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If christianity moves away from its namesake then it should change its name, Christ himself will deny some folks before the father, he says so. Christ himself says that all who say lord, lord will not get access to the kingdom. These are his words (you must follow the posts), and these words need to be explained; either he is ignorant, in which case this religion is using the wrong name, or he should have not spoken so ineptly, and sloppiness seems unbecoming of a god (and if he is not a god then he has little authority), or he spoke the truth so poorly and it is up to us to put words in his mouth to bring out the "true" meaning , which may mean we should seek another-someone who speaks more clearly. When christianity becomes a whatever one thinks religion, then it should change its name appropriately-mine was just a suggestion. Question marks are rude without dialog, as it implies that who they are directed to should be a mind reader, same with those cute little faces everyone uses, without dialog.
it was just an allegory to show the logical flaw of your argument, scripture says the wages of sin is death, not endless conscious torment, how do you deal with this?
"can" not "must", even if I would agree with this, it weakens your point, not mine, it would be at least no decisive argument for any side, also see here and a more scientific approach here
take the time you need, I suggest however to continue this particular topic in the thread there, this is a different topic, I think I have provided a reasonable biblical definion of aión there which is no Platonic eternity.
Ich geh jetzt schlafen, gute Nacht (23:00 Uhr hier)
If christianity moves away from its namesake then it should change its name, Christ himself will deny some folks before the father, he says so. Christ himself says that all who say lord, lord will not get access to the kingdom. These are his words (you must follow the posts), and these words need to be explained; either he is ignorant, in which case this religion is using the wrong name, or he should have not spoken so ineptly, and sloppiness seems unbecoming of a god (and if he is not a god then he has little authority), or he spoke the truth so poorly and it is up to us to put words in his mouth to bring out the "true" meaning , which may mean we should seek another-someone who speaks more clearly. When christianity becomes a whatever one thinks religion, then it should change its name appropriately-mine was just a suggestion. Question marks are rude without dialog, as it implies that who they are directed to should be a mind reader, same with those cute little faces everyone uses, without dialog.
I didn't know question marks were rude without dialogue. I won't do that again. I'm sorry.
I don't think Christianity is changing. I think people who call themselves Christians yet do not follow what Christ says aren't Christians and shouldn't call themselves Christians. True Christians are still following Him and listen to His words.
Please don't apologize as it puts me in a strange position as if I am being petty, and is not needed by me, at least. These are ideas that we work with here-well, it would be nice if it were so, and we mostly use fake names, so for me it is as if there are not people here-just thoughts not worth being owned up to, so it is nothing personal. These conversations would be different face to face over coffee; I am sure we would laugh a lot as there is a lot of humor here. Dialog creates the social (the question marks are communication but lack clarity, and can give misleading cues, from my perspective). But if that is one's style then why change, who am I to want otherwise, and I would only comment when in relation to me? A lot of posts say nothing, and so ideas do not get knocked around like they should and the structure of some of these posts kill possible communications; that destroys the social (if you are christian, killing the social is demonic, as the fall, as recorded in the bible, puts everyone at odds with everyone, so it is not our arguments that are bad but our stifling of them). When a post has content, it can be taken apart more readily, as it has more access points to be plugged by a poster, so one tends to say as little as possible and come off being brilliant (I am not referring to you personally). The access points, weakness in structure and all structures have these as reason is owned by no one, allows for dialog and creates the social-well that is probably more than you cared to read.
You are absolutely right. Christianity is not changing, but the people in it are. I think jesus says that his followers will hear him, his voice. All this made up stuff, feel good, etc, is something else that people hear from themselves. If I knew how to get one of those cute faces I would put it here (hahaha).
The original posts is not an appeal to emotion. It is an appeal to the readers to use their own moral judgment.
This is not the reason that atheists do not believe in god.
Nevertheless, the belief of many theists is that your god, if he existed, can with pleasure or equanimity (or even, if you wish, with great sadness) condemn even one, much less billions, of humans to unimaginable suffering for eternity. If this were true, one would have to agree that this god is the most evil monster imaginable, and not the god of all love and morality, as you claim.
Use your moral judgment. If you have the ability to reason morally you know that what I say is true. If you do not, then how can anyone be held to account for his acts?
I couldn't agree with you more. People who claim that this type of reasoning using moral judgment is all based on "emotion" just have no other defense concerning their accusations against God's character. We can all pretty much agree that torturing a person or even a human being is evil, and it brings out the same "emotion" in most people - horror, disgust, anger, shock, sorrow, etc. Where do they think reasoning and emotions come from anyway? God gave us these human emotions. They are universal. No matter what language one speaks, we all recognize laughter, crying, anger, etc. by their faces. Why, then, would anyone argue that it would not be digusting and evil for GOD to torture people? Why??
It is part of the hogwash that comes from the brainwash of the eternal torment doctrine. Every person who understands English knows the meaning of the words "holy" and "justice," but some say God has his own definition of these words because otherwise, something is wrong with their doctrine. When I believed in ET, I never bought into the explanation that God was so holy and so just that he had no choice other than to burn people forever. I just settled on not understanding why it had to be that way. Thank God He showed me it isn't that way at all!
