Dr. Lao
I’m ashamed for giving you such little credit. I should have known you would not bump your head against a conclusion. 
Doctor J
Why is it so unsettling that God will give us what we want?
On second thought, mevermind. I suppose the answer is obvious.
I would start by referring Spider Woman and Doctor J to the succinct summary made by Zabes of what Tris. had to say:
To this I would simply add that traditional Christianity suggests that at some time and place God has it in plan to enable those souls to take on new, “glorified” bodies – becoming not disembodied spirits but having the functionality of the human body though not subject to its limitations.
And to follow with a long quote from Spider Woman:
There are a number of points to address here. First, the nature of creatures in general is to die, to terminate their lives. This appears to be a given in any metaphysic since it is an observed fact. What precisely any beneficient God does with a deceased hare or tortoise is anybody’s guess – there may be no “spirit,” just a body which has ceased to function biologically. On the other hand, he may have some destiny beyond mortal life for them.
Humans are living creatures of this ilk. While it may seem totally unjust to imagine a god so blind that he does not recognize the value of keeping me around eternally, I am biologically little different than the chimpanzee. If my spirit is worth preserving and he decides to do so, or if he has in fact made me with “something added” beyond the beasts of the field (or has endowed them with that something else as well, for all I know!), that is his concern and not mine. “Remember, o man, that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return.” Or, in the Kansan, “All we are is dust in the wind.”
It would appear that he has promised some afterlife to all men. However, as I went into inordinate detail with slythe about on page one of this thread, human beings are quite capable of moving into a mode where their “spirits” (in the everyday sense, not the religious one) self-destruct from obsession with a particular unattainable goal. The distinction between the burnt-out ash of what had been a human spirit and total oblivion is pretty minor, and constitutes Hell – eternal privation, regret, and lack of fulfillment.
I have mentioned here in earlier threads having become a foster parent of sorts to three boys. What I have not said is that there were actually five. One was older than the others, a young adult who was close friend of the teens, and he lived with us too. He was from a broken home and was neglected emotionally if not physically by his mother. He contracted and died of meningitis while staying with us. And we speak of him only among ourselves. But one thing that has touched me deeply is what he said to his closest friend among the others, that he had finally found a home.
I bring this up because I wanted to address the fifth one. While the other three responded to our nurture, got their lives straightened out (more or less), and have gone on to make passable adult lives for themselves, he simply took advantage of what we had to offer, stole from us, and then took off. And we let him go, neither prosecuting him nor trying to tie him down. We had to respect his freedom to choose what he did. I would have gladly given him much more than what he took, but he found it better to use and leave than to stay and be cared about.
And that is the answer I’d give you, Spider Woman. It grieves God, as it grieved me, when someone adopts a use-and-leave policy and will not hear of his love. (And I’m inclined to think it pisses him off to have someone so misstate his policies that people become embittered against him and find him a petty tyrant, but that’s a whole nother thread.) But if their freedom to choose means anything, it means they can choose against him as well as for him. And, inevitably, so we are told, they end up with the disintegrated personality described above. (I might add that I do not see this as necessarily being limited to one earthly life; I’m sure happy and fulfilled agnostics and atheists die every day. And God deals with them according to his mercy. I’m relatively certain that if there were some effectively absolute proof available that the loving God I believe in is real and loves Eve and Gaudere, they would have no problem changing their worldviews to accommodate the idea. My own personal view is that somewhere down the road such people find that proof, and he does not wave a sheep-this-way-goats-that-way flag until they do, or until they have chosen against him once and for all in full knowledge of who and what he is.
Does this construction make sense, given the assumption of a loving god and what we know about human nature?
So Hell is the conseqences of self-destructive behavior? Would this Hell include Christians who were unwilling to veer from a self-destructive path? (As things go, though, I’m rather more inclined to consign other-people-destructive people to hell! 
