Then love is cruel, and I want no part of it.
Come on back. And here are some, I hope, nice parting words.
Even if you were witnessing, that is specifically allowed. What a lot of people don’t like is a drive-by witness, one who posts some stuff and then vanishes. You are hardly that. I’d say you are in the top 1% in terms of trying to understand what people wrote, and trying to respond. It is pretty clear you have never run across a place where Bible quotes are so little respected, but at your age learning stuff is to be expected.
If you are going to college, this year or next, remember that college is a great place to open your mind and absorb a lot of diverse opinions, and to learn stuff. I think you made a good start, and thanks for visiting.
And, sorry dude. That was an idiotic idea. The original thread was going nicely, and all that crap you threw in looks like (and in the context you threw them into, actually is) a collection of utter threadshits. Reported!
Timo,
I’ve gotten a bit behind in this thread, as I’ve done several times, so take this as you will.
I’m actually amazed at how you are dealing with us. Most fundies who come here to witness fall into one of two categories:
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They fall for the ‘Jack Chick’ view of the world. Mention Jesus, and everyone will say ‘I’ve never heard of this ‘Jesus’ guy. Tell me more!’ Except that everyone has heard of him. And can argue against anything the ‘Chick’ brings up. We’ve seen it. Some of us have lived it. You ain’t telling us anything we haven’t seen countless times before. They get challenged, get pissed, and they go away.
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They fall for the ‘Jack Chick’ view of the world. Mention Jesus, and everyone will say ‘I’ve never heard of this ‘Jesus’ guy. Tell me more!’ Except that everyone has heard of him. And can argue against anything the ‘Chick’ brings up. We’ve seen it. Some of us have lived it. You ain’t telling us anything we haven’t seen countless times before. They get challenged, get pissed, get hostile, and get banned.
You don’t fit in either of those categories. And you’re 17 years old, but don’t post in ‘txt spk, sux 2bu’. And you’re willing to actually read what we write.
I hope you stick around. You’re a refreshing change.
I would think you would first have to prove that it was truly God’s word and not the teachings of other humans. It truly is a human thought, idea or belief, No God proven. But it can be proven it was from the pen or mind of another human. There are many human’s with totally different ideas of what God Is, and does.
The thing is; faith is not fact! Once faith is proven or can be proven than it is no longer faith. One can believe there are men on the moon or mars, but that doesn’t make it so.
I would suggest that you read Matthew or Mark again and think about the things quoted as being of Jesus. According to Jesus the world was going to end in that generation, it didn’t happen so some churches teach the word generation had a different meaning, but Matthew uses the same word for generation as we do when he was said to have written there was 14 generations between David and Jesus. It may be a good idea to test the spirits if one can find where they are!
Since God made all humans with a flaw and knows all things there should be no need to judge.
If Jesus is quoted correctly in Matthew, then the Book of Revelations is Moot.
If you read John 10 or Psalm 82 you would see the psalmist said all are gods, and Jesus would seem to back this up. He is said to mention that, their father’s who also called God their father,and said he blasphemed also were called God’s and sons of God.
I remain Jewish, yes.
Nope.
Still, y’know, a Jew.
Sort of. I don’t affiliate myself with those call themselves Christians for the same reason I don’t affiliate myself with cab drivers or dog owners; I don’t happen to be one of them. You could almost say the whole point of Judaism is that the Is There A God question is completely separate from the Was Jesus Incorrect About Rather A Lot Of Things And No More Divine Than You Or Me question.
According to Australia’s version of Sarah Palin, you do so follow Jesus Christ! 
Hi, Timo. I hope you’re still reading this and we haven’t scared you off! Let me echo the others who’ve said that you’ve acquitted yourself quite well in this thread, and I think that’s something to be proud of! You’ve had people coming at you from all directions and challenging everything you’ve said and your most deeply held beliefs, and you’ve absorbed it all and responded graciously without losing your composure. Not many people would have stuck with this thread as long as you have, and most of those who would have stuck with it would have lost their temper many pages ago!