Last edited by Bright Hope for Tomorrow; 06-24-2010 at 10:31 PM..
I couldn't agree with you more. People who claim that this type of reasoning using moral judgment is all based on "emotion" just have no other defense concerning their accusations against God's character. We can all pretty much agree that torturing a person or even a human being is evil, and it brings out the same "emotion" in most people - horror, disgust, anger, shock, sorrow, etc. Where do they think reasoning and emotions come from anyway? God gave us these human emotions. They are universal. No matter what language one speaks, we all recognize laughter, crying, anger, etc. by their faces. Why, then, would anyone argue that it would not be digusting and evil for GOD to torture people? Why??
It is part of the hogwash that comes from the brainwash of the eternal torment doctrine. Every person who understands English knows the meaning of the words "holy" and "justice," but some say God has his own definition of these words because otherwise, something is wrong with their doctrine. When I believed in ET, I never bought into the explanation that God was so holy and so just that he had no choice other than to burn people forever. I just settled on not understanding why it had to be that way. Thank God He showed me it isn't that way at all!
It is a vicious cycle. If you don't believe in hell and it just happens to be real then you will go to hell. So then why not believe it even if it isn't true.
Then you have the problem of never truly knowing if you lived up to God's standard (for you, not himself) of conduct in order to avoid hell in the first place.
It cause me to look down on others as 'unsaved' people. And that is a bad fruit from an even uglier tree.
I couldn't agree with you more. People who claim that this type of reasoning using moral judgment is all based on "emotion" just have no other defense concerning their accusations against God's character. We can all pretty much agree that torturing a person or even a human being is evil, and it brings out the same "emotion" in most people - horror, disgust, anger, shock, sorrow, etc. Where do they think reasoning and emotions come from anyway? God gave us these human emotions. They are universal. No matter what language one speaks, we all recognize laughter, crying, anger, etc. by their faces. Why, then, would anyone argue that it would not be digusting and evil for GOD to torture people? Why??
It is part of the hogwash that comes from the brainwash of the eternal torment doctrine. Every person who understands English knows the meaning of the words "holy" and "justice," but some say God has his own definition of these words because otherwise, something is wrong with their doctrine. When I believed in ET, I never bought into the explanation that God was so holy and so just that he had no choice other than to burn people forever. I just settled on not understanding why it had to be that way. Thank God He showed me it isn't that way at all!
Excellent post. We have emotions for a reason! And of course our ideas of love and justice are universal. I have read some terrible doozies over the years printed in books. I remember "Christian" books that taught that God had NO FEELINGS - he was completely dealing with us on a legal basis, as a lawyer/judge and that he had no pity in his heart for people suffering who did not know Christ, etc.... that he was only interested in "seeing the blood" of Christ - nothing else could move him to feel mercy. Such horrible things have been written about God - it is just an abomination! No wonder this world looks like a hell hole - because it IS a hell hole filled with doctrines of demons!
Beautiful!
If there's something I've learned here on these forums, it's that sharing what the Lord is revealing to us, serves very little. It only leads to debate. Debating is fleshly and full of strife. Knowledge will indeed pass away. Prophesies will no longer be important.
Truly, the only thing that is important is Love. Even faith is less than Love. Praise God! Love the Lord thy God. Love thy neighbor. Sanctify God in your hearts. To HIM be the glory!
Blessings to all here,
brian
Brian,
I agree that the debates can be full of strife and I personally feel they can and do go to far at times, but I also feel it is important to share what we think and believe and also to be open to listening to what others say........
The original posts is not an appeal to emotion. It is an appeal to the readers to use their own moral judgment.
There was an appear to use moral judgment, but the stories thrown in were done as an appeal to emotion. What about those poor victims of rape and other atrocities? How could God send them to hell? Arguments like that are, in fact, appeals to emotion because they detract from the real issue by trying to stir up feelings of pity in our hearts. The real issue is whether they have sinned. If they have sinned, and if God is just, he must punish sin. Universalists reject eternal punishment because that concept does not pass the bar of human reason. Some even go so far as to equate torture with torment, which is not the same and is a disingenuous way to present the issue, IMO.
Quote:
Nevertheless, the belief of many theists is that your god, if he existed, can with pleasure or equanimity (or even, if you wish, with great sadness) condemn even one, much less billions, of humans to unimaginable suffering for eternity. If this were true, one would have to agree that this god is the most evil monster imaginable, and not the god of all love and morality, as you claim.
You make the same error that universalists make: You reject a teaching because it doesn't satisfy your personal concept of justice. The flaw in that reasoning is that if our personal concepts are to be the final arbiter of truth, that assumes that we have full knowledge; otherwise we would be incapable of being the final arbiter of truth. Universalists also make the error of underestimating sin. The more I discuss this issue with them, the more I realize that they reject eternal punishment as unfair because they don't realize how horrific sin really is in the eyes of a good, holy God.
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