If God is love, why would love punish for not loving?
544304
You can discipline someone and love them at the same time.  Parents do it all the time.
647900
God's love is unfathomable to us humans.  God's mind is infinite and ours is finite.  There's no way we can understand why He loves us so much.
1125859
A loving god would not create hell.
775692
The God Projected by religions is their own imagination.  They fix some morals and dogams and foolishly expect God to follow them.\n\nAnd loving does not mean saving one from death...sometimes loving is shown as killing too.\n\nTo Find answer you must study Eastern Religions, they have better explanations for the mysteries of Universe, life death and god
742164
relationships, and love for that matter, are not supposed to be judged/prejudged based on one event.  love is a decision to commit, not blind faith based on perceived symbolisms.  God has a reason for everything, every time.  It's not just the "ME" and the "NOW."
762733
It's very comforting to say that "God loves us all so much that He will save us all"; or "He hates the sin, but loves the sinner"; or "God is love, and will not send anyone to hell."  \n     \n     I must admit, it is nice to think of God's love being so infinitely great that all will ultimately be saved.  Hell is a terrible place and I don't want anyone to go there.   But it does not matter what I think.  It matters what the Bible says.\n     God is love (1 John 4:8), but God also punishes the sinner and hates all who do iniquity.  God is not one sided.  He is not simply an infinitely loving God.  He is also infinitely just.  He must deal with sin.  He must punish the sinner.\n\n Well? Does God hate anyone?  The answer is yes.\n\n      Psalm 5:5, "The boastful shall not stand before Thine eyes; Thou dost hate all who do iniquity,\n\n      Psalm 11:5, "The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates."\n\n      Lev. 20:23, "Moreover, you shall not follow the customs of the nation which I shall drive out before you, for they did all these things, and therefore I have abhorred them."\n\n      Prov. 6:16-19, "There are six things which the Lord hates, yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: 17 Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, 18 A heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil,\nA false witness who utters lies, and one who spreads strife among brothers.\n\n\n      Hosea 9:15, "All their evil is at Gilgal; indeed, I came to hate them there!  Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of My house! I will love them no more; All their princes are rebels." \n\n     Are these verses hard to read?  \nDo they make you feel uncomfortable?  \nDoes this sound harsh?\nMaybe you don't think your sins are that big a deal. God does.\nGod hates sin.  But, He does not punish sin.  He punishes the sinner.  Sin cannot be tied up and thrown into a fire.  It cannot be put in a box or glued to a stick.  \nIt is rebellion.  It is rebellion in the heart.  It is breaking God's Law.\n\nSo what standard will God use to decide our guilt or innocence?\nThe 10 Commandments. The bible says that they are like a mirror to show us what we are...horrible sinners to the core.\nWhen we see the standard; "Don't lie, Don't steal, Honor your parents, Love God with all of your heart soul mind and strength".\n\nGo to this website to take the test and find out how you'll do on the day of judgment...\n\nwww.needgod.com\n\nbob
666211
Because it's not a true love .True love never torment.
71313
God does love unconditionally, but love cannot cancel out Justice, they must both be infinite, or God could not claim to be ultimatley Good, which he does claim.  There was sin, and it must be payed for, or God's Justice would consume it regardless of his love for what was consumed. \n\n If you loved your child, but the child did a horrendous crime, would you turn him into the authorities, or would you hide him? Surely it is unjust for a mother to hide her murdering son from the  law.  If the mother is Just, she will turn her son into the police, even though she still loves the kid, because she's a good mom. \n\n So the problem is humanity sinned against an infinite being, and that requires an infinite sacrifice to pay for that sin, otherwise, the sinner must face the punishment.  The animal sacrifices from a Christian point of view, never did remove sins, but was foreshadowing of the atonement that would come, the perfect infinite sacrifice that was required.  \n\nIf he didn't offer a perfect sacrifice to his justice, his infinitely just nature would demand that we be punished.  He cannot do anything else, it would be contrary to his nature (unjust).\n\nGod sometimes asks us to do things that don't seem to make sense to teach us things(regarding animal sacrifice).  All God asks is that we turn from our sin and trust in his perfect sacrifice.\n\nYou ask good questions.  It's so boring seeing "how can a good God allow evil?" over and over again.
