Grizzly

Antipus2002,

Not to be nit-picky, but have you noticed the title of the discussion forum you posted in? Its called "Existence of God(s)". I can understand being burned out by a particular topic, but I hope that you reconsider. It sounds like you have tried to take an evidentiary approach to the question of Gods existence, and I'm sure that your findings would make for some very interesting posts and discussions.

But if you don't have the energy or time to do it, no problem. I hope you enjoy yourself on the II boards.

Griz

Antipus2002

Why worship? Well the question to me seems to be, why not? Or better yet, how could you not? Rather than get angry because God doens't fit into our little box that we have made for Him, far better to see how completely magnificent that He truly is and wonder in awe.
Of course at the end of the day, better yet at the end of this age, even non-believers such as yourself will worship Him. One of God's final acts in dealing with this universe is that He will make everyone bow and say, yes, you are Lord. Whether they want to or not.
Better to fall on the Rock and be broken, than have the Rock fall on you and be crushed!

Phi 2:10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
Phi 2:11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Antipus2002

Yes, you are right. I originally answered because of a post that I was reading. I will not keep posting here but it has been fun. I am one of those Christians that don't try and get people saved. I really don't care if people believe in God or not. My original post was in protest to the other Christians trying to package God and make Him sellable.

Thanks and have a great new year...

bgponder

Antipus2002!!

I beg of thee, O Antipus, do not flee!! Remain with thy Tyrant God, the fun is just beginning!!

Sounds anti-Christian to me!! Re Paul, Hebrews 13:7--"Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith."

It is one of your duties, O Antipus, to try and get people saved.

Peace Cornbread Happy New Year!! Barry

Optimistic

I wasn't trying to be difficult, but I'd rather listen then talk.

Antipus2002

As far as God being a tyrant, He just wants to have things His way, thats all. Don't you?
As far as saving people;
Sorry to say but that is just picking and choosing verses to support your particular bent. My only job, my only duty, responsibility is to minister to God, to serve Him, to be a bondslave unto Him. Thats it. I don't have to try and save anybody from anything. I think it is the hieght of ignorance when people try and talk other people into serving God. First they start with something like, "will you accept Christ?" not knowing that God will have no man "accept" Him. He has to accept you, not the other way around. The truth is that man doesn't accept God, God accepts man. Also if you do an exhaustive study or search on the foundations of the Greek words surrounding the choosing, you will find out that God doesn't want everybody, so He chooses. So all I have to say to all those who don't think that there is a God, decide that there is one but He doesn't quite meet their little puny human standards, etc, bully for you!! In a different setting I would go much deeper into the the word eklegomai, being the first aorist middle indicative, and on and on to bolster my side of "the choosing" but as Frank Zappa said, its hard to talk philosophy while listening to disco.

Grizzly

Hello Antipus2002,

Well, I'm glad you decided to stick around at least for a little while.

We'll try to keep the music down - but no promises.

[ January 01, 2002: Message edited by: Grizzly ]</p>

bgponder

Uh-oh!!

Sounds like an elect "from the foundation of the world" to me!! I think we got a closet Calvinist/Reformed/durned ol' C-P'ist, here.

RATS!! I suspected as such, but was hoping against hope.

Anyway, Antipus, you say it's me who's picking and choosing? Maybe so!! What's the diff, I'm hellbound anyway--let's pick and choose some more out-of-context-but-suggestive-of-admonishing-others-toward-salvation-as-Christian-duty:

Mt.10:38--and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.

You do realize that this is the Boss talking, right? And He preached a lot to try to get people to be saved.

Mt.12:29--Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. 30: For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.

I know, I know, it's got nothing to do with admonishing people to be saved, I thought that since I was in Matthew I would throw in this obvious antithesis to your tack--

Mt.28:19--Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations...

I realize this wasn't specifically directed at you, o Antipus, but gee those guys are all dead. Don't you want to help 'em out?

And besides, don't you remember the parable of the Good Samaritan? Mercy, Antipus, mercy. You are supposed to care for your neighbor as yourself, and you are supposed to care if we, the sick who need the physician, get some of Jesus' help, and you aint't helping things a bit by shoving this preoccupation you have with Yahweh's bloodthirsty power down our throat.

You, dear Antipus, need to go into your closet and pray, 'cause you got some 'splaining to do!!!

Peace, Cornbread, Happy New Year!! Barry

Bill Snedden

I'm sure that many of his Nazi stooges felt much the same way about Hitler, but it's certainly no reason to worship him...

