Kosh

But what he's getting at is that there are better ways to spread it....

Edit: THere WOULD if YHWH existed.

seebs

Maybe there are.

But the question is not whether there are better ways. The question is "does it matter".

There are better ways to get health care to people than what we use.

But the question that Johnny asked was "why does it matter that anyone hears the Gospel".

It doesn't matter whether we could do better; that wasn't the question raised. The question is whether, if you can't do a job perfectly, it matters whether you do it at all.

Johnny Skeptic

That is completely false. The texts say that Jesus and the disciples frequently used tangible miracles in order the help build the Christian Church. In the New International Version of the Bible, John 10:37-38 say "Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, BELIEVE IN THE MIRACLES [emphasis mine] that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father." The verses cite "tangible" evidence of Jesus' power. Acts 14:3 says "So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who CONFIRMED the message of his grace by enabling them to do MIRACULOUS SIGNS AND WONDERS." Matthew 4:24 says "And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them." Many Christians place great emphasis upon the supposed 500 eyewitnesses and other eyewitnesses. Do you?

If you discount miracles in the Bible, what is left? Subjective spiritual/emotional experiences? The very first verse in the Bible is a miracle. It says "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Does that miracle eliminate your faith?

Why would you ever want to know if there is actually a government in Washington, D.C.? Why did God tell Moses "I will show pharoah what I can do"? The texts say that one day Christians will not have to rely upon faith, so your argument is ridiculous. Doubt is not a good thing, but you are forced to defend it because you believe that God will provide you with a comfortable eternal life, a promise which by the way God has never made in public. You only have the word of a few Bible writers that God has promised believers a comfortable eternal life. Why in the world do you think that people have made up so many religions? They want a comfortable eternal life just like you do, and ultimately, no follower of any religion could care less which being provides him with eternal comfort as long as it is available. If you had cancer, would you care who provides you with a cure? Of course not.

John 20:29 says "Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed," but why do you believe that he said that? If he did, then will you please explain Acts 14:3, which says "So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who CONFIRMED the message of his grace by enabling them to do MIRACULOUS SIGNS AND WONDERS." Those supposed events occured AFTER Jesus died.

You are trying to divert attention away from the time of Jesus and the disciples, but it is quite important for you to reasonably establish that Jesus performed miracles. Otherwise, all that you have left is a being who had the power to rise from dead. There is no logical correlation that can be made between the ability to rise from the dead and goodness. If Elvis Presley rose from the dead and said that he died for the sins of mankind, would you believe him just because he had the power to rise from the dead? Well of course you wouldn't. You would require him to show you that he was compassionate in tangible ways. What evidence do you have that Jesus was compassionate in tangible ways?

As I have told you before, I am quite pleased whenever I can get a Christian to defend his beliefs by using only spiritual/emotional experiences. Just so I understand you correctly, are you saying that when you proselytize non-believers, the only evidence that you give them is your spiritual/emotional experiences? If so, what if they ask what distinguishes your spiritual/emotional experiences from those of the followers of other religions?

achristianbeliever

I really really don't care that he did do it at times in the Bible. The question is why isn't he showing to every skeptic who demands it of him? And I'm sorry but the Bible clearly shows Jesus won't show miracles simply because someone tells him to.

Have you read Matthew 27? Jesus is told if he takes himself down off that cross the people will believe in him. Clearly Jesus didn't do it and the threat of "they won't believe in him if he doesn't" isn't good enough to demand miracles of him. I really don't care about the times Jesus has done miracles cause he clearly won't do it every time simply because sometimes says they will only believe in him if he does. So again the question is not why does Jesus not show miracles to everyone because its clearly Biblical that he won't do it for everyone the question is what makes you so special that you should demand miracles of him when there are people like me who don't need it? Not to mention your indication of even if he does do a miracle you won't necessarily love him and worship him so he's got even less reason to do it.

I'm Canadian so the governmental situation in America is not that important to me.

But did God do it with the intention of making pharoah a follower? No he did it to free his people. Besides pharoah believed in Gods anyway. Trying to get pharoah to worship or love him had nothing to do with it.

promise of an eternal life is not why I became a Christian. It was to have my sins forgiven. I've said this before in another thread and you said you didn't believe me so I'm not gonna bother pushing the issue.

So you've met every single Christian in the world and knew each of them long enough to come to the conclusion of each of their motivations? Wow your committed to your work.

Did they do it simply because people told them to? No so its irrelevant to the question of why God doesn't do it for every skeptic who demands it of him.

Your moving so far away from anything that I've said. When did I ever equate resurrection with goodness? I do find a correlation between his death and goodness. I find God good for different reasons not necessarily because he performed miracles of healing or rose from the dead.

Actually that's a pretty darn good reason for me to take him at his word. Good thing Elvis hasn't risen from the dead otherwise I'd be really conflicted.

He created me. That's good enough for me. And don't ask me to prove that he created me cause that's not what I'm even trying to do in this thread.

Happy to oblige although I had no idea this thread was meant to prove Christianity I thought it was merely to come up with a reason why God may not be revealing his message to everyone.

Depends on the circumstances. Am I expected to speak about God in the exact same way all the time? Just because I may only be speaking of spiritual or emotional in this thread or even in this forum doesn't mean I do the same thing with ever single non-believer.

Again depends on the circumstances. I've spoken to non-believers from all over the world and trust me you cannot use the same reasoning on a non-believer from North America as you can from someone say from Asia. Again I don't understand what witnessing to non-believers has to do with why God doesn't give his message to everyone.

Plognark

Since you've missed the point, I'll try to give an analogy to clear it up:

A Christian and a Muslim are both trying to convert a non-believer.

Both the Christian and Muslim only use their spiritual/emotional experiences to try and win over the non-believer.

