; some of
them don't know me all that well, though; they might have a tough time
understanding or accepting me if they did, since they seem to be the sort
who are nice, undamaged people who have never had struggles like mine.

> Now, I really don't know whether your God is more severe and
> judgemental than this and thus really won't like/approve of you because
> you don't meet His standards, so I don't know if your error is in
> taking God to be more critical than He is or in assuming that people
> will be just as severe, but one of these assumptions is wrong.

Everyone tells me that my error is the first of the two, but I have yet to
see that convincingly proved from Scripture -- in the face of verses like
"The dead were judged according to what they had done" (Revelation 20:12),
not to mention I Corinthians 3:10-15.

-- 
-- Jeff Sargent
{decvax|harpo|ihnp4|inuxc|ucbvax}!pur-ee!pucc-h:aeq
Proud owner of two Control Data doorstops.