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Haha I understand. I got mad at a guy on here not too long ago because he just didn't get it. I should have just let him be and prayed that either I find a better explanation to give him or that God may help him understand. It's hard to help people understand what the truth is sometimes.
Again...the inevitable smugness and arrogance that is so very difficult to escape from when debating with a True Believer, i.e. your last sentence: "...understand what the truth is."
LOL--you have the market cornered on that, do ya?
P.S---Sanct....in an earlier post you mentioned yo were under the impression that I am of the belief that god no longer is in control because Satan has seized power over the world. This, in light of our long bloody history of violence and wars.
Please allow me to clarify: I DO NOT believe that. I do not believe in either god or Satan. My question was simply a hypothetical one for debate: asking people which deity would appear to be in charge of the World to an outside, objective observer.
Again...the inevitable smugness and arrogance that is so very difficult to escape from when debating with a True Believer, i.e. your last sentence: "...understand what the truth is."
LOL--you have the market cornered on that, do ya?
P.S---Sanct....in an earlier post you mentioned yo were under the impression that I am of the belief that god no longer is in control because Satan has seized power over the world. This, in light of our long bloody history of violence and wars.
Please allow me to clarify: I DO NOT believe that. I do not believe in either god or Satan. My question was simply a hypothetical one for debate: asking people which deity would appear to be in charge of the World to an outside, objective observer.
So you just want to see a bunch of us fight? Come on man I think you are better than that.
Do I think I am a True Believer? I don't consider myself better than other people because I believe in something that the person I was mad at doesn't. I am a true believer in God because I believe in Him, but there are a lot of true believers out there. Not all True Believers agree on how to worship God even though I don't think it matters how you worship as long as you do the things that He left us to do.The problem is that the people that are there to help us do those things took advantage of others in various ways and believers leave. You were once a Catholic you know what I am talking about. There are goofy people in this world. But I am not a Christian because of the people that are preaching Christianity. I am a Christian because of what Christ did for humanity. Whether humanity chooses to love Him back is up to the individual person. If someone leaves Christ, Christ will always be waiting with open arms should they ever want to go back. He will be patient with them.
Do not judge Christ because of a sinful representative. Judge Christ for Christ. If you see what Christ has done for us then you may love Him again. I'm not going to force anybody to do anything. But if they are interested in what I believe and why what I believe is true then I will gladly tell them.
I have done it once before and somebody insulted me by saying that everything I said was a lie. No matter what source I gave him, he never took what I said into account. Yeah I was mad. But that was a long time ago.
OK..here me out on this, please, and I implore you to have patience with this question, as it is a difficult and complex one, thus is a bit tricky insofar as framing it in a clear and concise manner. Nonetheless, I truly believe it is an interesting and vital question, and indeed one that merits a lively and entertainingly-informative thread.
To begin: Let us say you are a visitor to this planet from somewhere else.
You first read all the biblical literature that Man currently has available from throughout history. This of course includes the Christian bible, as well as all mentions and writings of Satan. or Lucifer, or Son of the Morningstar, The Accuser, or whoever you wish to call him.
And so you become familiar with the attributes, the powers, the characteristics, and the shortcomings of both the Judeo-Christian God, Yahweh, as well as those of Satan. (As I shall refer to him for the remainder of this thread in the interest of brevity.)
After acquainting yourself with all this literature and philosophy, you are given a tour of the World as it is Today. You see the wars; the violence; the poverty; the disease; the pestilence; the greed; the hunger; the famine.
And of course you also see the love, the families, the kindness, the charity and the philanthropy. At least what there is of it.
So when asked which of these two primary deities you believe is actually in charge, in control of the World--assuming of of course you had to choose one.
Satan? Or God?
I am of the opinion any objective, agenda-free, intelligent person wold have to come to the conclusion that Satan is in charge. After all, none of the christian apologetics or philosophers has ever been able to explain the reason for God allowing Evil. The "free will" argument does not make sense at the end of the day, as it flies in the face of too much logic. (why would god go to the trouble of beginning anew with the Flood only to allow evil again? And wasn't original sin erased with the new world after the deluge?)
Either God cannot stop evil or he allows it. Neither makes sense, does it? As the former denigrates his alleged omniscience and the latter decries his goodness.
Ahh...but EVERYTHING in this current world is exactly as it should be if Satan is in charge. Right?
Or no? If not, please name one thing that is different in our world today than it would be if Satan was not the Supreme Ruler.
I thank you in advance for your well-thought and non-hostile responses, as I fully realize this thread is going to rankle some of the more religiously-inclined people here.
Ok Let's say I'm Mork from Ork...
I've arrived and read the Bible end to end
I recall that God made the angels and man perfect. However perfection is relative because absolute perfection is ascribed to God only. So an angel starts to think he deserves some of the praise and worship and convinces the first human pair that they can decide for themselves how to live (the first liar and murderer-John 8:44) although man was not created to be independent from God.
Jeremiah 10:23 "It does not belong to man to who is walking even to direct his step."
Thus the three rebels reject God as sovereign and God in turn ushers the first human pair out of the Garden of Eden and the angel becomes God's chief opposer. For their disobedience they lose out on everlasting life and are no longer perfect and the days of God's adversary are numbered.
In the meantime God begins a plan to push forward with his original purpose of filling the earth with a perfect mankind and spreading that paradise in Eden earth-wide.
