What I think of the wheat and the tares parable in the bible

[jennifer_bloom]

Not everything that is religious is spiritual and not everything that is spiritual is religious.

Compassion and kindness are spiritual ideas that come directly from God but they don’t always involve direct worship or acts of religious sobriety.

Religious ritual and worship is not always spiritual or compassionate and kind, some people kill and murder in the name of their idea of God.

The bible says God chose two kingdoms, not one.

The kingdom of heaven is the kingdom of compassion and kindness which even unbelievers and pagans practice.

The kingdom of God is the kingdom of worship and hard work, it’s the centre of heaven but not the final boundary of heaven.

So, my point is, that a religion that unites compassion with worship is good religion: This is the pious doctor who worships every weekend and buys gifts for the poor and reveres and fears God. The good believers bake cakes for birthday parties and knits clothes for the homeless and give up their seat when they see somebody weaker than themselves.

They practice their worship with compassion and kindness and modesty and meekness and gentleness and humour and generosity and grace and cheerfulness and gratitude and humility and respect.

Bad religion separates compassion from worship and ritual. These are the media bigots who slander Muslim soldiers in the American army and say degrading things to homeless people who ask for money.

They practice their religion with pride and control and possessiveness and jealousy and hostility and anger and bitterness and revenge and vindictiveness and competitiveness and arrogance and pride and disrespect.

Your religion is a lot like a fish, if you feed your fish healthy things - you will get a healthy fish.

If you feed your fish unhealthy things by soaking it in bad ideas like racism or xenophobia or greed or superficiality - you will get a diseased fish that won’t live very long and cannot be used to feed people’s hearts without getting them sick.

So feed good ideas to your soul and soak your mind in good thoughts of love and compassion and not bad thoughts of anger and hate, and you will be a wheat and not a tare. (Relating to the bible parable of wheat and tares).

[Meldrum]

Jennifer: What a wonderful take on that parable. Thank you.

I believe that the Kingdom of God is real and lives in the mind of every living being. In India, they consider cows as sacred while in the US and elsewhere, they are considered a source for milk and meat.

If you believe there is a supreme being that has control over our lives, you have to ask yourself this. If that is so, then why does he allow, pestilence and war, racism and hatred, death from violence?

For me, this was a wall I couldn't get past. The young daughter of a minister of my church, a girl that was in my Sunday School class, was murdered. Did I wrestle with why? Absolutely! If God is so powerful, why would he allow this to happen?

Then it occurred to me the greatest truth. God doesn't take life. God receives those that have died, regardless of how. When you look through the Old Testaments, what you find is that God was a real prick. Locusts and floods kind of a prick. I guess he mellowed when he had a kid.

So what is worship? To me, it's recognizing that the world, with all of its various religions, teaching different things, based on who was their prophet, are all based on writings by men. Obviously, some of these men were inspired by the said prophet, some were written by men with an ax to grind.

Believe that there is good in this world, live that belief, and you will do good things. Bring your prejudices into the mix and any and all the good works you do will be lost to the ages.

[COMMODOREII]

God doesn't control our lives because he gave us free-will. And he will never jeopardize that.

[Jjpayne]

I totally agree with this! There is a proper balance for everything and a season and time for everything too

[Jjpayne]

Thank you for the mho 😊