The Bible (2 Viewers)

[Legham]

umm as far as i know most, or at least many Christians perceive God as an eternal being.. that is, He has always been there, and will exist infinitely.

Impossible :/

i was going to bring this up before, but i think that is a very contentious thing to say that an aetheistic life is better than a religious person's. i know that personally i find life more enjoyable living as a christian and the meaning and fulfillment that gives me as opposed to getting wasted every weekend and living your 'fun' way of life.
so yeah, maybe i am saying that to me, your concept of 'fun' is worthless. and no i dont think i live a terrible or boring life, and i'm not suicidal. not everyone enjoys their life purely because they can have 'fun' sleeping around or doing drugs/alcohol.

That's fine by me that people find the sense of "fulfillment" (whatever that is) outweighs the fun you can have without it. Different people, different views, and i have no reason to try and change you. But to say an Atheists life is "worthless", which orang3 has claimed (and probably a lot of other theists agree with), is just ridiculous.

 

[cupcake08]

Impossible :/

only to human comprehension. as humans there is a lot that we can't fully understand or comprehend, primarily our own existence. that doesn't mean it doesn't exist or can't happen, or that its impossible, it just means that we are fallible. i see that as one of the key indicators of the existence of God, the fact that the human mind is so limited in its capacity to fully understand the universe around us.

That's fine by me that people find the sense of "fulfillment" (whatever that is) outweighs the fun you can have without it. Different people, different views, and i have no reason to try and change you. But to say an Atheists life is "worthless", which orang3 has claimed (and probably a lot of other theists agree with), is just ridiculous.

agreed

 

[Not-That-Bright]

its also about glorifying God, asking forgiveness, giving gratitude, and having an ongoing, immediate, relationship with God.

I think you're similarily simplifying the argument made against prayer. The idea is that basically asking forgiveness in its self is pointless because god already knows you desire forgiveness, giving gratitude is pointless because god already knew it was there.... etc

There are extreme complications when you want to evoke a 'perfect' being.

its generally accepted that if something is not within God's will or in the overarching plan of God it won't happen, not matter how much you pray for it.

Is not 'within' God's will? So god has a temporal will? Shades of grey etc?

lso, ntb, you say that you can infer love exists because it makes itself evident in the actions of other people? well, cant a christian infer or as you put it 'observe insofar' that God exists because He makes himself evident in ways such as response to prayer, or even the actions of Christian people?

They definately can. Christians are fine to go ahead and 'observe' god responding to their prayers much in the same way as humans imagine a pet rat has fallen in love with them, doesn't really bother me, but at the very least I know that I can have the feeling of 'love' and thus can contemplate other similar creatures having the same feeling (i.e. other humans). I don't see how even such a preliminary understanding is available with 'feeling' god.

yes i know that there is probably never going to be any definitive evidence in this lifetime that God either does or does not exist.

I feel fairly comfortable with my logic... Basically do you accept all other (fundamentally equal) supernatural things as existing? If not then you're applying double-think and at the very least being less logical than me.

but isn't a view where you limit yourself to only what you can see or definitively prove one that is incredibly constricting and not allowing for all that we clearly dont understand as human beings?

I don't "limit myself to those things which I can see or definately prove", I do however hold that we have no reason to believe such things exist until there is strong evidence for them.

 

[lengy]

those two theists are the reason i hate theism with a passion.

 

[Josie]

i was going to bring this up before, but i think that is a very contentious thing to say that an aetheistic life is better than a religious person's. i know that personally i find life more enjoyable living as a christian and the meaning and fulfillment that gives me as opposed to getting wasted every weekend and living your 'fun' way of life.
so yeah, maybe i am saying that to me, your concept of 'fun' is worthless. and no i dont think i live a terrible or boring life, and i'm not suicidal. not everyone enjoys their life purely because they can have 'fun' sleeping around or doing drugs/alcohol.

Oh wow, we love generalisations.

Being an atheist doesn't mean you get drunk and sleep with everyone all the time.

Besides, I know plenty of Christians who do exactly the same thing.

 

[bazookajoe]

Oh wow, we love generalisations.

You realise, of course, it was in response to someone stating that Atheists have more fun than Christians.

 

[cupcake08]

Oh wow, we love generalisations.

Being an atheist doesn't mean you get drunk and sleep with everyone all the time.

