Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Oh wow.
I have so much to say to all this O_o
I'm gonna go get some coffee, warm up my fingers, and have "We see where this is going" ready to be pasted.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Yet hundreds of thousands of Christians "choose" to ignore the rather unpleasant parts of the Bible. Like how to sell your daughter, or how to beat your slave, or how to stone an unruly citizen.

God is a jealous god. Basically he's saying, love me above all us and do exactly as I say without question, or I'll send you to an eternity of pain and suffering. Hmm...

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Christian's do ignore parts of the Bible, because they are human... and we won't be free from our sin nature until death. The bits a pieces you are referring to are parables, examples, and old testament law. We are under the new testament law now because we have the Messiah (Jesus).

God is a jealous God. He want's you to have Him in every aspect of your life and praise Him because He is the one that gives and takes away. When you become saved this isn't a burden, this is what you like to do. It's hard to comprehend I know, because I was once in your position. He wants us to enjoy our lives, and I am telling you, if you follow Him, you will be happier than anything on this earth could possibly ever make you, yes there are tribulations, Job is an example of this but our eternity is so much greater. God isn't saying follow me or be destroyed, He is saying you have chosen your own way so you WILL be destroyed, and you need a Savior to escape this destruction, which is Jesus. A way to look at this is, God made creation, so we love Him for His creation and His love for us. An example, a mom has a baby. Now when the baby is born we tend to get caught up in the creation of the baby and how cute it is and how perfect it is. Yet we respect the mother and father because they are the creators of the baby, and ultimately we respect the mother and father more, because without either one of them the baby would never be born. Just like with God, without Him creation is impossible. We love His creation but ultimately we should love Him for creating it, not the things of it. Or a candy bar, say you love reeses, well your obsessed with the candy bar, and often times forget that someone created this for you to enjoy. Its the same concept of God.

The Bible says if you commit one sin, you have commited all sins. Imagine if this was the structure the law was based off of. E.G. You steal a candy bar, and get caught. Now you broke the law. You are guilty of murder, rape, stealing, so on and so forth, you would be greatly punished. God is the creator of all, and His laws are more perfect than anything the human mind can grasp or create. So if you disobeys God's law you can assume there will be a greater punishment then any man can grasp or create as well.

As Human's it is hard to accept this, but God came to earth, He performed miracles and helped thousands of people. Because He helped them and claimed to be the Son of God, we (humans) all crucified Him. We killed our creator, and He did absolutely nothing wrong. We mocked Him, and He didn't save Himself because it was the will of the Father that He be put to death by humans, and raised again. Jesus in fact asked for the Father to forgive all of mankind while he was being mocked and crucified and beaten, because even though we forsaken Him; He wanted to save us. I agree as being a Human this is hard to comprehend, why didn't He just save everyone? I don't know. I will find out when I get to Heaven. But I do know He died for everyone and man has a responsibility to be reconciled back to God. And for me this is greater than any love that has ever been shown to anyone on this earth. A perfect creator, dying for imperfect humans. The Bible says "large is the gate to distruction, narrow is the path to the Kingdom of God", which shows the majority of you will more than likely disagree with everything I say because as humans we try to understand God's ways but it is beyond us. This is why we have Faith.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

it doesn't matter what you believe, just having something to believe in at all is something that keeps many people going. god doesn't care what you think, as long as you try your hardest to be a good person.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

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Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Gonna try a different format of responding that'll save time.

You all have God as the evil punisher... I'll explain more within this.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

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Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

God asks that we follow him and only him else we get thrown into the fiery pit of death. Uh huh...

And what if God told you to kill your offspring, like Abraham and Isaac? You would? ...

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Mmhmm, yes, He does ask us. Life of sin with Hell after, of a life of sin, with salvation and redemption and a life of Heaven.

And if God so asked, I would. Do you actually know the story of Abraham? He didn't actually end up killing his son, it was more a test of faith to see if Abraham trusted in God's higher understanding. I would trust God. I have faith in Him.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

God's way of asking is like a person pointing a gun at your head and saying, "You have every right to disobey me, because you have free will. Although, if you do, I'll shoot you..."

Yes, I know the whole story. God asked him to blatantly lie to his son (as when Isaac told Abraham that they'd forgotten the sacrifice, and Abraham replied, God will provide us one...), then kill him in God's name. Then the angel came down and said, "Do not lay your hand on the lad or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me."