Genesis 3:15, " He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel." (a head blow when delivered hard enough can be fatal...a blow to the heel can temporarily knock one out of commission but not permanently)
John 3:16, "For God loved the world so much that he gave his only begotten Son so that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life."
The meek shall inherit the earth and find an abundance of peace. Bye bye to the wicked...Psalm 37:11
Jesus reaffirmed that in Matthew 5:5.
God gives mankind rules to live by but for the most part man ignores them. So coupled with this and dealing with imperfection along with the influence of a fallen angel and the angels that in turn followed him... wars, violence, lawlessness happen.
Ecclesiastes 8:9, "Man has dominated man to his own injury."
1 John 5:19, "We know that we originate with God, but the whole world is lying in the power of the wicked one."
But when is God going to step in? Didn't he provide a clue? what's taking so long? All these innocent victims that died from wars, violence, etc. Is that the end of them?
Matthew 24:7-14 and 2 Timothy 3:1-5 (clues to when he will step in)
Why is God taking so long? 2 Peter 3:8-9
What about all those innocent victims?
Resurrection- Matthew 5:28-29.
Revelation 21:3-4.
Mork from Ork realizes they're are lots o other scriptures that he has read that offer more in depth knowledge but just like earthlings alien visitors need sleep.
OK..here me out on this, please, and I implore you to have patience with this question, as it is a difficult and complex one, thus is a bit tricky insofar as framing it in a clear and concise manner. Nonetheless, I truly believe it is an interesting and vital question, and indeed one that merits a lively and entertainingly-informative thread.
To begin: Let us say you are a visitor to this planet from somewhere else.
You first read all the biblical literature that Man currently has available from throughout history. This of course includes the Christian bible, as well as all mentions and writings of Satan. or Lucifer, or Son of the Morningstar, The Accuser, or whoever you wish to call him.
And so you become familiar with the attributes, the powers, the characteristics, and the shortcomings of both the Judeo-Christian God, Yahweh, as well as those of Satan. (As I shall refer to him for the remainder of this thread in the interest of brevity.)
After acquainting yourself with all this literature and philosophy, you are given a tour of the World as it is Today. You see the wars; the violence; the poverty; the disease; the pestilence; the greed; the hunger; the famine.
And of course you also see the love, the families, the kindness, the charity and the philanthropy. At least what there is of it.
So when asked which of these two primary deities you believe is actually in charge, in control of the World--assuming of of course you had to choose one.
Satan? Or God?
I am of the opinion any objective, agenda-free, intelligent person wold have to come to the conclusion that Satan is in charge. After all, none of the christian apologetics or philosophers has ever been able to explain the reason for God allowing Evil. The "free will" argument does not make sense at the end of the day, as it flies in the face of too much logic. (why would god go to the trouble of beginning anew with the Flood only to allow evil again? And wasn't original sin erased with the new world after the deluge?)
Either God cannot stop evil or he allows it. Neither makes sense, does it? As the former denigrates his alleged omniscience and the latter decries his goodness.
Ahh...but EVERYTHING in this current world is exactly as it should be if Satan is in charge. Right?
Or no? If not, please name one thing that is different in our world today than it would be if Satan was not the Supreme Ruler.
I thank you in advance for your well-thought and non-hostile responses, as I fully realize this thread is going to rankle some of the more religiously-inclined people here.
The Bible provides the answer to this question in Genesis chapter 3.
God does not 'allow evil' MAN DOES. God did not create evil, MAN EMBRACED IT.
In the Garden of Eden, man chose to deny God's command. What God intended to be an act of self-denial and a gesture of love became the embodiment of wickedness and evil.
God created the garden and everything in it. He gave Adam and Eve life and the ability to enjoy everything they saw and touched. God did it because He loved man. But man did not have the capacity to reciprocate God's love. He could not return it. So God created the framework whereby this could be realized.
Throughout the Bible it is taught that God considers acts of trust and obedience to be an act of love. Therefore when God put the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the garden and told man NOT to eat of it, He created the method by which Adam and Eve could return love to God - an act of self-sacrifice manifested by trust and obedience. The scenario was created for good, by the goodness of God.....
BUT......
Instead of obeying God, man obeyed the serpent. In this way sin, which had no power before that time, was given authority by man to rule his (man's) life BY MEANS OF REBELLION AGAINST GOD. From that time to this, man has been ruled by sin.
Man was created in the image of God, but when man sinned he lost the image and became evil. MAN IS NO LONGER THE IMAGE OF GOD. Look upon the whole face of the earth and see man's inhumanity toward his own kind. Even animals do not act like this.
But God is not willing for the evil of man to continue and provided the means for redemption in the death of Jesus Christ upon the cross BY MEANS OF OBEDIENCE UNTO DEATH. Those that accept Christ are given a measure of the spirit of God, thus the image of God in man is PARTIALLY restored. It is partially restored because man cannot ever again enjoy the autonomy he enjoyed in the garden before the fall. In Christ, the image of God serves to restrain man and to cause him to grow or become like Christ.
The salvation of Christ is a 'pairing' or marriage of man and the Holy Spirit of God. The result is a new spiritual creature spoken of by St. Paul - the greatest act of creation since the formation of the world itself. The new creature is able to return love to God by means of trust and obedience, which is what God intended for man since the first day he breathed the air of earth.
and that's me, hollering from the choir loft...
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