Besides, I know plenty of Christians who do exactly the same thing.

yes, my post was in reply to someone who said atheists can do 'fun stuff' (and i made the assumption that 'fun stuff' involved drug alcohol etc) and that if fun is worthless to you you will live a 'terrible and boring life'

i never said that all atheists do any or all of those things or vice versa. if your going to pick arguments, at least do it in context.

I think you're similarily simplifying the argument made against prayer. The idea is that basically asking forgiveness in its self is pointless because god already knows you desire forgiveness, giving gratitude is pointless because god already knew it was there.... etc

There are extreme complications when you want to evoke a 'perfect' being.

yes but in a christians eyes that external acknowledgement still has value. say you are going to apologize to someone for something you did, and that person finds out you are going to apologize. does that mean the apology isn't necessary anymore because they know you are repentant?
also isn't asking God for something a different act from simply desiring it?

They definately can. Christians are fine to go ahead and 'observe' god responding to their prayers much in the same way as humans imagine a pet rat has fallen in love with them, doesn't really bother me, but at the very least I know that I can have the feeling of 'love' and thus can contemplate other similar creatures having the same feeling (i.e. other humans). I don't see how even such a preliminary understanding is available with 'feeling' god.

i know some people have a problem with biblical quotations in this thread. but a major principle of christianity is the notion that the good tree bears good fruit ie. a person's actions can reflect God working in them. dont we do the same with love? i dont think we purely judge love by feeling, i think a major factor by which we assume love exists because it makes itself evident in the actions of ourselves and other people. therefore, the godly actions of a person who had repented and believed are attributed to God working in them. also i'm sure that a lot of spiritual people would attest to having felt the presence of god, much like many people would attest to having felt the feeling of love, while there will always be people who will say they have felt neither.
also how does observation of God via reponse to prayer correspond with 'feeling' god? if your only argument against that is that it is purely in the imagination of the person who prays, much like imagining a pet rat has fallen in love with you, then i respectfully disagree, but i suppose a non-theist and a religious person will always diverge on what exactly is just coincidence vs the hand of God.

I feel fairly comfortable with my logic... Basically do you accept all other (fundamentally equal) supernatural things as existing? If not then you're applying double-think and at the very least being less logical than me.

I don't "limit myself to those things which I can see or definately prove", I do however hold that we have no reason to believe such things exist until there is strong evidence for them.

much the same as you, i dont neccessarily affirm or discredit the existance of any other supernatural beings other than God, i just dont have any evidence to reason that they exist. i think the point is, i do have reason to believe an omnipotent god exists, moreso than other supernatural forces via evidence from my own personal experience that you would seem to disregard as we covered above. and that evidence i have sufficiently implies God's existence enough for me, i dont require God to personally come down and transform me into a leprechaun to have that belief - where the concept of faith comes in - hence not limiting yourself to what you can see or definitively prove. however, i wouldn't discredit any other supernatural beings from being in existance, i just wouldn't believe that until i had any kind of evidence, and i also see it as quite possible that God can exist singularly.


and Lengy, sorry i inspire such hate in you or anyone else but i'm still entitled to my opinion however lowly or illogical that opinion might be.

 

[lengy]

it wasn't you that annoyed me it was the two new lurkers who suddenly decided to rant about how awesome the bible is, then comparing that to science.

also you make it seem as if non-theists cannot be repentent or remorseful of their actions.

 

[orang3_]

"If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark."

- C.S.Lewis

 

[orang3_]

But to say an Atheists life is "worthless", which orang3 has claimed (and probably a lot of other theists agree with), is just ridiculous.

-_-; sorry; i used the wrong word; everyone's life has worth~
but, in the end .. after you die, what happens then? Are you just going to be buried in the ground and your existence just ends there? Or are you going to go around the world"haunting" people?

----> nuhp, the satans do the haunting~
For us, it either Heaven or Hell.

And, i don't know about everyone, but i prefer Heaven

 

[munchybuddy]

-_-; sorry; i used the wrong word; everyone's life has worth~
but, in the end .. after you die, what happens then? Are you just going to be buried in the ground and your existence just ends there? Or are you going to go around the world"haunting" people?

----> nuhp, the satans do the haunting~
For us, it either Heaven or Hell.

And, i don't know about everyone, but i prefer Heaven

Yeah, but wat would happen if u spent your whole life living by the bible and not living life to its fullest and then when you die and realise that nothing is waiting for you.......

