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Your talking about ideas and beliefs, not what is actually happening.
Look - first establish that things are (quote) "getting crazy". Then we can hypothesize why.
I'm sure IF an earthquake destroyed half the world tomorrow the end timers would hypothesize it is a biblical sign from God and atheists will still hypothesize that it's just a natural (although unprecedented and crazy) event.
What we DON'T hypothesize about is something that isn't happening (more/bigger earthquakes) etc. When the raw data shows that something crazy is happening THEN we can talk about the unknowns and personal conclusions.
Your post shows that you are just going with what you think - which is fine - think whatever you want, but you can't just make up stuff about literal physical verifiable events - it doesn't work that way.
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
That's because you personally took the time to contest each point of an admittedly lazy copy and paste.
Yikes!!!
And I'm glad he did. At least he read it and analyzed it for himself. I can respect that. You probably did not read a thing which is typical because of course you would do anything to keep your eyes from the truth.
My head hurts. Lots of cookie cutter writing that takes some serious liberties with the bible to make up things that are not really there. That's MY opinion.
I respect the fact that you actually took your time out to read what it said and analyzed half of it under your own perception. I don't want to respond to everything you had to say because I am not willing to get into another argument with you. But I however do not agree with your last statement. I don't think it's cookie cutter writing. You know better than most atheist what the author was talking about because all of it was written in the bible and I assume as you were a christian for 15 years, you are familiar with all of it. I don't get how you say it's alot of made up things that aren't there when you read them for yourself. Just because your an atheist now doesn't mean you have to make up a false sense of reality about it all. It's all there in the book.
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I said use common sense
I SAID USE COMMON SENSE!!!!
Common sense says you don't develop a hypothesis as to why something is happening if it isn't happening.
If it happens (an unusual number of quakes for the year or unusually larger quakes during the year) then we can discuss why at that point. And I'm sure we will. It could happen you know. Just hasn't happened yet.
Do you ignore the fact that quakes are actually down a bit for the last several years? What does common sense tell you about that?
I respect the fact that you actually took your time out to read what it said and analyzed half of it under your own perception. I don't want to respond to everything you had to say because I am not willing to get into another argument with you. But I however do not agree with your last statement. I don't think it's cookie cutter writing. You know better than most atheist what the author was talking about because all of it was written in the bible and I assume as you were a christian for 15 years, you are familiar with all of it. I don't get how you say it's alot of made up things that aren't there when you read them for yourself. Just because your an atheist now doesn't mean you have to make up a false sense of reality about it all. It's all there in the book.
Allen, I wasn't born yesterday and please, give me a little more credit. It is NOT because I am an unbeliever I refute things in the bible. Let's get that clear. I am not that spiteful. I've read and studied the bible far more than you can EVER imagine and this is, in great part, the PRIMARY reason why I am unbeliever today.
First of all, let me provide you some perspective. I'm anal about that. The Old Testament was NOT written in real time, ok. There were no scribes, for example, following Abraham around writing down everything he did or heard from god. Using this, as an example, what does this tell us? It tells us that since Abraham wrote no book, someone had to have [A] sat down with Abraham and write down all that he told them about his life including conversations with an invisible deity that [allegedly] spoke to him or [b] make up a story around his character or even make up the character of Abraham to establish a subsequent story. What do you think is more likely?
I gave the above example to point out to you that all that you read in the Bible is not the prophetic "gold" you think is there. Jews sat down and compiled their canon AFTER the fact which gave them the very easy task of writing from hindsight and writing whatever they wanted to write. For example, if there was indeed a great ancestor by the name of Abraham who left his homeland of Ur for one [usual] reason or another, simply write into the story that it was god who spoke to him and told him to leave to set up the idea that his reason for leaving was part of some great divine plan. Once this has been established, the rest is gravy. A writer could now rewrite the history of Abraham and point out that his line derived from great ancient men like Seth, Enoch and Noah as opposed to someone like Cain.
With such a starting point, then a carefully crafted divine story could be written, one where Abraham, due to his divine calling, becomes father of a people known as Israel who are called by god to be his people who are called for his special purpose and are destined to rule the nations. Then, as Israel failed to live up to expectations, it was an easy stroke of the pen to show that they failed NOT because they were of inferior power (as in Judges 1:19) but because they failed to serve their god and failed to listen to god's prophets and so on.
Why the need to create this elaborate story? It's the very same reason we black folks (for example) needed to RE-tell our story and why militant, ethno-centric groups arose amongst our people. When you are a historically oppressed people, you try to re-tell the glories of history through your personal bias? Similar groups within the white community do the same thing. Listen in on a Klan rally and all they talk about are the great white men of the past and how they believe god is with and for the white man while all other peoples are cursed and inferior. The Jews of old were no different and here was what they were working with.
