Indeed as an ex Catholic as well, I found a lot of church traditions not scripturally based. I had innate difficulties with much of it's teachings and artificial prayers by rote replacing scripture readings and personal prayer! They were the epitome of deciding they were the only true and approved way to God, arbitrarily dispensing and withholding salvation and eternal destiny. Now we have a Pope embracing every known religion in the world, so long as he remains on his papal seat! Oh my, lions and tigers and bears! TR Yeah I think there are a lot of lazy people who don’t want to search the Scriptures for the Truth and just rather depend on sinful man’s advice. I had one boss give me back the Bible Tract and say he didn’t need Jesus because he went to Catholic school and the nun said he is good enough for heaven. Another co-worker visited Rome to get “holy” water blessed by the pope John Paul and it was placed in a small glass vial to hang around her neck. She made sure she showed that to everyone. This was before they came out with the pope-on-the-rope soap :wacko: Geri wrote: Its hard for me to imagine God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who always was and created everything, was lonely. It wasn't loneliness that caused God to create the universe, Geri. That would suggest that there is something lacking within Himself, and that is a theological impossibility. God is utterly self-sufficient and does not require our praise our existence to be complete. That would be a faulty concept of God, based on our own sense of incompleteness as created beings. A better way to express it would be that God chose to reveal His attributes to others apart from Himself, that they could have life and know His love. https://seanmcdowell.org/blog/was-god-ever-lonely Good point, David. I didn’t think of it that way. Thanks for the clarification and the SeanMcdowell link. :good: I will certainly be studying this topic further. :yes: Throughout eternity they shared their love with one another and had constant fellowship! Then God decided that so much love needed to be spread abroad to others that could appreciate His glorious love. I believe that's when God decided to create humans! Though the angels had been around for some time I would expect, they were simply servants. For when Lucifer and the angels saw that the Lord's heart would be offered to men rather than to them, their pride kicked in. I believe that this scorned lover syndrome came into play which caused the rebellion in the hearts of the angels! Especially in light of the fact that we had less glory than the angels! Lucifer's pride was damaged. They were neither offered forgiveness, nor a divine romance with the Lord God! That's my story and I'm sticking with it! TR
