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Do you believe in a God
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so will do your gods. u believe that he can control time and teleport and do all the crazy funny things. humanity wil be able to do it.
I see no need to defend God; many people these days do not believe in him and will never no matter what. However, I do like debating these things because they tend to be informative and interesting to read. As for your above statement, humanity can already do some things that God can do. Humans can walk; God can walk. They can talk; God can talk. You're forgetting that humans are made in his image and can do wonderous things if given plenty of time to do them. He made a great creation and humans are fascinating (sometimes annoying) creatures. It will make no difference whether humanity can teleport from place to place at thought in the future or turn invisible at thought; humans will never be as great as God, I'd think.
"Put your foot where your mouth is." - Wisdom from my grandfather
"Paper or plastic? ... because I'm afraid I'll have to suffocate you unless you put this bag on your head..." - Ethnitrek
AC1: Wierding from Harvestgain
Also as a side note i've been reading the 'Da Vinci Code' what an amazing book
(Repost - Site messed up) And do you think it is truth or do you just find it an interesting read? I've heard that there are flaws in the book, and I've read an article or two about these flaws. I haven't read it yet. I am considering reading it. If I do I'll also have to get a book that contradicts it, naturally, to see both sides of the story.
"Put your foot where your mouth is." - Wisdom from my grandfather
"Paper or plastic? ... because I'm afraid I'll have to suffocate you unless you put this bag on your head..." - Ethnitrek
AC1: Wierding from Harvestgain
The dead sea scrolls are older than 800 years by far....we have also ound manuscripts of books in the New Testamant that date to ~50ce. These are the same as the Bible we have today (making allowances for differences in language of course). God has miraculously preserved His word, despite the many attempts of evil men to destroy it!
You say it is foolish to believe in God. How then do you account for fulfilled prophecy? The fact that Jesus entered Jerusalem on the VERY DAY it was predicted he would by Isaiah almost 1500 years earlier? How do you account for the restoration of the nation of Israel? The Jewish people retainign their culture no matter where they were? These and many more are unprecedented historical facts for which we have many extra-biblical sources.
Do not try to make man's sin and folly God's responsibility. He gave us free will, people will always corrupt His name and message to make a buck, but rest assured that they will answer for it.
I'd also like to point out to you guys that The DaVinci Code's author never intended for it to be a factual book, it is a NOVEL, a work of FICTION. It is amazing the lies people will swallow. Oh look more prophecy being fulfilled:
2 Tim. 4:3-4
For the time will come when they will not tolerate sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, will accumulate teachers for themselves because they have an itch to hear something new. They will turn away from hearing the truth and will turn aside to myths.
Give you life to Christ today, He will make you a new person, with the peace that passes all understanding.
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
in the end there can be only one
You obviously misunderstood what I said, since your rebuttal has nothing to do with my statement. Don't sweat it though - believing in things that aren't there and being intellectually feeble usually go hand in hand.
But Jesus fulfilled every single prophecy in the Old Testament about Messiah, that is undeniable, and supported by non-religious sources outside of the Bible. That's over four hundred prophcies many given a thousand or more years before His birth, all fulfilled in one man!
It wasn't liek a random guess of when He would come, it was a very specific prophecy.
"So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks; it will be built again, with plaza and moat, even in times of distress. (Daniel 9:25)
Some more prophecies given and fulfilled, look em up:
The future of the 12 tribes - Genesis 49:1-28
Ninevehs destruction - Isaiah 10:5-34; 14:24-27 (612 B.C.)
Egypt to be conquered by Assyria - Isaiah 19 & 20
Babylons destruction - Isa. 21:1-10; 47:1-15; Daniel 2-5 (539 B.C.)
Edoms destruction - Isaiah 21:11-12; Jeremiah 49:7-22 (550 B.C.)
Arabias destruction - Isaiah 21:13-17 (715 B.C.)
The destruction of Tyre - Isaiah 23:1-18; Ezekial 26 & 27 (332 B.C.)
Judahs captivity - Jeremiah 1:13-19, 2:35-37, 5:1-19
Judah attacked by Babylon - Jeremiah 6 & 7
Jerusalem would be rebuilt - Jeremiah 31:38-40 (currently fulfilled)
Judahs return from captivity after 70 years - Jer. 29:24-32, 32:1-40
Damascus would be destroyed by fire - Jer. 49:23-27
The future empires of Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome - Daniel 2 & 7
The fall of Babylon - Daniel 5:25-28 (fulfilled 539 B.C.)
