As a non-christian I guess I just have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that salvation or eternal life or earning reward from a god, whatever you want to call it is dependant on being a part of the god fan club and not about juding a man by his actions. It seems to me that a god deserving of praise, admiration, respect, and love would judge people based on the relatively good or bad decisions people make in life that are unrelated to religious ideology.
Greetings,
Not sure what you mean? What is being contradicted. Please be more specific for me. Its late.
I'll See it tomorrow.
Peace and Blessings
How does Jhn 15:16 redefine the quote that The Presence was inquiring about (No one comes to the father but by me) in such a way as to allow for what thecoolnessrune stated to be true.
In essence what relevance does Jhn 15:16 have to the discussion. In layman's terms.
- Sep 21, 2001
- 18,447
- 133
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The thing is, as I understand it, salvation/eternal life is the EXCEPTION from judgment on our actions. All people are judged by their actions and condemned for them, since nobody is perfect and perfection is the standard by which people are judged. It's a God deserving of praise, admiration, respect and love that decided to provide a get out of jail free card by sending his son to take the consequences for us, and he leaves it to each individual whether or not to pick up that card.
bassoprofundo
Golden Member
Well said, hotchic... You said nearly all that I've wanted to say but just haven't had the time and energy to sit down and put into writing. In fact, my wife read your first post and asked if I wrote it... 
I'd say more, but I couldn't say it any better! Thanks for sharing.
I'd say more, but I couldn't say it any better! Thanks for sharing.
Siddhartha
Lifer
- Oct 17, 1999
- 12,505
- 3
- 81
silverpig
Lifer
- Jul 29, 2001
- 27,703
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Uh, not really. Scientists are always looking for new information. Nothing is infallable. You can subscribe to the Big Bang as the best current explanation for the universe we see while keeping an open mind to the possibility that the theory may need some changes later. There is no faith required.
dug777
Lifer
- Oct 13, 2004
- 24,778
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That's ironic really, the 'Christian' pouring scorn on those who support a rational, 'heavily supported by vast amounts of evidence' theory, and taking the moral high ground, because she can see holes in it, holes which of course she's not going to point out for us
There's nothing irrational in considering evolution to be 'the' theory behind development of our species at this stage, and it certainly doesn't close one's mind to any other theory, if that theory is as well convincing and supported by available evidence as evolution.
Some might say it's irrational to consider we were created by god, because you've absolutely no evidence to prove that :roll: IF you don't believe we were created by God, but refuse to accept evolution as an extremely solid theory, what do you consider?
I suppose it's arguable that discounting evolution, with the vast amount of evidence that backs it up, and no other remotely attractive explanation, IS irrational. You're discounting something because you don't like it, not because it doesn't adequately explain how species develop...
EDIT: i'm giving the impression that i care here, which i don't. You're free to be as condescending as you like to people, and believe what you like into the bargain.
It depends on which version of Jesus you get from the NT. You've got quotes like the one above, and you also have ones like this
Like much of the NT, the message changes depending on the intended audience, so it's often a judgment call which of the contradictory texts to follow. Since there were many more gentiles than Jews as the target of early conversion attempts, the authors & books targeting them were more numerous, and obviously it was easier to recruit from that group if you didn't have to observe hundreds of obscure laws from the OT. But it's tough to reconcile those writings with the passages obviously written for observant Jews such as the one above.
I thought the standard Christian view was that you go to hell because of one bad thing that Eve did, and your actions can't help that one way or the other. That's the whole reason for the need to be saved through faith, right?
If your intelligence is any indication of what normal or sane is, I'll be happy to be loony.
Opinion of translation is very easily categorized as right or wrong. You can translate something properly, or you can translate it improperly. Perhaps you in your infinite wisdom could provide another scenario?
No, I'm just impervious to idiots like you. Since you can't read, I'll tell you what you can try. You want to back up any of your ridiculous comments on the lunacy of Mormonism, you go ahead and try it little man. But like I said, you don't have the ball or intelligence to do it.