294758
I have to agree with the previous poster that no, Christians do not love as they ought.\nThe fact that we fail however, does not negate the commandment, or mean that we don't make it our goal in life to love even our enemies with a perfect love.\n\nNow, this begs a question, what does loving your enemy look like in real life? Does loving your enemy mean that you put yourself in harms way by trusting them not to hurt you? I don't think so. Does it mean to have warm gooshy feelings for them? again, I don't think so.\nLoving your enemy means that you wish the best for them, as a Christian, the best we could possibly wish for someone is that they too would come into the relationship with God that we enjoy. If that is rejected, the next best thing is that they enjoy good things in this life because they will surely have nothing to enjoy in the afterlife. (Luke 16:19-31) Not only does loving your enemy mean that you wish the best for them, but it also means that you activly engage in things that will directly benefit them.\nIn the case of Bin Laden, I also have to weigh out the fact that I am commanded to love the other 6 Billion people on the planet, and since Bin Laden is actively engaged in harming many people (he has never done anything against me personally), I should support efforts to express love to my fellow-man by putting a stop to Bin Laden's activities.\nPersonally, I desire to see Bin Laden come to a saving and redeeming knowledge of Jesus Christ, but failing that, or until that happens, the most loving thing I can do is desire to his terrorist activities halted by whatever means possible.
796048
God is Love, he doesn't send any soul to "Hell", we are a part of him. He does not make mistakes and abandon his "original" plan and this earth WILL be paradise one day.
950273
Someone is punished for the wrong he did and that is punishment.If you are punished and you die in the cause of the punishment, you must have merited it.\n   On the other hand if God allow you to be passing through some difficulties we can call it trials.God may do that to see how much you love Him or He may do that to glorify His name at the end. The point here is that if you remain faithful to God until you die in that situation, that is not punishment.Look at the trials Job had in the Bible. His wife even asked him to curse God and die but he refused and said it is God that gave and He has taken back. Look at what happened to him at the end. You see how God showed his power? If you do not know the story read Job.\nI live in Cameroon, the neighbour to Nigeria.
392728
Without God, we are not capable of knowing what love is.  \n\nAre we supposed to read your name "Pastor Hatred"?\n\nYou still haven't told us what it is that you have against God.
220764
Dear: Love    GOD is LOVE.They are afraid of the TRUTH.Mans Heart is far away from GOD.Jesus said if you follow me you will also be persecuted,your reward will be in HEAVEN.Be of good cheer for GOD never sleeps,and sees our works.      GOD BLESS
292911
God is Love.\n1 John 4:16\n\n\nThe man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned\n1 Corinthians 2:14
725527
Hey "I LOVE JESUS", yeah, there are "choices", and the CONSEQUENCES of making the WRONG choice are being sent to Hell and suffering forever.\n\nThat IS a punishment.\n\nAnd if I were a deity I would NOT be so pompous as to think that my creations, with all their intelligence and complex reasoning skills and ability to look beyond their primative fears and live life without needing my help, would NEED to worship me.\n\nIn fact, I'd be proud of those who didn't feel the need to cling to my leg like a quivering 4 year old.  I'd be extra fond of the independent ones, the strong ones who could survive and flourish unassisted.
676101
Ummmmm.....you still don't quite "get it".  You almost make it sound like a demand for popularity and a demerit system.\n\nChristianity is based on love, not on punishment.  Those Christians who preach focused on hellfire and brimstone, mean well....but, their efforts only try to "scare" relion into people.\n\nThe truth is....our God is a loving one, who loves us..as we love our own children....even more.  He doesn't want to see us fail....just as we wouldn't want that for our own children. Get it?\n\nAnd, just as being a parent is sometimes, less tha pleasant....so is life.  Sometimes the negative things have to happen to provide learning and growing opportunity. \n\nChristianity is much more complex, and also much more simple ...than what you have come to conclude.
1035522
This is a tough one.  Your original question reminds me of Matthew 10:37-39.  I had trouble with that passage as a child.  I couldn't imagine loving anyone more than I loved my parents.  And frankly, I knew it wouldn't be okay with them, which was threatening.\n\nWhat I've learned is that what we sometimes call love isn't very loving.  Sometimes we condition it such that it is merely a means of control or selfishness.\n\nI believe God calls us to love Him most, because if we love on His terms, we love everyone else better.  When we learn to define love as patience, kindness, truthfulness, hopefulness; having endurance and belief; able to bear all things; lacking envy, pride, rudeness, self-gratification, evil thoughts; not easily angered, not gloating over the failures of another, and neverending - when we define love as serving others instead of demanding that they please us, we love them to their highest good.\n\nMy husband and I both come from dysfunctional homes.  Abusive homes.  What we learned about love in our families, we knew we didn't want to pass on to the children we hoped we'd have or to incorporate into our relationship.  We promised to help each other love God most - even more than we loved each other.\n\nAnd that's hard sometimes.  But loving God most, helps us keep our family patterns out of our relationship.  It helps us love each other in ways that would not naturally flow from what we learned in our upbringing.