To intervene or not to intervene: that is the question
My question, anyway .... does God intervene? If not, why not? If so, under what circumstances? I'm still watching the Stargate episodes on DVD and came to one that almost seemed to address this issue :)
If we will reflect backwards, we'll remember that in my last Stargate post, archaeologist Daniel Jackson had been terminally irradiated and was at the point of death when an ascended being offered him ascension to a higher plane of existence, which he accepted.
In this episode, Abyss, one of the main characters, Daniel's friend Jack O'Neill, has been captured by the evil Goa'uld named Ba'al and is being tortured by him for information. The torture has been going on for quite some time (Jack can be tortured to death over and over, as Baal possesses a sarcophagus, a device that can resurrect most fatalities), but between the bouts of torture, Jack is imprisoned in a heavy-gravity-field cell.
As Jack languishes in that cell, he's suddenly joined by Daniel. Jack thinks at first that he's imagining Daniel, but Daniel assures him that he's there in truth, though of course in his ascended body (is this like Paul's "spiritual body"? :). Finally believing, Jack asks Daniel to help him break out of the cell -- after all, he has some heavy duty powers as an ascended being -- but Daniel says he can't intervene, that he's just there to console Jack ..... so reminiscent of my conversations with Jesus/God :).
- Jack and Daniel
***
Daniel - Hi, Jack.
O'Neill - Daniel…
Daniel - I leave, and look at the mess you get yourself into. It's good to see you.
O'Neill - Yeah, you too. It's a shame you're a delusion.
Daniel - No, I'm here. I'm really here.
O'Neill - Sure you are
O'Neill takes off his shoe and throws it at Daniel, who winces. The shoe passes through him and bounces off the wall.
Daniel - Here in the sense that my consciousness is here, if not here in the full physical flesh and blood sense, which is really neither here nor there. The point is, you're not imaging this.
O'Neill - I just tossed my shoe through you.
Daniel - Yes you did. That's because I've ascended to another plane of existence ..... I'm energy now.
O'Neill - How's that working out for you?
Daniel - Good, actually, very good. You, however…
O'Neill - Yeah, well…you know what it's like coming back from the dead. Takes a while to get the color back in your cheeks. So…not a delusion?
Daniel - No.
O'Neill - Okay…show me your stuff. Bust me out of here.
Daniel - I can't.
O'Neill - Why not?
Daniel - I'm not allowed to interfere.
O'Neill - You're interfering right now.
Daniel - No, I'm not.
O'Neill - Yes, you are.
Daniel - No, I'm not. I am consoling a friend.
O'Neill - What good's the power to make the wind blow or toss lightning around if you can't use it to spring an old friend out of jail?
Daniel - I would if I could.
O'Neill - You can't do that stuff?
Daniel - I can. I just can't ......
O'Neill - If the Daniel Jackson I knew was really here…
Daniel - I am.
O'Neill - Then do something. You listen to me. I don't want to go through that again. If you were really my friend and had the power to stop it, you'd stop it!
Daniel - The hardest part of being who or what I am is having the power to change the things I want to change and knowing that I can't. Even when I'm certain, even when it's absolutely clear to me, even when it affects the people I care about. Because for all I can do, I'm no more qualified to play God than the Goa'uld are .....
***
And that's where the similarity ends, because God is eminently qualified to play God, so to speak, and yet still .....
If we will reflect backwards, we'll remember that in my last Stargate post, archaeologist Daniel Jackson had been terminally irradiated and was at the point of death when an ascended being offered him ascension to a higher plane of existence, which he accepted.
In this episode, Abyss, one of the main characters, Daniel's friend Jack O'Neill, has been captured by the evil Goa'uld named Ba'al and is being tortured by him for information. The torture has been going on for quite some time (Jack can be tortured to death over and over, as Baal possesses a sarcophagus, a device that can resurrect most fatalities), but between the bouts of torture, Jack is imprisoned in a heavy-gravity-field cell.
As Jack languishes in that cell, he's suddenly joined by Daniel. Jack thinks at first that he's imagining Daniel, but Daniel assures him that he's there in truth, though of course in his ascended body (is this like Paul's "spiritual body"? :). Finally believing, Jack asks Daniel to help him break out of the cell -- after all, he has some heavy duty powers as an ascended being -- but Daniel says he can't intervene, that he's just there to console Jack ..... so reminiscent of my conversations with Jesus/God :).
- Jack and Daniel
***
Daniel - Hi, Jack.
O'Neill - Daniel…
Daniel - I leave, and look at the mess you get yourself into. It's good to see you.
O'Neill - Yeah, you too. It's a shame you're a delusion.
Daniel - No, I'm here. I'm really here.
O'Neill - Sure you are
O'Neill takes off his shoe and throws it at Daniel, who winces. The shoe passes through him and bounces off the wall.
Daniel - Here in the sense that my consciousness is here, if not here in the full physical flesh and blood sense, which is really neither here nor there. The point is, you're not imaging this.
O'Neill - I just tossed my shoe through you.
Daniel - Yes you did. That's because I've ascended to another plane of existence ..... I'm energy now.
O'Neill - How's that working out for you?
Daniel - Good, actually, very good. You, however…
O'Neill - Yeah, well…you know what it's like coming back from the dead. Takes a while to get the color back in your cheeks. So…not a delusion?
Daniel - No.
O'Neill - Okay…show me your stuff. Bust me out of here.
Daniel - I can't.
O'Neill - Why not?
Daniel - I'm not allowed to interfere.
O'Neill - You're interfering right now.
Daniel - No, I'm not.
O'Neill - Yes, you are.
Daniel - No, I'm not. I am consoling a friend.
O'Neill - What good's the power to make the wind blow or toss lightning around if you can't use it to spring an old friend out of jail?
Daniel - I would if I could.
O'Neill - You can't do that stuff?
Daniel - I can. I just can't ......
O'Neill - If the Daniel Jackson I knew was really here…
Daniel - I am.
O'Neill - Then do something. You listen to me. I don't want to go through that again. If you were really my friend and had the power to stop it, you'd stop it!
Daniel - The hardest part of being who or what I am is having the power to change the things I want to change and knowing that I can't. Even when I'm certain, even when it's absolutely clear to me, even when it affects the people I care about. Because for all I can do, I'm no more qualified to play God than the Goa'uld are .....
***
And that's where the similarity ends, because God is eminently qualified to play God, so to speak, and yet still .....
posted by crystal | 1:23 PM
2 Comments:
I wonder if the question to pose to myself is, "Am I more qualified than God to determine what God ought to do?" similar to Job's answer from the whirlwind I guess. Another way of asking it might be, "Is God nothing more than a super-powered human and in so being, sees Truth as I do, only better?"
Not sure if I phrased that right but even in the example given in Stargate that seems to be what his friend is suggesting; you aren't aware of things in the same manner that I am, and God is even more aware of them than I.
I've never watched the various Stargate series, but every time you post something about them, I get curious. ;o)
Hi Cura,
The nice thing about Stargate if you're watching DVDs is that it was 10 seasons long - lots to watch.
I do sort of hate what the whirlwind says to Job. If someone you loved, who had just had terrible things happen to them including having their children killed, asked you why .... even if they were childlike and too dumb to grasp the whole picture, wouldn't you try still to explain it to them in some way that might make sense to them?
Maybe God is soooo different from us, so other, that we can't understand him and what he does, and we don't deserve answers, but that God does not seem like the God Jesus revealed, called papa, told us would be a better parent than we are to our own children.
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