Bubba

This whole thread beats around the bush way too much for my taste. A divine being would easily be able to give one proof that one was a true Christian that could be easily falsified.

E.G.

1. All Christians have a blue belly button full of lint.

2. Carrie and other former Christians formerly had blue belly buttons full of lint.

3. Carrie no longer has a blue belly button, nor is it full of lint.

4. Therefore the premise is false...one can be a Christian, a true believer, and deconvert.


From my own experiences I know that Christian is wrong.



My mother worked for the Billy G Evalgelistic assoc. for years, was invited to his personal Christmas party, etc. I became a Christian at the age of 9 and at the age of 37 I no longer believe that it is true for the most part. I was as on fire for Jesus as you can get. Today, I doubt most of the Bible. Go figure.

Christians talk about an inner knowledge or an inner peace. I am an Electrician that works in the service department of a lage electrical contractor. We service a buisiness with lots of Muslims working, as well as several Jewish oganizations.

I would like to know, Christian, how your inner certainty is any different from that of my customer/friend Mohommad or that of my customer/friend Levi.

In Darwin

Bubba

Infidelettante

JTVrocher
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I just can't let this pass without comment. Christian, do you have any concept of how insulting this is? To say that anyone who decides to leave the fold was never a *true Christian* is a tactic that Christians use to insulate themselves from the reasons others find not to believe any more. If you can convince yourself that we didn't really know Jesus then you don't have to deal with the truths we discovered about your religion.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And your baseless speculation that I am so motivated is not insulting?

If my speculation is baseless it would be because my experiance as a Christian who had used this very tactic against others was as false as yours. If you are insulted we are even.

So convince me. Have you ever passed the test in 2 Cor 13:5-7, for example. If so, please describe why you believe that you did. I'm not irrational, and I do consider these questions or I would not be here in this conversation.

That you seriously think there is some test in the Bible that will, after thirty years, reveal to me whether I was a Christian or not only reveals how irrational your thinking is.
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And before you think I never knew the real Jesus understand that I earned a BA in Biblical Education with a major in theology from a Bible college that was about as fundie as they get.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That has zero to do with whether or not you have actually been in a relationship with the risen Christ. Many of the faculty at Bible colleges don't actually know Christ. Seminaries are even worse ... it seems to be very rare that a seminary professor is a true Christian from the evidence I have seen. (Admitedly this is second and third hand observations on my part. I've never had even an hour of formal Christian education.)

How could I or you have a relationship with a dead man? My education serves no purpose but to point out that my experiance with Christianity is deeper and longer than yours and that my experiance is first hand not second hand or third hand.

Where you went to school has nothing at all to do with whether you actually know Christ.

I do not claim to know Christ. I claim to know Christianity and Christians and to know them better than you do.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is not a *quip* and no protestation of how much you respect intellectual honesty makes it anything but an insulting show of condescension.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How am I being condescending? I'm not saying "you're a liar" or "you're a really bad person because you have never known Christ." I think we are all really bad people, including me.

Look up *condescending* when you have a moment. Had you called me a liar or a really bad person I would not have accused you of condescension. You seem to have trouble with definitions. I'm quite sure I'm not the first to notice.

What I am saying is that there is a difference between a true Christian and a false Christian. The evidence you offer for being a former Christian illustrates that we have differing definitions of what an actual "Christian" is. Let's get on a common definitional framework so that we can at least communicate about the issue, unless you are happy with your incorrect assumptions about who I am and what I think.

What I am saying is that there are only false Christians and that some of them discover the truth and others never do. You have accused me of not knowing the difference between my experiance of believing in Christianity and my experiance of knowing Christianity is false. The difference in our definitions of *actual Christians* is beyond any *definitional framework.* I will take the word of any who says * I was once a Christian and now I am not* at face value. You will not. How can we agree on a definitional framework if you are free to call them deluded at best and liars at worst? If you are happy to make incorrect assumptions about who I am and what I think I am happy to call you on it.

JT

Respectfully,

Christian

Christian

Gregg,

I don't think it's possible to be absolutely certain of anyone's true spiritual condition except your own. But scripture is filled with the idea that both true and false followers of Christ exist, and that there is a difference ... a critical difference ... between the two.

And I still don't understand how making a distinction between a "true xyz" and a "false xyz" constitutes a logical error. Drawing such distinctions seems valid, especially if they are clearly defined and do not involve shifting a definition.

Respectfully,

Christian

Christian

Bubba,

I have no basis for comparison, since I have never spoken to Levi or Mohommad.

Respectfully,

Christian

wonkothesane

Well you have obviously never known the feeling of being a true atheist!

I was a Xtian fundie for years, and now, as an atheist, I feel far more at piece now than I ever did as a Christian...so maybe you are the one missing out on something???

