rules and regulations

i'm not so good at following rules. seventh day adventists have a lot of rules, even though many are implicit and understood, rather than codified and written out. because of the emphasis on rules, it follows that many adherents end up with a picture of the divine as one who keeps a tally of dids and did-nots, and only the ones with a certain percentage of dids gets into "the kingdom."

this is not an accurate picture. in fact, i say it's a false picture.

looking through the old and new testament, there is a picture of a strange divine, one who wants nothing more than being loved by it's creations. "wants nothing more," as if that was a small thing. it's a huge thing. it's something that i wish i understood, but i don't. it is a foreign concept. in english, love is a word applied alike to salad, family, and objects like the '04 corvette. am i supposed to apply the same substance as used here --> "i love my frog tree yarn," in this situation also --> "i love the divine?" huh?

but i digress. what i wanted to say was that given that the divine isn't a tally-keeper, and given that some rules have no contextual importance except to make lines in the sand between folk (i keep more rules than you = i am better than you), why then should i be concerned with keeping them for the mere sake of keeping them? i don't think i should. there should be a deeper reason for the keeping or rejecting.