Self-destructive people often suffer enough in this life–that’s why it’s called “self-destructive”.) “Eternal privation, regret, and lack of fulfillment”…do you believe that after death people can remove themselves from hell or heaven by their free choices? It seems unjust for someone to suffer eternal consequences without hope of change, regardless of how far down they have gone down an evil path in the paltry years they lived.
Poly–it was exactly that explanation that I was referring to. (That’s why I quoted it before my question.)
Let me re-phrase–many Christians (including, if I may assume, FriendOfGod) would tell me that if I do not accept Christ, I will spend the rest of eternity in a very real and very hot place of fire and brimstone. Not just a “separation from God”, not just a failure to exist, but an eternity of literal, tangible, unimaginable torture. (I know that not all Christians share this literal view.)
However, John 3:16 implies that those who do not believe in Jesus will not have everlasting life at all, which would make it hard to spend an eternity in Hell.
That view seems contradictory to me. The one expressed by Tris, summed up by Zabes, and reiterated by you seems much more in line with this verse.
Dr. J
Spider Woman
I am sorry your parents went through such an excruciating experience. I am sure they would have sacrificed their lives for your sister, if that would have saved her. I haven’t experienced such a loss myself, and therefore I can only try to imagine the extent to which such an event affects someone’s life.
I wouldn’t normally try to make any analogy between the loss of a loved one and anything else in this world, to anyone who experienced such a loss. But you mentioned it in order clarify your question about God, and I will try to address your question the best I can, while staying in the same frame of reference.
I believe that God did exactly what you described, precisely for that reason: His un-conditional love for us. Christians believe that this was what actually happened two thousand years ago, when Jesus Christ died on the cross. His death saved us from ours. His ressurection gave us our lives back. Christians also believe that this is a free gift that He made available to anyone who asks. The only thing that is required on our part, is to truly want Him in our hearts.
You said that any loving parent would do this for his children, if it were possible. It is possible for God, and that’s what He did.
Thank you for your reply.
What you say about “being biologically little different than the chimpanzee” ia true to a point. I believe that humans are the only animals that are self-reflective, and have an understanding of the meaning of death and its finality. (IMHO, that is why most religions developed, to quiet and soothe the fears of beings aware of their own mortality).
As far as most of us know, a tortoise does not know it will die (I’m told my box turtle will possibly outlive me; maybe she won’t die) and does not suffer agonies about what happens after death to it or its progeny.
My own take on this whole matter is something like this:
If there is truly a god, that god is unknowable to all faiths, sects, religions and people, until such time that god chooses to manifest itself. I believe such a deity would be good beyond our imagination, beyond the “you were naughty so I will punish you” mentality or beyond the “you must make the right choice or I won’t let you continue” concept. I would think at the point of death, all suffering would be erased, all wrongs forgiven, and that very good, loving deity would welcome all of us forever, no matter WHAT we did while living.
As to your foster children, and that fifth one, I believe (even not knowing this person) that something in his previous life, probably when he was very small and helpless, caused him to make the choices he made. We can only hope that someday he gets the help he needs to make better choices.
Sorry if I missed some of the points in your reply; I hope this covers it all.
Thank you for your reply.
I have heard the concept of God giving his only begotten son to die for our sins, so that we could have life everlasting (with some important conditions which supposedly must be met, different ones according to which sect or religion you ask).
I think that the important difference there is, this Christian god never truly lost his son; he is seated at the right hand of the father and is part of the holy trinity.
When human parents lose a child, as far as they know, they will never see that child again (except for those who believe they will see that child in heaven by carefully jumping through the hoops specified by their particular religion).
This still doesn’t explain how some Christians believe an all-loving god could allow the souls of his mortal children to perish. I repeat, whether you are talking about a hell of fire and brimstone, or a hell of eternal death or separateness, it doesn’t fit with the image of a god of unconditional love. In the end, is this god capable of forgiveness?
