And now to piss eveyone off

You didn’t get what I said in the first place… Because we fell if he tried to reunite us to himself (live in Heaven, be with God, etc.) the very fact that he is a good God and that no evil can stand before him would destroy us… He is a good God but, in essence, his hands are tied because man fell in the Garden… A cruel, merciless God would try to reunite us with himself now, but that in the end would condemn us to hell anyways…

Jermo, the best example I can think of to answer what you are describing is that God basically can watch the big picture movie… He can go anywhere forward and backward in time, stop and any part and replay it… But no matter how much he tells that person “Don’t pull that trigger, you have a wife and kids at home!” He alas is watching a movie he in the end cannot control… Most view God as having the ability to take over our lives and get us on the right track 100% of the time but if he did we would be no more then robots on his stage… We in the end control our own destiny’s he can only try and encourage us to go after him… He handed the earth’s domain over to man (Gen. 1:26 I believe is the scripture that states that and Psalms 13?:??) man handed it to satan and God cannot get it back unless someone can accept his plan of redemption… Not because he wouldn’t do it with a snap of his finger but because if he snapped his finger he would destroy all of us… I consider what he has done mercy…

GG

All lovely speculation. My question is, how do you know ANY of this?

Hehe, you don’t know the meaning of speculation:
Speculative reason or pure reason is theoretical (or logical, deductive) thought (sometimes called theoretical reason), as opposed to practical (active, willing) thought

I don’t theorize about what I am talking about… That would require someone to not believe in what he is hypothesizing.  How do I know this is true? Faith, mentioned that before in previous threads, used it here in this thread as disclaimer… I understand that this in the end of proving it by any educated method “Christianity” still requires at best a thread of faith to hold… If you want it to be in a completely acceptable system that can be proven, I respect your decision… The difference is I have read the word of God (Bible) and know what it says about the subject you brought up (I would have to search to find every scripture to support them, I only know them by paraphrase) so when you assumed something about this “flawed” system I post only to show what the “system” says about itself… That is where I reserve the right to “speculate” as only to show a reasonable and logical solution to what we call humanity…

GG

Heh. Yeah, I know what the Bible says on the subject too - I went to Bible College for three years and got a Theology degree. For me, it just doesn’t wash.

Very well, I respect your stance… Not for the bible degree though, merely on the fact of how far you have delved into the subject…

we cannot be tempted to virtue, only to vice God would rather woo us to virtue through glimpses of our role in eternity
God has given us a means to reunite and regardless of the month Jesus is still that means
God could reveal himself and have us worship out of fear but then it is not true faith
the pharisees had vast biblical knowledge as well, they didn’t get it either

You know, I think that a LOT fo you are messed up about what SHE actually wants her followers to do  :mrgreen:

i think God transcends gender, as well as our comprehension

@critmonster:

i think God transcends gender, as well as our comprehension

No man may know the mind of God.

Which pretty much is true also about men knowing the mind of a woman.

So God MUST be a woman :-D

:lol: touche  :-D

I think the best defense for God is “no one knows.”  I can’t argue with that…but it doesn’t necessarily make it true.  Yet, if we can’t understand God, then how do we know anything of him?  Of his desire, his past actions, etc.?

I then think about the idea that God has given us free will, and we have strayed the path.  This stance really makes God to seem like a trickster - that our existence is merely a game to him.  Who is good enough.  Who has more faith.  This is absurd to me.

What I think is truly valid, and deserves my thoughts & time, is the life of Jesus.  Regardless of whether this was a real man, or simply an idea, to try and live your life in that sense means more than anything else about Christianity.  The thing is, it’s nothing new - many religions and non-religions have stated the same.

@Jermofoot:

I then think about the idea that God has given us free will, and we have strayed the path.  This stance really makes God to seem like a trickster - that our existence is merely a game to him.  Who is good enough.  Who has more faith.  This is absurd to me.

Yet that view of Christianity as backed up in black-letter bliblical text… The Book of Job.

@ncscswitch:

@Jermofoot:

I then think about the idea that God has given us free will, and we have strayed the path.  This stance really makes God to seem like a trickster - that our existence is merely a game to him.  Who is good enough.  Who has more faith.  This is absurd to me.

Yet that view of Christianity as backed up in black-letter bliblical text… The Book of Job.

So, can we go on a first name basis with God, and just call him Loki?  :-)

Or Coyote if you are a native of this continent…

The unknowable and the non-existent are indistinguishable.

Posted by: froodster 
Insert Quote
The unknowable and the non-existent are indistinguishable.

does that statement really make sense to you?

It does to me…

If you care to describe the differences, with a compare and contrast between them, I am willing to read it…

scientifically or philosophically?

haven’t we proven that the speed of light can be changed and does that make einstien’s theorum invalid?

currently the universal constant is unknowable but does that mean it is non-existant?

this is an over simplification i agree but don’t we as humans tend to over complicate things enough already

Perhaps not indistinguishable. My point is that nothing meaningful can really be known about either, if it is unknowable.

Put another way: Is there a God? I don’t know. Is there an angry unicorn on the dark side of the moon? I don’t know that either. This illustrates both that neither “fact” can be tested, and also that neither fact has much impact on anything else - both are irrelevant possibilities.

If something can’t be tested, that means it does not interact in any consistent, meaningful way with the rest of reality.

The universal constant is something that is hinted at by experimental observations. No observations point toward God’s existence other than wishy-washy ones like “nature is beautiful/complex”. MAYBE it points toward an intelligent creator, though I don’t think so, but it certainly does not support elaborate ideas like the Trinity, Heaven, Hell, angels, souls etc.