Is Mankind Really in Control of Its Own Fate? (paradise, believe, Kingdom)
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"Faced with unexpected disaster, all our knowledge, skills, and ability count for nothing…. We can only cry out in sorrow, awaiting death amid fear and helplessness…. And we can’t help but ask ourselves: Who controls our fate? Who is our only salvation?"
But I think your plea is a bit sensationally negative - the bit about crying out in sorrow, awaiting death etc. How about praising God and seeing how you feel then?
I believe we do control our own fate..we also get what we deserve. The canvas is blank before us, it is we who paint it. It can be either bleak or paradise..that is up to us.
"Faced with unexpected disaster, all our knowledge, skills, and ability count for nothing…. We can only cry out in sorrow, awaiting death amid fear and helplessness…. And we can’t help but ask ourselves: Who controls our fate? Who is our only salvation?"
XinMing: welcome to City-Data. I trust this will be a rewarding experience for you. I am one of those silly individuals who are of the opinion that our God is the sovereign Creator of the all, and as such is in control of everything! The events all of us face continually appear on the surface to challenge such a view, but alas our God reigns!
I believe we do control our own fate..we also get what we deserve. The canvas is blank before us, it is we who paint it. It can be either bleak or paradise..that is up to us.
Zero, there comes a day when one awakens to the fact you have little to do with your own fate. Of course there are aspects that are up to us, and in them a road leading to expansion or implosion, but in the end is One who reigns supreme over the all.
I offer a different theological viewpoint. Yes, we are vulnerable but we have agency. Our responsibility here is to not await God's kingdom on earth but to create God's kingdom on earth. And over the past two millennia, we have steadily done that in ways large and small, from the creation of better living conditions and greater humanity to the poor and oppressed. Yes, there scandals every day. Yes, there are setbacks. However, as Martin Luther King famously noted, the arc of the moral universe is long but bends towards justice. To me, these are all fulfillments of God's desire for a peaceful and prosperous humanity.
Compare the ways of the world today to the barbarism of the world in 18 AD, or even 1918 AD, and how can you not be optimistic about God's blessings?
Man is skilled with destruction and decay, but inept at rescuing or saving himself.
Facile, but wrong.
You realize that lifespans are longer, material prosperity is better, and a far, far greater percentage of mankind enjoy happier, fuller lives, right? Global poverty rates are cratering. Diseases that were once the scourges of mankind are being successfully treated. More and more people enjoy the blessings of freedom, not living and dying at the whim of some despot somewhere. Work is far easier, far safer.
Tell you what. Let's perform a mental exercise and assume that someone invented a time machine. Taking your iPad with you and a universal translator, you travel back to the year 18 AD and show people of the period videos of what everyday life is like in 2018 AD. Ask if anybody wants to come to the future. You wouldn't have sufficient room for all the takers. Heck, choose the 14th Century when the Black Death killed off a third of humanity. Or 1918. Or 1970.
People who parrot the woebegone view of history don't really bother to understand its long-term arc.
Last edited by MinivanDriver; 06-07-2018 at 06:51 AM..
Armegedon is just ahead. You are witnessing it's tremors now.
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