This topic contains 35 replies, has 18 voices, and was last updated by 
Tim WB 1 year, 5 months ago.
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@Alyson The idea of God orchestrating the rape of the wives is sickening. God killing the baby for its parents’ sin was terrible enough, and I wonder how pro-lifers would react to that.
Alyson has a good point. This is the problem I have always had with the story of David. All it teaches is that it’s good to be King.
I don’t think there are any spiritual lessons to the idea that David was a man after God’s own heart. This is the same old story to make people follow the king. The victor gets to write the history. Every king has some divine right narrative. If anyone else had done this David would have put them to death and he did. So if David was a man after god’s own heart, how come god didn’t kill David? This is just a lesson in hypocrisy and class favoritism.
Anonymous@Sara Thanks!
Wow can’t believe I missed this post! I knew that David was a polygamist but concubines too? As @Richard said, all his stories seem to do is show how awesome it is to be a king, or a leader, seems like because he knew that God was on his side, he went ahead and did what the hell he wanted. Also I support what @Hugh said about how a belief in biblical infallability causes one’s theology and outlook to become incredibly restrictive and judgmental, it also causes one to attempt to justify the God of the Old Testament flooding an entire planet because of sin and then God essentially going ‘Hmm…. yeah maybe that was a bit too harsh.. Sorry guys! Won’t do it again!’. And a God justifying war and violence, essentially having no problems with one guy having up to 20 sexual slaves, having nothing to say about implied rape etc etc. We need to take away such a dangerous idea of the entire Bible being God’s word (which I may remind people, was developed in the 18th century purely out of insecurity over growing critique of the Bible and the establishment of Darwinism) because then we simply MUST believe the entire Bible and all of its inaccuracies and contradictions. Hell, on the face of it, the God of the Old and New Testament, the latter played out by Jesus, is the greatest contradiction of them all. They are like two completely different characters.
By believing everything in the Old Testament then we are essentially believing in the Jewish accounts and taking it as read that we are reading precise history. That’s quite a stretch for me. I mean look at Genesis, who wrote all that down?! Who could have possibly known all of that detail? Why does no one ever ask those questions of Genesis? Instead people look at it as if God, came down with a pen, and wrote it all down themselves. Madness! And we must also remember, that like the formation of the New Testament, there were a great many ‘other’ books that were a part of it, of which there existed mass debate about what to include in the ‘final’ book that was considered canon. The Jewish scripture has up to 20 other books that the Christian Bible has not included. Why not? Again, its men deciding things like what books are valid, not God.
I think we all must remain skeptical about all of the accounts in the Bible, we must test them for their validity, and for their history. As far as I know, David did exist and he was a mighty king, but was he really favored by God as much as the Bible suggests? Was the mass wars between Israel and factions such as the Canaanites, which as far as I am aware is also proven to be valid historically now, instigated by God? The fact is, when you look at the accounts of the First Crusade, Pope Urban II said that God was telling him to do this. When Constantine fought Maxentenius before becoming emperor and Christianising the Roman Empire, he claimed he and his entire army saw a great holy vision in the sky, claiming that God wanted him to do this. We must be skeptical when people in history claim that God is talking to them, just as we do when people in present day do the same thing!
As far as I am concerned, the only thing going for the Old Testament is the fact that Jesus personally vouched for the ‘Prophets and the Law’, but such a phrase is vague, he could have been referring to any number of things.
Anonymous@Shift – “Hmm…. yeah maybe that was a bit too harsh.. Sorry guys! Won’t do it again!” This cracked me up. LOL I have always wondered about that one…
AnonymousI cracked up too. It’s also interesting/disturbing to me that at one point in the Bible, God wants to kill off all the Israelites (except Moses’ family) because they are such naughty children, but Moses talks him out of it, not by making a moral argument or begging for mercy, but by saying, “OMG, what will people say!” And God goes, “Darn it, you’re right. Even though genocide always gives me such satisfaction, my reputation is more important.”
That nails it.
I am coming to this discussion late, but it is relevant to a current situation I am in.
Two friends of mine have recently been seeing each other. Once has been divorced for six months. He has two adult children and two children still in the home. One of the boys in the home is in my home several times a week as he is a close friend of my sons. His dad has sought out counseling from me – we hangout out once a month at my home and talk about our faith and our families. Much of it is about how he is navigating life outside of marriage trying to make up major mistakes he made with his x-wife and his kids.
The other friend has been in my life four about 3 years. Her kids see me as one of their father figures as their dad basically abandoned them. I have been instrumental on guiding her to get her divorce finished so she could get some closure and move forward with her life.
The two of them have found each other, are now sleeping with each other, and plan to move in together. I am against it – not for the perceived morality of it, but because of the impact that it makes on the community around them, especially their kids. Of course they don’t want to hear what I have to say. They think they are making love in a vacuum, but the truth is they are hurting those around them with their selfish antics. Truthfully, if they gave themselves some time to let their worlds come together before their loins did I would be excited for them. Right now I just see the damage it is causing.
So here is my issue – yes MY issue – because they are now rejecting me and any discussion about their lives together I want them punished. They both belong to the same church (one that I used to be a pastor in) and it is all I can do today to hold myself back from calling their ministry leaders and exposing their “sin.” I want their hypocrisy exposed and for them to lose their benefits around the church. Pretty petty of me, isn’t it?