The fall of Medo-Persia - Daniel 8:1-8, 20-22 (fulfilled 334 B.C.)
Jerusalems temple destroyed - Matthew 24:2; Luke 13:2
Certain signs would precede this destruction - Matthew 24:4-14
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
You're treading a very fine line FireMagic.
First and last unofficial warning.
"The greatest trick the devil played on humanity in the 20th century was convincing them that he didn't exist." (Paraphrasing) C.S. Lewis
"If a mother can kill her own child, what is left before I kill you and you kill me?" -Mother Teresa when talking about abortion after accepting the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979
Is that not, in fact, violating his right to free speech, Finwe? I am not saying that I support or oppose his views, but really he is just supporting his assumptions which he made earlier.
"Whoever controls the media controls the mind..-'Jim Morrison"
"When decorum is repression, the only dignity free men have is to speak out." ~Abbie Hoffman
"The greatest trick the devil played on humanity in the 20th century was convincing them that he didn't exist." (Paraphrasing) C.S. Lewis
"If a mother can kill her own child, what is left before I kill you and you kill me?" -Mother Teresa when talking about abortion after accepting the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979
Shouldn't mediators be unbiased?
Too much preaching here for me. Over and out.
-Let's all be ignorant!
Firemagic:
My argument was not that somethnig is true because the Bible says it. I was setting precedent. If the Bible said something very specific would happen 1000+ years before it happened, and it happened, if the Bible said one man would do 400 different things, and one man did, then I think the Bible at the very least bears further consideration.
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
There are limits to free speech. You overstepped yours, calling someone's beliefs trash and those who believe in them stupid.
"Put your foot where your mouth is." - Wisdom from my grandfather
"Paper or plastic? ... because I'm afraid I'll have to suffocate you unless you put this bag on your head..." - Ethnitrek
AC1: Wierding from Harvestgain
Actually, I find the whole idea of there being a god quite amusing.
I really cant understand how people can believe in "god" because of some book written thousands of years ago, I mean cmon - noone has any proof whatsoever that this entity actually exists, and even if it does - how come other people have other gods and they are taught (like us) that theres is "the true God"?
This is what I think happened:
"On a windy day, long long ago, a man was sitting around being bored out of his boots at herding goats all day long without any fun at all. Sitting there he tried to amuse himself by imagining great and wonderful stuff happening to him.
That night when he sat at home at the dinnertable he got the idea of writing down the little story he had grown in his mind during the day - just to have something to do you know.
As next day dawned the man was actually looking forward to go back out to his goats, as he was already spinning new tales in his head - one thing more wondrous then the next. So he spent the day there thinking not of his goats but of the grand world in his head where he was the center of creation.
As the days grew into months the story also grew - and he decided to call it "the Holy Bible" and himself "God" and the people his "Worshippers".
Years later, laying on his deathbed, the man handed the book to his son (who didnt know the father had written it) - the son read the book and was fascinated by this god-character so he shared it with some of his fellows who coied it, and they shared it with their fellows and so on..."
...until today - when people still believe in fairytales...
Very unprofessional.
If you disagree, fine, but don't abuse your position as a moderator. If I've broken any forum rules in this thread please use the mail system and we can discuss the matter.
If I said I believed the universe was created by an invisible chicken named Bob and showed you a book written 2000 years ago that confirmed my belief, you would quite rightly ridicule such a suggestion, which is exactly what I do with people who insist that fantasy is reality.
If religious people's beliefs stood up to analysis, there'd be no cause for alarm when people analysed them. As it is, they realise they've built their entire life around sheer lies and start to panic.
Not my fault.
Do you really think that God told the priest to set up a scam to tell people that they must be good and give money. Its called donations. God never said if you don't give money your going to Hell. God gave us 10, count them 10 simple tasks that he wanted us to follow as best as we could through out our lifes.
I believe what I want to believe about God. I believe that man makes his own desteny, and choices in his own life for better or worse. I believe that I should follow the 10 commandments as best as I should, yea I have broken the rules but God has not smited me yet, and I don't think hes going to any time soon. I believe that we all evolved from apes, God just got tired of looking at apes and some of them evlove into us. And heres the biggest one of all I BELIEVE IN GOD MANY FACES. What this means is that all Gods are all the same, My God and the Hindu Gods, and the Native American Gods and Spirits are all different forms of one God.
