Tag: Adam

Is It True, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger???

On By Papa TonyIn bible, God, goodness, knowledge, love, spiritual, Thought, UncategorizedLeave a comment

imagesCA5GJTBPRecently I’ve been listening to the audio book, “The Happiness Hypothesis” and more specifically a sub-chapter entitled, “The Adversity Hypothesis.”  In the segment the author posits the question of whether or not adversity makes you stronger.  An interesting question, don’t you think?  But, as you may have come to expect by now, I plan to hit this subject from another angle.  So before we delve in, I’d like to say how grateful I am that someone took the time to teach me the truth concerning God and life so that I don’t have to spend my time and effort researching what men say and studying conclusions that philosophers make!  If you think about it, the disadvantage a scientist or a philosopher has is that they can only study the effects of what is and what is, is not always as it appears to be…  Add to that the reality that God has so arranged life in order to help us win and overcome, but that arrangement often appears as an original intention, not an adaptation.  Confused? Okay, I’ll explain…

God in His ultimate perfection does not need evil or suffering or pain to make us better people.  The prototype, Adam, was not designed to suffer or get sick or even die.  His beginnings started without the influence of evil.  Adam’s choice allowed the entrance of evil and as a result people have been suffering ever since.  Am I angry with Adam?  Of course not.  I’m just glad it wasn’t up to me (smile).  I digress…  So along the way of life, human beings now have to overcome evil and pain and suffering.  Was it part of the plan?  Well, yes and no.  No, in that it was not God’s original intention (remember He is all love and light), but yes in that in His foreknowledge He knew what his blessed free-will man would do.  And thus knowing, made a way for man to escape the clutches of evil and sadly overcome his suffering.  And to now come full circle, in the future there will one day be no such thing as evil again and those of us who choose to believe will live forever without any suffering ever again (in that day when… He shall wipe the tears from their eyes).  But until that great future day, here we are…

So, does what doesn’t kill you make you stronger?  Yes, if so be that you happen to survive it.  There are many folks still living today that have not actually survived it.  For example, I recently received a long comment on one of my blogs, where I was expounding God’s ability to heal us from His heart of love, whereby a rather hurt lady proceeded to inform me about her horrible suffering dating back to her childhood; her ardent displeasure in God for apparently allowing it to happen and her present sentiment, “F**k God for allowing it!  And naturally my heart goes out to her.  You see, she is alive but is clearly not okay.  So why would anyone ever conclude that God would purposefully allow suffering or worse, cause suffering to make people better in the end?  That logic is insane even on the surface, yet that’s what “people” say and teach and so life goes on in suffering.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, God does not “allow” bad things to happen to people!  His heart of love is infinitely greater than yours and mine; infinitely greater!  He doesn’t need the horrific ways of the adversary to help Him bring His people up.  But free will necessitates that we all can choose what we will believe and thereby ultimately what we may unknowingly allow.  And I should point out before you get angry with me, of course a child isn’t responsible for what is “allowed” to happen to him.  Parents are responsible to believe “for” their children, while they are still children.  Then, it’s a daisy chain of events that sometimes goes on for generations because as a whole, folks don’t generally understand what God is really all about and what He can and will do to help us.  Even worse, many people don’t even think there is an adversary that seeks to work them woe, so they blindly assign it all to God, and suffer!  I’m no scholar perhaps, but I’d be pretty pissed at God if He did cruel horrible things to me and my family!  And, would not give a damn how many mysterious purposes you assigned to the evil!

So after being very clear regarding who does the good and who does the evil, we are ready to answer the question and the answer is maybe…  The obstacles and trials of life can actually make you stronger if you can see them for what they really are; attribute it to the evil that is really behind it and believe God to show you the way to recovery and wholeness.  Research actually shows that people recover faster from tragedies when they are able to make sense of what happened and random happenstance or bad luck makes no sense!

God has given all of us the ability through His Word and His spirit to overcome even the most devastating of events (See Job in the Bible), but you and I, like Job, have to get to the place where we see God for who He really is; a loving, kind, tender, compassionate Father that seeks our best interest no matter what we have done to the contrary!  Blaming ourselves for the evil that happens in our lives will never help us.  What helps us is when we get real honest and earnestly seek the answers to the questions that plague us.  There is always an answer folks.

Life being what it is, in version B, we are going to face many obstacles and challenges.  They weren’t just part of life, but now they are just part of life.  Accordingly, God is able to use that wrong directed toward you (for no good reason) and turn it to your benefit as you get strong and wise in areas you were formerly weak and ignorant.  But in the process, let Him show you how to do it without the suffering part.  You’ll like that a lot better!