ThePresence
Elite Member
- Nov 19, 2001
- 27,727
- 16
- 81
If they don't contradict each other than what was your answer to begin with (that we cannot stand on one verse)?
As SlitheryDee pointed out, since on the surface they seem to say the same thing, then again, the question remains unanswered.
If someone grew up and died in the Jungles of Asia without ever hearing of Jesus or his teachings, is he doomed?
Southpark points out how ridiculous Mormonism is: Find and watch, Episode: Season 7: All About Mormons. I wish I could find a link to the entire episode but so far no luck. Here is a small part of it at the end:
LINK
What mormons believe cartoon:
LINK
Now finally if your a christian and you believe mormonism is obviously ridiculous please take the time to read the following completely by Sam Harris:
Since the publication of my first book, The End of Faith, I have received thousands of letters and e-mails from religious believers insisting that I am wrong not to believe in God. Invariably, the most unpleasant of these communications have come from Christians. This is ironic, as Christians generally believe that no faith imparts the virtues of love and forgiveness more effectively than their own. Please accept this for what it is: the testimony of a man who is in a position to observe how people behave when their faith is challenged. Many who claim to have been transformed by Christ's love are deeply, even murderously, intolerant of criticism. While you may ascribe this to human nature, it is clear that the hatred these people feel comes directly from the Bible. How do I know this? Because the most deranged of my correspondents always cite chapter and verse.
Before I present some of my reasons for rejecting your faith-which are also my reasons for believing that you, too, should reject it-I want to acknowledge that there are a few things that you and I agree about. We agree that, if one of us is right, then the other is wrong. The Bible either is the word of God, or it isn't. Either Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation (John 14:6), or he does not. We agree that to be a real Christian is to believe that all other faiths are in error and profoundly so. If Christianity is correct, and I persist in my unbelief, I should expect to suffer the torments of hell. Worse still, I have persuaded others, many close to me, to persist in a state of unbelief. They, too, will languish in "everlasting fire" (Matthew 25:41). If the claims of Christianity are true, I will have realized the worst possible outcome of a human life. The fact that my continuous and public rejection of Christianity does not worry me should suggest to you just how unsatisfactory I think your reasons for being a Christian are.
You believe that the Bible is the literal (or inspired) word of God and that Jesus is the Son of God-and you believe these propositions because you think they are true, not merely because they make you feel good. You may wonder how it is possible for a person like myself to find these sorts of assertions ridiculous. While it is famously difficult for atheists and believers to communicate about these matters, I am confident that I can give you a very clear sense of what it feels like to be an atheist.Consider: every devout Muslim has the same reasons for being a Muslim that you now have for being a Christian. And yet, you know exactly what it is like not to find these reasons compelling. On virtually every page, the Qur'an declares that it is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe. Muslims believe this as fully as you believe the Bible's account of itself. There is a vast literature describing the life of Muhammad that, from the Muslim point of view, proves his unique status as the Prophet of God. While Muhammad did not claim to be divine, he claimed to offer the most perfect revelation of God's will. He also assured his followers that Jesus was not divine (Qur'an 5:71-75; 19:30-38) and that anyone who believed otherwise would spend eternity in hell. Muslims are convinced that Muhammad's pronouncements on these subjects, as on all others, are infallible.
Why don't you find these claims convincing? Why don't you lose any sleep over whether or not you should convert to Islam? Please take a moment to reflect on this. You know exactly what it is like to be an atheist with respect to Islam. Isn't it obvious that Muslims are not being honest in their evaluation of the evidence? Isn't it obvious that anyone who thinks that the Qur'an is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe has not read the book very critically? Isn't it obvious that Muslims have developed a mode of discourse that seeks to preserve dogma, generation after generation, rather than question it? Yes, these things are obvious. Understand that the way you view Islam is precisely the way every Muslim views Christianity. And it is the way I view all religions.
