Posted by Eduardo on March 21, 1999 at 12:55:05 {MWs6WNq0.c9YU}:
Opposers often refer to the destruction of millions of people during the Great Tribulation and Armageddon as a horrific act of God. We tend to view the consequences of God's war as "killing people" or taking their lives.
But in reality, the world is populated by billions of people who are already dead .
From the day we are born we begin to die due to the sin that we have all inherited. The undisputed fact is that all of us will die someday. Not one person in the world can live. Do you fool yourself by thinking because you move and eat and sleep for a mere eighty years that you are alive?
Christ and his warriors are not then taking something away from which we are entitled.
True, in human law the precipitation of a death even in the event when death is inevitable renders one bloodguilty. But this precept could not be applied in this instance since in reality "life" is a mere illusion when we are all dying due to sin.
Therefore, the "different perspective" alluded to in the title is not to view God's actions as taking life but rather as an extension of the opportunity to gain life out of a reality of no hope for life.
Only by the study and application of God's Word and by the redeeming power of Christ's shed blood can we be made alive.
Our hope then is optimistic not pessimistic. WE, Jehovah's Witnesses, want people to learn of this hope of how to gain "real" life and not the illusion of it.
As we approach the Memorial of Christ's Ransom Sacifice, may all persons reflect personally on its meaning and discern how to share this hope with others.
Eduardo