Gamera

So?

History is a text.

I think you mean cannot be located in factual experience. Hate to tell you this: no part of history is factual. It's all textual

Gamera

[QUOTE=Johnny Skeptic;3894596]We have an imperical disagreement. Doing something to gain something (the essence of all nonChristian religion) is by definition selfinvolvement, regardless of the quality of the action.

Gamera

I hope you're getting it, and I'm glad you're beginning to understand the excellence of the commentary on the gospel that is the NT.


You're right. Love must be demonstrated and failure to do so shows lack of acceptance of the gospel. Each Christian must determine how to demonstrate that love. You can't decide that for them, though you seem anxious to do so.

No, it's my position it was a meteorological phenonmenon like thousands of others that happen every day. It was an example of physics in action. Nothing more.

As Jesus said, God sends the rain on the just and unjust alike. (I.e., the world isn't moral but random)

aa5874

I mean located nowhere, in any form, except your imagination.

EarlOfLade

Are you saying that a video recording of an event some years ago (which is history) is not factual?

Example: We have a great video showing Jack Ruby killing Lee Harvey Oswald. Are you telling me that this is not factual?

Johnny Skeptic

But your main argument all along has been than when people become Christians, they DO gain something, meaning experiencing God's love in spiritual/emotional ways. Jesus, Paul, and Peter said a lot about the wonderful benefits that believers will obtain in the next life. This life is much too brief for some people to be of any real value, and even a life of 100 years is a speck in time as compared with eternity. 1 Corinthians 15:14-19 say "And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable."

Do you believe in life after death or not? Do you believe that Jesus will judge everyone after they die?

It is impossible for any mentally competent man to do anything, whether physically, or spiritually/emotionally, that he does not hope will benefit himself or someone else, either at present, or in the future.

Johnny Skeptic

I assume that the average sixth grader is able to understand that James is saying that unless a man provides people with things “which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?”, and if a man does not do that, he is vain, and his faith is dead. James gave the examples of food and clothing. Food and clothing are necessities of life. While God has deliberately deprived millions of people of these necessities of life, many non-Christians have joyfully provided people with these necessities of life. I am not able to will myself to love a God who is able to prevent people from dying slow, painful deaths from starvation but refuses to do so. James knew that food is a necessity of life. Obviously you and God are obviously not aware of this.

Many non-Christians demonstrate love. Many non-Christians are much more valuable to society in tangible ways than some Christians are. What good is the gospel to people who have never heard it? Hundreds of millions of people died without ever having heard the gospel. That was because God deliberately withheld it from them.

The intent of a man’s heart is best demonstrated by his deeds, not by his words. The deeds of many non-Christians indicate that they are loving people. Some non-Christian police officers would be willing to risk their lives to save your life.

From a Christian perspective, there is no such thing as random. Surely you do not believe that hurricanes create themselves and go wherever they want to go, and that God is not able to protect people from hurricanes. God is responsible for the creation of Hurricane Katrina, and he sent it to New Orleans. Whether he created it last year, or originally created the weather thousands of years ago and did not affect the weather directly after that, he is responsible.

God created the bacteria (Bubonic Plague) that killed one fourth of the people in Europe. He allowed one million people to die of starvation in the Irish Potato Famine. God makes people blind, deaf, and dumb, Exodus 4:11. God punishes people for sins that their ancestors committed, reference Exodus 20:5. In the New Testament, God killed Ananias and Saphira over money.

Mark 14:21 says “The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him: but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! good were it for that man if he had never been born.” Revelation 9:3-6 say “And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads. And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.” Revelation 14:9-11 say “And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.” Such hatred could only have come from the mind of man.

Do you believe that God killed babies at Sodom and Gomorrah. Do you believe that he killed all of the firstborn males in Egypt?

It is my position that if the God of the Bible exists, he is mentally incompetent. Even Attila the Hun did not kill some of his own faithful followers, and he provided food for them. A God who tells his followers to provide food for people, but refuses to provide it himself, if not worthy of being accepted, or he does not exist. If God does not exist, it is to be expected that all benefits would be subjective spiritual/emotional benefits, and that tangible benefits would be distributed entirely at random according to the laws of physics. The best evidence indicates that God of not exist. That is because a loving God would be concerned with the spiritual AND tangible needs of mankind. Otherwise, he would not have created food in the first place, and he most certainly would not feed some animals better than he feeds some of his own followers. Galations 6:10 says “As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.” If Christians are obligated to be especially good to their fellow Christians, then surely God is obligated to be especially good to Christians too. A loving God could not possibly derive any benefits whatsoever from deliberately refusing to tell people about the Gospel message and allow them to die in their ignorance. Mankind most certainly does not derive any benefits whatsoever from God’s refusal to tell everyone about the Gospel message, and his willingness to allow millions of people to die slow, painful deaths from starvation.

Do you believe that the Devil exists? Do you believe that angels exist?

If the Gospel message is so good, why did God wait for thousands of years before he provided it to a select group of people? Why do you suppose that in the first century, after the death of Jesus, God discriminated against people who did not live within close proximity to the Middle East? If God does not exist, it is to be expected that the Gospel message could only have been spread by human effort, and that how many people heard the Gospel message depended entirely upon the prevailing means of transportation, communication, printing, and translation of any given time period.

Ignostic Morgan

:Cheeky: :devil: :devil3: Buddyro, it is Christians who hope to gain as a result of their goodness. Your idea of self-involvement is ludicrous . More theistic swill!:notworthy:

Gamera

Yep, a video recording is NEVER FACTUAL. It happens within a perspective. You don't see outside the frame of the camera, and what's outside the frame may provide what the facts really are.

Thus, a video of man praising God may seem to mean one thing. Pan back and if you see a guys in hood holding a gun to his head, then it means another. The meaning is never fully there because you can't videotape all the context.

This is basic semiotics. No text no representation EVER reveals completely. It always involves an agenda, a perspective. It always conceals something.

Gamera

History is located in texts. That's what it means to have history -- it means to have texts. Texts are not experience and are not facts about experience. They are texts, written for a purpose, and all have an agenda.

You simply cannot divide texts between "factual" texts and religious texts. The categories are meaningless.