That whole encounter, if it actually happened, had to be traumatizing. Think of Isaac's reaction to this whole thing... His dad was going to kill him... Come on... And the fact that Abraham would actually go through with it is a test of his sanity... I don't have empathy, and even I know that's not right...

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

As I've stated. Christian's are not perfect, just because we are saved does not me we are in turn better than anyone else. It means that we have chosen to attempt to be more Christ-like whether we fail or not. Christian's do have disagreements in the Bible because we are human and will not understand it to the full degree until our relationship with Christ is fulfilled when we die.

God never said that man is more important than woman. In fact it say's the median. God created man AND women in His image, thus we are both like Him (Genesis 1:27:). The difference is that woman would not have been created if God did not see that man was lonely and He knew exactly what man would need, someone to comfort Him, and encourage Him which is why He made woman (Genesis 2:18, 20-24). Both were given equal authority over the earth. The difference between man and woman is their roles in society, not necessarily that one is more important than the other. The role of man is to be a leader, as man was created first and is to support his family through labor (even though this is not how society is anymore, so yes we are technically living in sin because we see so often today that women are the workers in the families). The woman's role is to support, encourage, comfort her husband, and maintain the family. Each are equally important. And example of what I mean would be this, in school, you know what is required of you in order to get good grades, however. Doing this on your own is almost impossible, you need support from family, teachers, and friends or you will struggle greatly with this. It is the same with man/female. Men are to lead their families, yet they need the support of the women to do so.

Homosexuality is not condemned by God except in the Old Testament. It is a sin, YES. But so is lying, so is anger, so is malice, so is cursing, so is using God's name in vain, so is murder. You commit one sin, and you commit them all. There are people who are Christian and are gay, the thing is they should be trying to be more Christlike and control their urges to be with the same sex. Much like we most learn to control our anger, or any other sin. The thing is many Christian's condemn a lot of things and twist the Bible around. But let me point out another thing. In Matthew, Jesus was tempted by Satan, and Satan was tempting Jesus by the use of Scripture, and Jesus resisted this temptation because He knew scripture better than Satan. The point I am trying to make is that Satan has been there since the beginning, he knows scripture better than any Christian a live because he has been studying it since the beginning of time, now if Satan wanted to confuse people, and lead them astray do you not think that he has people planted in Churches to confuse people? Satan has no rules, he will do any means to lead people away from Christ, as long as they don't believe in the need for a Savior, Satan is winning is his eyes... So although people claim to be Christian, and maybe some of these peoples are Pastors and religious leaders in Churches, this doesn't mean that they are saved, they can be actually under the influence of Satan himself.

As Christian's it is us who need to discern whether or not the Church is speaking the truth or not. The Bible never says that being a Christian will be easy, it actually says the opposite, so it's no wonder so many people don't want to do it. We want everything handed to us which won't happen in Christianity, we are to deny ourselves and follow Christ. You can sit here and say, well Christians do this and Christians do that, and I will have the same answer for you everytime... Christian's still sin until their death, and revival with Christ.

[edit]
Also if you think Abraham had it hard, read about Job. Just because we have faith in God does not mean our lives are going to be easy, or even logical. We just trust that God is doing everything for His glory, again it comes down to denying ourselves and following our Savior. We give up our 80 years on earth, for eternity with God. Even though in this example of Job, God destroyed all he had and known, but because of Job's faithfulness he was rewarded both eternally and on earth by the end of the book of Job.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

No, God's way of asking is more like, "You have every right to disobey me, because you have free will. Although, if you do, know that Satan is waiting to ravage you in sin, and I cannot tolerate to be with sin."
It's an offer for life, not a choice between life and death. There is a slim difference, and it means a lot.

There is a bit more to the story than that. And God did not actually ask Him to lie, all Abraham said is God will provide the offering, and guess what? God did, and it was not His son. Kinda cool.
For Abraham, the Bible said it was a relief and a gift to both, as it was also shown to Isaac belonged to God.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Also referring to Annoni's post to clear it up in a simple paragraph: the punishment is our sins, God is a judge not a punisher. Satan is the creator of all evil, read Genesis 3, we chose to follow Satan instead of God, therefore are separated and ALREADY JUDGED into damnation. God however, offered a plan for Salvation (the death of His son) to save us from this punishment, so you're calling God a evil punisher, when Satan was the one who caused this punishment and God died for us so we don't have to deal with this eternal punishment.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

^Everyone, read this.
I was never good at shortening things :p

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Yes, I am familiar with the story. I was raised as a Catholic.

