God - respecting choice

Following my thoughts about grace I have been asked how I could worship a God who chooses to let more than half of the people perish and still consider this God to be a God of love. Jesus isn't the 'Saviour of the world', He's merely the saviour of some and condemns the rest! How can a God of love exclude Ghandi, the Dali Lama and others whose lives have touched nations and changed the path of history?

Let's try and look at this logically. God is a God of love and is, through the one atoning act of the cross, the Saviour of all. This is the reality and just as some choose to ignore the reality of their birthright by walking away from their family, some choose to walk away from this salvation. Both family and salvation remain as realities but the choice is made to live outside of them and so whilst it (family and salvation) continues to exist, it is not the day-to-day reality for them.

Now, as to the question,"How can a God of love not include Ghandi?" the answer is simple, God didn't exclude Ghandi, but Ghandi choose not to be in the family photograph but choose for himself a different existence. One that was separate from God and having done so made the choice. If God was then to force him to be part of the family later then He would neither be respecting that choice or leaving us to the wonderful reality that is freewill.

A friend of mine had a child who decided to leave home and live their life their own way. They told the family that they wanted nothing to do with them and whenever they were approached by either of the parents, complained that they didn't respect the child's choices. Whenever this happened, people would agree that the parents were being unreasonable and mutter against them.

That said, every now and again the same child would present demands for money or representation to settle debts or keep them from prison. Whenever they did this other people would point out how they (the parents) were being used and how they were being stupid. Eventually the situation arose when, after an expensive episode with the, now quite adult, child the parents asked whether they would come to a family celebration. The child responded by reiterating their contempt for the family and sadly these were their final words on the matter as, very sadly, they died a few weeks later.

They never stopped being loved but chose to live their own life outside of that love, even though they used it to their own advantage on a number of occasions, but in the end they died outside of that reality. The love never went away but they lived outside it and the family had to respect that choice. Ghandi made the same choices and God, being a God of love and giving freewill, respected that then and continues to even when the final day arrives! To drag Ghandi into the family he chose not to be part of when alive would be to deny his choices and would remove any respect got his choices and deny freewill.

As for the Dali Lama, think he has a god of his own making and a philosophy of his own that says his choices are elsewhere.

Pax