#2, looking at two gospels (1/2)

Jesus has said many things in the Bible, and they can be interpreted in various ways. Two such ways that I have come across are the Prosperity Gospel and the Suffering Gospel. I will discuss about the Prosperity Gospel more later but I want to focus on the Suffering Gospel, being that I am a fan of psychology and I feel the Suffering Gospel deals more with the psychological well-being of people.
Now, just what exactly is the Suffering Gospel? To paint it with a broad brush, "If you ain't sufferin', you ain't Christian (the 'a' is silent)!" Now basically what they teach is Jesus said you would suffer in life for following him. I have to say, if I were a deity of great power, I would reward those who follow me with things they need now instead of giving them treasures in heaven for when they die. But, Jesus does have a point with this whole suffering thing.
Life has its ups and downs. For someone to think it's all on the up side and never on the down side is in a state of constant denial and may eventually have a nervous break down and never be the same again. I have never met a person like this, thank the Lord of death, destruction, and tyranny (also known as Yahweh).
However Christians seem to have a problem when things are going well for them (that is, Christians in America and first world nations). Something happens to them where if they are not suffering, they have to create it in their mind they are being persecuted in some way or fashion. They need this, or else they are not suffering for God and they are going to hell because they are just not getting the persecution their God demands from them.
Take for example the issue of the ten commandments being taken "down" (more like put in the storage room) from the Alabama state judicial building. Apparently 77% of the American people disproved of the monument being taken down (which is odd, considering that is the ballpark of Christians in America). Even though we have this separation of church and state, they still wanted the ten commandments up. And even though really three of the ten commandments we and the rest of the world agree with (not including those secret assassination missions, taking tax payers money, and denying both claims), people still opposed the idea of taking down the ten commandments in a public place without realizing that then you would have to put in other laws for other religions in the place (which I don't think any Christian would appreciate their holy ten commandments next to the tenants of Scientology or Satanism). However, they protested, prayed, and asked God for this horrible thing to not occur.
Now, why would they do this? I don't think they were ordered to do that in the Bible (unless there are passages that say you must oppose government that does not feed God's narcissism when there are hundreds of churches in a 100 mile radius of this nation). It's due to Christians being "persecuted." They are so desperate for suffering, they will take something as ignorant as opposing the bill of rights that protect THEM from persecution of OTHER religions or the government, because their religion is "under attack." Instead of taking the time to understand their national rights, they would go against their rights they praise when it suits them and attack it with the mask of persecution. Why would they do this? Because they need to show God he is the number one man in their lives, and they are really wanting to get into heaven.
They have pastors telling them they "must suffer." Pastors are feeding them fear and panic by telling them "I'm not trying to scare you. I'm just trying to tell you the truth that most Christians in this sanctuary are going to be in hell and be tormented for eternity UNLESS they become the Christian I tell them to become!" Do these pastors not realize the stress they are giving these people? Anyone who takes an intro to psychology class should have learned that we all deal with stress in our lives, whether it be positive or negative, and if not dealt with, it could lead to even physical problems. Causing someone to be in a state of panic...I would say that's negative stress.
Let us not forget how you also suffer so when you get to heaven, you will be greatly rewarded (just not 70 virgins. There is no sex in heaven. Join Islam if you have to join a religion). Not only do you have people in a state of panic and fear of going to hell, but you also have people doing good things so their lives of suffering will be rewarded in heaven. So they will find ways to bend over backwards to show God they are good enough to get into heaven because they "suffered" for him. Is that not capitalism there for ya? You can be up there with God, just be his mindless, panic prone, fearing, bitter slave.
Why would anyone want to live their life for a god who all he does is make you do all his work just so that when you die, you can have riches? Why not give you riches now, to help support yourself and your family as a way to show gratitude for all the hard work you do? Why work for a man who all he wants to do is drive you til you have nothing left, not even your will to power? We have names for people like that here on earth, but God gets off the hook because he's God. What a joke.