@moonbus saidI've been thinking about this post; there are a few things in it worth noting. "The book" is a source of information. I think casting it out without explaining why is much like your saying I don't believe in eternal life without evidence. It at least should be addressed; to be fair, am I wrong? Can we talk about math without using numbers?
I could hardly disagree with that. Now show me that this immaterial aspect of any individual human persists after his death and goes to heaven and eternal bliss. I mean some sort of evidence, not quoting a book I don't believe in.
I believe we see the immaterial aspect of any individual when we look at what we call human life. Are we just chemicals? If there is more...?
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I could hardly disagree with that. Now show me that this immaterial aspect of any individual human persists after his death and goes to heaven and eternal bliss. I mean some sort of evidence, not quoting a book I don't believe in.
This is not an argument against anything I have taught in the forum.
Heaven as an place you have to DIE to be with God forever is not a New Testament teaching.
You remarked that I believe in Jesus because it gets me through discouraging times. That is true. However I wonder if you have yet experienced this:
Bertand Russell, an atheist mind you, said that there are two tragedies in life. One is to be withheld from the desire of your heart. And the other is to obtain it.
It is when you arrange your circumstances JUST the way you wanted them and you have gotten what you dreamed would fulfill your desires to finally realize you are still empty, hungry for something, you wonder at the tragedy. The desire of your heart was obtained. And you still feel "vanity of vanities". That is when you realize there is something deeper that you have to have. But you don't know what.
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Maybe that moment has not happened to you. I'll grant you that.
Read some people's comments. Ecclesiastes by Solomon is a good start.
You know Solomon? The guy with untold material wealth, seven hundred wives, in addition to that some three hundred girl friends. Okay, concubines. Smarts he had and wisdom such that his comments on all kinds of subjects were sought out from around the world.
A guy who collected beautiful women for himself like butterflies, a millionaire many times over, had religion too, wisdom like a real live ancient Mr. Spock.
But it all left him sick with the empty feeling of vanity.
No wonder Buddhism preaches it is all an illusion. They have their hands on some truth there. It is. Without God living within it is all a matrix or meaninglessness.
Then there was the immensely wealthy Queen Elizabeth the First who uttered her dying words - "All my possessions for a moment of time."
I was taught that Alexander the Great conquered more of the whole world then anyone ever before him. He died of alcoholism. I was told he requested that his hands be shown protruding out of his coffin. He wanted the world to know that he felt that he had NOTHING! - a drunken empty handed conqueror dying with nothing to satisfy him.
So moonbus, Jesus is not my teddy bear to comfort a sad little boy. Jesus is the one who stood at the end of the feast crying out that if anyone was thirsty they should come to Him and drink. Out of their innermost being would flow the Holy Spirit of God as rivers of living water.
He feeds something deep within that the world cannot supply.
And the world cannot take it away either.
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I could hardly disagree with that. Now show me that this immaterial aspect of any individual human persists after his death and goes to heaven and eternal bliss. I mean some sort of evidence, not quoting a book I don't believe in.
Its not "Pie in the sky when I die." Rather He's "Ham where I am."
And I would never even THINK to ask for what He offers - eternal life.
It would never even occur to me to have the imagination to request of anyone
eternal life. I don't think it would cross my mind to make a request of eternal life to anyone.
I am saying essentially, Christ is beyond what I would ever imagine to request or ever want. I don't want to go to heaven or anywhere else forever if I cannot have Jesus Christ within.
As it stands the culmination of history is not a lot of disembodied souls in heaven forever as a happy place. Rather I read of a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells and God and man are eternally united "organically" in an interwoven unity. I am foretasting the joy of Christ living in me now - today. I mean today.
By reading the Bible closely for myself I realized it was an error to think God is Someone you only can enjoy by DYING. The objection of this above was to me a strawman.
@sonship saidYou haven’t “taught” anything, you regurgitate what you’ve heard from others in your sect.
This is not an argument against anything I have taught in the forum.
I challenge on person come forward and talk specifically and credibly about something spiritual they have learnt from you.
@kellyjay saidOf course we are not just chemicals, I've agreed to that. There is no evidence that what more we are than chemicals persists when the chemicals fall apart.