Christians regularly assert that the Bible predicts future historical events. For instance, Deuteronomy 28:64 says, "The Lord will scatter you among the nations from one end of the earth to the other." Jesus says, in Luke 19:43-44, "The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you." We are meant to believe that these utterances predict the subsequent history of the Jews with such uncanny specificity so as to admit of only a supernatural explanation. It is on the basis of such reasoning that 44 percent of the American population now believes that Jesus will return to earth to judge the living and the dead sometime in the next fifty years.
But just imagine how breathtakingly specific a work of prophecy could be if it were actually the product of omniscience. If the Bible were such a book, it would make specific, falsifiable predictions about human events. You would expect it to contain a passage like, "In the latter half of the twentieth century, humankind will develop a globally linked system of computers-the principles of which I set forth in Leviticus-and this system shall be called the Internet." The Bible contains nothing remotely like this. In fact, it does not contain a single sentence that could not have been written by a man or woman living in the first century.
Take a moment to imagine how good a book could be if it were written by the Creator of the universe. Such a book could contain a chapter on mathematics that, after two thousand years of continuous use, would still be the richest source of mathematical insight the earth has ever seen. Instead, the Bible contains some very obvious mathematical errors. In two places, for instance, the Good Book gives the ratio of a circumference of a circle to its diameter as simply 3 (1 Kings 7: 23-26 and 2 Chronicles 4: 2-5). We now refer to this constant relation with the Greek letter p. While the decimal expansion of p runs to infinity-3.1415926535 . . .-we can calculate it to any degree of accuracy we like. Centuries before the oldest books of the Bible were written, both the Egyptians and Babylonians approximated p to a few decimal places. And yet the Bible-whether inerrant or divinely inspired-offers us an approximation that is terrible even by the standards of the ancient world. Needless to say, many religious people have found ingenious ways of rationalizing this. And yet, these rationalizations cannot conceal the obvious deficiency of the Bible as a source of mathematical insight. It is absolutely true to say that, if Archimedes had written a chapter of the Bible, the text would bear much greater evidence of the author's "omniscience."
Why doesn't the Bible say anything about electricity, about DNA, or about the actual age and size of the universe? What about a cure for cancer? Millions of people are dying horribly from cancer at this very moment, many of them children. When we fully understand the biology of cancer, this understanding will surely be reducible to a few pages of text. Why aren't these pages, or anything remotely like them, found in the Bible? The Bible is a very big book. There was room for God to instruct us on how to keep slaves and sacrifice a wide variety of animals. Please appreciate how this looks to one who stands outside the Christian faith. It is genuinely amazing how ordinary a book can be and still be thought the product of omniscience.
Of course, your reasons for believing in God may be more personal than those I have discussed above. I have no doubt that your acceptance of Christ coincided with some very positive changes in your life. Perhaps you regularly feel rapture or bliss while in prayer. I do not wish to denigrate any of these experiences. I would point out, however, that billions of other human beings, in every time and place, have had similar experiences-but they had them while thinking about Krishna, or Allah, or the Buddha, while making art or music, or while contemplating the sheer beauty of nature. There is no question that it is possible for us to have profoundly transformative experiences. And there is no question that it is possible for us to misinterpret these experiences and to further delude ourselves about the nature of the universe.
If you have read my letter this far, one of two things has happened. Either you have perceived some error that is genuinely fatal to my argument, or you have ceased to be a Christian. Please don't hesitate to contact me with any errors you may have found. You could yet save me the torments of hell.
