In my stripping down of the bible don’t think I am against it, there are nuggets of treasure to be found, there is poetic language that is unmatched and wisdom to be gleaned, I just see it as epic history not literal history, as inspired not literally but spiritually, as frozen in time but pointing to that which is beyond time, good stuff

You have never to be embarrassed for anything. There is nothing wrong whatsoever with calling and seeing God as good. I guess for me because I have faced some very difficult circumstances I have learned that my understanding of good is so limited by my humanness. I don’t believe evil exists in God. I do believe all of us are IN God, so does evil exist at all or is it just an illusion based on our eating of the tree of the knowledge of Good & Evil. As I have said many times, WE are so limited in our ability to even understand the concept of GOD, and so we fumble around using language that best describes Him. Good is a description but it doesn’t come close to what God is. That’s one reason why you will hear me describe God as PERFECT much more then you will hear me say He is Good. The word PERFECT means “COMPLETE”. None of us understand God’s perfection and yet we too are PERFECT in HIM.

Marco, You have made many important points about how we approach the Bible, but I still think it is a book that God intended for mankind to have. As I have stated before I think within it are LIES and TRUTHS and as Audrey has pointed out we need to look to our heart of hearts within to know what are the lies and what are the truths.

Sue, I too enjoy the stories of the Bible especially since I have come to trust my own inward heart in discerning what I should trust and what I should discard.

Jesus said: You search the scriptures daily thinking that in them you shall find eternal life, but they are that which testifies of ME.

Who is the ME? Isn’t that the Christ within ALL of US?

Why should we be shy in calling God “good”? He calls himself good. The psalmists call him good. Jesus calls him good. Paul calls him good. He is called “good” throughout the scriptures. So, I’m not sure that it’s my place to come along and say that my awareness is advanced that I can declare that He’s not.

I think it’s something to be celebrated. God is good. Thank **** for that! I/we had best avoid the knowledge of good and evil, because it’s not for us. Only God gets to make such declarations - and he says that He’s good.

The thing is, I’m pretty sure that you’d agree with all that. So, I suspect I’ve just embarrassed myself by completely missing your point!

Perhaps God in his wisdom let “stories” be written so man would evolve to realize it is within him/her to love and discern good and evil. I love the bible stories because they help me discern. The story of Lot always made me angry and taught me these were stories from a time when mankind knew little about the earth or heavens, illness, or each other, or God for that matter. I believe we have a better understanding, yet people in many countries (and the U.S.) still live in bible time poverty and so behave. Our world is still violent and much is loveless. We have a big job ahead of us to teach this “new age - old age Jesus love” to them. Yes, God is within and without, in nature. Because he first loved us - Sue

One thing about this topic of Gods goodness, the first question that comes to mind is if God cannot even meet the human standard of good what kind of God are we really embracing? Not only that but how does he manage to get a free pass into I AM without goodness?

The God of the OT, of which all the NT writings are based from, has serious anger managament issues, is responsibe for mass genocide, killing disobedient victims in a flash(but sometimes having patience), has a select chosen people, enemies of these chosen are fishbait, virtually raping a young maiden named Mary(what choice did she have in the matter?) and impregnating her, and we celebrate this?

I could go on and on but no need, with the above examples alone can we credit the theistic God of the bible with goodness? I know I cannot. A God who needs the blood of perfect sacrifices to appease its anger? If we cannot see the barbarcity of such a being then what are we seeing? Religion and justification of religious ideals. Tribal mentality. A God that was relevent in that day but not this day.

In the wake of science and reason this God is on his death bed, the world has no use for such and has moved on.

Luke 18:19 says “And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is God.”

God is good.

Jesus also said the kingdom of God is within you, if it is within us then it is not without us. Divinity itself then is a human concept. This realm of goodness is within us, out of this goodness comes love faith mercy grace loving kindness patience tenderness peace. This has always been since the dawn of conscousness, its the awakening to the fact that is new, that is now. It is the realization, the awareness of this Life, that we neither made up or created with perceptions, or attached doctrines to and made religious love with.

We realize that God is not a being, but the Ground of All Being. This is I AM and the essense thereof.

At the end of the day we see that God is really good afterall.