Here they are, a dejected, exiled people in a strange land far removed from their beloved city of Jerusalem. How do you explain to the younger generation what happened and to the older generation what is going to happen. How do you get the spirits up of a people who sit "by the rivers of Babylon" weeping when they remember Zion (See Psalm 137) being mocked by their oppressors? It is in moments like these, just like our black ancestors did, that you make god your personal cosmic hero. For the Jewish scribes, they retold the story with the solid intent to show that Israel's god was the greatest of all gods, but taking it further, they set out to prove that he was the ONLY god there was; all other gods being the futile imagination of heathen men. They then tried to prove that this great god who created all creation called THEIR father Abraham who gave birth to the people of Israel, a nation hand-picked by god, born out of oppression and delivered from said oppression through great miracles. I mean, how can't you help NOT feeling special or the "apple of god's eyes" as stated in the book of Hosea?
You want the listening audience to grasp the idea that the reason they are currently in exile, oppressed and cast aside is because of their failure to obey the laws/rules that were passed down (by the victorious religious group known as the Yahwehists) so it becomes necessary to show that in the past events, the people of Israel kept wavering back and forth between serving their national god and other people's gods. When they served the national god (Yahweh), they did well and when they failed to do so, they met with punishment. It even served the purpose better when numbers are thrown in. Show that Israel was the smallest of nations, but when they served the national god, they kicked ass and when they failed to serve god, they were trampled by the enemy. In fact, for good measure, throw in a few wars where diminutive heroes like David kills a giant enemy (symbolism proving little Israel defeats bigger enemy with the help of god) or as in the days of King Asa, a motley crew of an army defeats 1 million Ethiopian soldiers. The underdog role serves the interest well.
Then to explain why you're in the exile mess in the first place, simply tell the audience that god just finally had it, after centuries of patience and sending prophets and just could not take it anymore. As a result, he wanted to cleanse his land and sanctify his name and decided to remove them from the land through Assyrian and Babylonian conquest. You carefully point out it had nothing to do with the Assyrian or Babylonian gods being bigger, better or more powerful (as was believed in ancient times), but because Israel sucked and had to be punished for their sins. But NOT to worry and lose heart, god would be faithful to his promise and bring the captives back home and after doing so, would vanquish Israel's enemies and restore Israel and Jerusalem to their rightful place and all the Gentiles would be forced to recognize Israel, her holy city and Israel's god. Create an elaborate, romanticized vision of the future glories of Israel and BINGO, you have the Old Testament! NONE of it has ANYTHING to do with us 2,300 hundred years into the future.
You are making a statistical claim about physically verifiable events. Produce the verifiable data about your claims and they will be proven true. Fail to do so and they will be proven false.
Verifiable data? That is your criteria, as you guys want some scientists, who probably believe that we came from apes, to confirm something for you. That's your choice, not mine. As already stated, the lack of technology in the past can neither verify nor dispel, from a "scientific" perspective, that this earthquake activity is either normal or abnormal. Therefore, you have no case based on your own definition of verifiable data.
Now, for the believer, our facts are thus saith the Lord. God said there would be earthquakes and terrible things coming upon the earth, and that is what has happened, is happening and will be happening. The birth of Israel in 1948 was a prophesy fulfilled against great odds. Jesus said that the generation that saw this would see it all unfold. It's not a new thing for unbelievers to scoff at what is happening, as the Bible is filled with naysayers throughout the Word of God. Did there scoffing change anything? No. They simply go down just like Pharaoh.
That's because you personally took the time to contest each point of an admittedly lazy copy and paste.
Yikes!!!
Yeah, I know. If one takes the time to siphon through all of the usual cut and paste of thousands of scriptures that are often tossed out to prove "prophecy," you probably won't get past the first two scriptures and not realize some serious liberties and abuse going on with said scriptures.
Verifiable data? That is your criteria, as you guys want some scientists, who probably believe that we came from apes, to confirm something for you. That's your choice, not mine. As already stated, the lack of technology in the past can neither verify nor dispel, from a "scientific" perspective, that this earthquake activity is either normal or abnormal. Therefore, you have no case based on your own definition of verifiable data.
What if they don't? Does it make them more credible because I am sure you can find a handful of Christian scientists who will come to the same conclusion.
Quote:
Now, for the believer, our facts are thus saith the Lord. God said there would be earthquakes and terrible things coming upon the earth, and that is what has happened, is happening and will be happening. The birth of Israel in 1948 was a prophesy fulfilled against great odds. Jesus said that the generation that saw this would see it all unfold. It's not a new thing for unbelievers to scoff at what is happening, as the Bible is filled with naysayers throughout the Word of God. Did there scoffing change anything? No. They simply go down just like Pharaoh.
How can it be "facts" when you have nothing to prove god said anything? At least the scientist have TANGIBLE evidence to work with. All you have is a book with words you have to put faith into, no???
How can it be "facts" when you have nothing to prove god said anything? At least the scientist have TANGIBLE evidence to work with. All you have is a book with words you have to put faith into, no???
God has more than proven Himself to me, because I obey Him; good tangible evidence of my faith. It's wonderful to know that I abide in Him, and He in me. Jesus said, seek and ye shall find; that is the secret to it all. Honest-hearted people who humble themselves before the Lord God Almighty will see His wonderful works and blessings. The disobedient will never understand the things of God.
Meanwhile, these earthquakes are just as God said they would be, because what He says comes to pass.
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