I liked Poly’s answer in the last part of his post addressed to me about his friends Eve and Gaudere. That sort of answer leaves the possibility of epiphany up to each individual and whatever deity may exist, rather than trying to convert people by logic or witnessing.
micilin
I was a bit confused, but rest assured, no offense taken. I objected only because I do not subscribe to the question giving the title of this thread. Whatever the answer is, it is different from person to person, and I don’t think I should try telling others what to think or believe.
My post was an emotional reaction to Libertarian’s account of his experience. It struck me as completely identical to my own, and I couldn’t resist the urge to shout it out loud, in the purest witnessing style that so many people on this board surely appreciate… (To Libertarian: I shouldn’t have assimilated your experience with mine; I can’t possibly know what really happened with you at that time. I can only guess it was similar to my experience, but, at any rate, I should have kept that thought to myself.)
“The explicative and predictive power of the Bible in regards to my inner self” that I was talking about is related to one of Kimstu’s observations in an older thread: “… according to most people’s experience, you can’t summon up an empirical experience of God any time you want[…]” What I meant by the last sentence of the post that triggered your reply was that Christianity gives me a “theory of myself,” and it is one that never fails in its predictions.
Related to your post, this isn’t “what it took” for me. What it took was one split second during which I experienced the unmistakable certainty that I was loved. Any questions, doubts, or objections, were completely silenced during that short second by this incredible feeling. Surely enough, they all came back with a vengeance immediately after, but for the first time in my life I had my own, intimate representation of what God might really mean. That was the trigger, the seed, the one event that changed my whole perspective. Whatever I felt then, it passed all my internal criteria of certainty, and that’s the only thing that mattered to me.
This has been my experience. I don’t believe, as FriendofGod seems to believe, that it’s possible to drag people through a step-by-step tutorial on how to discover God. And I don’t know why I was offered such a clear turning point, while others, certainly more deserving, never do. All I try to do is give a true account of my own journey, hoping that others will resonate to whatever bits and pieces they might find relevant, if any.
Spider Woman:
I want to assure you that I didn’t mean to imply that you were not familiar to the Christian core statement. I was simply trying to map the elements of your example onto that statement.
God did lose His children: us. And He will never see some of them again. The analogy breaks here, because neither the human parents, nor the child, have a choice. We do. What I meant to highlight in my analogy was the desire of the loving parent to give his life in order to save his child.
Many Christians believe different things, and some do believe what you stated. I don’t, though. I believe he just allows his mortal children to walk away from his offer.
It would be hard for anybody not to appreciate Polycarp’s answers. I wish I had one hundred’th of his brilliance and eloquence. I surely didn’t mean to interfere with his answer to you. I love this board, and in my attempt to become a part of it, I may have offended you. I apologize if my post was inopportune.
I wasn’t at all offended, and I like your answers and everyone who has responded to me here. I think it is wonderful that people of so many differing belief systems can carry on a civil conversation here. And thanks again for your reply.
Good evening everyone! I’m going to dive right in and start responding to posts, in hopes that I will, actually, really, certainly, finally catch up tonight! Here we go…
Starting near the bottom of page 5, previous post
My response to Zabes
Thank you for responding and answering honestly. Would you mind if I asked a personal question? What is it that gives you such bedrock certainty that you “never will” believe in God? And what do you mean when you say you “tried to” believe?
No, you gave a pretty accurate summation. I think I’m understanding where you’re coming from, but not fully as noted by my questions.
Thank you for the well wishes. I am sorry you feel so certain that Christ won’t “work for you”, apparently ever. Again, I’d like to hear more.
My response to GLWasteful
Well sure. That’s true for any publication. I don’t think this means that you can’t accurately report facts. For example, a magazine devoted to environmentalism is very focused on stories that make their point. They will focus on stories that seem to make that point. It doesn’t mean they can’t report accurately.
I don’t know for sure about Europe one way or the other, to be honest. Primarily Far East and African countries are the ones I’ve heard of the most (again, primarily from first hand accounts).
