Please Don't Thank God; It's Weird
"Children understood at a very young age that doing nothing was an expression of power. Doing nothing was a choice swollen with omnipotence. It was, in fact, godly.
And this, she now realized, was the reason why the gods did nothing. Proof of their omniscience. After all, to act was to announce awful limitations, for it revealed that chance acted first, the accidents were just that--events beyond the will of the gods--and all they could do in answer was to attempt to remedy the consequences, to alter natural ends. To act, then, was an admission of fallibility" - Steven Erikson.
So I like to have debates with my Christian friends about their beliefs and the role of religion in general in today's world. In my most recent one, however short it was, a friend was taking me on on my position on the idea of expressing gratitude to God for anything that happens.
His move was occasioned by how I put up a screenshot of a tweet in which a lady was thanking God for escaping a robbery alive on my whatsapp status, along with a sarcastic caption.
Just thought I should share the explanation I gave him . . .
Giving someone praise for limiting the amount of harm done to you when in fact they are all-powerful is quite cringeworthy. It's either you accept that God has no role in anything that happens or you accept that when bad shit happen, they happen because He allowed them to; He picks and chooses when he wants to intervene.
If she's praising God for rescuing her from death, she's more-or-less admitting that He lets others die even though he is able to stop stuff from happening. Now what are the reasons that could possibly account for God's hesitance to intervene quickly in certain situations?
1. He probably never interferes in the first place.
2. He waits for things to get serious to test your resolve.
3. He waits for things to get critical so he can show off his might.
4. He just no dey like your matter sake of you are not living according to "His Word"
Don't those reasons sound sociopathic to you? How do they merit praise in times of miraculous narrow escapes? The logical continuation for "thank you for not allowing me to die" is ". . . even though you let others perish". Like it or not. And there's no point thanking Him because he's still going to let you die when you've outlived your usefulness to Him. SOCIOPATH!

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