LINK
What mormons believe cartoon:
LINK
Now finally if your a christian and you believe mormonism is obviously ridiculous please take the time to read the following completely by Sam Harris:
Since the publication of my first book, The End of Faith, I have received thousands of letters and e-mails from religious believers insisting that I am wrong not to believe in God. Invariably, the most unpleasant of these communications have come from Christians. This is ironic, as Christians generally believe that no faith imparts the virtues of love and forgiveness more effectively than their own. Please accept this for what it is: the testimony of a man who is in a position to observe how people behave when their faith is challenged. Many who claim to have been transformed by Christ's love are deeply, even murderously, intolerant of criticism. While you may ascribe this to human nature, it is clear that the hatred these people feel comes directly from the Bible. How do I know this? Because the most deranged of my correspondents always cite chapter and verse.
Before I present some of my reasons for rejecting your faith-which are also my reasons for believing that you, too, should reject it-I want to acknowledge that there are a few things that you and I agree about. We agree that, if one of us is right, then the other is wrong. The Bible either is the word of God, or it isn't. Either Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation (John 14:6), or he does not. We agree that to be a real Christian is to believe that all other faiths are in error and profoundly so. If Christianity is correct, and I persist in my unbelief, I should expect to suffer the torments of hell. Worse still, I have persuaded others, many close to me, to persist in a state of unbelief. They, too, will languish in "everlasting fire" (Matthew 25:41). If the claims of Christianity are true, I will have realized the worst possible outcome of a human life. The fact that my continuous and public rejection of Christianity does not worry me should suggest to you just how unsatisfactory I think your reasons for being a Christian are.
You believe that the Bible is the literal (or inspired) word of God and that Jesus is the Son of God-and you believe these propositions because you think they are true, not merely because they make you feel good. You may wonder how it is possible for a person like myself to find these sorts of assertions ridiculous. While it is famously difficult for atheists and believers to communicate about these matters, I am confident that I can give you a very clear sense of what it feels like to be an atheist.Consider: every devout Muslim has the same reasons for being a Muslim that you now have for being a Christian. And yet, you know exactly what it is like not to find these reasons compelling. On virtually every page, the Qur'an declares that it is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe. Muslims believe this as fully as you believe the Bible's account of itself. There is a vast literature describing the life of Muhammad that, from the Muslim point of view, proves his unique status as the Prophet of God. While Muhammad did not claim to be divine, he claimed to offer the most perfect revelation of God's will. He also assured his followers that Jesus was not divine (Qur'an 5:71-75; 19:30-38) and that anyone who believed otherwise would spend eternity in hell. Muslims are convinced that Muhammad's pronouncements on these subjects, as on all others, are infallible.
Why don't you find these claims convincing? Why don't you lose any sleep over whether or not you should convert to Islam? Please take a moment to reflect on this. You know exactly what it is like to be an atheist with respect to Islam. Isn't it obvious that Muslims are not being honest in their evaluation of the evidence? Isn't it obvious that anyone who thinks that the Qur'an is the perfect word of the Creator of the universe has not read the book very critically? Isn't it obvious that Muslims have developed a mode of discourse that seeks to preserve dogma, generation after generation, rather than question it? Yes, these things are obvious. Understand that the way you view Islam is precisely the way every Muslim views Christianity. And it is the way I view all religions.
Christians regularly assert that the Bible predicts future historical events. For instance, Deuteronomy 28:64 says, "The Lord will scatter you among the nations from one end of the earth to the other." Jesus says, in Luke 19:43-44, "The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you." We are meant to believe that these utterances predict the subsequent history of the Jews with such uncanny specificity so as to admit of only a supernatural explanation. It is on the basis of such reasoning that 44 percent of the American population now believes that Jesus will return to earth to judge the living and the dead sometime in the next fifty years.
But just imagine how breathtakingly specific a work of prophecy could be if it were actually the product of omniscience. If the Bible were such a book, it would make specific, falsifiable predictions about human events. You would expect it to contain a passage like, "In the latter half of the twentieth century, humankind will develop a globally linked system of computers-the principles of which I set forth in Leviticus-and this system shall be called the Internet." The Bible contains nothing remotely like this. In fact, it does not contain a single sentence that could not have been written by a man or woman living in the first century.