I think Christians would have MUCH more credibility if they had other sources of God's will except some old book. I asked how God defines sin, and you give me a fictional story of Adam and Eve...

And did you HONESTLY just say that the earth is 5000-6000 years old? Have you completely ignored all the physical evidence that suggests that the earth is actually 4.6 billion years old? Evidence also suggests that humans have been around for about 100,000-200,000 years. I'm sorry, but you need to REAL LIFE FACTS before you debate further. There's no nice way to put this. It's comments like this that make me questions everything Christians believe.

It makes more sense to me that he would want his creation to LIVE and learn its way on its own. He didn't create life so it would worship him, he did it so it would LIVE.

Very interesting, but this raises another question: You say we have free will....But God wants us to follow his ways, and Satan wants us to follow his own ways....So really, is it just a battle to see who turns to God and who turns to Satan/sin? Do we really have free will then? Wouldn't the one with the most influence sway us?

You say that the dealings of sin STOLE the hearts of God's children, so isn't it Satan's fault that people sin? NOT the people themselves? Why should God condemn others for something thats arguably not their own fault?

And the problem with sin: Is that it HAS CHANGED throughout the centuries. What God wanted in 600 AD is COMPLETELY different than what present day God wants. Crusades? Middle Ages? Renaissance? 18,19,20th centuries? "God" wanted different things in all these different ages. He's been very inconsistent (assuming he's the one dictating. I believe this is just the evolution of society, not God changing his views).

Because I believe a reasonable creator would be more thrilled by seeing his creation flourish than to sit back and except praise and worship from everyone. I've been trying to live my life in such a way, and I feel that God would be pleased with my efforts...

I wouldn't want to praise my creator. If I created something, I would want that life to live. I believe the best praise is (like I said countless times) to live your life to the fullest and enjoy your life.

The bible had prophecies? The only prophecy I was aware of was Revelations, which hasn't happened. I'd like a few examples from the bible.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

God created Satan. I'm still wondering how an omnibenevolent being even has the ability to create evil.

Why are we pre-judged?

A choice of life and death is exactly what it is. If one doesn't choose God, one dies.

Okay, the analogy is more like this... Two guys are standing next to you, one with a gun. The other says, "You have every right to follow me or disobey me. If you decide to disobey me, this guy is going to shoot you."

Let's face it. God told Abraham to kill his son. Abraham lied to Isaac to get the kid the rest of the way to the sacrifice without having to forcefully drag him there.

Of course it was a relief. On the other hand, if I were Isaac, I'd be a little skeptical of my father, who was completely willing to kill me... A sane person wouldn't kill their child, regardless of who asked.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

We aren't pre-judged. We were judged at the time we became knowledgeable of God and a Savior, and chose to reject that because of our sin nature.
John 3:18
"He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God."

God did not create evil. Evil does not contain any means of physics, it does not have energy, spatial dimensions, or matter. Therefore evil cannot be created. God allowed for evil and good to happen. But if you are looking for a author of evil, the first man to ever commit a evil deed was Lucifer.

Isaiah 14:12-14
"How you have fallen from heaven,
O star of the morning, son of the dawn!
You have been cut down to the earth,
You who have weakened the nations!
"But you said in your heart,
'I will ascend to heaven;
I will raise my throne above the stars of God,
And I will sit on the mount of assembly
In the recesses of the north.
'I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.'

Lucifer desired to be better than God. And so God gave Satan the reign over evil, and cast him and His followers from Heaven. If you want to get into more detail of evil read Ezekiel 28:12-19.

In Ezekiel 28:15 it say's that God created Lucifer without sin.

"You were blameless in your ways
From the day you were created
Until unrighteousness was found in you.

This shows that God is not even the AUTHOR of evil, but Satan formed evil from his heart.

As I keep saying, many of these questions do not make sense, and will not be answered until we get to Heaven. The Bible is NOT based off of knowledge it is based off of Faith.

Think of it like this:
You are going to skydive, you have a parachute, as you leap from the plane you have faith that your parachute will deploy and save you from death. However, you DO NOT KNOW that your parachute will deploy, you simple have FAITH it will. You may have a ton of knowledge in the world about sky diving and about how your parachute works, but in the end you simply have faith it will deploy and save you from death. Much like the bible, we studying to get more knowledge and understand God's ways and how He works. But in the end it is not our knowledge that saves us. It's our Faith that Jesus will be there to rescue us from destruction.