My response to Spider Woman
I finally got to you! You said, in response to the notion that hell is the punishment for nonbelievers:
I hope you got a chance to read the first part of my response to Dr. Lao last night. It partly answered your question.
I want to zero in on this sentence: “his father would deny that same mercy to his earthly children”. One of the most popular misconceptions out there is that we are “all God’s children”. We are not. Those that come to Christ are adopted into God’s family and become His children. So, God does have mercy on His earthly children.
As for logic and mercy … here’s the thing. As far as hell goes, as I said to Dr. Lao, I believe it very well might be simply eternal separation from God. It is very logical. If you go your entire life, rejecting opportunity after opportunity to come to Christ and be in God’s presence, it makes sense that at the end God would say, “Well, okay … if that’s the way you want it, here you go!”
You might say, “Why would anyone choose that on purpose?” You’ve got me. It is definately and literally a form of insanity to reject the love and blessings of God’s presence when the alternative is so miserable in the long run.
Here’s another thing. Earth is a sneak preview to eternity. I truly believe Heaven begins on earth for believers and hell begins on earth for nonbelievers. I am not speaking of circumstances. Many times the exact same circumstances will hit a believer and unbeliever (ie the famous scripture that the rain falls on the just and the unjust, etc etc).
No, I am speaking of heart. I am speaking of the spirit and soul inside each person. In the short term, living for God can be difficult because so many changes happen in your life it can be disconcerting. But as your life goes on, as long as you continue walking with Christ, your heart gets just a little bit free-er (sp?) and a little more fulfilled in Him. At the end of life, stepping off into heaven just seems natural.
On the flip side, a nonbeliever may start off with a bang. They can do whatever they want to do! It seems like a lot of fun. But as life goes on, the emptiness inside eventually begins to grow and stand out more. At the end of life, unless they’ve made a choice to turn to Christ, the choice they’ve made to not live in God’s presence naturally leads to an eternal existence outside of God’s presence.
My point is: we kind of can see where we’re heading while we’re here on earth. If God uses nothing else, He wants to use that emptiness that grows and grows as a way to get your attention and make you realize there’s a void in your life. God is going to honor our choice, one way or another. And if you think about it, choosing to reject the greatest offer of love imaginable from the very creator of the universe is indeed worthy of an eternal punishment. Especially since it’s what’s being chosen by the person!
To be continued on next post …
More for Spider Woman
I just realized I had more to say about your post. Didn’t mean to split it in two like this ;).
First of all, in response to what I just wrote, it occurred to me that you and others might say, “Well I don’t feel any void right now”. That’s entirely possible, but come back in 20 years and tell me if you don’t feel one. It’s something that builds over time. It’s different for different people. Some don’t fully realize it’s there until the very end of their life, when they realize all the successes they’ve piled up, all the money they’ve made, all the people they’ve helped … it was all for nothing.
Responses from Page 6 of Original Post
My response to Ben
I said you should examine the logic of religions and see how they reconcile God’s goodness and justice. You said:
First, I don’t think we should call me the expert on anything first of all ;).
Second, if you took anything I said to mean that I believe Christianity makes little sense, let me put that to rest. I believe Christianity is the only logical religion. I know that offends people but I truly believe it.
Ben, I would encourage you to search for a post called “Christianity and Love” (actually 3 posts with about 6 pages apiece) in which I gave my best attempt at explaining the logic of Christianity. Gaudere and I went back and forth on it for quite a while, and she stumped me on a few points for sure, but I basically explained why Christianity makes sense.
Here’s the quick’n’easy summary version:
There’s more but that’s the essence of it.
As for our back’n’forth debate on creation and why God would create “imperfect people”, I hope you got to read my response to Dr. Lao last night which went into this pretty in-depth. Let me try to give brief responses to some of the specific things you mentioned:
Oh sure anyone can change … but God is the only one I know of that can instantly transform a person’s heart.
