Where has the Respect for God Gone?

This of course is not a new adversity that man has created on his own. Ever since man first took a breath there existed a corruption that would compete for the full attention of humans that God placed within the thoughts of the finite mind. To be sure, God did not create man with the idea of letting this species fend for himself. In fact, by the very holy manner of the Incarnation man would find more than the forgiveness of his sin by Christ assuming the same nature. God would also share every facet of man, without sin, learning through the many mistakes that he would encounter as a human being. It is here that a direct stubbornness would present a block between God and man.

When we read about how God let the Israelites follow their own desires, they became the slaves of the attacking king of Assyria and found themselves now under someone else’s rule. (2 Kgs 17: 5 -6). People may respond with questions why God would not protect them from being captured and treated so poorly. We must remember that God does not coerce any of us to come to him as a puppet. We all have that free will that guides as a suggestion and only our Yes will find God’s protection; first through Christ’s Passion, and then by our giving back through love and forgiveness to those who hurt us.

It isn’t a show of respect for God that is the crucial admonishment of his encouragement to guide us in holiness, it is the fact that he is God; Love and forgiveness for the worst actions any of us can commit. Love is God; God is only Love Who is Eternal himself.

The question of hell as a place of eternal punishment became an entity of individual choice by those who want only what they have chosen as their final decision to avoid and reject Almighty God. God does not condemn sinners. So hell is not God’s creation but the many who want an eternal existence away from God’s Love and eternal forgiveness. Thus we find the existence of an eternal condition that these souls would rather have.

As the fatal scream I heard while praying at 3 AM was told to me by the Lord; “That scream came from the depth of hell.” I may never forget the shivers of that call for help. Perhaps once one who decides he/she was wrong could remove themself from their original choice of rejecting God. That will never happen. Unfortunately the choice is theirs, not God’s.

What we might describe as punishment will not begin to suffice for the total absence from God, especially with the full knowledge that God exists and their absence from him will never cease. Since time and space do not exist in eternity, their presence is compared to never sleeping and only being aware that this choice is the same for ever; without changing from morning to evening. It will always be a reality of never knowing a sunrise or sunset. They do not exist.

Keep in mind that God encourages every sinner to repent and seek his mercy. That he will do and welcome all who turn back to God and receive his grace of forgiveness. God desires that all human beings will yearn to be with him forever.

Ralph B.Hathaway