Take a moment to imagine how good a book could be if it were written by the Creator of the universe. Such a book could contain a chapter on mathematics that, after two thousand years of continuous use, would still be the richest source of mathematical insight the earth has ever seen. Instead, the Bible contains some very obvious mathematical errors. In two places, for instance, the Good Book gives the ratio of a circumference of a circle to its diameter as simply 3 (1 Kings 7: 23-26 and 2 Chronicles 4: 2-5). We now refer to this constant relation with the Greek letter p. While the decimal expansion of p runs to infinity-3.1415926535 . . .-we can calculate it to any degree of accuracy we like. Centuries before the oldest books of the Bible were written, both the Egyptians and Babylonians approximated p to a few decimal places. And yet the Bible-whether inerrant or divinely inspired-offers us an approximation that is terrible even by the standards of the ancient world. Needless to say, many religious people have found ingenious ways of rationalizing this. And yet, these rationalizations cannot conceal the obvious deficiency of the Bible as a source of mathematical insight. It is absolutely true to say that, if Archimedes had written a chapter of the Bible, the text would bear much greater evidence of the author's "omniscience."
Why doesn't the Bible say anything about electricity, about DNA, or about the actual age and size of the universe? What about a cure for cancer? Millions of people are dying horribly from cancer at this very moment, many of them children. When we fully understand the biology of cancer, this understanding will surely be reducible to a few pages of text. Why aren't these pages, or anything remotely like them, found in the Bible? The Bible is a very big book. There was room for God to instruct us on how to keep slaves and sacrifice a wide variety of animals. Please appreciate how this looks to one who stands outside the Christian faith. It is genuinely amazing how ordinary a book can be and still be thought the product of omniscience.
Of course, your reasons for believing in God may be more personal than those I have discussed above. I have no doubt that your acceptance of Christ coincided with some very positive changes in your life. Perhaps you regularly feel rapture or bliss while in prayer. I do not wish to denigrate any of these experiences. I would point out, however, that billions of other human beings, in every time and place, have had similar experiences-but they had them while thinking about Krishna, or Allah, or the Buddha, while making art or music, or while contemplating the sheer beauty of nature. There is no question that it is possible for us to have profoundly transformative experiences. And there is no question that it is possible for us to misinterpret these experiences and to further delude ourselves about the nature of the universe.
If you have read my letter this far, one of two things has happened. Either you have perceived some error that is genuinely fatal to my argument, or you have ceased to be a Christian. Please don't hesitate to contact me with any errors you may have found. You could yet save me the torments of hell.
Muslims follow a book whose prophet is an illiterate womanizing man of questionable morals, and though claims Jesus was not God, also claims Jesus was a prophet. Sooo... They believe Jesus was wrong about His claims to Godship but also a servant of God?
Christians believe Jesus was who He said He was, backed up by the support of dozens of precisely fulfilled prophecies well established to predate Him by 6-12 centuries, and four independently written Gospels. In all this time, no one has ever questioned His morality - perhaps His sanity if they found His claims too incredible.
The quran is rife with references all over about subjugating women and that we should kill the infidels and become martyrs, but it also says Christians are brothers and "of the book"... The Bible contains consistent references to the attributes of God, showing in general more wrath in the OT, and more mercy in the NT, but with prophecies and historical references to each other tie it all together.
From a worldly perspective, faith is closely tied in to heritage. This is very true today of Jews, Muslims, and we all know Christians have committed lots of "ethnic clensing" in the name of god. But there is no rationale in the Bible for this. Paul even said that Gentiles (non-Jews) are the "new" Isreal, meaning that the Lord will "graft" Gentile believers into the faith as easily as the Jews. The Jews may not all realize that they are chosen not due to an inherent superiority, but for God's glory - to set the example for other nations. To put His longsuffering and wrath on display over and over again as an example to us.
