Queen of Swords

Originally posted by Magus55
He created you with the ability to choose.

What if he created someone without the ability to choose, such as a severely mentally retarded person? How can they go to heaven if they never make the choice to accept Jesus?

What happens to people who never hear the gospel, who maybe died before the christian missionaries reached their countries? Do they burn in hell?

Queen of Swords

Originally posted by Magus55
If you don't believe in Jesus and his death/ressurection - you can't be forgiven - thus unbelief is unpardonable.

I don't know about anyone else, but I find it a bit confusing when you keep referring to this sin as "unpardonable" when it can be pardoned. All you have to do is accept christ and you're pardoned. To call unbelief an "unpardonable" sin implies that it can never be forgiven.

Just for the sake of comparison purposes, in your theology, if a man butchers every person on the face of the earth (except himself), is this a pardonable sin or an unpardonable sin?

Jayjay

Okay, so we are to God like pots are to potter. I'm just wondering, what kind of potter creates pots that he knows he'll break anyway? Either he's a really bad at making pots that please him, or he just likes to smash things for fun.

Old Man

That's a good question. That answer lies in that refusal to believe on the basis of reasonable evidence carries with it a present judgment on a person, so that he becomes "unable" to believe.

The bible presents the very capacity to believe (of a sinner) as an act of mercy by God, which mercy is held out to the ignorant and unknowledgeable, but when refusal to believe is continued in, perversely, then the mercy extended by God is withdrawn, and judgment follows - even in the present life.

The bible does not deal in hypothetics. And there is little value in starting down that road.

Queen of Swords

Originally posted by Old Man
That's a good question. That answer lies in that refusal to believe on the basis of reasonable evidence carries with it a present judgment on a person, so that he becomes "unable" to believe.

Let me get this straight - you are saying that if a person refuses to believe on the basis of reasonable evidence, that person is judged? Who gets to decide what constitutes "reasonable evidence"? Different people have different thresholds of skepticism or gullibility, after all.

What happens to a person who refuses to believe on the basis of unreasonable evidence, or on the basis of no evidence at all?

The bible presents the very capacity to believe (of a sinner) as an act of mercy by God, which mercy is held out to the ignorant and unknowledgeable, but when refusal to believe is continued in, perversely, then the mercy extended by God is withdrawn, and judgment follows - even in the present life.

What, precisely, would this judgement "in the present life" be? And if the mercy of god if withdrawn, was the writer of Psalms 136 wrong when he said, "O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever"?

Why does god hold his mercy out to the ignorant? What is so special about ignorance, that it deserves something which knowledge and intelligence do not apparently deserve?

The bible does not deal in hypothetics.

Please provide evidence for this statement, such as a verse from the bible which says, "This book doth not deal in hypothetics".

And there is little value in starting down that road.

Little value in whose opinion, yours? Why should your opinion determine what we discuss? And what if this road was the one that might lead me and other lost souls back to Christ?

Or perhaps my question is too difficult to answer? I can understand that.

Jack the Bodiless

I have yet to see any Christian apologist answer the question of why I can't choose Jesus AFTER death (except luvluv, who believed this was possible).

If I can be forgiven for unbelief and go to Heaven: fine, what's the problem? If I find that I'm still conscious after I die, and in the presence of a divine being: I'll consider this to be reasonable evidence.

...So what IS the problem? Nobody's going to Hell for unbelief anyway, right?

(of course, I know why Christianity doesn't teach this. I wonder if the Christians do?)

Magus55

Yes unbelievers go to Hell according to Jesus. If you didn't accept his gift when you had the chance, once you stand before him its too late - you aren't written in the Book of Life. Plenty of people would beg Jesus for forgiveness once they are standing in front of him and know their fate. That's not sincere - thats our purpose on Earth - to deal with trials and tribulations, specifically accepting God's gift or rejecting it - once you are dead you lost your chance.

Not sure where luvluv gets the idea that God gives you another chance at judgement. It's not biblical. Judgement is when your actions and deeds are put on the table so to speak. If you had faith in Jesus, he vouches for you to God the Father, if you rejected him, he says he never knew you.

Jack the Bodiless

That doesn't answer my question, Magus.

If I can repent 5 minutes before I die, then WHY can't I repent 5 minutes afterwards? Saying "that's what the Bible says" won't cut it. I'm looking for a REASON.

...Also, I share MrDarwin's bafflement about why finite sin deserves infinite punishment because it's against an "infinitely holy" God.

Why not simply use the appropriate words to describe this God? God is perfectly intolerant and perfectly vindictive. We offend God with trivial sins because of his intolerance, and receive eternal punishment because of his vindictiveness.

Why pretend that this God has virtues that he does not possess, or that intolerance and vindictiveness are virtues in this special case?

Of course, this doesn't apply to Christians who don't believe in eternal damnation. Nor does it apply to those who fully accept that the Biblical God is one mean SOB (though they might like to explain why they worship such a being). But it seems to cause severe mental dysfunction in those who believe God is like this AND that God is omnibenevolent, leading directly to the "psychopath problem": the befuddled Christian loses the ability to distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil, justice and injustice, mercy and cruelty.

Oxymoron

What a fantastic point, Mr Darwin. Do we continue to have a rational mind and free will in the afterlife? What if there is the notion of a meta-god whose existence can't be proven but can only be perceived by the believer. What do we do then? Can we "die" again, to go to meta-heaven or meta-hell? How far does this nonsense recurse? Can we conclude that for there to be One True God then we lose our free will and our rational mind in the afterlife? Hey, suddenly it sounds even worse than I used to think.

schu

How about answering QoS? You use the term "unpardonable" and then turn around in the next sentence and say that very sin is pardonable.

This isn't a sign of deep theological knowledge, it is a sign of word twisting. The only way someone can think that unpardonable can mean pardonable is if they have abdicate their reason. Which is exactly what xians have to do to believe the garbage in the bible.

You claim that we can't understand god and that you can't explain him! It is true that no one has ever explained the god of the bible that is consistent with the bible because it can't be done without the word twisting of the apologists. The bible is not only inconstant with the physical world, it is inconstant with itself. Only word twisting can make it seem reasonable. Only people who can believe that "unpardonable" can mean "pardonable" can make themselves believe the bible is anything but mythology.