Richard, here I think we are in very good agreement! I don’t believe that doing something good because I think that will help me get to heaven does anything at all to help me get to heaven. That’s not the motivation God wants me to have for doing anything. And I do believe that God cares more about why I do something than He cares about what it is that I did. And I believe God has chosen to value love as the one approved motivation, and God has given me the capability to love, but He has also given me the free will to choose to love, or choose not to love, because love that is compelled is not love at all.
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But we are not talking about anything other than God. So unless you think God is either obliged to punish or has unexpected or uncertain action, none of your comparisons apply.
Richard
The question I am trying to address is whether I have a free will choice to love, or not to love. And my answer is fairly simple: Love is an internal, personal motivation. God chooses to love me, that is His choice, not mine. And part of His choice is to set me free to choose whether to love Him, or not love Him. I do not have any idea what the total parameters are of the space and time (or some other place that is not defined by space and time) in which I am permitted to make this choice. But I do understand that my love is not something that some other person can demand of me. And I also believe that God has chosen not to make us puppets on strings, which we would be if we had no choice but love Him, if we do not have real free will, which means that our choices do have consequences, whether we fully understand those consequences or not.
All of the actual observational evidence of how God really interacts with the world which He created are consistent with God not forcing us, whom He loves, every one of us, to love Him, but doing many things to offer us the opportunity to choose to love Him. And, yes, as you point out, there are many religious leaders who try to tell us other things about what they think God wants.
The system suggested that I send this as a private message. Have we gone far enough away from the topic of this thread to follow that suggestion, or do you think this discussion is something others would want to see? If you think we should continue this discussion publically, is it appropriate in this thread, or should it be a new thread?
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It does that automatically if we exchange three posts in a row.
Possibly, but usually the Moderators move things rather than us
It is not new. There have been other threads which have gone over the same grounds. There is a different emphasis between Free will in general, and our choice to follow God or not. There is no doubt that god wants us to choose Him, but traditional Christianity has invested interest in the exclusivity clauses.
Paul concentrates more on the final judgement, relating all actions to it. As such, much of Christianity follows those guidelines.
In truth we are not miles apart, it is more clarification than conflict.
Richard
You now claim to have studied second-Temple Judaism? That’s the relevant “thought and theology”, and it does not match your claim that Jews didn’t think God hears prayer.
That’s not Jewish theology at any point in history! What you’re describing is close to the Babylonian view, but still fails to match it – don’t forget that they had “household gods” they talked to!
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I am not going to srgue with you it is pointless
You don’t listen to anything that doesn’t match your understanding.
Richard