I've been thinking about this post; there are a few things in it worth noting. "The book" is a source of information. I think casting it out without explaining why is much like your saying I don't believe in eternal life without evidence. It at least should be addressed; to be fair, am I wrong? Can we talk about math without using numbers?
I believe we see the immaterial ...[text shortened]... any individual when we look at what we call human life. Are we just chemicals? If there is more...?
"The book" is a source of information -- about what people thousands of years ago believed. People were very ignorant then about basic properties and processes of nature. It is fairly easy to get people to believe in such things as virgin birth when people don't know about ova and chromosomes and the elementary facts of fertilization. People then believed that a mans 'seed' contained all that was needed to make a foetus, that woman contributed nothing to a foetus other than a womb (a 'vessel' ) for it to grow in, like a field which received a man's seed. Well, they got it wrong. If they got it wrong about that, they could have gotten it wrong about lots of other things, too. Such as whether souls exist and whether souls persist after the death of the body and whether a zygote is ensouled at the very moment of conception. I want to see some credible evidence, not fairy tales from 2,000 years ago when people believed in all sorts of superstitious nonsense, including demons and witches.
@moonbus saidMiracles were as surprising to them like anyone else, it wasn’t as if such things were believed to be normal events at that time. You are only looking for natural causes in all events?
Of course we are not just chemicals, I've agreed to that. There is no evidence that what more we are than chemicals persists when the chemicals fall apart.
"The book" is a source of information -- about what people thousands of years ago believed. People were very ignorant then about basic properties and processes of nature. It is fairly easy to get people to believe in s ...[text shortened]... years ago when people believed in all sorts of superstitious nonsense, including demons and witches.
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@divegeester
You still haven't indicated WHAT is wrong even if I do regurgitate.
Someday explain:
"Regurgitating what another said is always wrong because ______________"
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I challenge on person come forward and talk specifically and credibly about something spiritual they have learnt from you.
Why go right ahead.
And when you do your head count either way, please tell me how this passages was CHANGED.
"That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the the dead, you will be saved." (Rom. 9:10)
Tell me afterwards how the number who wrote "Boy, did I get helped by sonship" or who wrote "I didn't get one thing from sonship" effected Rom. 10:9.
Tell me how your tallies effected what is written there in Romans 10:9.
@sonship saidIt’s plagiarism. What you do is take the ideas, words, ministries from other people in your church denomination and pass them off in here as being your own.
@divegeester
You still haven't indicated WHAT is wrong even if I do regurgitate.
Someday explain:
"Regurgitating what another said is always wrong because ______________"
You’ve been pulled up and had this explained to you dozens of times by several regulars here.
@sonship saidNo one will put their name down.
@divegeester
I challenge on person come forward and talk specifically and credibly about something spiritual they have learnt from you.
Why go right ahead.
Firstly there’s only a handful of posters in this forum, and secondly none of them recognise your stealing of other people’s ministry as “teaching”.
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No one will put their name down.
Firstly there’s only a handful of posters in this forum, and secondly none of them recognise your stealing of other people’s ministry as “teaching”.
Oh, I am so unhappy to hear these results Divegeester, I don't know what to do !!
A BIG "sniff, sniff! boo, hoo!!"
As for plagiarism, multiple times I gave you precise information as to who to report to any plagiarism you objected to - addresses, phone numbers, names, websites.
You never did a thing.
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Exscuse the typo of two thes - "the the".
"That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from [the the] dead, you will be saved." (Rom. 9:10)
That's what I get for usually copying by hand rather than cut and pasting.
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One thing I find interesting is that objections from opposite ends of the spectrum I receive when speaking of the church.
One side says that I am being nasty to other Christians accusing them of being in an organization of Satan, Very bad - cultish, elitist, exclusive and sectarian.
But the another comes along with shock as to how naïve I could be seeing church history through rose colored glasses of optimism ignoring obvious faults of Christian churches. - naïve, rosy, unrealistic, sweeping problems under the rug.
This is like - Damned if you point out historical failures in the Church / Damned if you speak positively about the Church.
Objections either way. Its interesting.