JPD

Any reading could result in a conclusion like this, hence those who spend a lifetime believing and then they realise that it is fiction. Those that you like to deal with in a convenient fashion by describing them as if they never really felt it deeply in the first instance. I find it amazing that you are able to tell this about someone, yet you are unable to provide us with reasons as to why we should regard anything that you say as having any significance.

JamesBannon

Provided you accept Calvinist dogma and not Arminian? We've all seen this argument before and there are so many different doctrinal position, all supposedly based on your holy text, that Christians themselves are confused as to what Christianity actually is.

Johnny Skeptic

Your argument is ridiculous. If God is good, he would portray himself as being good, but if God is evil and deceptive, he would not portray himself as being evil and deceptive. Paul admits this. He says that Satan has transformed himself into an angel of light. The rebuttable presumption is that if God is evil, it would be quite natural for him to transform himself into an angel of light too, and that if God is evil, it would be easy for him to duplicate anything that it attributed to the God of the Bible.

Do you have any tangible evidence that the God who is depicted in the Bible is still alive? If he used to exist, maybe now he is dead and the universe is self-sustaining. It doesn’t make sense for you to suggest that people use speculation and guesswork to conclude that they should accept a God whose present existence has not been established.

Spare-Flair

Biblical religion doesn't really demand tangible verification. If human beings make tangible verification by empircal standards a prerequisite of faith, then it's really not faith.

This does not however preclude the esoteric metaphysical or spirtual experiences that many faithful claim to have experienced, while whether an element of the imagination or actually real...that is a countervailing legitimizing force.

Johnny Skeptic's standards of legitimate authority are grounded in a completely different foundation or even rhetorical dimension than the one religious people are supposed to ascribe to ultimately and ideally.

The claim that God created the Universe and therefore has legitimate reason to impose such a religion upon his creation, is simply a de facto truth in Christianity. If Johnny Skeptic doesn't believe in that, then Johnny Skeptic doesn't believe in that. Neither does Spare-Flair really, but I don't exclude the possibility.

If we really want to explore this exercise in logic as it's stated, do you have any tangible evidence to disqualify that notion that God did in fact create the universe? That maybe super-dimensional nigh-omnipotent aliens were responsible? Or maybe this universe is all just a figment of yoru imagination? Maybe we are all living as test subjects in a bizarre dream? It's all conjecture and doesn't get us anywhere.

If you don't believe there's enough tangible evidence that God created then universe, therefore you cannot legitimate the precepts of Christianity and therefore reject the whole concept altogether, then that's what you do. But what do you have to disprove of that fundmental princple in the first place besides your own skepticism? You're just arguing that whoever made the universe has the right to enforce rules of their choosing. Okay so the Flying Spagetti Monster created the universe when he accidentally overcooked his special sauce and added a little too much garlic, therefore he's the boss.

The bible is the only authority on the authority of God. If you don't believe it's legitimate then the Biblical God is illigitimate as well so you have neither proved or disproved that God created the universe, you just don't believe in it either way. When I used to be Christian, I accepted God not based on tangible evidence, but that esoteric faith experience that I felt was genuine. Ironic that years later, it was the lack of tangible evidence and lack of faith experience that led me to pretty much drop my faith anyway. But that doesn't make the experiences of other Christians illegitimate. The only way to verifiably test the Biblical God is to test the Bible so you have to accept the Bible as a whole and test its concepts for yourself. IE: The scripture on tithing states that if you tithe, God will pour blessings upon you and you can test him in that. Try tithing with an open heart (how cliche and impossible for the cynic like me) and see if God really does bless your life. If you view the experient as a success and you really have been blessed and aren't skeptical of it, then there is your supernatural and esoteric experience. There's your theoretical chance for tangible proof based on the Bible. But if you reject everything altogehter, you have nothing to work with and this is a pointless discussion.

aa5874

The Christian Bible is certainly not the only Book that claims to be the authority of Gods. The Christians Gods,though fictitious, are not the only Gods that people believe in. It is claimed there are 1 billion muslims and 750 million hindus, these religions must have some authority.

Pascal's Wager does not take into account that the Christian Bible is totally fictitious, so all of the premise of the wager are invalid. How can one be expected to wager on Eternal Torment when such a place does not exist.

Belief in the Christian Gods is also undefineable. No-one can say with absolute certainty that the Roman Catholic, Jehovah Witness, Seventh Day, the Baptist, the Mormon, the Pentecostal and other numerous Christian Gods are the same.
Why does the Jesus of the Seventh Day forbids work on a Saturday?. Why does the Jesus of the Jehovah Witness forbids blood transfusion? The Pentecostal Jesus expects you to be full of the Holy Ghost. What really is Belief? Jesus can you help me? No answer!!

Pascal's Wager is totally useless.

Johnny Skeptic

I never said that I did.

I am an agnostic. As such, I would not try to disqualify a possibility of intelligent design, but I believe that the odds that the God of the Bible created the universe are virtually zero. However, the existence of a God or of the God of the Bible has not been what rhutchin and I have been debating for weeks. We have been debating whether or not we can reasonably know that the God of the Bible is good. If you read my previous post you will basically see what my position is.

rhutchin

The evidence we have is that contained in the Bible. If it is not sufficient to answer all your questions, then there is nothing anyone can do about it. If you doubt whether God is alive, that is fine. There is nothing wrong with doubts. If you are certain that God is not alive then you should act on that knowledge. If you have doubts whether God is alive or dead, then act consistent with that uncertainty.

You quote Paul as if you are certain that he has told you the truth or at least willing to accept the idea that he has written the truth. Treat the rest of the Bible in the same way. If you are certain that none of the Bible writers wrote the truth, then act accordingly.

rhutchin

You could act as an impartial observer and sort it out. Different doctrinal positions can result where one person considers some verses and ignores others (not necessarily on purpose) and another a different set. True doctrine would consider all the verses and be consistent with all verses. As an impartial observer with no bias to sway you, you can always test the doctrine to see if it accounted for everything the Bible says.

rhutchin

People do things for all manner of reasons. Religion based on emotion (deeply felt things) generally evaporates once the emotion runs its course (which can take a day, a year, a decade, or longer). The Bible says that the person whom God saves will serve Him until the day they die. My suspicion is that people lose their religion when something bad happens to them that they think God should have prevented. As in other areas of their lives, if they do not get what they want, they leave.

Jack the Bodiless

And, in my case, your "suspicion" is unfounded. Nothing unduly "bad" happened to me.

BTW, the Bible also says that those who were "saved", those who actually have "shared in the Holy Spirit" and who have "tasted the goodness of the word of God", can indeed "fall away" later. Hebrews 6:4-6 mentions such people.

Another Biblical contradiction.