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        Hello, I'd like to explore the notion of reality as a choice of trusting God and doing good or rebelling against God and doing evil. God has given us free will. We have the choice to do anything that we are capable of. We can love. We can hate. We can strive for personal gain and in the process put monetary values on our morals if we're not careful. There are all sorts of things we can do in this life. We won't be judged on our failures if we accept Jesus Christ, but we should try and do good once we figure this out. If reality breaks down into,"Have faith in God and love" or "Doubt God and go astray" we can explore the Bible and see all the situations where this is the case.

        God is love. Love is how all beings in Heaven are able to live in peace. No one cares that another being is greater than them because everyone else is happy for them. If you love someone, you want them to be blessed with greatness. If you love someone, you do not get hostile to them. If there would be a proof of God, it would involve that God is love, and that love is good. The Heavenly kingdom revolves around love. God wants us to love him, but because of free will, we are not robots who are forced to love him. The only way God has for us to love him is to love us and have the mutuality of love draw us to him. God blesses with many good things, and even if this life is filled with suffering, there is an eternity of joy without suffering awaiting. Most importantly, Jesus showed his love for us by dying for us when we were still sinners. Romans 5:6 For when we were still helpless, Christ died for the wicked at the time that God chose. 7 It is a difficult thing for someone to die for a righteous person. It may even be that someone might dare to die for a good person. 8 But God has shown us how much he loves us - it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us!

        How else do you convince someone to love you other than being loving yourself? Again, being loved doesn't automatically mean someone is going to love back, but it should be the natural response of a loving individual. Remember, all of mankind has a sinful nature. Because of this sinful nature, we're broken people who don't always respond to love with love back.

        This theme of mankind having a sinful nature is a consistent theme through the Bible. God wants us to fight against our sinful nature while Satan wants us to sin as much as possible. In Job, Satan wants to show God that he can break Job down so much that Job will end up hating God. God oftentimes protects his followers from evil, but he saw enough faith in Job that he can withstand the test. It is possible that God allows Satan to do things here and there along the way if he knows his followers are going to pass the test. Of course we're told to pray in the LORD's prayer,"Lead us not into temptation" or as sometimes said,"Lead us not into hard testing" At the core of our beings, we are not creatures of flesh, we are not our property, we are not our friends and family. At the core of our beings, we are a soul which can choose to fail and go evil, or be determined and stay with God no matter the current situation. So we should strive to be fine if God strips away everything we have and all we're left with is a relationship with God. A relationship with God is worth far more than anything. Even if you can't think a relationship with God is of premium value, remember God can restore everything that you do find of value! I'm sure you've heard,"The LORD gives and the LORD takes away." This is how we should lead our lives. It is easier said than done of course. Let us explore the Book of Job where Job loses everything he has except for his life.

        A lot of critics of the Bible misunderstand the book of Job. They see God as some sort of capricious deity that plays cosmic games. Nothing of course is further from the truth. God is constantly making a case against Satan which is necessary to do to condemn evil forever. Throughout the Bible God is making a case for saving mankind, and he ultimately does save mankind on the cross. If all we understand from the difficult to understand parts of the Old Testament is that things had to happen the way they did such that Jesus could save all people from Hell, we should be satisfied. After all, finite suffering on Earth is an acceptable price to pay for an Eternity of joy without suffering. And some of us are blessed with a life with minimal suffering. We should be happy that our destiny is Heaven. Can we understand what part Job has in the case for mankind or the judgment against Satan? No, we're not supposed to understand God's case unless sometime he reveals it to us in Heaven. One thing we'll learn later about the book of Job is that there are things man cannot understand that only God can.

        So Job loses all he has, and gets filled with intense pain and suffering. All that he has left in life is his friends. Yet, his friends also do not bring him comfort. His friends instead speak of flawed theology. You should not read into anything his friends speak about God as true theology because they're found to be in the wrong. This is a danger if you read the Bible as everything in it being edifying. The danger is even amplified when you realize what is going on. Not only is Satan tormenting Job, but it is a really good chance he's influencing his friends. Satan can influence anyone's thoughts he chooses, but it is up to the person to reject the thoughts that come to him if they don't seem like a good thing to do. I'm sure everyone has thought up something particularly wicked at one point and go,"Where did that thought come from? I'm not like that at all." I could give examples in my own life, but just take my word for it, this is one of Satan's modes of operations. Just take from this,"Always act moral and just in all you do, and rejecting evil thoughts comes natural" Anyway, Job's friends are being influenced by Satan. So it makes you wonder,"Is Satan trying to get Job to also curse his friends?" That would seem reasonable since Satan wants to make a mockery out of love and the love of friendships for he himself does not embrace love. If Satan valued love, he'd not be rebelling against God who is at his core love. You could even say Jesus was love incarnate. So remember, do not take Job's friends' theology as good theology. It is flawed theology. Even if they're not being influenced by Satan, anyone can come up with flawed theology, it isn't tough.

        Job does not curse God, but he wants to have his case heard by God. Job does not realize he's actually trying to put God up on trial by doing this. Job just looks at himself and wonders why he deserves what he has been given. To say that Job should not be going through what he is going through is to say God is making a mistake. And we all know God makes no mistakes. So Job doesn't realize until God comes down to confront Job that he is trying to put God on trial.

        God comes down from Heaven to confront Job. God lets Job immediately know that Job is trying to put God on trail. God then asks many questions that Job cannot answer. Because God knows more than Job, it shows that Job is not a competent judge for this trial. Would you replace the 9 Supreme Court justices with children? I know a couple of you are snickering and saying,"Yes! Please!" But seriously children don't have the education to know how to properly hear out a complex case. In the same way Job does not have the knowledge to fully understand bringing a case against God so he would be a corrupt judge. Job didn't want to bring a case against God at all, and once he realized what he was doing he repented.

        Now if you look at Satan's desire to judge God, we see that a mortal has more sense than Satan does. Satan doesn't understand all that God knows. Satan might know a lot of information, but he does not know all, and such he knows he should not take the place as judge. The mortal Job realizes he should not be doing it. So the conclusion of Job is another victory for God. Not only did Job not curse God, he also showed that he has more sense than Satan by not bringing a case against God.

-Jim Sager

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