I actually did mean my story as a slight warning to you, but not about the danger of belief. I only wanted to show you that bland assurances that there couldn’t be any harm to believing something aren’t always true. But my experiences are just mine, and truth be told, the time I spent on my faith wouldn’t have been wasted if I’d stayed with it. My faith would still have been misplaced and my beliefs wrong, but I could nevertheless have used them to do good in the world.
Plenty of people draw strength and inspiration from religion, and I think anything that helps people to be happy and to make the world a better place is good. I hesitated before posting my story, because my goal was not to talk you out of your beliefs. I don’t want to discourage faith, but to encourage thinking and reflection. I know plenty of thoughtful, intelligent Christians (and Jews and Buddhists) who I respect, even though I think they’re wrong.
Hmmm…Good point…If I want others to sincerely understand the christian belief then I’m going to have to sincerely understand their beliefs.
And who knows, there may be more than one way to worship God, like the blind men and the elephant parable. Maybe the so called “christian” way isn’t the only way.
I’ll need more time to reflect on this, but I’ll definitely read through the posts again. First year of college is starting soon! So I gotta get ready. Again, thanks for your guy’s time and perspectives. I’m glad to have had the privilege to interact with you guys.
John 6:66
“From that time many of his disciples turned back and walked no more with him.”
When even Jesus’ disciples accuse him of being a liar and bail out on the big show, I have to question his purported ‘miracles’.
There’s no direct evidence for god, and there are too many conflicting descriptions from various religions to choose from. If he/she wants to pop by and say hi, that’s great, but like any other celebrity, I’m letting them make the first move. If God wants a relationship with me, she/he can stop being so damn coy about it. Facebook friend me like every one else. Email, text, and phone work too.
Even were I to actively believe in god, there is no way I could believe in eternal hellfire. That’s obviously a lie made up by the church to keep members.
Timo, there’s nothing wrong with being a Xtian. You’re entitled to have the gut feeling that there’s something more than we see. I don’t discuss my personal spiritual beliefs on line because I’m comfortable in my own superstitions, and I don’t want to convert anyone nor do I need to seek the approval of strangers on a message board.
Don’t lose sight of this … self identifying as a Xtian doesn’t make you responsible for the negative things churches or their members have done, and it doesn’t mean you have to agree with every tenet of Xtian canon.
The best thing to do, before you do anything else, is to spend a minimum of two hours looking at why you believe what you currently believe.
On the other hand, a Christian can take some abstract pride at the good things that have been accomplished in the name of faith. A Christian can look at the magnificence of Cathedral architecture, or take joy in the religious music of Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi, and others, and share in it.
Marc Antony had it backwards, I think. Let’s bury the ills that have been done, and let the good things live on within our spirits. Learn from the past, and practice forgiveness. (Not only a Christian virtue!)
I think this will be best served in here as opposed to other threads:
It’s an interview with Reza Aslans - the biblical scholar that went viral after a horrible interview with Fox News and a pretty good one with the Daily Show. He discusses why he turned away from Christianity rather than the details of the book he was plugging. It seems germaine to this conversation.
I do believed that there is an all powerful creator, and that this creator is responsible for everything summed up by the term existance.
This creator does not have a name nor does it have a gender. The creator I am referring to is the creative force in the universe. The sum total of all the creative processes taking place as you read this to include any responses this posting may inspire you to create.
The universe as we know it is moving steadily towards a state of ever increasing complexity. New creative processes are continuously evolving along the way. There is no GOD in the religious sense.
I believe that all life’ indeed all of exsistance both spiritual and physical can be attributed to emergence. Humans were not created in Anyones image’ and we did not evolve from something else, we emerged from the endless sea of possibilities that make up all of exsistance.
Consider the analogy of a room full of monkeys all typing and eventually reproducing the complete works of Shakespeare. We are the same.
God himself may yet emerge along side of us.