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Isaiah 45:22-24 (NIV)

[22] "Turn to me and be saved,
all you ends of the earth;
for I am God, and there is no other.
[23] By myself I have sworn,
my mouth has uttered in all integrity
a word that will not be revoked:
Before me every knee will bow;
by me every tongue will swear.
[24] They will say of me, 'In the Lord alone
are righteousness and strength.' "
All who have raged against him
will come to him and be put to shame.

Our God is a God who gives us cancer. He allows children to die. He causes depression and anxiety. We worship a God who will put us to shame trying to get us to repent. He does extremely painful things. He is supreme. In Him is righteousness and strength. He can do whatever he wants to do. This is the only true God and there is no other. But we don’t want a Jesus like this. We don’t want Jesus to be Lord. We want Him to answer all of our prayers, “get me a new job and a better house and the plasma TV and raise my kids and make my marriage better.” That is the God we want and the God we see preached on Sunday. But what happens when you preach this false message to a church and all the blessings don’t come? People are left sitting in church waiting for a God to bless them. And if you are blessed, is it really God who is blessing you or is God sending a delusion to test you and you are miserably failing. But the true God reacts contrary to your design. We are left to hang on a cross and put in a tomb. If you worship God you will be brought to your knees.  

 :)


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Does God cause anxiety and depression?

Matt 6:34 Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow; for tomorrow shall be anxious for its own things. Sufficient to the day is the evil of it.

John 14:Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

Luke 10:41 And Jesus answered and said to her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things.
42 But one thing is needful, and Mary has chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.

Jhn 14:1 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.

I think we experience evil things because we live in an evil world that is cursed.  We are also under constant assult by the enemy.

I am not disagreeing with your post - just trying to clarify it a bit.  There are times when God allows these things to plague us for His purpose - often times to refine us, train us, and humble us.  Many times, anxiety and depression are brought on by circumstances and environment.  I am not sure that being anxious is Godly.

Not sure what you mean by depression.  Clinical or spiritual grief? - there is a huge difference.

I would also have to be very careful about saying that God gives us cancer.  He may allow satan to attack us with it, as He allowed satan to give Job the boils.  Maybe it's terminology :)

However, I agree with the gist of your post.  We were bought with a price - if we are His bond slaves, we submit ourselves to whatever He wills.

Shalom, Nana

Be careful what you utter with your mouth for you would not want to speak any blasphemy against God. I like some of your post put the other parts just seem as if you are smashing God's name. God should be praised and you should tell of his great love. In response to answering all of our prayers God is that God and he can do all those things.

                         Mark 11:23
"For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be removed and be cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says."  

                            Mark 11:24
"Therefor I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them."
                                 

I understand what you are saying...but it seems the post is directed more towards people who believe that being a Christian means you'll have a better life here on earth. If you really knew Jesus, you would know that this is not true. "For things that are visible are temporary, and the things that are invisible are eternal." Paul says, "To live is Christ, To die is gain." To live is Christ...Jesus Christ did not have a wonderful life on earth. Even though Jesus was God and deserved to be exalted and worshipped by men, He was treated as a criminal by the pharisees. If "to live is Christ" then that means that for us to live is Christ as well. Which means...we wont be treated like kings on earth and we wont always get what we want.

There are many new born Christians who are still prone to believe that worshipping God = a new house and car. Or witnessing = good luck. I believe this is what you are speaking out against.

A Christian must suffer in his lifetime. "For whatever our master suffers, we will go through it also." It is good to point this out; however, the tone of the message sort of puts it in a darker light.  :-\  God hears our prayers but only gives us the things we need. If we don't know better (like an infant) then we most likely won't get the desert before our dinner. Often times, infant Christians will ask these prayers and then ponder why God never answers them. Perhaps its lack of faith? Never! God listens


If we worship God we will be brought to our knees, not because God makes us do it...but because we choose to. If Jesus shown as much humility as He did dying for us; we ought to humble ourselves even more before Him...In fact, ALL things deserve to be humbled before Jesus. "For those who humble themselves will be exalted, those who exalt themselves will be humbled."

I know, that whoever humbles themselves greatly before Jesus...will be greatly exalted by God himself over those who humbled themselves less.

I don't go to a church that says Jesus will make your life materially good.  I do go to a church that preaches you will have a joy unending when you live for Jesus.  That joy is the joy of knowing one is saved and that ultimately we have won.  The LORD does not put us through what we can not handle.  If the LORD allowed satan to torment Job like he did how much will he let us go through?

Not it's not all peaches and cream from a worldly stand point but God blesses as He sees fit.  Live first for Christ and these thing will be added unto you.  God ALWAYS gives us what we need.  Anything else is just icing on the cake.

I also feel there is a HUGE difference between causing and allowing.  If you are sick and I have the cure and hold it back from you, I am ALLOWING you to saty sick but I surely did not cause it.  More often than not we cause our own sorrows and ails but most do not want to hear this.

We live in a fallen world and reside in fallen, decaying bodies. So we do have illnesses of various sorts. Some seem to have more illnesses than others but oh well, that is life. We also have free will and suffer badly, often as a result of our actions. Others on this planet also have free will, including those who are very mean and they hurt others. Lots of things can happen to us on this world, but God does not cause it. All things that happen to us result from a fallen world and the actions of ourselves or others.

If we make bad choices and get hurt, we can learn lessons and get emotional healing from Jesus and doing our part to deal with whatever issues we had which caused the hurt. If we get hurt by others, unless we are killed, we again have a choice on how we handle it. We can grow from it or be bitter. And in our suffering, we can touch others who are going through something similar.

Then spiritually, we have a choice. In Christ, we have the Holy Spirit to help us to endure all things. And no matter how bad things are, they are worse without Christ. Also,  I wanted to be a missionary and felt the call to go to foreign lands, but then my health failed (1996) and I was not healed after prayer, so I went back and said ' ok God, I know you have a plan for me to serve you, so maybe you have another plan than I thought. How can I serve you from this bed?' And yes this did happen in 1996, when I was mostly bedridden for six months. This happened again about 6 months ago, where i could not walk well for about three months and again mostly in bed.

 But, so far, in those times, I can write to others or on forums and only God knows what that writing does for them and I can talk to others on the phone. So in those times, it is a matter of doing whatever one call do for Christ. You never know, when you think you are doing the least, may be when you are doing the most, in terms of touching souls.

I have what is called relapsing/remitting MS, so I have those times, then remissions when I can go more places. This is just the hand that I got dealt. Lots of people my age (52) are running about all of the time and work full time jobs, but that was not the hand dealt to me. God did not do this to me. Paul said that he had learned to be content in whatever circumstances he found himself in. And when things looked bleak, well "I woke every morning to birdsong', my dogs cuddled up to me, I have My Bible, I have God and a lot of other nice things. Sometimes it just takes a little more effort to look at the good, kind of like making a gratitude list. LOL

If I love Christ, my purpose here is:

1)To strive to become as much like Him as I can as the Holy Spirit revealed sins or shortcomings I need to jettison.

2)To be His servant in whatever capacity I find myself in.

3) Within my ability or limitations, to seek Him to find out how I can help others and reach the lost.

'The harvest is plenty, the workers are few', but as long as I have a breath in me, I am still one of those workers. I have a friend who has so many illnesses, she is house bound and walking is difficult. At one time, she thought she had nothing to offer. She wanted to serve Christ and did not know how she was serving him. People called her and came to her house and to those she gave the unconditional love of Christ and they heard the gospel. How can a person give a greater gift than the unconditional love of Christ?

And, oh yeah, we are just passing through...

Laura