Here is the weird thing. I don’t feel the same way about other friends that I have in similar situations. I am so excited for two friends of mine that are getting married in a couple of weeks. They have been living together the past year and a half and I don’t know how they would have got through the youngest daughter’s cancer without this man having shown up and taking care of the rest of the kids as the mom focused on the sick child. They were both divorced already and trying to plan a wedding seemed ridiculous. Now that the daughter is in remission we are planning a to “make this thing legal” and throw a grand old party! I should also say, both of them also left the formal church gatherings.
So why am I hung up on my two friends who are screwing like rabbits right now? I know both of them have had sexually frustrating marriages in the past, but it still doesn’t feel like they are doing this in a healthy way.
Spinning…
Chad
@Chad! Why oh why aren’t you at our house making us coffee? Why oh why aren’t you coming with our family to camp?! Seriously.
If I were in your shoes I might throw a tantrum. Then, I would ask myself… “What is going on here that has me so tied up in knots?” I would wonder, “Am I being petty, really? Or do I see something worth noticing and there’s really nothing I can do about it?” Then I would post here on TLS and ask everyone to drink beers with me and I’d cuss and swear and get over it. There’s a lot of angst with the noticing the folks who are in church and “who are screwing like rabbits right now (and not owning it) … I know both of them have had sexually frustrating marriages in the past, but it still doesn’t feel like they are doing this in a healthy way.”
Some direct talk: Chad, you’ve told them what you think, and why – now butt out. They’re adults with their own lives to live and messes to make and clean up. Making a public stink about it won’t help anyone. All it will do is cause hurt, anger, and resentment. If they’re being stupid about their relationship you won’t need to say anything to anyone for the shit to hit the fan – they’ll do that all by themselves. If the kids at home are being neglected, then that’s what needs to adressed – not their bedroom activity. If the grown kids are upset, tough. They’re grown and have lives of their own to live, which is what they need to focus on. If things turn out well in the end, then you’ll have not sabotaged a good relationship, your friendship, or created harmful unintended consequences. If things don’t turn out well, you can be there for those who need support and understanding – without saying “I told you so”. You can’t fix this – if it even needs fixing. There are times to be a hero, but it is often true that discretion is the better part of valor, and I strongly suspect this is one of those times.
A question for you to ask yourself is why you feel as though you want to or should do something hurtful to these two people? That desire is not about them, it’s about you – whereas their situation is theirs to break or build. What buttons is this pushing? I don’t want to know – that’s a question for you to answer for and to yourself. When you figure that out you’ll be in a better position to know how to address your feelings about this in a constructive, practical way.
Thanks, Syl, these are good questions to ask, and I am processing them.
@Starfielder – I would so love to pack up right now and head with you guys to CBS. If money wasn’t an issue we’d be there. I’d make you coffee every morning.
I’m reading and responding while drinking beers!
@Chad – “So here is my issue – yes MY issue – because they are now rejecting me and any discussion about their lives together I want them punished. They both belong to the same church (one that I used to be a pastor in) and it is all I can do today to hold myself back from calling their ministry leaders and exposing their “sin.” I want their hypocrisy exposed and for them to lose their benefits around the church. Pretty petty of me, isn’t it?”
Well I don’t know if I would use the term petty…but perhaps.
But I do think it reveals to you some real inner struggles, and that your reaction to their situation is much more about you than it is about them IMHO. The whole notion of a church being the keepers of what is “sin” in the lives of individuals is another of my hot buttons. One thing I have personally determined is a truth in my life is that sin is not defined by any specific action, but rather by the heart. And I most certainly do not believe that sex is sinful (though it certainly can be) outside of marriage. They may have a great thing going which will end up being positive and healthy for them and their kids. Or they may totally fuck it all up and cause some hurts and have it end badly. But isn’t that the struggle we all face in life?
Anonymous@Chad – “So here is my issue – yes MY issue – because they are now rejecting me and any discussion about their lives together I want them punished. They both belong to the same church (one that I used to be a pastor in) and it is all I can do today to hold myself back from calling their ministry leaders and exposing their “sin.” I want their hypocrisy exposed and for them to lose their benefits around the church. Pretty petty of me, isn’t it?”
lol – I know I just quoted Gary, quoting Chad, so get over it…
Chad, thanks for posting your thoughts here and being transparent to a fault. I too go through the same strange and irrational inner struggles about folks and have in the past. I think part of it is having been a Vineyard Pastor and participating in important “Pastoral Meetings” where portions of our meetings were devoted to those members of our congregation that had slipped, either by not coming to church regularly, or by “sinning”. The goals of these meetings were to help “lead those folks towards healing and health,” or at least that is what we told ourselves. Many times they were like sanctioned gossip sessions. Either way, the outcome was generally the same. One of us would volunteer based on our relationship to the wayward one to go and spend time with them and look them in the eye and ask them about their issues and point them towards church programs that would help. If they refused to meet with us, or they refused to follow our corrective advice, we would remove them from leadership positions (which were ANY positions in the church including playing drums in the band). For the most part, we removed them from their church jobs anyway simply because they were “struggling” and needed to focus on “healing,” etc.
So there was always a punishment for fucking up in the pastoral staff’s eyes and the pastoral council’s. Think that shit might be bleeding over into your real life?
I know it did into mine for awhile.
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