The Little Man and the Great Big God

The world isn't black and white, and the obvious answer isn't always the righteous answer. Worse, it may be the righteous answer but it isn't the merciful answer. Justice and mercy don't always go together. Mercy isn't always leniency either. I'm an imperfect being that's being created by a perfect being. He has to teach me to think for myself, be persistent, keep pushing, strive for the best thing rather than the easy thing. Experience is a better teacher than straight answers.

Take the Sodom and Gomorrah story, for example. Abraham learns of God's plan to destroy the cities (we all remember that part, but we never remember this) and he's horrified. He barters with God. He says "Far be it from you, Lord to do this wicked thing. Far be it from you!" and he starts with fifty righteous men. He asks God to spare the city of there are fifty righteous men in it. They're aren't fifty righteous men. He asks for thirty, twenty, ten, right down to one righteous soul out of the whole bunch.... and there aren't any. Why does God, who knows that there isn't one righteous soul in the whole place and thus decided to torch it, allow the little man to argue with his maker?

Because he needs to learn that he can. The little man will be the father of the chosen people, the granddaddy of three major world religions, and his behavior is setting the standard for all his children. Faithfulness...but not blind faithfulness. Considering all the "prophets" and "holy" men who were to come who were liars and deluded fools who didn't really hear God's voice, it's a fine thing that our faith traditions (speaking for Jews, Christians, and Muslims) started with the little man who called out the great big God and lived to tell the tale, isn't it?

The ones who pay attention to this story not because of it's fire and brimstone, but for the way God interacts with man are the ones who keep on calling bullshit when the rest of the church gets out of hand. I do the same thing because he's teaching me with this craziness. He's always right...but he lets me do it. Otherwise how would I find out why anything happens? Asking wouldn't cut it. I wouldn't believe him. Neither would Abraham until he'd had the city searched from top to bottom for that one righteous man he prayed was there.