Cipher Girl

Then shouldn't christians not go around trying to convert people. Potential converts would have a better chance of ending up in heaven if they had never even heard of Jesus.

Magus55

Considering Jesus is the most famous human on Earth, and the Bible is the most published and read book on Earth - very few people will ever get the excuse "I never heard of Jesus", unless you live in the Amazon your entire life.

Magus55

Works have nothing to do with being saved. Faith saves you, works are the fruits of your salvation. If a dying man repents on His death bed, and has faith in Jesus - Jesus will save Him, even if He dies 5 mins later. Works are important yes, but they come after being saved. By saying works are required for salvation ( which the RCC so loves to add to the Bible), you are lowering the power of Jesus sacrifice. Was His sacrifice completely sufficient or not? The RCC says no, since Jesus blood can't save you on its own.

Biff the unclean

How can you people worry about silly things like works v. grace when one of the main characters is going to die in the Harry Potter book that comes out tonight. Gee, I hope it's not Hermione.

kctan

Which jesus ? Which bible ?

There are countless jesuses out there & countless bibles out there as well.

Owning a bible does not equate to someone reading it. Neither does published means someone brought it.

BTW most famous as in who's view ? Your's, mine, their's ? I could name quite a few names as the most famous human on earth. Mohamed came to mind as it's the most common name on earth. Now why could such a name be so famous ?

I don't think I heard about your jesus before nor do I read about your bible before.

kctan

Now how did this double posty thingy happened ???

conkermaniac

Oh please...we're not even sure if he existed or not.

Magus55

Yes we are. Very few credible historians would doubt that as fact. Jesus of Nazareth did walk the Earth.

nermal

I thought The Beatles were the most famous people on earth.
Seriously, has anyone done a poll? Jesus vs. Buddha vs. Confucious vs. John Lennon. I'm not sure Jesus would come out on top.

Ed

lpetrich

Except that that is not quite correct.

Many people are brought up in other religions. One of the biggest of these is Islam, which teaches:

Jesus Christ was only a man, and not God or the Son of God or 1/3 of God
Jesus Christ was only one of Mohammed's predecessor prophets
Jesus Christ was not as great as Mohammed
Unlike the Koran, the New Testament is corrupted
Jesus Christ had not really died on the Cross -- he had some sort of fake crucified in his place
Thus, Jesus Christ had died for nobody's sins

Also, there is the serious problem that Xtian sects do NOT see eye to eye on various important issues, like how much literal truth the Bible contains.

In addition, as one looks backward in time, Jesus Christ becomes less and less familiar, and before 2000 years ago, nobody had ever heard of him, because he was yet to be born. Meaning that nobody in most of the 100,000-200,000-year history of our species had ever heard of him. Are the Cro-Magnon people of Ice Age Europe doomed to eternal damnation because they lived as much as 30,000 years too early?

And there is the serious question of almost-human species like the Neanderthals and Homo erectus. Which become less human and more simian the farther back one looks in time.