This is where the Bible's purposes run counter to the world's, and reading the Bible has a two fold effect. It serves to convict and edify believers and it also hardens non-believers. What would happen if I told you the day you will strike the lottery with numbers I give you, and the day you die, and you believed me?
Would you live your life the way you live it now? No. You would slack off and not worry till that day and then play the lottery. You would visit the physician every week for the last six months leading up to the day of your death, perhaps mentally counting down the years and months from the time I tell you.
Prophecy is for edifying. God reveals to us what we need to know to live our lives the right way. We should fear the Lord, and desire to serve Him for His glory, and our edification and purity, not out of dread and anticipation of His wrath.
One is from the sermon on the mount and the others are apostolic discourses which are themselves somewhat contradictory -- which one do you give more credence to when there is apparent conflict? I'd look first for an explanation that resolves the conflict though, but I don't have one now, so I'll take the position that the law is inviolate, although God can do as He pleases.
I think Romans, in particular 2:13-15 can be read in a different manner than the original, but be applicable to the current times and discussion. The difference is that the "Jews", or followers of law, are as the Christians of today, who think they follow a law and are thereby saved. And the lawless, the Gentiles, are others of different faith or none, who follow the same law, which they might see through different words or means in their own hearts.
I don't like challenging Christians. My time would be better spent challenging myself. But I don't like these positions, which I think are based on errors of understanding and propagation, which moreover lead to a lack of spirituality and recognition of that in the world. Many Christians would be abashed at the level of spirituality held by others in the world if they knew about it, and would be ashamed to count on a "get out of jail" card to see them through in that light; be ashamed of their pride and vanity.
Love Jesus, sure, and delight in his aid, but don't delude yourself into thinking that He, as God, loves not those who don't know or accept the name Jesus in the same way, though they live a good life.
Greetings,
Rom 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; This means everyone. God knows this because
Rev 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. God is from eternity past to eternity future. He has seen it and knows it all.
Jhn 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And the Father gave the Son All that would be saved.
Jhn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Thus Jesus is/has the key(s) to Heaven (and Hell).
Jhn 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. And those that the Father (God) gave to the Son (God) were chosen by the Son (God).
As for what was stated with regard to children? There are verses that point to the love that God has for Children. However, God has also Hated and Condemned the unborn and children. See Isac and Esau and many cities that were to be 100% destroyed. There is no one or many verses that hold God to saving All Children. I know of no verses that command that God be held to this. Who God saves is His Rightious Pleasure.
Children are not innocent. No one is. From birth we are filled with sin and we are a dead bag of bones and rotting flesh (spiritually). Only through the blood of the lamb are we able to be forgiven (made perfect) and receive salvation.
Let me know if I completely missed here or if I left something unanswered.
Peace and Blessings
ThePresence
Elite Member
- Nov 19, 2001
- 27,727
- 16
- 81
You keep beating around the bush and throwing in unrelated verses in what seems to me an attempt to muddy the waters.Originally posted by: Macattak1
Greetings,
Rom 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; This means everyone. God knows this because
Rev 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. God is from eternity past to eternity future. He has seen it and knows it all.
Jhn 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And the Father gave the Son All that would be saved.
Jhn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Thus Jesus is/has the key(s) to Heaven (and Hell).
Jhn 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. And those that the Father (God) gave to the Son (God) were chosen by the Son (God).
As for what was stated with regard to children? There are verses that point to the love that God has for Children. However, God has also Hated and Condemned the unborn and children. See Isac and Esau and many cities that were to be 100% destroyed. There is no one or many verses that hold God to saving All Children. I know of no verses that command that God be held to this. Who God saves is His Rightious Pleasure.
Children are not innocent. No one is. From birth we are filled with sin and we are a dead bag of bones and rotting flesh (spiritually). Only through the blood of the lamb are we able to be forgiven (made perfect) and receive salvation.
Let me know if I completely missed here or if I left something unanswered.