Even as a Christian, we will have our doubts, much like a skydiver. We will ask the "what if this, what if that", so on and so forth. But in the end like the skydiver, we have Faith we will be saved.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

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Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

What if it's, you know, just not my thing... That still sounds like attrition.

If God created everything, but didn't create evil, evil would not exist... God created Lucifer, and, if everything is created in God's image, by God, who is omnibenevolent, Lucifer shouldn't be able to do evil.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

If by not your thing you mean you don't want to follow God, don't want to take up salvation etc, then... well, your loss, honestly. And God's, for losing someone to sin.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

I can't imagine how one would be sinful until they actually sinned...

By "die", I meant hell. Still sounds like attrition...

What Biblical support?

At the time, Abe had no idea whether or not there was actually going to be another sacrifice there. He went with the idea and intention to murder his son. That still constitutes a lie...

If I were Isaac, I'd be a little skeptical of the God who told my father to tie me up and stab me to death...

And the fact that God praises Abraham for his willingness to murder his son without question is ... condoning blind faith ... I can't do that!

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

I'd have to say that i do something similar to you. I mean i'm christian, i just disagree with a few parts. The way i see it, everyone is trying to please God, they're just doing it in different ways and they just happen to call him something else. I don't see why people who try to please him and do it the 'wrong' way should go to hell. The big thing for me is that i just see heaven as a place for people who lived with good intentions. Try to do good things with your life and you're in; try to do bad things and hell awaits. These are just my personal beliefs

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

"God is god, therefore he gets a free ride"? No, I don't buy that. I acknowledge that I have a good life, yes. I also acknowledge that millions of people do not have good lives, that billions throughout history have not, and if Christianity is to be believed, that many of them continue to suffer now in hell, even those now born many hundreds of years ago. I am aware of plenty of good reasons for earthly suffering, and I don't deny their validity, but eternal suffering is another matter.

I'm portraying god that way because that is how I see him; or at least the Christian interpretation we're debating. There is a phrase that states that "we are guilty of all the good we could have done but did not do." Just because god is not the direct cause of eternal suffering doesn't mean he is not still guilty of allowing it to exist. God created Lucifer, for one. He wrote the rules, for another.

If he is actually powerless to prevent this; if he cannot destroy or overpower Satan, if he cannot choose to forgive everyone of their sins, not just the repentant, if he truly cannot exist with sin, then perhaps he could reveal himself to the world so that people can know he exists and be warned that he is incapable of protecting us. There are many ways god could prevent eternal suffering. Unless he is totally powerless, he is choosing to allow this cycle to continue, and he is thus guilty of it. If he is that powerless, I think it would be better that humanity try to fend for itself in the afterlife than continue to rely on such a meager god.

It all stems from a single question: does god exist? Yes or no. If you believe no, as I do, this entire debate is nothing more than hypothesizing. If you do believe, then complications of faith ensue, but for those who believe god doesn't exist, the matter is entirely simple. And no matter how much good they do in the world, god will condemn them to hell for their lack of belief, and from that a lack of repentance.

And speaking of which, why is sin so detestable to god? I'm only human, and I'm capable of forgiving someone even if they don't apologize for hurting me. Surely god is capable of at least that. God seems to be of assuming a stance of "well, if you don't want to apologize that's too damn bad for you, you can burn in hell." No person who spoke those words, or anything like them, would be considered enlightened. Why is god allowed this without question?

For that matter, why are we required to repent in the first place? I'm aware of having hurt people in my life, both directly and indirectly. I avoid it as much as I can, and I apologize and regret when I do cause harm. But I've caused no harm to god, except perhaps his pride. And if it's that easily wounded, he could stand to have it taken down a peg or two. But repenting simply because I'm not perfect? Hell no. If god had wanted us to be perfect, or perfect sheep, he should have made us that way. I feel no need to apologize for who I am, to anyone. Nor should any other person feel the need to.

Heh, apparently I start to speak with an edge when I get going on this topic.:p Sorry, I don't mean to offend anyone; as I've stated often I have no issues with people because of their beliefs. It's simply the concept of god that upsets me. I'm an idealist, and I've yet to run into a religious portrayal of god that I can look at and think: "Yeah, if that god exists I think I'd be pretty okay with it."

