I'm sorry, I guess I was reading your posts the wrong way--I am not a "biblical thinker" much---I am a Christian but I don't attend church---have had some bad experiences, so my faith is between me and God...
I know I should become more familiar with the Bible, though, I have only read it through once, but have read certain passages many, many times...
Sorry again, I didn't intend to preach to anyone, I just fear for the America that my two very young granddaughters will have to live in...
For years now, since 9/11, I have worried that they may some day have to wear burkas if we were to lose the "war on terror", but the bleakness that has been talked about tonight on this thread, I am not sure how to deal with it...I guess it frightens me too much...not for me, I am old, but for them, Kailey and Chase...
I understand where you're coming from completely.. we have had many so-called "devoted" christians on the wrong side of this.. and lots of in betweeners who actually get it! I've been fighting on one side or another for so many years.. I'm just tired of it all I guess.. trying to focus in my later years on what counts most to me.. getting my life in order since both my parents died so young, as well as several relatives..
The other day, I woke up and checked the news, and when I saw that nothing was changing, and it was looking hopeless for Terri, I just cried, and was feeling so upset and downhearted. Not just about the Schiavo case, but about all evil, and how it seems God often stands back, and evil wins (for now). So I began to pray, and I poured out all the things that were depressing me. Then after I prayed I felt led to go to a Bible, so I did. And this is the truth, without even looking or flipping through the pages, I just opened it up, and the page was Job Chapter 24, which happens to be the exact questions I had just asked God. I'll just post the whole thing (hope you guys don't mind) and make sure to read the last few verses.
"Why does the Almighty not set times for judgment? Why must those who know him look in vain for such days?
Men move boundary stones; they pasture flocks they have stolen. They drive away the orphan's donkey and take the widow's ox in pledge.
They thrust the needy from the path and force all the poor of the land into hiding.
Like wild donkeys in the desert, the poor go about their labor of foraging food; the wasteland provides food for their children.
They gather fodder in the fields and glean in the vineyards of the wicked.
Lacking clothes, they spend the night naked; they have nothing to cover themselves in the cold.
They are drenched by mountain rains and hug the rocks for lack of shelter.
The fatherless child is snatched from the breast; the infant of the poor is seized for a debt.
Lacking clothes, they go about naked; they carry the sheaves, but still go hungry.
They crush olives among the terraces; they tread the winepresses, yet suffer thirst.
The groans of the dying rise from the city, and the souls of the wounded cry out for help.
But God charges no one with wrongdoing.
"There are those who rebel against the light, who do not know its ways or stay in its paths.
When daylight is gone, the murderer rises up and kills the poor and needy; in the night he steals forth like a thief.
The eye of the adulterer watches for dusk; he thinks, 'No eye will see me,' and he keeps his face concealed.
In the dark, men break into houses, but by day they shut themselves in; they want nothing to do with the light.
For all of them, deep darkness is their morning; they make friends with the terrors of darkness.
"Yet they are foam on the surface of the water; their portion of the land is cursed, so that no one goes to the vineyards.
As heat and drought snatch away the melted snow, so the grave snatches away those who have sinned.
The womb forgets them, the worm feasts on them; evil men are no longer remembered but are broken like a tree.
They prey on the barren and childless woman, and to the widow show no kindness.
But God drags away the mighty by his power; though they become established, they have no assurance of life.
He may let them rest in a feeling of security, but his eyes are on their ways.
For a little while they are exalted, and then they are gone; they are brought low and gathered up like all others; they are cut off like heads of grain.
"If this is not so, who can prove me false and reduce my words to nothing?"