Interactions with unbelievers

@sonship said

However, I see two problems with this, practically.

1. Jesus presents us with a clear image of what it looks like to be in this state, but did not leave us any clear technique how to reach this state in practise.

The technique is HIMSELF. Since He is alive and available and experiencible He says HE HIMSELF is the way.

[b]"Jesus said to him, I am ...[text shortened]... NY whose lives persuaded me that I was on the right track to give my heart over to this Lord Jesus.

What you speak is not my experience at all.

I do not for an instant doubt that. Do you doubt that my experience is the basis of my lack of faith no less than your experience is the basis of your faith? What else do you expect? That I base my faith on someone else's experience? On yours??

@moonbus said
Don't take it personally. I reject 99% of what Christians in general believe.

For me, Christianity, I'd liken the sudoku game; everything fits when looking at life without conflict, or jigsaw puzzle, all the pieces fit together. Every other belief system has issues of explanation from start to finish and all points in between.

@kellyjay said
For me, Christianity, I'd liken the sudoku game; everything fits when looking at life without conflict, or jigsaw puzzle, all the pieces fit together. Every other belief system has issues of explanation from start to finish and all points in between.

So, it's an intellectual exercise of explanation for you, is it? A system which seems to you to explain everything gets your vote, does it? Especially if it proposes to answer the question how everything got started, that's your question to end all questions, isn't it?

Can you get your mind around an idea? That not everyone else in the world is like you. That not everyone else in the world has this same hunger you have to know or even care how everything got started. And therefore that the Judeo-Christian myth propagated in Genesis is irrelevant, because it does not speak to the longing that some people feel, because it does not lie along the path on which others find themselves, because it does not map to their personal experiences and histories.

@moonbus said
So, it's an intellectual exercise of explanation for you, is it? A system which seems to you to explain everything gets your vote, does it? Especially if it proposes to answer the question how everything got started, that's your question to end all questions, isn't it?

Can you get your mind around an idea? That not everyone else in the world is like you. That not everyone ...[text shortened]... n which others find themselves, because it does not map to their personal experiences and histories.

I believe it is accurate, and truth doesn't conflict with itself, so ...

@kellyjay said
I believe it is accurate, and truth doesn't conflict with itself, so ...

And I don't. That is why you and I so often find ourselves talking at cross purposes. Things you think of as settled, I think of as not settled. Things you think of as hard evidence, I think of as not any sort of evidence at all. Questions you need answers to, I don't . You think I'm not seeing things right in front of my nose, and I think you're imagining things which are not there. And so ... we have to agree to share a world without anyone getting burnt at the stake any more.

@moonbus said
And I don't. That is why you and I so often find ourselves talking at cross purposes. Things you think of as settled, I think of as not settled. Things you think of as hard evidence, I think of as not any sort of evidence at all. Questions you need answers to, I don't . You think I'm not seeing things right in front of my nose, and I think you're imagining things which are no ...[text shortened]... re. And so ... we have to agree to share a world without anyone getting burnt at the stake any more.

Didn't you admit that you don't worry about how it all started; you only care about what is going on now, as if the reasons for what is going on can be gleaned from ignoring the beginning from the end? Hard evidence is absolutely everything around us; the whole universe/creation is evidence it is difficult to miss unless you choose to.

I'm not asking that anyone gets burned at the stake, not demanding anyone get sentenced to anything, but I am warning that we are all under wrath for the evil we have done, are doing, and will do until judgment. Grace is offered through faith; that is the critical part of all of this the reason we are here, the reason we can think and understand, the reason the universe works, the reasons there is beauty in the world, the reason love is the supreme ethic, He who did all of this has a say in what is done here.

@kellyjay said
I'm not asking that anyone gets burned at the stake, not demanding anyone get sentenced to anything, but I am warning that we are all under wrath for the evil we have done, are doing, and will do until judgment.

What would you say would be a proportional punishment for all the “evil you have done” in your ‘three score and ten’ years?

@divegeester said
What would you say would be a proportional punishment for all the “evil you have done” in your ‘three score and ten’ years?

I would say we define ourselves by our actions; our actions allow others to know us, out of our hearts, our mouths speak, so what is going to occur is when judgment day comes, and God's Kingdom is about to be populated with those who were here; if God isn't in them now, they will not be allowed into that Kingdom then.