Regards,

Bill Snedden

Koyaanisqatsi

My two cents...

What a load of unmitigated nonsense. There are no "facts" surrounding the resurrection, there is only the bible, at best one account retold by others of an event that only becomes a bodily resurrection in one author's
retelling.

What "facts" are you talking about? And don't for a second say the "empty tomb" or "Joseph of Arimathea," etc., because none of those are facts; they are merely alleged events by anonymous authors written decades after the events are alleged to occur.

If you're going to come in here spouting arguments from authority, you'd better establish that authority at the very least. Pretending that there are facts to study instead of cult mythology written by authors unknown thousands of years ago does nothing to establish your credibility.

But then, you don't care about that, right? You're not here to defend your god or youself, you're just here to....to....what are you here for again?

Not that I mind, I just prefer to debate someone who has some modicum of purpose; especially since that purpose is fairly clear by their posts.

And when analyzing ancient Middle Eastern warrior-deity cult mythology, almost no degree of probability, other than getting some of the towns right.

Unless you care to present this mountain of evidence you've studied in such an objective manner as you imply?

Which eyewitnesses would you be referring to? Not a single one of the authors of those stories was an eyewitness to the event.

Ok, let's. We have a fantastic, cult-oriented mythology about a god/son of a god who comes to earth in flesh in order to be crucified as a necessary sacrifice to himself/his father in order to pay for all of our crimes.

Setting aside the irrefutable fact that such a scenario is both impossible, ludicrous and irrefutable proof of an unjust action, we have the further claims that this god/son of a god somehow died (apparently his flesh was nothing more than a meat puppet for him to dance around in) and is then later found missing from his tomb; we know this from the first story because there is some guy sitting in the tomb who tells the mourners that Jesus is no longer there.

No one questions who this guy is or what the hell he's done with the body or even why the hell he's sitting in the tomb.

Where's our sliding scale of probability on resurrection so far?

Keep in mind that this story is not told first hand by the author, even though the author implies that it is being told first hand.

Also keep in mind that in this first story, Jesus is not said to have resurrected bodily; that the resurrection is only spiritual.

So, I ask, where's the scale of probability that this event factually occurred so far?

Zero.

Funny, most of us in here and those atheists and agnostics and the millions of people who are not part of the christian cult throughout the world have the exact same qualification that you do and not a single one of us has come away with anything remotely ludicrous as your conclusion, based on the exact same literature and the exact same amount of rigorous study.

So how is it that you read all of this mythological nonsense and came away with, "Yep! It's all true. Magical fairy god kinds exist and trifurcate in order to kill themselves as a necessary sacrifice of themselves to themselves! Probability is HIGH?"

I do not believe you in the slightest. IMO, it is not possible to read those stories and conclude that an anthropomorphic fairy god king trifurcated into flesh in order to kill himself as a sacrifice to himself without a preconceived belief in the veracity of the stories.

Not possible and if "probability" is your guide, there is no level of probability that such events occurred that could allow for you to arrive at any other conclusion than ours.

Forgive me, but no one is interested in your reason for believing, since no one ever needs any reasons for believing something. Belief in something fantastical is pointless to any discussion about
whether something fantastical actually exists.

But then, this thread isn't about that either, so, moot.

Far from it. The claim that your god exists and is a "just" and "good" being is indeed on trial here. Your proclamations from assumed authority do not serve to change that fact.

So either defend your concept of god or don't post here (meaning this particular thread), since that is the topic at hand.

How so? According to your theology, mankind was already found guilty, sentenced, punished and then the debt paid. Yet, none of us are birthed directly into paradise--the place we were banished from due to Adam's crime that Jesus paid for--so if your beliefs are factually true, then it is indeed god who has some explaining to do, yes?

Accepting on blind faith, as you are, that such a ridiculous being factually exists, what you've just stated means that there is no such thing as free will or morality or "right" and "wrong;" there is only irrational, dictatorial decree and action by a being that has no accountability.

The only retort to this observation would be to claim something like, "But that's ok, because what god wants is love and what god is is just and good," etc., etc., etc., which is exactly what we're debating from his actions and his words.

Unless you just don't care what god is and what his actions entail, in which case, again, IMO, you should simply bow out of the discussion.

No, that is by no means the truth; that is your baseless declaration that could not have come, IMO, as the result of careful study of "all sides" as you claimed.


(edited for tonal adjustment - Koy)

[ January 04, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>