What is there to distinguish the evidence of either believer as being more compelling than the other?

achristianbeliever

Irrelevant. It assumes that all that determines whether someone will or will not follow a certain faith is the tangible or emotional evidence of either side.

You assume that every single person is saying, "I will either become a muslim or a Christian by comparing what and how many miracles either side has performed". I'm sorry but that's not the case. I've met many people who already believed in miracles before they heard the Christian faith. When they eventually did hear of the Christian faith they thought the miracles were no more or less amazing than the miracles they already believed in. And yet they became Christians. So in that case the miracles had nothing to do with whether or not they would follow Christianity.

Johnny Skeptic

What are those reasons?

So to you, the abilities of a given being determines how good he is, right? Following your same line of reason, if you had been alive in say 75 A.D., and a jet plane landed, you would worship the pilot if he claimed to be a God, right? Many if not most people living in ancient times would have believed that anyone possessing today's technology was a God. The universe is old, vast, and complex, and it is full of possibilities. Who knows what abilities alien beings might possess, including the ability to simulate death and appear to have risen from the dead? Such aliens need not necessarily be good. Whether a God or a powerful alien being, and it would be impossible to distinguish between the two, there is no logical correlation that can be made between creative ability and goodness. Creative ability has to do with physics, nothing else.

So if you had been born with serious birth defects and died a few weeks after childbirth, that would have been good enough for you, right? In other words, God has no tangible responsibilities to his followers in this life other than creating them, right?

That is true, but it is common for side-topics to develop in threads, just like if you were discussing Christianity with an unbeliever at a park. If you wish, I will start a new thread and we can discuss why you are Christian.

What I want to know is when you use evidence other than spiritual/emotional experiences, what evidence do you use? Based upon some of your previous posts, it seems to me that you put little emphasis upon tangible miracles.

If you wish, I will ask you my question in a new thread. How about it? The question that I would like to ask you the most is what gives God the right determine what is right and what is wrong? Again, if you wish, I will ask you my question in a new thread. Actually, right after I make this post, I will start a new thread that will be titled 'What gives God the right to determine what is right and what is wrong'?

Noggin

I would like to respond to achristianbeliever

Taken from this most excellent website created and annotated by Lewis Loflin:

http://www.sullivan-county.com/news/mine/

The Bible is a book of contradictions written by various converts' decades after Jesus' death and fought over for about another 350 years. Only when a Roman emperor by coercion and sword did they get an official agreement. But the question remains: if the Bible is the "inerrant" word of God than why all the disagreement and use of terror?

Noggin observes: If god were god and truly omni-max, he should be able to provide his followers/worshippers with a perfect diction as to how he is or is not. The fact that so much confusion and error is associated with god, jesus, mary, and the holy spirit creates an aura of ungodliness behind christianity... or at least should spur one on to investigate what it is they are devoting one's life to.

Mr. Loflin's comments continue (henceforth in italics):
You've never even seen the autographs (originals) of the 27 books in the New Testament. Nobody today has. The earliest copies of those books we possess are centuries older that the originals. Like it or not, you have to take the say-so of the Catholic Church that in fact those copies are accurate as well as her decision that those 27 books are the inspired canonical New Testament Scriptures.

Noggin observes: Feeling confident in your bible? I'm not. This is the reason why I pushed onward to find out just what I was basing my faith in. Here is where we find the 4 main christian factions at around 300 a.d. In utter chaos. And Constantine was going to unify them all...

1. Jewish Christianity (Ebionites) was a sect of Judaism and this is the church Jesus founded.
2. Gnostic Christianity was wiped out by heresy hunters but has revived.
3. Pauline Christianity is what we have today and has little resemblance to anything Jesus taught.
4. Unitarian Churches also existed (Arian heresy).

Noggin observes: All 4 of these belief structures contradicted each other and created deep schisms that went unresolved for eons. Enter the council of Nicaea, where emporers got down to brass tacks:

325 AD - Constantine convenes the Council of Nicaea in order to develop a statement of faith that can unify the church. The Nicene Creed is written, declaring that "the Father and the Son are of the same substance" (homoousios). Emperor Constantine who was also the high priest of the pagan religion of the Unconquered Sun presided over this council.

Noggin observes: Constantine was eventually killed for this attempt of unification. But by and large, this council is responsible for the official deification of your Jesus.


According to the Encyclopedia Britannica:
"Constantine himself presided, actively guiding the discussions and personally proposed the crucial formula expressing the relationship of Christ to God in the creed issued by the council, `of one substance with the Father'."

Different schools of thought were developed by the 4th century. In Antioch, literal interpretation of Scripture was emphasized, putting the writings in a historical context. Arius, a native Libyan, went to school in Antioch. He argued that the Father alone is true God, and Jesus was not God. Since Jesus was created by God, there would be a time when Jesus did not exist and Arius used Proverbs 8:22 and John 14:28 (the Father is greater than I) as his proof text. In Alexandria, Egypt, allegorical (mystical) interpretation was taught and Alexandrians could then spiritualize the text so they could explain away (make excuses, reject reason) any unwanted literal reference by claiming it was allegorical. They both relied on the Gnostic John 1:1 written by a Greek around 100 CE. Much of their philosophy was based mainly on Plato and Egyptian paganism. Alexander of Alexandria issued a statement that Christ was homoousios (same substance) to describe the relationship between Son and Father and thus Jesus was also the Father or God come to earth as a man. Arius thought that was dangerously close to heresy and plain stupid, so he said that the Father alone is true God more in line with reason and the content of the Bible. This controversy was tearing the church apart, so Constantine issued an invitation to settle this dispute at the Council of Nicaea.

Thus this council brought about the finality once and for all where your jesus became god.

Hope that helps.

Noggin