I could have stated my point better. Again, see my answer to Dr. Lao, but in essence I should have said: “God created perfect people with free will. With that free will, they chose to become imperfect people.”
I don’t totally get your point here, but God has created a situation in which we can succeed in being sinless. It’s called heaven.
I said “when you come to Christ, one of the things He does is change your desire back toward wanting to do good again!” and you responded:
As opposite as night and day. Secular humanism teaches that by sheer personal will, you can choose to be a good person and/or to better yourself. Christianity teaches the exact opposite – that you have no hope of either unless you submit to Christ and let Him change your desires.
I said that God would be manipulative if He only created people who would choose Him. You responded:
No, God didn’t create just such a situation. Everyone has not rejected Christ. I have not, and millions around the world have not.
If you were the only person God created, you would have free will to choose to accept or reject God like anyone else. Free will. That means your choice could go either way. That’s the definition of creating someone with free will.
Do you realize what is somewhat comical about this discussion? If you go your entire life without submitting your life to Christ, Ben, you are talking about yourself in this conversation! Are you saying you would rather God have looked at you and said, “Hmmm Ben isn’t going to choose me so I’ll make sure he doesn’t exist?” Would you not have rather let God leave it up to you to decide?
Not sure exactly what you’re getting here. I think you’re just rehashing your main argument which I’ve already answered, but feel free to clarify.
Actually, just to really blow your mind, there’s an interesting debate among born-again Christians about the true nature of God. Some have said that it is entirely possible that God doesn’t know all possible outcomes of things. I have personally not studied this subject indepth but it’s interesting.
But that’s an aside. Lets assume God is omniscient. I think you are getting the sequence of events wrong. Here it is:
I think you see it opposite:
But the first sequence is what actually happens. Hope that helps a little, or at least gives you something to chew on!
Unbelievable! I’ve reached the end of the original post.
I may try a few more responses in a little bit. I’m almost there …
…more later…
I would look at this in a different way; that even if I gain no heavenly honors for helping people, it is never for nothing. Wasn’t Jesus purported to have said something like “what you do unto the least of these, so you do unto me” or something like that? I believe kindness and good works are their own reward.
Does what you are saying here mean that good works and kindnesses are worthless because they do not garner you the reward of getting into heaven? Probably not what you mean, although it sounds a little strange to me the way you put it. I think that people have been manipulated throughout history by whatever religion they happened to believe in, by being told what formula they had to follow to enter the kingdom of heaven.
I think that in the Middle Ages, indulgences were sold to relieve people of the sins the church told them they were guilty of committing. Until Martin Luther, I don’t think the concept had been espoused that faith alone (and not good works) was the entrance requirement for heaven.
I myself can’t shake the idea that if there is an all-powerful deity, that deity is not just for Christians who believe in that Christian god, but for all people (maybe animals too, we would have no way of knowing), and that god would never exclude anyone from that everlasting love, or goodness, or whatever there might be. And if I am wrong, and there is a god, and that god demands worship and faith and values those things above kindness and good works, maybe I am better off not being one of the select.
Okay, I’m almost there. Let’s see if I can basically get caught up tonight …
Page 1 of This Post
My response to Falcon
You may have misunderstood me. You said your belief system doesn’t include hell. You said there are no consequences if you are wrong. My point is … what if your belief system is wrong and their is a hell? In that case, there are consequences to deal with!
As for “Pascal’s Wager”, I’ve heard that mentioned many times on her but never had it fully explained. Anyone want to take a shot?
As for the notion that God would not let you into heaven becuase you’re a pro-choice, radical, whatever (i’m sorry but I forgot all the things in your original list), I said that God isn’t like that as far as attacking you for those things. You said:
Please tell me if I’m misreading this, but I think you’re saying some so-called Christians attacked you for these things in your life. IF that’s the case I’d say: first, not everyone who claims Christianity is a Christian. Second, most believers I know would hug you and pray with you and encourage you and love you like nothing you’ve ever experienced. They would not condemn or verbally abuse you.
