Does she really mean that?

"The first thing we need to know is God is chasing us down like a lover. Every lover is a pathological stalker. God is a stalker." --Janet Smith

Some of you may have seen that quote floating around on teh interwebz lately. I know I have. I can recall choking on my ice water and destroying my keyboard in the process when I first read that quote.
So, I've been thinking about it. What on earth does Dr. Smith actually mean? Surely she's not actually accusing God of being a stalker. All-seeing suddenly takes on a voyeuristic tone, doesn't it, when considering God as...a stalker?

Over at this page, a gentleman left a comment, saying:

"A lot of people have been getting upset about this quote from Janet Smith: "The first thing we need to know is God is chasing us down like a lover. Every lover is a pathological stalker. God is a stalker." But you know what? If I hadn't known it was Smith who said that, my first guess would have been G.K. Chesterton. He might have phrased it a little differently, but the basic idea -- that God is MADLY in love with each one of us -- is Chesterton all the way."

If Dr. Smith was genuinely trying to convey God's love...then, fine. It's true, after all, that God loves us enough to, uh, send His only Son, God-Made-Man, to die a brutal and gruesome death for us.
But the wording is inexcusable.

When I think of "a pathological stalker" (to use Smith's term), I don't think of Freddie walking up and down the street where Eliza lives. I think of the definition of stalking--"Unwanted, obsessive attention by individuals to others". Or, using the "lover" context, erotomania. You know, the disorder where a person believes fervently and obsessively that another person is deeply, deeply in love with them. Hence the stalking. The erotomanic believes that the stalking is perfectly normal, since, after all, the stalk-ee is deeply in love with them, and vice versa.

From the ever-reliable wikipedia:

In "A Study of Stalkers" Mullen et al.. (2000) identified five types of stalkers:

• Rejected stalkers pursue their victims in order to reverse, correct, or avenge a rejection (e.g. divorce, separation, termination).
• Resentful stalkers pursue a vendetta because of a sense of grievance against the victims – motivated mainly by the desire to frighten and distress the victim.
• Intimacy seekers seek to establish an intimate, loving relationship with their victim. To them, the victim is a long-sought-after soul mate, and they were 'meant' to be together.
• Incompetent suitors, despite poor social or courting skills, have a fixation, or in some cases a sense of entitlement to an intimate relationship with those who have attracted their amorous interest. Their victims are most often already in a dating relationship with someone else.
• Predatory stalkers spy on the victim in order to prepare and plan an attack – usually sexual – on the victim.

Now, let's think about this. Do you really want God to be ANY of these kinds of stalkers? Using Dr. Smith's "lover" analogy, let's say she's referring to "Intimacy Seeking Stalkers". Who almost always have erotomania. And even when they don't, let's refer to the definition of stalking--unwanted, obsessive attention.

God might be a jealous God, but He is not mentally deranged.

Does anyone know what Dr. Smith was really trying to say? Because..."pathological stalker" ain't it. I really hope it isn't, anyway.