Does what doesn’t kill you make you stronger?  Yes, if you get God involved!

Just some good thoughts (that didn’t kill you!)…

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Living on the Plus Side of the Ledger…

On By Papa TonyIn bible, God, goodness, happiness, knowledge, love, spiritual, Uncategorized2 Comments

imagesThis is a blog about living without debt, but has nothing to do with your financial decisions.  Rather this is summary of the greatest story ever told; a story about how to have a fulfilling and effectual relationship with God.  But, I’m going to warn you right up front, if you are a fan of religion and religious ritual, read no further because chances are I’m going to make you angry.  Naturally a discussion about your relationship with God will take more than a thousand words, but I’ll do my best to give you the salient points and then you, my friends, can decide for yourself!

So, here goes…  Anything that you do for God that you really, really don’t want to do will ultimately be based upon fear.  All kinds of things are said and done in the name of God are not only nutso and illogical, but are often far removed from the things God says actually please Him.  Forced obedience is not obedience, no more so than when your kids do what you tell them because they are afraid of what you will do to them if they don’t do it.  And if you are honest, when you follow some commandment or refuse to partake in an activity because you fear negative consequences with God, you are acting out of fear.  I’m pretty sure that you want your children to do what you say because they love and you and trust you, not because they are afraid of you.  Well, God is no different!  Add to that a society that has ever-changing rules regarding what is a sin and what isn’t, we are left with a real conundrum.  But God is smarter than that…

This may surprise you, but God is well aware of the human condition.  He knows how evil works and He’s well aware of the pitfalls that follow bad decisions.  And, in the world of “anything goes”  bad decisions still remain.  Thus in His infinite (and I don’t throw that word around haphazardly) wisdom, He came up with a grand solution.  For those of us that choose to believe, He did away with the sin problem once and for all.  He knew we would never live up to His Word on our own.  The first man, Adam, the prototype didn’t, so why would He expect that we would be any different.  Yet how many of us think otherwise?  How many of us do all kinds of shenanigans to “make” ourselves right with God.  And have you enjoyed much success playing that game?  For every good deed we do, we inadvertently do two things wrong.  And even the good things we think we do often present with another layer of how we could have done better and on that dastardly game goes.  Have you ever noticed how angry and judgmental religious people are?  Have a little compassion on them, that’s a tough, tough game they are playing!  Instead God masterfully devised the ultimate solution.  He sent His son as the Savior from sin.  Jesus Christ with all that wonderful freedom of will you and I have (minus sin in his blood), decided to walk and live God’s Word perfectly.  Then after suffering the worst torture any human has endured, died, paying once and for all the price for everything that was ever wrong with you and me!  He became sin for us so that if we chose to believe in him and that God raised him from the dead, we would be forevermore righteous in God’s sight!  Now think about that for a moment.  Once you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and believe God raised him from the dead, you are forevermore righteous in God’s sight.  And in being made righteous by God Himself, never, ever have to fear again coming up short in His sight.  That’s true freedom folks…but, it gets better.

Being now made free by God, you are now 100% free to choose how you live your life.  Stay with me now!  You simply cannot sin in God’s sight.  You cannot.  Because you behave so well?  Of course not!  Rather, because you chose to accept God’s sacrifice for you.  Sidenote – if you revert back to earning God’s love and protection with your good behavior because something made you afraid, you go back to the ‘game of losers’ that no-one ever wins.  And now paradoxically, for the first time in your life, you truly have freedom to decide how you will live.  When you afraid of making God mad or losing God’s favor, you aren’t really choosing freely.  I don’t know about you, but I want my children’s love and respect and trust to come from their hearts, freely and without fear.  God is no different!  He wants you to do what you really want to do.  Don’t you think He can see through your rituals?  Can you imagine that He already knows your heart isn’t in that behavior you are begrudgingly choosing?  Really?  He is God, after-all… Now I’m not saying anything goes or do as you please through life.  You already know that doesn’t work.  I’m saying stop doing stuff for God you really don’t want to do.  You aren’t blessed, God isn’t blessed, so why do it?

You and I, as believers, are living life on the plus side of the ledger.  We cannot dip into the red because Jesus Christ already paid the price for us.  You wouldn’t pay more for something than it costs would you?  Well, that’s what you do every time you try to earn God’s favor!  Don’t go by what people say, go by what God says in His Word (you didn’t think I made this stuff up, did you?).  Don’t rely on your Pastor or the TV or the Internet, find out for yourself what God says in His Word.  Not too long ago dancing was a sin (smile).