All of that means eternity is at stake, whether we have sinned in our lives or not; since all have sinned and fallen short, we all need a Savior. Since God cared enough to take on our sins upon Himself so we could be saved, and some of us don't care, in the end, what is and good will happen.

@kellyjay said
I would say we define ourselves by our actions; our actions allow others to know us, out of our hearts, our mouths speak, so what is going to occur is when judgment day comes, and God's Kingdom is about to be populated with those who were here; if God isn't in them now, they will not be allowed into that Kingdom then.

All of that means eternity is at stake, whether we hav ...[text shortened]... n Himself so we could be saved, and some of us don't care, in the end, what is and good will happen.

Have you ever considered the proposition that what you believe to be just punishment [of the kind you describe] is in fact profoundly evil and that a belief that 'everyone deserves" it is a profoundly evil disposition too?

@divegeester

What would you say would be a proportional punishment for all the “evil you have done” in your ‘three score and ten’ years?

What else should a sinless eternal God do for you to be saved from judgement beside become a righteous man who became a curse, becomming sin itself (an agony of which we cannot imagine), under both ignoble human torture plus divine judgment innoent and gloriously right yet pouring out His life in love for your reconciliation to God?

He knew no sin. He became sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Did you hear that? It is not just that me may be made righteous before God. It is that we may become THE righteousness of God in Him.

That is what it says - "Him who did not know sin He made sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21)

What more can God do for us? He became the Son of God under curse, being made a curse that we might be constituted "the righteousness of God in Him" .

He became a curse that you would be saved from the demand on sinners of His absolute holiness, sinless glory, eternal righteousness.

"Christ has redeemed us out of the curse of the law, having become a curse on our behalf; because it is written, Cursed is everyone hanging on a tree." (Gal. 3:13)

It sounds like you are saying "He should change HImself or recuse HImself from being the Judge. He should renounce what He is so I am not accountable. "

I suspect that you will respond saying that the programmed is flawed and not just for billions of other persons x y and z. But this could be your underestimating One who is perfect in omniscience. This is an assumption that it is impossible for God to have this level of knowledge, insight, awareness, and perfect justness.

I have not said everything in this post.
Nor have ai said something which has not been said before.
But I stop here.

Suppose we do not know everythng yet God examines us as to how we respond to what we do know has been spoken by Him?

What would you say would be a proportional punishment for all the “evil you have done” in your ‘three score and ten’ years?

Jesus appears to understand proportionality perfectly well.

He said of the Pharisees that some were twice as much a child of Gehenna than others.

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrits! For you go about the sea and the dry land to make one proselyte; and wehen he becomes one, you make him TWICE as much a son of Gehenna as yourself." (Matt. 23:15)

While I don't claim to be able to answer all of your objections, there seems enough in the NT to indicate that in spite of some unknowns the Righteous One knows about the case of everyone and proportionality.

Hope that God will be so stumped as to renouce His function to be Divine Savior and Divine Judge I would say are vain.

@sonship said
Jesus appears to understand proportionality perfectly well.

He said of the Pharisees that some were twice as much a child of Gehenna than others.

the Pharisees [...] were twice as much a child of Gehenna than others

So would that make proportionality = '2 × infinty' for the posthumous torture of the Pharisees?

@fmf said
Have you ever considered the proposition that what you believe to be just punishment [of the kind you describe] is in fact profoundly evil and that a belief that 'everyone deserves" it is a profoundly evil disposition too?

There is a distinction between good and evil and God is the embodiment of good, righteousness, truth, holiness, and justice. So no, I believe that as He judges He does so without flaws and I personally don’t.

@kellyjay said
There is a distinction between good and evil and God is the embodiment of good, righteousness, truth, holiness, and justice.

Do you understand that someone who does not subscribe to your subjective opinion/assertion [above] might see the vengeance and punishment meted out by your God figure as being just about the most evil thing anyone has ever imagined? I am not asking you to agree. I am asking if you understand.

@fmf said
the Pharisees [...] were twice as much a child of Gehenna than others

So would that make proportionality = '2 × infinty' for the posthumous torture of the Pharisees?

Maybe they get resurrected as one soul in two bodies and suffer infinite tortures in duplicate. 😉