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

I gave this example before I'll give it again:
I don't believe in gravity. If I were to go to a cliff could I walk and float in air because I don't believe in gravity? No. I would fall, because the point is gravity is still there. You may chose not to believe in God or His teachings, but this does not eliminate the fact that He is there.


God created everything Good. Does a baker create a cookie to crumble? Did the baker make the crumbs? Or did he make the cookie? The cookie crumbles because of the absence of the baker.

Read the passages. Lucifer was created blameless, he separated himself from God and desired to be better than God, thus the "author" of evil came from Satan's heart because he was the first one to sin. To say God is the author of evil is to say God is evil, but He is blameless, and Holy, therefore cannot be the author of evil. Does this make sense? Like the cookie, sin or evil is the separation from God. In other words let me put it like this:

Say Bob was the first man to make a pair of shoes and you had to tie them to keep them from falling off.

Jamie who was his daughter, worked for Bob and desired to become richer than her father. She decided people hate the time it takes to tie shoes so she would make slip on shoes, and sell more shoes than her dad, and therefore make more money. Bob found out that his daughter was trying to over throw Bob's company with this idea by getting his employees who helped design the shoes to work for her, and Bob fired her, and the employees who followed her.

Jamie created the slip on shoes with her employers, and she was right. Slip on shoes were a big success, because people rather do what is easier.

Since Bob made the first pair of shoes, does this make him responsible for slip on shoes?

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

I get it. The faith thing. I just want people to also think for themselves and not get all their answers from a book. Know what I mean?

Ok...I think we're going down the wrong path here. I don't want to respond to this because we're debating how a belief system can work by believing in God, but not believing in the Bible. The flood debate can save for another discussion. All I can say is take a geology course or something. You'll learn alot.

As for how the earth came to be: I honestly have no idea. I'm not a geologist or astronomer. But what makes sense to me is that God may have started something (created science, rather) and then life/nature/the universe took over from there...All I know is that this huge chunk of rock has been here LONG before we have, and will be around LONG after we're gone (assuming that the human species doesn't live long enough for the sun to destroy the earth).

I disagree, but opinion respected.

But you say that God made us good, without evil. So why would our hearts gravitate towards sin if that's not what we were made for? And if a person's heart is leaned more towards sin, isn't that a little unfair? I still don't see how we have a free will if whats in our hearts dictates whether we rejoice in purity or sin. It sounds like it's already been decided for us when we were born.

Again, I don't see how free will fits into all this if Satan is the one controlling us. God should be punishing Satan, not the people.

I agree that HE never actually changes, but I disagree that we see different sides to Him. I believe that it's society twisting and manipulating us to believe that God acts a certain way and wants certain things out of us. But who is right? Is anyone right? It's impossible to tell.

I don't mean to say that people should sit back. I guess I can understand how you could get that vibe, but that's not what I meant.

And I agree. Given the individual, praise and worship may work for him/her. But I don't believe the same glove fits all.

I shall give you time. If anyone else knows any, feel free to give out some....

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Gravity is rational. God isn't.

A perfect baker should make a perfect cookie...

Tough for Bob, he should compensate by making a better shoe instead of declaring Jamie "evil".

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Let me just point an argument out, you can shoot it down or chose to do whatever you with it, and this is mainly for Lugez, and this isn't out of spite, this is simply to provoke your thought process.

You just said you want people to think for themselves, apart from what a book says.

All of History is faith. Chose what you will with this, facts or no facts. It's all faith. You say take a Geology course, I have. Is not the very thing these courses teach you based off a book, and other peoples opinions and studies? I will not get into arguing the age of the earth because truthfully no one knows. There's evidences for the Biblical approach and there's evidences for a scientific approach but none the less you would have to exist since day one of the universe to truly know the answer without a shadow of a doubt, so whatever you chose to believe is based off the opinions of others, and their studies... which is in turn FAITH.

Truth of the matter is, no matter what facts or studies you perform, they are all based off opinions. How many times does science change their thoughts or theories on a particular topic? How often are we finding things in science that we thought to be true at one point are now being proven false, or entirely different. I will not argue about the age because truthfully who knows? And this is a different discussion completely but no matter what you believe about History is all based on Faith.