I would be pretty pissed.. I must say however, i am not religious, but i am spiritual..... I believe that there is something waiting for us when we die but i dont believe that there is a heaven and hell

 

[Not-That-Bright]

yes but in a christians eyes that external acknowledgement still has value. say you are going to apologize to someone for something you did, and that person finds out you are going to apologize. does that mean the apology isn't necessary anymore because they know you are repentant?
also isn't asking God for something a different act from simply desiring it?

The analogy fails imo because you're dealing with an omnipotent being who definately knows of your forgiveness and to whom it is doubtful vocal communication is any more important than our thoughts. If we could read the thoughts of others then yes, I do think vocal appologies (hell vocal communication!) would become a thing of the past. There are also other issues of free will etc...

but a major principle of christianity is the notion that the good tree bears good fruit ie. a person's actions can reflect God working in them.i dont think we purely judge love by feeling, i think a major factor by which we assume love exists because it makes itself evident in the actions of ourselves and other people. therefore, the godly actions of a person who had repented and believed are attributed to God working in them.

I agree I think much of it is found through observing the selfless actions of people towards you etc. Your god example, however, is lacking.

- Not only those who accept God do good.
- You're assuming that God will always do what you percieve as good, he appears to be rather neutral given the state of the world.
- You're assuming it's your God.
- You're assuming what is done can be attributed to that supernatural force (which you only 'know' exists from personal experience, but I can't imagine how you know it is that particular supernatural force acting in that instance... but I'll argue more along those lines further down).

It's like if I were to say I think everyone who does evil is the actions of a magical leprechaun, you wouldn't be very impressed now would you? It's possible to pick out any trait and attribute to it supernatural origin (as you have done with 'doing good') but it's essentially a useless claim.

if your only argument against that is that it is purely in the imagination of the person who prays, much like imagining a pet rat has fallen in love with you, then i respectfully disagree, but i suppose a non-theist and a religious person will always diverge on what exactly is just coincidence vs the hand of God.

We have very solid evidence that people can imagine things - None that a God exists. If you want to imagine it's God communicating with you then that's fine, but it's no better an argument than an insane person who will tell his doctors "Yes but you can't prove my experience is wrong".

i think the point is, i do have reason to believe an omnipotent god exists, moreso than other supernatural forces via evidence from my own personal experience that you would seem to disregard as we covered above.

Not really, no matter what sort of personal experience you're having I don't think you can discount the possibility that it is some other force than the one you've chosen to attribute it to and I don't think such experiences would lend themselves to even being able to weight it up as being 1 supernatural explanation over another. Perhaps you can explain how?

 

[xsjado]

God is capable of doing anything right?
well in that case,

Could God build a wall so big there was no way he could ever get over it?

and then, Get over it?

 

[jest]

i actually forgot about this thread when i first posted on it and seeing as i'm lazy to not bother going through all the pages to check if these had been answered, i wanted to ask that guy that started this thread and asked about the whole 'find me contradictions in the bible' thing, what he thought of these quotes from the bible:

"Jacob said, 'I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.'" (Genesis 32:30)
"No man hath seen God at any time." (John 1:18)

And Jesus said, "For judgement I am come into this world." (John 9:39)
"I came not to judge the world" (John 12:47)

 

[Not-That-Bright]

Am I the only person that finds the notion of eternal life horribly horribly worrying?

EDIT: The afterlife.

I mean, I want to die at some point, I don't want to exist for eternity.

I do, somewhat as I cannot really concieve what i'd do with immortality or what heaven would be like. At the same time though while I used to hold the position you do, I actually now sway towards thinking an eternity of endless possibility would probably be better and I'm just not creative enough to understand how.

 

[all4gsus]

i actually forgot about this thread when i first posted on it and seeing as i'm lazy to not bother going through all the pages to check if these had been answered, i wanted to ask that guy that started this thread and asked about the whole 'find me contradictions in the bible' thing, what he thought of these quotes from the bible:

"Jacob said, 'I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.'" (Genesis 32:30)
"No man hath seen God at any time." (John 1:18)

First, i'd like to put the verses in context... The first verse from Genesis is actually taken from the story about Jacob's wrestle with God. The basic plot of the story if you dont know it already, is Jacob and his family are making their way to see his brother Esau (they weren't getting along, but if you want to know the story... read Genesis chapter 27), and he was really scared cause the last time he saw his brother, he was going to kill him. So, he send everyone in front of him and he stayed back for a night, and wrestled with a man all night. 33:25 "when the man saw that he coudl not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man". I dont know exactly, but my youth minister said something about at that time, it was tradition to give someone you're blessing after you fought with them or something. But the story goes that Jacob wouldn't let the man go until he blessed him, and then the man changed his name to Israel "because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome".