Good lord! How horrible. Are you saying you deliberately sliced your arms open (ie attempted suicide) or was it a horrible accident? Either way, what do you mean that God was “not open to me”? What I can tell you for certain is that God was in major emotional agony over what you were going through when you were going through it. He wanted to comfort and encourage you. I know friends whom God has helped through tragedies countless times.
My response to matt
How can someone “be healed by believing they are being prayed for”?
I disagree with your first sentence believe it or not. God is not responsible for all aspects of the universe. What He created was perfect. We are the ones who are responsible for screwing up a good thing.
I don’t necessarily know that birth defects are one of the consequences of sin as a whole. It may simply be the reality that ‘bad things happen sometimes’. But even if it is, God didn’t “make it so”.
Look at it this way. God did not create sin. He created people with a choice. They made a bad choice and there were bad consequences. God is not at fault.
Just as an overall point, one of the main problems with mankind as a whole is we blame God for stuff that is our own fault! It’s classic blame shifting. We don’t want to face our own guilt so we point to the nearest target.
Yeah we do … but I think this gets into the whole issue of God transcending time. Time is a limitation we are under now, but I think eternity is not bound by years, days, and weeks. God can look to the left and see the beginning of time and look to the right and see the end of time.
I may surprise you, but I disagree totally. Christianity is not about man being the center of the universe at all! It is about God being the center of the universe and us submitting to Him.
I also don’t believe at all that God created the universe just so he could be worshipped. In Genesis it appears He created it as a big, beautiful playground and had no one to share it with, so He made us!
My image of God creating the earth is kind of fun. I think it was the childlike aspect of God’s personality coming out. I picture Him whipping some mountains and oceans into shape, dashing in a little color, throwing in beautiful landscapes, having a blast the whole time! That’s why He kept saying, “THIS IS SO GOOD!!” (or something like that ;)). Then when it was all done, He made us just to say, “Check it out!! It’s all yours! Have fun! Just don’t eat from that one tree…”. Ooooohhhh if only we’d listened …
No problem, I appreciate that! I respect yours too, and I hope I’m at least giving you something to consider.
My response to dixiechiq
Thank you for responding! You said:
Do you mind if I ask you for more details? Why do you think it is “obviously” a fairy tale? Are you saying you don’t even believe in the historical parts of the Bible? And why are you so certain you could never be convinced of God’s existence?
Slythe I’m going to sign off for now but I’ve reached your post. Again, if you’ll look back at my responses to Dr. Lao and Spider Woman it might partly answer your question, but I’ll deal with anything specific you said next time.
Well I’m 1/3 of the way through page 1 of this post. Have a good night, all!
FoG, you have a major blind spot. You argue as if the choices are believing or not believing. You keep saying,“What if you’re wrong and there is a God?”
I ask you, what if you are wrong in not believing in Odin, Zeus, Jupiter, The Invisible Pink Unicorn, or any of thousands of possibilities available? Changing one’s belief system just to hedge the bet is the worst reason of all.
Would you be willing to offer a prayer to Aphrodite? If She doesn’t exist, you’ve lost nothing, and if she does, well…
On the questions I keep having to ask over and over-Could you just come out and say whether or not you believe that sinners go to an eternal hell without promise of redemption when they die? Could you tell us what kind of sin could justify such a punishment? And could you tell us what the purpose of an eternal punishment could be?
From FoG:
I believe somebody already posted the offical version from Pascal himself. Its a bit difficult to follow, so I’ll try a paraphrase of Pascal’s Wager from an excellent book, An Incomplete Education by Judy Jones and William Wilson.