Gravity is rational because we know it to be real. What if we were born on a planet where gravity did not exist? Someone discovers a planet with gravity and says "there is this place where you are held down to the grown and you do not float around" because we have not seen this we chose to ignore this statement or we believe in it because of Faith.

God made creation perfect, man decided to stray from God. Just like Jamie. God allows us to make our own choices. If you have a kid, you can guide it and tell it what to do, but ultimately it is that kids choice to do what he or she wants to do, not yours. Though you desire for them to do the right thing, you allow them to make their own choices.

I am truly amazed you can say that God is irrational. If you truthfully believe all of this is coincidence, that is foolish. Simply learn about DNA and it's complexity, to say there is no creator is ridiculous.

Let me ask you, I want to build a car:
I put all the pieces required to build this car and all the tools in a garage to make this car. Billions of years pass by, eventually will this car create itself? No. It needs a creator.

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Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Counterexample:

Someone presents the same argument: "I don't believe the world is flat. If I were to walk forever in a straight line, would I not fall off the edge of the world because I don't believe there is one? No, I would fall, because the point is that the edge is still there. You may chose not to believe that it is, but this does not eliminate the fact that it is there."

Would you say they are correct?

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

I really do grieve for you. I can tell that you are struggling with what to believe and I can tell God is at work in you. You are questioning the very things I question before I came saved. Let me answer some of these for you.

1. Yes it is much easier to believe in something with proof. But faith is another matter. Dictionary.com describes Faith as this: "belief that is not based on proof". Faith in science or religion is all based on proof, yes there's facts of both, yes science has more facts. This is why being Christian is on Faith.

2. Yes it is easier to put a belief in something with more facts. The bible says "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it" Matthew 7:13. Through this verse we can assume the people going to Heaven will not be many. So based off what you heard about humans like to believe what is based with facts, is true. But the question I ask is, how do you know your facts are facts? You don't, you believe what you hear, and what schools teach. I'm not saying some of these are true but I will show you what I mean in a minute. And I will agree with you this argument goes both ways, however I personally believe that science and every religion is simply there to avoid God. They want answers against God, so they say well because of this and this, there is no God. When in reality God is evident and factual through His creation. Again I will show you an example about the big bang in a minute.

3. The Bible does say God created other planets:
Genesis 1:14-16 (New American Standard Bible)

14Then God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years;
15and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth"; and it was so.
16God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night; He made the stars also.








3. God created man to have a relationship with Him but we are born into darkness so we invent all these other means to escape being with God because we "love darkness rather than light". "This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil." John 3:19 this is what we will be judged upon. We love the Light or we love darkness.

4. Now I would go into more detail then this person does but I ask you to look at this link http://www.tangle.com/view_video.php...0c5940458979d5 although I disagree with some of venomfangx arguments I believe he explains this very well, and I suggest you watch it.

This is a straw man argument. My argument is for the sake that just because you chose to believe one way or another does not eliminate the fact that something exists. Perhaps try rewording it, but by the way I am absorbing this information it is a straw man argument.

However, my argument is simply based off my Faith. I believe that I am saved because I was living in what Christian's would call a lot of sin, possibly more sin than a lot of people on this board, but I am not here to brag or get into details of what this sin was. One day I had a desire to go to church, I went to church and started questioning religion, I tried to find answers for a lot of the same questions you are asking. I continued to live in sin, and then I eventually came to a point where I was ready to make a change because I saw that my life was going no where, and I had nothing to lose. As soon as I confessed to God and put my faith into Him, my desires completely changed. Immediately. I no longer had the same desires, although I do struggle with it, my life is completely changed. And this is why I believe what I do.

Before I knew I was going to hell, I believed I would go to hell because of my sin. Now like the bible says the spirit confirms with my spirit and I know there is a Heaven.

I truly grieve for a lot of you and if any of you have questions I will try to help you and I will pray for all of you.

I do not want to continue arguing not because I am flustered, but because of what the Bible tells me to do in situations like these. I will continue to answer any questions if you guys want to PM me, but I wish to not argue with you guys anymore. I do think all of you have valid points, but I ultimately believe in my Faith, and am willing to allow God to use me in anyway to direct you into Salvation.

Just please I urge you to question yourselves, can you not see that the things of things of this earth do not matter? They will one day all disapear. Whether its your death, the destruction of this earth, whatever you want to believe it all goes away. The things of God are eternal, and I really have a sadness for the way you guys reject it. I was once where you are and I will continue to pray for all of you. I just wish to no longer argue because I know ultimately it is God who will work through you, and not myself.

