God is Not From Greek Mythology

 I have loved you with an everlasting love;

I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.

 Jeremiah 31:3

I was raised by a mother who regarded her God as a vengeful tyrant given to temper tantrums when His children didn't do what He told them to.  She was always admonishing her children to behave, lest God grab a lightning bolt from the sky (or Poseidon's trident) and hurl it at one of us.  God was a "do it or else" Master with a sharp temper and a short fuse.

I bought Mom's portrayal - hook, line and sinker - and tried my best to behave, but was consistently unsuccessful in accomplishing perfection.  I grew to hate her God - the one that expected the impossible from me and punished me when I couldn't hand it to Him.  i know I have mentioned this before, but it bears repeating:  One of the overriding memories of my childhood is the death of a young boy in our church (kicked by a horse), and our mother's proclamation that God took his life because the child and his parents didn't obey Him (examples at the ready).

When I moved away from my childhood home and began exploring Christianity and God for myself, including my own reading of the Bible, I found a Deity that was quite different; so different, in fact, that I had to rework my entire thought process about Him.  For example:

•  He loved us before we even knew who He was (not because of our performance): ...while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  (Romans 5:8)
• God is willing to talk together (negotiate?):  Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord. (Isaiah 1:18)
• God does not want to hurt people who are already hurting:  A bruised reed He will not break, and a smoldering wick He will not smother.  (Isaiah 42:3)
• He will not turn away anyone who comes:  ...whoever comes to me I will never cast out.  (John 6:37)

Even Christ's disciples had the "it's the victim's fault" disease!  When confronted with a man who was born blind, the disciples asked Jesus who committed the sin that caused this to happen.  His reply?  No one!  The Bible says that the sun rises on the evil and the good, and the rain falls on the just and the unjust.   Just so, human tragedy happens to the sinner and saint alike.  God's job in that moment is exactly opposite of being the cause of the suffering.