In practice it comes closer to east because it encourages living a fulfilling life / heaven on earth. So life isn't only the preparing part, as in most Christian beliefs.
yes, which brings me to the idea of hell as something you do to yourself here in this life, cutting yourself off from the love and grace of God - not him cutting you off as a punishment because he's like the father of the prodigal son, always ready to forgive and reinstate. It's us turning our backs on him, and hell is a state of existence wherein you're cut off totally, empty, discontent, dissatisfied and stuff... I've seen people living that kind of hell and it ain't pretty.
I just never could quite square the whole Jesus story as being about sacrifice and atonement for inherent sins, as I mentioned above. I've never had any difficulty in accepting the idea that when we die, it's possible that absolutely nothing happens. I keep an open mind but in the end nobody can know for sure. For me, it seems obvious that Jesus (ie God in flesh form) was here to show us himself. Looking at him, the more you do, the more you cannot help but love, because God is love and love begets love. And the more you allow love to permeate you, the more you become one with him. Your actions are borne out of love and when this happens things tend to go more right... usually lol
I don't 'try' to love God to get to heaven. I just DO love God, and that *is* heaven. I don't need scriptural 'proof' or explanation, or high falutin' promises of eternal bliss or fear of eternal damnation. All the explanation I need is in the Gospels and living out Gospel principles is its own motivation and reward.
God is not a snooping neighbour or a forbidding schoolmaster. He's in you, he's all the best parts of you, the parts that want you to be fulfilled and at peace; that want your spirit to be at rest no matter what goes on around you. He wants you to listen to these parts of you, that is, to him, for your own good, because he knows it will bring you contentment and peace. He knows that if you don't, you'll suffer, not from any punishment meted out by him but by inevitable consequences of your actions here in the world without any need for supernatural intervention.
The alternative is to listen to the outside world and seek instead for OUTER peace, an easy life etc, at the cost of inner turmoil. I'd rather, anyday, be at peace inside despite the world raging around me, like the Buddhist sage who "smiles like an amused infant" despite whatever fortune brings.
IMO, Jesus wasn't here to save us from eternal hellfire or the wrath of God. He showed us quite explicitly that God forgives; it's not his wrath that we should be fearing but his love that we should perceive and accept. He was here to show us an example that, if followed, saves us
from ourselves. The exact parts of ourselves that the suffering he endured highlighted in our other selves, the people who persecuted him. The parts of ourselves that fear and try to gag truth out of our fear and self delusion. And through his suffering and rising he showed that the truth CANNOT be gagged or killed and will always resurface, especially within ourselves. No matter how much our egos try to bury it, there's a part of ourselves that's the breath of God within us that will keep on whispering within us. The longer we ignore it, the closer we come to hell on earth. The more we listen to it, the closer to heaven.
I might even go so far as to say that Jesus also symbolized the dual nature of our own lives, part flesh, part divinity; the Jesus that lives in us.
To say that God punished the Israelites - and all the other nations that he supposedly egged the Israelites onto massacring when he happened to be pleased with them, apparently - for disobeying a bunch of rules he laid on them for being just not good enough (despite being only what he created and allowed them to be) goes against, to me, the spirit of the God who stands at the door, knocking, never forcing himself on anyone but gently asking to be allowed in.
Death isn't something to be pointed out as a flaw in everything, something that, unless we can explain it away, renders life pointless. It's just a natural consequence of being alive. And we're given the wherewithal to make being alive a good thing. But this is the Taoist in me... haha...
"When the master died, his friend Yi came to the funeral. While everyone was weeping, Yi only stood and smiled. 'Why do you not weep?' asked a student, 'were you and the master not as brothers from one womb? do you not lament his death?' 'Of course not!' replied Yi, 'the occurrence that was the master's life was something good to me. His death was a natural consequence of that, as all that lives, dies. To be sorry he died would mean being sorry he lived. And so, I do not weep, but smile.'"
I don't really understand why all the 'good stuff' has to be seen as happening after death in order to give life meaning. And I can't help but speculate that it's more actually about people not really being willing to put in any effort unless they're promised a more specific reward. To say "your reward is that, through a path of self-denial and transformation, you will achieve oneness with God" is a bit vague for the average Joe, who's more interested in getting the harvest in...
I don't think you need to be a Christian or even necessarily to think of God in the same theist terms as Christians and religious people commonly do. Quakers for example, often refer to God as 'the Light within', which removes a lot of the negative connotations associated with theism which hinder many people from seeking or achieving the peace available within themselves.
Sorry, bunch of slightly disjointed stuff there that just came out by itself. It's late and I'm tired so... I know how it's connected but... well, good luck LOL