If you have any question please PM me.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

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Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

If you want to understand why people make such a fuss, here's the best explanation I can give, at least regarding my beliefs. I see accepting god as the easy road, in the same way that Christianity preaches that giving in to sin is the easy road. It's easier to put blind faith in god than it is to question whether god is actually just and loving.

I believe that if god really does exist after all, I'll want a lot of answers before I will happily accept him as god. Yes, there is heaven and forgiveness, but for me the price would be compromising my own beliefs and my freedom, and that's not something I'm willing to do. If god exists and I get my answers, and judge to the best of my ability that god is indeed good, then I'll accept him.

In the mean time, I'm living my life to its fullest and doing my best to be a good person and a positive influence in the world. If that's not good enough for god, then bluntly, god's not good enough for me. If that means I burn in eternal damnation, at least I'll burn with a clean conscience. That is truer freedom to me than any gilded cage.

I actually see god as not existing at all. As I've said, for me this is all hypothetical debate, mostly for my own enjoyment. It's a fun exercise to consider and articulate my beliefs, and to respond to those of others.

It's not "sin" I'm arguing against; it's the punishment for sin. Personally, I think some of god's sins at least make the world a heck of a lot more fun, and I'll certainly agree that without any sin at all the world would be dead boring. It's hell and eternal suffering that I'm arguing against, because that has no conceivable purpose other than punishment. Again, if god can explain to me why it is actually good for so many billions of souls to be so tortured, I'll cease complaining. Personally, I doubt he'd be able to find an explanation I'd find satisfactory.

Yes, typo corrected, thank you.

If god is perfect, shouldn't that come with perfect tolerance? Why exactly can god not tolerate sin? Is he allergic to it? Is it to his eyes what an unbearably bright light would be to ours? Are sin and god like matter and antimatter? Just because I'm 100% blond doesn't mean I can't stand to be around brunettes or redheads. Just because I'm 100% British doesn't mean I can't tolerate Americans or Scotsmen. If god is perfect and free of sin - and I question even this - why is it that he cannot tolerate sin?

I didn't ask god to let his son die two thousand years before I was born, I'm certainly not about to thank him for it. It doesn't make a spot of difference to me whether I'm "tainted with sin", since it seems that it's god that cannot stand it. As I've said before, if he cannot accept me as I am, I see that as his failing, not mine. And in that case, thank goodness for Satan. I have no more desire to be perfect than I have desire to seek god's forgiveness for my imperfections. Acceptance I would take, but forgiveness is patronizing and condescending.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

That's absurd! All planets have gravity.

Perfect things do not spawn imperfection. If imperfection does not exist, nothing can be imperfect. If evil does not exist, nothing can be evil. That's like saying two dogs mated and spawned an animal that never existed...

I prefer coincidence. Even if there were a higher power, how are we to know it's the Christian God?

I don't want you to reply to this because it's off topic. But, so you never ever say this ever again... A car cannot pull itself together because it's not a living, growing organism... Living growing organisms can pull themselves together.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Why is salvation more important than the peacefulness, mercy, compassion, etc...? I think that they're all equally important but please explain your stance.

I don't see why it wouldn't be alright. The OP isn't destroying the beliefs of salvation, peace, mercy, compassion, etc... . There is now the idea of resurrection but still most of the christian belief is there.

You're right on the definition of perfection. But you're ignoring the premise of my argument, which is the idea that god is perfect at every single possible thing (calling onto the idea of all-powerful if you want also). So by that, he must be perfect at imperfection because he is perfect at every thing. You cannot say he is perfect at everything except for imperfection. That's a contradiction. LOL the underline shows you agreeing with what I said. It is anger nonetheless as the verse didn't specify the target of the anger. If you read my entire post on that section, you'd have seen that it read:

So, seeing as how you have supported my argument, the only thing that is left is your argument for why god cannot sin. Ideally, try to present your argument without using circular reasoning, bare assertion fallacy and such.

The problem still stands that you ignored the premise for the perfection so you simply give me the definition of perfection.

Wait... so if god doesn't decide for us to go to hell, then who is judging? It cant be god so please explain this.

