Do you take the pis* out of someone who is all-loving towards you?
It would be inconsequential to the 'someone' who is 'all-loving'.
I am 'all-loving' when it comes to my daughter. She could be rude to me, hit me and so on, but it wouldn't change any aspect of my love towards her in the slightest. If it did, then I could no longer be classified as being 'all-loving' when it comes to my daughter.
And if you do, how long do you think they should show you grace for? How long should they be patient with you? Forever?
Yes, forever. If now you claim 'all-loving' has boundaries, then it's no longer 'all-loving'. We are just humans; imperfect and ignorant. Invariably there will be times that we don't do the best things, don't make the best choices, and indeed do not reciprocate love that is shown to us. However, this can in no way affect 'all-loving', and if it did, then it wouldn't be 'all-loving'.
If you say 'Yes of course, forever!', should you really continue to take advantage of their patience? Is that loving on your part?
As mentioned above, not reciprocating something is inconsequential to 'all-loving'. Whether you should take advantage or not, doesn't mean anything from the perspective of 'all-loving'. It would be 'all-loving' regardless to what you did or felt.
Let me post a story I wrote and see what opinions you have concerning it. It is a mere first draft and is not finished. Anyway, let me know what you think.
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'Perfection'
Many people have told me that in order to find God, one must seek him. To me this has always seemed somewhat bizarre a notion. The world’s most powerful, and arguably the world’s most loving being, and he resorts to hiding in the shadows. This being that many would claim is the source of light, seems more comfortable in the darkness, in the void where man cannot reach.
However, I came to the conclusion that God is somewhat similar to Bigfoot. Three hundred years Bigfoot has roamed this planet, and yet he has only been seen a dozen times. Those of us who truly seek Bigfoot must truly search for him. You don’t just wake up one day and find Bigfoot, so there’s no reason to believe God would be any different. And so eventually I found myself searching: I looked under the sofa, I shuffled through the closet, and I picked up every rock that lay in my garden for sign of this being. I bought a submarine and explored the depths of the ocean, I stole the Hubble Space Telescope to view the depths of the big black expanse above us, and I purchased a dune buggy that was on special offer in Toys R Us to search the arid desert regions. All of this ended up in futility, and having explored this planet and beyond to an extreme degree, I couldn’t even find a molecule going by the name of God.
And then my son died.
You would be amazed at how sobering the death of a son can be. You would be amazed at how many questions scurry through your mind like ants on a summer night. You would be amazed at how much you need answers. There was no anger, which comes later in the process, just a general lack of understanding. I asked the doctors, and they gave me an explanation. I asked the priest who also gave me an explanation. I asked the rabbi, the philosopher, the Buddhist, the man who painted my fence and the woman at the bus stop. All of them gave me an answer. As you will know, no human is perfect, and yet they all answered me. The one being that
is perfect declined from comment. What does this say of perfection?
When I really sought an answer, everyone helped. God hid. When I really needed help, everyone tried their best, even with all their imperfections. God hid.
What do we conclude about the all loving, perfect being that seems to find hide and seek so enjoyable, even at a time when man is at his very lowest? Do we claim him loving or caring, or even all knowing, when at best he cannot help when people ask, he cannot speak when people need to hear, he cannot feel when people need a shoulder to lean on?
I would of course dare one man to say I was not humble. To that man I would ask he experience the death of a son to know what humility is. To know what it is like to be powerless, and yet to seek answers, and to seek help. I did just that, and those who answered did not hide, but became more visible. God just crawled further into the void. It was incredible to see all the people that came to me. They did not ask that I seek them and they did not ask that I must find or want them. They came to me without asking, and simply out of love and out of kindness. Where was God through all of this? Nobody knows. Perhaps he was vacationing in a galaxy far far away. The strange thing is though, that my mother, who was vacationing far far away, still managed a response.
The very word ‘love’ becomes as worthless as a car with no wheels, and ‘perfection’ can only be seen in the imperfect. And so we have something to think about. In this case, isn’t the imperfect perfect? And isn’t the perfect imperfect? Where the perfect has failed, which goes against the very definition of perfect, the imperfect has succeeded. While we have no need to expect anything from imperfection, that luxury does not extend to perfection which by very definition does not have a choice in the matter.
I have the feeling that eventually I will meet God and ask him why he wasn’t there when I needed him most. To this he will undoubtedly respond: “Nobody’s perfect”.
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