God's Will

A. Unabashed Pacifist:

Some people see enemies. Okay, let's love them.

B. Unabashed Christian:

Holy One,
Waste and decay, greed and lust and violence, suffering and death.
These appear all around and within us.
Some people see them as the primary facts of life.
I see them and know them all too well.
But I also know their opposites:
Beauty and growth, sharing and love and compassion, joy and renewal.
I see these as the more significant facts of life.
For life itself ranks as the primary reality.
And it's all glorious.
Amen

C. Unquoting Jesus:

"I thought the plague of frogs was a leap."

[No, but He did like word-plays.]

D. Blog: God's Will?

I imagine God hates it when, following a natural disaster, some people say something like "It was God's will."
I imagine God hates it when, following the death of a child or young person, a minister says something like "God needed her more than we do."
I imagine God hates it when insurance policies have the disclaimer about "wars or acts of God."

Sure, put the blame on God for life's tragedies. Sure, make God the scapegoat for all the bad or evil in the world. We pick God out of the line-up without looking at other possibilities, just because God brought us into this messy world. We wallow in our suffering so much that we forget all about the joys...

Who's responsible for those, by the way? Never mind, we want blame and retribution. So we "kill" the monster God who causes such pain. God does not exist. We don't believe in God.
How very mature of us. How very becoming of humans made in God's image.
God's reply to Job, as I interpret it, says we should quit groveling in sackcloth and ashes. We should stand up in the dignity of our humanity, welcoming the breadth and depth of life and engaging in it for the miracle it all is. Enough of the blame game, already.