Peace and Blessings
I understand this is not something easily answered with a yes or no which is why most Christians I've asked this to simply stated that they do not know a correct answer. However you have attempted to answer the question, so let me post to you a yes or no question.
Jesus said no one comes to the father but by me, which means that in order to be saved, one must accept Jesus. If someone is born, lives a good life and dies in the jungles of Asia without ever hearing of Jesus and his teaching, is he doomed? Yes or no?
I'm not trying to attack anyone's beliefs.
I honestly want to know what the Christian faith believes regarding this question, and I have never received a satisfactory answer.
Originally posted by: ThePresence
You keep beating around the bush and throwing in unrelated verses in what seems to me an attempt to muddy the waters.Originally posted by: Macattak1
Greetings,
Rom 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; This means everyone. God knows this because
Rev 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. God is from eternity past to eternity future. He has seen it and knows it all.
Jhn 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And the Father gave the Son All that would be saved.
Jhn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Thus Jesus is/has the key(s) to Heaven (and Hell).
Jhn 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. And those that the Father (God) gave to the Son (God) were chosen by the Son (God).
As for what was stated with regard to children? There are verses that point to the love that God has for Children. However, God has also Hated and Condemned the unborn and children. See Isac and Esau and many cities that were to be 100% destroyed. There is no one or many verses that hold God to saving All Children. I know of no verses that command that God be held to this. Who God saves is His Rightious Pleasure.
Children are not innocent. No one is. From birth we are filled with sin and we are a dead bag of bones and rotting flesh (spiritually). Only through the blood of the lamb are we able to be forgiven (made perfect) and receive salvation.
Let me know if I completely missed here or if I left something unanswered.
Peace and Blessings
I understand this is not something easily answered with a yes or no which is why most Christians I've asked this to simply stated that they do not know a correct answer. However you have attempted to answer the question, so let me post to you a yes or no question.
Jesus said no one comes to the father but by me, which means that in order to be saved, one must accept Jesus. If someone is born, lives a good life and dies in the jungles of Asia without ever hearing of Jesus and his teaching, is he doomed? Yes or no?
I'm not trying to attack anyone's beliefs.
I honestly want to know what the Christian faith believes regarding this question, and I have never received a satisfactory answer.
I don't know. People don't believe in saying that much anymore, as if lack of confidence is a sign of weakness. ITs actually a sign of humility and openmindedness. .
If I had to say, it would be a "probably doomed" based upon the Bible. But we don't know when He may chose to be merciful - it is part of His sovereignty which is not revealed to us.
My one point of contention here is that I don't believe that there is such a thing as living a "good life" - at least not in any context of claims to "deserving" heaven.
Greetings,
Maybe there is no faith required. But, just like a movie, one needs to Suspend Disbelief. And I am very thankful that we only do this to the degree that we do with Evolution.
Immagine if the attitude towards Evolution, Big Bang (primo soup and such) were used in other places. Say a court of law where you just accept what just may be the best story. That might be how the innocent murdered another or how the guilty could not have committed a murder.
Or how about in corporate or personal accounting and book keeping, driving cars, building houses and office towers, etc.
It should not be based upon the best story, line, or idea at the time. If Toyota designed the safety of cars upon an idea there would be a lot of dead drivers. One must ignore a lot of evidence when one takes up the Evolution or Primo Soup position. There is a new theory out there gaining ground. Goes something like this. The chances of planet earth occuring as it did with life is say 1 out of 5,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 so naturally, there must be 25,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or so universes out there.
A christian scientist some 30 to 50 years back stated basically that one can design theories and such, but at some time they must be proven true. They can not go on indefinatly as 'theory'. His theory was that when we can measure the radioactive deacay from one heavenly body to another we will find that the decay is the same. That the decay will not be at different stages, etc. This was proven a few decades later to be true. Radioactive decay from one heavenly body to another has been shown to be equal and consistent (same rate). Which indicates that things originated at the same time not spread out over billions or millions of years.