So, this can be taken literally to mean that Jacob was literally fighting God, or figuratively. I read this to be figuratively, because Jacob had earlier in his life struggled with God and his faith, as well as struggling with men (esp. his brother and wives' father).

As i have taken this verse figuratively, you can see that i dont believe this is a contradiction, however, if you take it literally, then the man must have been Jesus, becuase Jesus is the Son of God, and is God in human form. But, i do not believe this was Jesus... cause his first physical appearance in the Bible was in the Gospels..

This brings me to the second verse... John 1:18 "No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known." I see this verse as talking about Jesus, as the first chapter of John is talking about Jesus, and these first verses are all talking about Jesus coming down to Earth. I believe this is sayingn that Jesus has made God known by coming down to earth (physically known, that is), so that he can be seen and those people who doubt can be saved.

Make sense? If not, just reply, and i'll see what i can do...

And Jesus said, "For judgement I am come into this world." (John 9:39)
"I came not to judge the world" (John 12:47)

Again, i would like to finish that verse and put it into context... John 12:47-48 says "As for the person who hears my words but does not keep them, i do not judge him. For i did not come to judge the world, but to save it. There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; that very word which i spoke will condemn him at the last day"

The rest of verse 39 is "Jesus said, "for judgment i have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind".

I think there is alot in this two verses, and i wont say that this is the definate answer, but it's what i think....

I believe that Jesus came to both judge and save. The rest of the chapter quoted above goes on to say that Jesus is saying what God wanted him to say. The first verse it taken out of the section called "Spiritual Blindness", and Jesus is talking about the Pharisees being blind, and those we are 'blind' will see. It's also mentioned several other places in the gospels about people being blind, where the disciples and the crowd do not understand what Jesus is saying, but the Pharisees do. Personally, i think these two verses do not contradict each other, but instead talk about spiritual blindness and how Jesus came to show people the way to get to heaven.

Now, i'm not saying you have to agree with me, or see where i'm coming from, but personally, i think it's really important to look at the two verses in context, rather than just two verses by themselves, and at that, only half of the verses. There are many instances in various religions, you'll find it in most, where verses have been taken out of context and used to justify actions which may not be what the verse is saying, if read in context.

Hope that helped. Let me know if u have more questions.. or even about this... i'll try the best i can, but i'm not God, so i dont know everything, and i'm not a minister, nor do i have the resources of commentaries etc. but that's what i think.

 

[terriphyd]

God is a physical entity:​

"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness"
Genesis 1:26
fficeffice" /><O>"Thou canst not see my face</O><O>" Exodus 33:20</O>
<O>"Sit thou at my right hand" Psalms 110:1</O>
<O>a "cloudy pillar" Exodus 33:9-10
</O><O></O>
<O>God is an abstract concept:</O>
<O></O>
<O>"the Word was God" John 1:1</O>
<O>"God is a Spirit" John ffice:smarttags" /><?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com

4:24</st1:time></O>
<O>"God is love" 1 John 4:8</O>
<O></O>
<O>So who answers my prayers, a human being, a cloudy pillar, or an abstract concept like love or the Word?</O>
<O></O>
<O></O>

 

[aussiechica7]

terri maybe God anthropomorphises Himself in Biblical references because it's easier for us to understand? I think God exists in spiritual form and that the physical realm (time, space, matter) were CREATED by Him. Jesus is the unique physical image of the spiritual God. But apart from that I'd consider Him spiritual.

 

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

 

[terriphyd]

terri maybe God anthropomorphises Himself in Biblical references because it's easier for us to understand? I think God exists in spiritual form and that the physical realm (time, space, matter) were CREATED by Him. Jesus is the unique physical image of the spiritual God. But apart from that I'd consider Him spiritual.

Spiritual 'form'? Sounds like a self-contradiction already! If 'spirit' is like conscience what 'form' can it have? If God looks like a human, how can he also be an abstraction? It seems to me that you are trying to cover all the bases with this spiritual-form duality.