Mace

No offense to any, but Chris does relate this perfectly. We're taught all our lives that Christianity is 100% true, and that we'll go to heaven if we all stand about on eggshells.

It's very, very tough for a Christian to forsake his doctrines. On one side he has these people--with some of the worse examples even patronizing him*--telling him to leave it all and become a skeptic, a freethinker. Then, on the other side his family from Church is preaching fire and brimstone at an alarming and terrifying rate. It takes a great deal of courage and understanding to give up your inscribed-into-stone beliefs.

*Yeah, I'm guilty, too.

Thomas II

We all know what you mean because we all went,and still go through, the same process,
but the birth of TRUTH is what all this is about...
Have faith in yourself, not in arrogance but in honesty...
Open it all, and place all the cards on the table...and trust that the TRUTH WILL REMAIN WITH YOU, so have faith in the TRUTH...
TRUTH will welcome your questions because it will thrive in the LIGHT, while a lie will not...

TRUTH IS AWARE...FEAR NOT.

:wave:

Sheshbazzar

Half-Life has finally made his big discovery about what the Bible teaches concerning where the rain, (and all weather phenomenon) comes from. Obviously it wouldn't have been such an "interesting" discovery if he had been at all familiar with the Bible.
And your post indicates that you aren't very familiar with what Elohim is. By Elohim are all things, in heaven and earth:
Remove Elohim, (as if such thing were possible) In whom we live, and move, and have our being, and by Whom and in Whom the worlds exist, and there would be no rain, no weather, no earth, no heavens, no reality nor time, and no men to be foolish anymore.

Chris Weimer

I repeat my claim. I also now doubt your theology.

Sheshbazzar

Never a lack of doubters in this world.

Chris Weimer

This is very true, and for good reason. I'm sure you are included in this group - do you not doubt that Gabriel gave the only true word to Mohammed?

Sheshbazzar

Touché, A persons life is all about choices, and if we choose to walk in this Way, we are thereby indeed restrained from taking any other paths.
As Scripture says in a certain place, "This IS the Way, walk ye in it."

Chris Weimer

I think that was in the Quran somewhere.

Thomas II

The mythology involved in the Bible, specially in the beginning, is pretty amazing...It would make for a heck of a movie...said G.Lucas...
Say to yourself : "Now it begins..."
Have a great discovery...

Sven

Well, it does not happen often that I defend literalists.

But Half-Life, it isn't that easy. Of course rain can be explained entirely naturally - but as a theist, one can still presume a god behind these natural processes, who directs them. So although a god isn't the direct cause of rain, he's still an indirect cause.

Now, back to my usual position.

There are two counterarguments against the interpretion above:
(1) It isn't 100% literal any more (but then you only get into arguments what is 100% literal and what isn`t).
(2) An additional god isn't necessary to explain rain. The argument above just inserts one again because of the preconceived conclusion that a god is there and that the bible is 100% correct. Certainly not the best start if one wants to figure out if it's 100% true.