Peace and Blessings
Do you deny the very concept of living a good life, yet proclaim yourself spiritual, but think that you might deserve heaven because you appeal to the right name of God?
ThePresence
Elite Member
- Nov 19, 2001
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Okay, that's fine.Originally posted by: busmaster11
Originally posted by: ThePresence
You keep beating around the bush and throwing in unrelated verses in what seems to me an attempt to muddy the waters.Originally posted by: Macattak1
Greetings,
Rom 3:23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; This means everyone. God knows this because
Rev 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. God is from eternity past to eternity future. He has seen it and knows it all.
Jhn 6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And the Father gave the Son All that would be saved.
Jhn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Thus Jesus is/has the key(s) to Heaven (and Hell).
Jhn 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. And those that the Father (God) gave to the Son (God) were chosen by the Son (God).
As for what was stated with regard to children? There are verses that point to the love that God has for Children. However, God has also Hated and Condemned the unborn and children. See Isac and Esau and many cities that were to be 100% destroyed. There is no one or many verses that hold God to saving All Children. I know of no verses that command that God be held to this. Who God saves is His Rightious Pleasure.
Children are not innocent. No one is. From birth we are filled with sin and we are a dead bag of bones and rotting flesh (spiritually). Only through the blood of the lamb are we able to be forgiven (made perfect) and receive salvation.
Let me know if I completely missed here or if I left something unanswered.
Peace and Blessings
I understand this is not something easily answered with a yes or no which is why most Christians I've asked this to simply stated that they do not know a correct answer. However you have attempted to answer the question, so let me post to you a yes or no question.
Jesus said no one comes to the father but by me, which means that in order to be saved, one must accept Jesus. If someone is born, lives a good life and dies in the jungles of Asia without ever hearing of Jesus and his teaching, is he doomed? Yes or no?
I'm not trying to attack anyone's beliefs.
I honestly want to know what the Christian faith believes regarding this question, and I have never received a satisfactory answer.
I don't know. People don't believe in saying that much anymore, as if lack of confidence is a sign of weakness. ITs actually a sign of humility and openmindedness. .
If I had to say, it would be a "probably doomed" based upon the Bible. But we don't know when He may chose to be merciful - it is part of His sovereignty which is not revealed to us.
My one point of contention here is that I don't believe that there is such a thing as living a "good life" - at least not in any context of claims to "deserving" heaven.
Me, myself as a person, I would have trouble with this question if I were Christian.
I'd have more trouble with the answer. It's beyond this person's control because he was never given the opportunity be saved, so he is doomed. That would bother me.
But I'm on the outside looking in as I am not Christian.
Thanks for your honesty.
Greetings,
There is nothing contridictory. Because I do not understand a principle of math does not mean it is broken or contradictory. Take accounting, it has rules that actually have no explanation and you are taught that it just is that way and do not try to figure it out as you can not, it is a rule and that is that.
Nont one iota or dot has passed. Nothing has been thrown out or discarded. However, things have been FullFilled in Christ so we are not commanded to continue them as they were cerimonial, etc. Burnt, wave, and friendship type offerings were about seeking Gods forgiveness and cleansing oneself. Jesus came to show us more clearly that we can not actually cleanse ourselves and that He is the real offering, thus those things were shadows of things to come.
The Jews knew it but refused it. The Gentiles had yet to learn it. That is why there is so much that does not point only to the Jews.
Peace and Blessings
Greetings,
That is basically correct. What Adam and Eve did is the original sin/disease if you will. Since then we are all infected. And not one of us is capable of performing the actions to save ourselves. We could save ourselves if we could perform the actions, but the OT is all about showing us that we are incapable of getting any where near perfect rightiousness. Thus we need a Scape Goat, Lamb for the slaughter, standin, something to take our place which God provided in His Son.
Peace and Blessings
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