“Pascal’s Wager: The pragmatic approach to God, and Pascal’s attempt to save the skeptical soul through common-sense reasoning. Basically, his agruement goes: OK, so you’ll never know for sure whether or not God exists, it’s all a cosmic game of heads or tails. But you have everything to gain and nothing to lose by betting on His existence. Remember, you’re only staking one finite, so-so little life–no, not even that, only the way you live that life–against a chance to win an infinity of an infinitly happy life. If you win (if God exists), you’ve won everything; if you lose (if God doesn’t exist), you haven’t really lost a thing. And don’t say you’d rather not play, because you have no choice; you’re already in the game.” The only arguement for believing in God that doesn’t assume he exists to begin with, that I know of. The main problem with this is obvious; which God do we believe in? It doesn’t say which one is correct, it doesn’t even consider the possiblity of more than one way to live a Godly life. This is crutial because there are things that you can do in one religion that will majorly piss off the God of a different religion. It is even open to the question of whether the true way to live one’s life according to God is even being supported by an existing religion. Maybe He wants us to hop on one foot while singing John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt. All the signs were there, but we ignored them. So in the end, Pascal’s Wager is a fun mind game, but not too useful.
He grieves, of course. His grief is greater than you could imagine that God’s grief might be for the loss of uncounted souls among His children.
It sounds worse than that to me. But that is not what I said. I said that man might follow the Lord into eternal life, not that man must pass a test, or guess the divine riddle, or otherwise avoid being culled as defective. I said that they might follow Him into eternity. But eternal life comes only from Him, and men seek other things.
Death is not eternal, it is but the end of life. Eternity simply is. God is not incapable of forgiveness, but many among men cannot accept it, or will not. But more than the forgiveness of sins, which seems so great to us, is the power of love, which takes us beyond the limits of the world. This is what God offers us. Forgiveness is incidental, however much it seems great from the mortal perspective. But the Love of God is what gives us immortality. The fact that love must be free is what makes our life possible. Life here on the earth, and life beyond it. While God can love you, whatever you might do, or think, or be, you cannot love God unless you choose to do so. It isn’t a trick. It isn’t a test. He is the WAY.
The denial of God’s love is not the God’s cruelty to man, it is man’s cruelty to himself.
I must make clear here that I place no specific value in the organizations that speak of God as “theirs” and of salvation as a special prize for the followers of some specific doctrine. I am a Christian for one reason only. I love Christ, and I have found that He loves me. By that I mean I know Him, and have faith in Him, and have felt the overwhelming force of His Love. But that means nothing to you, nor should it.
I believe that He shall save every soul that will be saved. I don’t think any soul will not be reached, though many will perish from the world because they will not let that love be theirs. But compelled love is not love. Love must be given freely, even to God. And it must be accepted, as well, even from God. If you cannot accept it, then I weep with the Lord, at the loss of your soul to us. But I am bidden to love you no less because of that loss.
I never was very good at logic. But you see, while the world is logical, Love is not logical. Nor is faith, nor hope, nor salvation.
Love is.
Tris
Tris
Logic proves only that your conclusions are properly derived from your assumptions, definitions, and undefined terms. Nothing more.
Slythe
You seem unable to refrain from assigning to me that god you seem to know so well. I’ll try to get across the point a different way, perhaps, by appealing to your empathy. Here’s what you’re doing:
Slythe, your evolution philosophy, survival of the fittest, was invoked by Hitler and others as a means to engineer society by the summary elimination of those who are perceived as weak. You seem to advocate killing off people like Stephen Hawking for no reason other than his handicap.
You conclude that God is not real because you’ve untied reality from that which can be conceived. You’ve neglected the physical aspects of thought. Emotions cause measurable physiological changes. Thought isn’t a concept; it’s a synaptic discharge.
Emotion is “the affective aspect of consciousness”[sup]1[/sup]. God is not that kind of love. And so your quasi-syllogism breaks down.
Your argument does imply, however, that what is perceived by the brain is not real, and there I would agree with you. But perception of God by the brain is worthless. Faith is comprehension of God by the heart.
[sup]1[/sup]Merriam-Webster
Don’t blame me, Lib, if you didn’t specify :