- bryce

Christian

JT,

In what way is that irrational?

We cannot. He is alive.

I submit that there is a vast difference between experiencing “Christianity” (however you are defining that term) and experiencing Christ. Where you went to college or who you rubbed elbows with has zero to do with whether you knew Christ. It’s irrelevant data.

Then you validate my initial assertion on this thread. Former “Christians” never actually knew Christ in the first place.

In what way am I acting superior? I only claim to be more fortunate than you, not smarter or more experienced or more insightful.

If I am defining terms inaccurately, then please do correct me. I’m willing to use almost any set of definitions you care to establish in a conversation with you.

A rational opinion for you to hold, since you have never known Christ. As I told Carrie, that would be my opinion as well if I had never known Christ. Few things are as distasteful to me as intellectual dishonesty.

I have made no such accusation. I’ve only accused you of not knowing Christ ... something that you openly state as being the case in your last post.

A Christian is anyone who claims to be. OK. That renders the term basically meaningless for me. So I’ll again state my opinion without using that term:

My position is still that you never actually knew Christ (which you admit to openly), and that if you had known Christ you still would.

Respectfully,

Christian

Christian

Bryce,



Respectfully,

Christian

Gregg

But you just said, "I don't think it's possible to be absolutely certain of anyone's true spiritual condition except your own." Therefore, how can we define who is a "true" Christian and who is not? You say there's a difference, a critical difference between the two, but you can't define this critical difference in any way that can be tested, except to say, "A person who claims to be a true Christian and is still a Christian may in fact be a true Christian, while a person who claims to have been a true Christian and says he/she is no longer Christian was never really a true Christian."

And "shifting a definition" is something YOU have been accused of. No matter how much like you a former Christian is (or was), you are always different somehow. Now, you tell JT that perhaps you are more "fortunate" than he is. I guess this is a reference to predestination? Certain people are predestined to truly know Christ, and those who say they knew Christ but no longer do actually just "thought" they knew Christ, or are lying outright.

Of course, predestination seems to contradict the whole notion of free will, not to mention Bible passages that suggest that God shows no favoritism and that Christ will come and dwell with anyone who asks sincerely.

It appears from your post to JT that you don't believe anyone who truly knows Christ and lives in a state of grace can fall away. But the Bible does say it's possible to truly know Christ and later reject him and the gift of grace. I'm surprised you haven't offered this as an explanation for the existence of at least some former Christians.

Gregg

HelenM

In spite of what you said in the first quote above, the second quote implies that in fact, you do think the absolute term 'no-one', because in the second quote you said 'if you had known Christ you still would'. That's an absolute statement.

And I maintain that there are people here (and elsewhere) who are adamant in not believing in Christ now, that were you able to go back in time, you would have been convinced were 'True Christians' based on any measuring stick you believed valid, for assessing whether they were or not.

Helen

Christian

Gregg,

If the word "Christian" is impeding the exchange of ideas here, let's just avoid that word altogether.

My assertion is that you either know Christ, or you don't. Christ is either a personal entity alive and at work inside you, or He is not.

And if He is, that is something that it is not possible to lose.

Attach whatever label you care to. That is the difference between a true whatever-you-want-to-call-it and a false whatever-you-want-to-call-it.

Better yet, let's call those two concepts by different names so that I'm not accused of a logical error for claiming such a distinction. How about "this thing" and "that other thing?"

This is primarily a reference to regeneration, but yes ... also to the idea God is always the initiator in the relationship and He chooses to quicken some hearts to receive Him and leave other hearts to their own devices.

Again, I cannot judge any other person's true spiritual condition with absolute certainty. And I certainly can't tell you what you did or did not experience. Predestination is not an adequate answer to the issue, since scripture is very clear that God does not turn anyone away who chooses to receive Him.

The reason I ventured into this conversation was because of Carrie's lengthy opening post. Her description of her experience with Christianity was exactly what I imagine it would be like to go through the motions of Christianity without the fundamental inward transformation, without regeneration. I think it's very sad that anyone's experience with "Christianity" would be what she described. I can't blame her for dropping it if that is all she found ... I would have done the same thing.

That's a matter of debate. I'm a compatibalist ... I believe that our "free" decisions turn out to be part of what God has predestined from the git-go.

If I were a five point Calvinist predestination would basically answer this question for me. I'm not, and predestination only partially solves the puzzle in my mind. There are aspects here that I have no explanation for. But if you never actually knew Christ and you admit such, then it is not surprising to me at all that you no longer consider yourself a Christian.

Correct.

That is a matter of interpretation that Christians disagree on. I don't believe that anyone who has been truly born again can become un-born. So that solution is not a possibility in my mind.

Respectfully,

Christian