for all those who follow God or Christ...?

I'm kinda tired right now, but since you seem really to be searching for an answer (I found Jesus in Yahoo, that would be something), anyways try this....tonight when you go to sleep ask God to remove Himself from you so that you can see for yourself whether He exists or not...............by the time morning comes around you might then realize that He is everywhere (more), He's with the baby, the bank robber, the mothers, priests, rapists, flowers, sewage pipes. etc.......you might be afraid to fall asleep for several days or weeks after you wake up.................

How about if when you were taking a pretty healthy poop, all of a sudden your toilet spoke up and said, "You know this is very degrading being a toilet....why was I even made in the first place?", or you had a very handsome crown on your head that had many precious stones in it and it suddenly said, "You know I appreciate being made a crown and all don't get me wrong but I would have perhaps liked to have been made a little more humble in appearance!"?

Sounds like your are in the right place to feel the way you do.Probably only God can give you the exact answer you need. But since you abandoned Him in your teens, maybe He does not hear your plea. Maybe your faith (that you left) was in something other than in God. If you can't find the answer you like-I would go back where I left off and start there. If you were raised So Baptist-then married a Catholic, you missed some serious teaching. Many Catholics are good God loving people, but their religion is not.

You are making the mistake of assuming God causes all the bad stuff in the world. He doesn't. It's us, humans, always has been and always will be. If you want to know where God is with all the suffering in the world, then go amongst those who suffer and find Him, that's where He'll be. He sends His people to help, even those who aren't Christians are being used by God to help those who suffer. If you are at angry at God then fine, many people in the Bible and since then have been angry at God, why not ask Him to reveal Himself to you, and make Himself real to you so that you can yell at him. Read the book of Job too, that man suffered so much and refused to curse God, hope you can see the light through all this anger.

Q: "Why is it that everyone seems to follow God or Jesus Christ for some reason?"

A: There are still many people not follow bible and Jesus in this world, why should you? there are Muslim, Buddha, Hindu,etc..

Just a little thought, if you are the owner/director of a company or organization, how would you treat your people? May be you will test your man before belong to this company..you will give them task after that..you apply reward and punishment system, to achieve the company objective..May be that is what god do to us...BTW, "who/what""is/are" God?

The Lord created all things beautiful, almost perfect, no diseases, a man without sins.Satan introduces sins in the world, even the disasters.God did not create sins nor disasters. try to observe those people who serve the Lord, God never neglect those who believe in him he may allow some trials but to prove that he is always with them all the way. God also created "free will" for the man to decide what to do and he will be judged for that.

Let me admit that I don't know the ultimate reason for sure, but I'm guessing it has something to do with God wanting mankind to become something more that they were in the Garden of Eden. That may sound strange, but God knew that Satan would tempt Adam and Eve and He knew that sin would come into the world and He knows what coming in the future, so it isn't like all of the things you mentioned are not somthing that He decided that it was worth it to allow beforehand.

One of the ideas that makes the most sense to me is that God allowed sin in this world, and the consequences of the earth no longer being like some wonderful parkland where no one got sick or died or was hungry, because He wanted to make people to be Holy, that is to have the conscious knowledge and choice to obey or disobey Him. He might have wanted those whom He would have to be his children for all eternity to be grateful for their rescue and also have it deeply ingrained into their being the consequences of rebellion so that they would never be tempted to do what Satan did.

So the question is, why did God allow anything bad to happen? The answer is, we don't know for sure but here's what the Apostle Paul wrote to people who had similar questions. It may sound cold, but at least it's real.

http://web.express56.com/~bromar/

"Therefore He has mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will, He hardens. You will then say to me, Why does He yet find fault? For who has resisted His will? No, but, O man, who are you who replies against God? Shall the thing formed say to Him who formed it, Why have you made me this way? Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel to honor and another to dishonor? What if God, willing to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction; and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy which He had before prepared to glory;" Romans 9:18-23

It seems that Christianity is indeed a popular faith.

I am a christian who chooses to worship in my own way. I occasionaly go to church or pray privately, but can honestly say I haven't read the bible and don't intend to. I certainly haven't read it and thought it was gospel!

Not every Christian is die-hard, has read the bible, takes it at face value and will tell you diasters are "matters of faith". I certainly wouldn't.

And another thing, every religon has die-hards and those that take the word of their book at face value!! So why bring up just Christianity and the bible?

When man disobeyed God in the garden it upset the delicate balance of nature. It affected everything. Who would think that eating a simple piece of fruit could do that. It just shows you that when you disobey God there are consequences that are just about unfathomable. Remember that God is holy.

Most people trivialize sin but it is a big deal to God.

God is a gentleman and He never wants to coerce our volition or free will. He wants us to come to Him of our own accord.

God does not own the earth. He gave it to the devil. When Satan to Jesus to the mountain top, he offered all the kingdoms of the world to Jesus if Jesus would bow down before him. The devil could not give something he did not have. Therefore, all of the maladies and evil on this earth are from Satan (Lucifer, Mephistopheles, etc.)

I am glad to see that all those years attending Southern Baptist sermons ( as did I) did not take your ability to think.

I honestly am convinced that the vast majority of people who go to church do not truly believe in their hearts what they are being told. Mark Twain gave a really good example in his book "Letter to Earth" ( I wonder why we never got to read THAT one in school) about peoples faith: He asked, why do people (men in particular) seem to believe that in paradise they will sing all day in praise of the Lord, when they don't even like doing it on Sundays? How could people imagine paradise being full of things they don't enjoy doing?

As far as your example goes, people will say all of those things we do to each other is because of Free Will, and all the bad things He does to people is to test us and strengthen our fear of and faith in Him.

I would like to know why He said in His commandments "Thou shalt not kill" but He does every day! Why did he purposely and maliciously kill those chasing Moses by letting the Red Sea close upon them? (Just one example)

I am sorry for answering, you only wanted "believers" to answer, but I needed to get that off my chest.