All of this simply is a biased view on Satan and on God. Essentially, whenever there's something bad you point the finger and say "SATAN, it was him all along" and whenever there's something good, you point the finger and say "GOD, it was him all along". That's all that the above quotes you gave are showing except it's constructed into a nice fancy story.

Some of these verses can teach good morals. However, I'd rather have your explanation and your interpretations instead of you tossing me a bunch of biblical passages. I'm not interested in what the bible has to say, if I were, then I'd read it myself. I'm interested in what you have to say.

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Considering proof is needed to validate all fact, then the definition of faith in 1. implies that faith has not been validated, unlike scientific observances. QED we can ignore 2. and 3. :p

I'll only address one part of the debate so as not to fuel it - it's already gotten to a very advanced stage :rolleyes:

So what image do we get of God? Someone who is completely uninterested with the plight of humans, and only wishes to save those who will worship him without questioning. He is content with condemning the hard working, the charitable, the concerned and the kind to eternal torture. Meanwhile Satan doesn't mind who joins his ranks, so long as they don't adhere to the dehumanised ranks of religion.

And you expect us to be CHRISTIANS?

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Obviously, many devout/fundamentalist Christians would be against you, but if you don't like the Christian faith to begin with then it probably won't matter to you. :p

Your beliefs and practices are completely up to you. If you believe in God but you aren't religious, that's okay!

On a more personal note, I think it's really cool that you're figuring things out for yourself. Good luck!

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Haha, you sound alot like the way i used to think before God finally came it my life. I was totally against the labeling of "Christian" and yet I was looking for something. I've driven through lots of bummpy roads in my life and one day i really crashed. I needed help and lots of it. (although at the time I didn't really believe in God, i doubted alot) But God has revealed himself to me and i am a strong believer now. It's not about the label, God is God no matter what you call yourself and if you want your life to turn around for the better, all it takes is giving God a chance to enter your life. I used to be really stubborn and would reject listening to anything about church, Jesus, and God. I didn't want anything to do with it because I thought the whole idea was a method of brainwash and pointing fingers at bad people.

It is true that sometimes you find "Christians" who are less than ideal. But we have to remember that we are all human and we all make mistakes. God doesn't ask us to be perfect. All He ask is for us to love Him the way He has always loved us. Although a life living for God does come with some cost attached. It's not an easy life, I can tell you that. But in the end I can guarantee you it's all worth it. The biggest and hardest thing we have to do in order to truly survive in this world is have faith in God.

Faith. That's a big word. What does it mean exactly. Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. We get so used to living a life where everything appeals to at least one of our five senses, that we come to the conclusion that if we can't see it, hear it, smell it, feel it, or taste it, then it's probably not real. And at first glance God doesn't seem to apply to any of those senses. But I tell you something, if you give Him a try and truly call out to Him with all your heart, He will come to you and soon you will be able to see him. You will be able to hear him, and you will most definately be able to feel Him. But it takes faith. Faith that he exist, faith that he loves us, and faith that his word is true.

The bible is his word. I know it's a hard concept to grasp. It took me a while to trust it too. No, there isn't any hardcore evidence saying that the bible is really God's word, other than what the bible says itself. But if that's something that you still doubt, ask God for an answer. You can talk to him. The same way you talk to any other friend. God WILL listen and he will answer. Maybe not literally with a great big voice, but he'll show you in other ways. You just have to be patient, keep your eyes and ears open, and and most important of all.... have faith.

The fact that your asking questions is a good thing. Your searching for answers and I can confidently tell you "everyone who asks recieves; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."

Keep looking for answers, if you truly want to know more about God, the truth will be revealed. It's not about the names of "religion" but the relationship you have with God.
God Bless

your friend,
Protege

Re: Belief in God without Religion?
 

Why would God care which human perception of him and "his word" we follow? God is entirely beyond human comprehension, so no one religion can claim to have Him pegged. I am of the belief that God and faith are universal (almost all theistic religions are right).

I completely disagree with this. I was raised Roman Catholic and I still identify as that. However I don't think that in order to be Christian you have to believe in the Bible word for word.

God's word as written in the Bible was inspired by the Holy Spirit, not written by Him. There are many things in the Bible that do not apply to society today. There are many things in the Bible that do apply and that one should try to emulate when living their life. Custom and convention (the semantics of religion) are created by man, not God.

I think that God wants you to be a good person, to love others and yourself, and to have a relationship with Him. How you do that is entirely up to you.