Even though Im a Christian I believe in all what I said above, because God never came to me and said their is only one. So Im some Hybreed of some sort. I believe that Jesus is Gods son, and only that. That there is some other big guy up there watching me.
Some of your are going to say that the first comendment says that God only wants us to believe in one God, but he never said he dosent represnet all of the other Gods, so if I worship some Hindu Gods, they are all the same God to me combind into one, so then really Im really worshiping God who only wants me to worship only one God.
Some of you are going to tell me that Im wrong that Im stupid, but its was I believe in and Im dead set to it.
O and about the stories in the Bible, stories change after years and years. Im sure some of the preist changed it to get followers but I dont care, an example tell us that God split the Red Sea. Really I dont know if God did it or not. But I do believe that Jews got across the Red Sea some how, maybe by boat, or by rafts, or maybe it was split.
THEMANMAN or Doctor WHo
NOOOOOOOOO..... THEMANMAN......... There is no god !!!!!!!
ppl created it to earn cash. and there r 10000+ religions made to do it. but u all want to believe YOUR ONE is right, it makes u better that others(that is what u think). u will deny it, i know but in todays human psychology they can even prove it. the need of being better, like the rat race...
in the end there can be only one
If I said I believed the universe was created by an invisible chicken named Bob and showed you a book written 2000 years ago that confirmed my belief, you would quite rightly ridicule such a suggestion, which is exactly what I do with people who insist that fantasy is reality.
If religious people's beliefs stood up to analysis, there'd be no cause for alarm when people analysed them. As it is, they realise they've built their entire life around sheer lies and start to panic.
Not my fault.
Show me such a book and I will give it some serious thought. Unfortunately, your argument hold no water as there is no such book.
The majority of the Bible was written well over 2000 years ago btw.
Please, analyse my beliefs in a civilised manner and we can proceed from there. You have yet to do anything but insult and contradict. You have not presented an argument, merely spiteful and angry statements.
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
But we know that isn't true as we have found manuscripts that are older than the events they foretell. These manuscipts do not differ from the Bible we know today.
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
Now that I think about it, we really do not know how many times the Bible has been "modified". You'd think something would get lost in translation these past 2000 years.
"Whoever controls the media controls the mind..-'Jim Morrison"
"When decorum is repression, the only dignity free men have is to speak out." ~Abbie Hoffman
Well...actually it says, (Exo 20:3) Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
(Exo 20:4) Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
(Exo 20:5) Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
Which I wouldn't see the point of that commandment at all if what you believe is true...
And personally...If I had your beliefs. I'd be scared outta my wits...Believing in a god that once took upon the shape of a babylonian fertility goddess that got the people of babylon to sacrifice their babies and use their blood for a ritual...
"Fear not death; for the sooner we die, the longer shall we be immortal."
Think about it for a second. Does it really matter if someone declares belief in God or a god? All that entails is that the person submits belief in a higher-power beyond the realm of control for that person. If you think about it, all of us accept such higher-powers, even if we don't claim them as God or a god.
Even the most "devout" atheist will accept things that are more powerful than him/her that affect his or her life (read: controls them). The weather is out of our control, for instance, and can have a very profound effect on our lives. Every reasonable person would posit that. Perhaps a Christian person would say that God controls the weather, but it affects the Christian just as much as the Atheist who believes that chaos theory controls the weather (or whatever). Both of those people have just as much control over it as the other -- none.
So why does it matter? It's not God or a god that affects others, it's religions that affect others. That's what needs to be evaluated--motives and powers of religions... not gods.
Again, we do know this. You are coreect that some things do get lost in translation, but the overall message remains the same. Some nuance may be lost as English does not have the sames tenses as Aramaic or Koine, but the message is the same today as it always was.
Linux is free.....if your time costs nothing.
It matters because thousands of years of needless wars - millions of deaths - are caused by peoples belief in the supernatural.
It matters because innocent children are repeatedly, consistently abused by the clergy. Young lives destroyed because of a culture built around turning a blind eye to reality.
It matters because religious doctrine is the number one killer of scientific advancement.
It matters.
I already said that religions need to be evaluated. Did you read my post?