Get off that high horse you have constructed over time and let God do for you what you were never able to do for yourself!  A relationship with God isn’t all about you (what you do and don’t do, though the preachers beg to differ).  Instead it’s all about what God has done for you in Christ Jesus.

Breathe in the fresh air of freedom folks; where there is no fear.  You deserve that, don’t you think?  Haha, well maybe not, but God made you deserving of it!

Just some really, really, really good thoughts…

 

The Secret to a Good Relationship…

On By Papa TonyIn love, spiritual, Thought4 Comments

Relationships come in all shapes and sizes (yes, clichés are my life!).  Relationships represent one of, if not the greatest,  component of our lives. You can’t really function as a human without some sort of relationship.  Oh, you can try, but you aren’t going to be very happy. But when it comes to relationships between men and women, we as collective group, have developed some rather odd expectations.  How many times have you heard of someone looking for their soul-mate or for Mr. Right?  The idea behind those notions is somewhat unrealistic.  First, that whole soul-mate thing presumes that there is that one person “out there” who is predestined to be your other half.  You, apparently, have little or no choice in the matter and have to get busy finding them.  (And there are how many people in the world?)  Then, funnily enough, when you find them they only lived about 20 minutes from you (smile).  Amazing!  And then there is Mr. Right.  Mr. Right is again that one fella who is just right for you.  You can tell when you have found him because he will be just right (haha).  Those of us that have been married for any length of time know that our Mrs. Right or Mr. Right is far from always being just right (Just ask my wife!).  Add to this, can you even imagine living in a culture where your folks choose your mate?  No thanks Mom and Pops!

So what exactly then is a relationship supposed to be?  I think we are smart enough to recognize that any two people can make something work, if they are committed to it.  But what is the secret to a good relationship?  Is there a secret?  To answer that question we have to go back to the origin of man.  Before there were Adam and Eve, God was.  God being all-knowing and all-powerful came up with the grand idea of people.  But there is another aspect of God we must consider as well.  God is love.  God isn’t just the act of loving or One that maintains a loving nature.  God actually is love.  Whatever love is, is God and whatever God is, is love.  They are inseparable.   Interestingly, the one thing the whole world seeks is love.  Mankind is born with a God-hunger on the inside, which can also be called a hunger for love.  In light of that, we have been looking for love in all the wrong places…(singing)…I digress sorta.  Now back to Adam and Eve.  (Hey maybe Eve was Adam’s soul-mate?  Okay only choice?  I guess Adam was Mr. Right as well as Mr. Only…again I digress.)  When God made Adam, He made him body, soul and spirit.  Adam’s spirit was his connection to God, or if you will, his connection to love.  Eve came in similar fashion and was connected to God’s love as well.  They started out connected to and filled with love; God’s love.  There wasn’t much competition so they formed a relationship together (smile).  We can assume as the prototype that they were both pretty “hot” and attracted to each other.  Though they started out perfect, they soon proved by their own free-will that they weren’t perfect.  (You know the story…)  Now if you can take a brief pause from your uncontrollable laughter, the secret to a good, if not great, relationship is in that story.  Relationships between men and women were “supposed” to be based upon a strong, wonderful love from God and a mutual love and devotion to God.  With that firmly in place, the rest was easy!  Sure there was still forgiveness.  Sure there was a willingness to let the past be forgotten.  But in reality, those wonderful qualities are all a part of God’s love anyway.

Accordingly, the problem with relationships now-a-days is that we are looking to fill that void with our mate.  We foolishly think, “if this person would just do what I want; look how I desire and treat me the way I deserve to be treated, I will feel loved.”  Then, when they fall short, as they invariably will, we wrongly conclude that love is lost and that they weren’t really our soul-mate after all.  In reality that approach is very selfish.  Your mate’s job is not be everything you think they should be.  Their job is to be everything they want to be with you being there to support them and love them and encourage them (and vice versa).  Marriage is not two people living one same life.  Marriage is two people living “separate” lives together.  And the only way for that to work out most effectively is for both of the parties involved receiving and sharing God’s love with one another.   Folks ask how Connie and I have stayed together for so long and the answer isn’t, as Connie jokingly says, “that we never wanted to get divorced at the same time.”  The truth is that when things got real crappy, we both loved God enough to persevere.  Without God we would have never made it this far.

So don’t spend all your time and energy looking for Mr. or Mrs. Right.  Spend your energy learning how to receive and give the love that God wants to give to you.  Get good and full of that love and you will suddenly discover there’s a whole lot of soul-mates out there waiting for you!

Just some good thoughts…