'not really a Christian'

[Twilight]

Originally Posted By: Twilight

I note you have sidestepped both of my queries Cardw.

You seem to claim to be a champion against false Christian claims, but you do not seem to think that you have to defend your points...

Why not pick "one" of your evidences so it can be examined Cardw?

A link to a load of spurious claims is not "evidence"...

Do you have a favourite that you like to present to Christians to shake their faith?

Mark, it is pointless to debate against your blanket dismissal of anything you can't explain.

It is evident to me that you are following a script. If anything goes outside that script you just repeat the script.

Another sidestep Cardw?

Please supply one example of evidence that you think is insurmountable proof of your position.

Not a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss. And leaves you free, to keep claiming something without any logical argument required of you.

As you are the self proclaimed champion of free thinking, you must have something in your "bag of tricks"? :-)

[fccool]

Quote:

Athiests like to argue that point, but it is really no point at all.

Your next major objection to the Christian Prophetic core running through the bible?

I don't think you understand atheistic objections. Most of the people who do believe in Biblical inerrant, believe so based on the initial acceptance of that claim. Thus the initial claim perpetuates the premise... not evidence.

For example:

Prophecy has been fulfilled. How do we know that? Bible tells us. How do we know the Bible is inerrant? Bible tells us.

If not for their use of Biblical quotes for supporting their assumptions about God, most of the Christians in this world would be mentally castrated. They really would not know what to do. There are no other accounts of fulfilled prophecies or resurrection of Christ that we have today. It's historically absent, rather than in the Bible, and the claims that later derived from reading of the Biblical account. If there were in fact other claims, the Christians would wave them left and rights. And because of the weight of the accounts, and the amounts of miracles recorded... there should be a likelihood of surviving evidence of the eyewitnesses other than that written 30-40-50 years after these things took place.

My mother-in-law recently saw her dead dog running around the house. Would you admit that as miraculous happening and believe it if she's written a book about it? I'm certain that you would not believe any other "historical account" of the extraordinary claims of supernatural occurrences. Yet, you make an exception for the Bible... not based on evidence of its veracity, but solely based on your belief in the concept and the ontological explanation that it presents.

Let's for a second examine the claims of psychics who talk to the dead. You can't prove or disprove their claims. They just feed you with information "from the dead relative", and if it's not correct, then it's the person on the receiving end

who is shifted the blame on. For example:

- I'm hearing from your dead mother that you have two other siblings?

- No, I just have one.

- Well, she's telling me that you have two, so there must be a sibling that you don't know about.

It's an easy thing to do when we assume infallibility of one side, and thus automatic fallacy of other. It becomes the proverbial King's clothes that only stupid people can't see.

It's for that reason that you have the phenomenons of Christian's making up the acts of God to be viewed as "super-spiritual". Ernie Knoll is the latest and greatest example of that. Yet, he's using the same defense of "selfish and wicked will not believe what I have to say", while the only evidence of the veracity of his dreams are the claims made by the characters in these dreams.

I hope you can see what I'm talking about here. Our faith does not rests on evidence, but on belief and hope in something better. Thus our attempts to influence the world should not originate with proving to other people that we are correct or that Bible is inerrant, but rather with functional demonstration of our belief of better world through principles outlined in the Bible.

So far, religion has managed to do the opposite.

[cardw]

I note you have sidestepped both of my queries Cardw.

You seem to claim to be a champion against false Christian claims, but you do not seem to think that you have to defend your points...

Why not pick "one" of your evidences so it can be examined Cardw?

A link to a load of spurious claims is not "evidence"...

Do you have a favourite that you like to present to Christians to shake their faith?

Originally Posted By: cardw

Mark, it is pointless to debate against your blanket dismissal of anything you can't explain.

It is evident to me that you are following a script. If anything goes outside that script you just repeat the script.

Another sidestep Cardw?

Please supply one example of evidence that you think is insurmountable proof of your position.

Not a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss. And leaves you free, to keep claiming something without any logical argument required of you.

As you are the self proclaimed champion of free thinking, you must have something in your "bag of tricks"? :-)

It's a waste of time presenting evidence to you because if you can't understand or refute evidence you either dismiss it as "a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss" or you present some triumphal announcement or you attack the character of the person or persons presenting the evidence or you make up something you think they are saying or you exaggerate or you misrepresent the other position or you bait or you keep asking for more proof or you flat out ignore the evidence.

It's a shtick, con, or in your words a "sidestep."

In this particular quote you have managed to do all of the above.

And I'll save you the post, don't ask me to prove that you have been doing this. LOL

[Twilight]

Quote:

Athiests like to argue that point, but it is really no point at all.

Your next major objection to the Christian Prophetic core running through the bible?

I don't think you understand atheistic objections. Most of the people who do believe in Biblical inerrant, believe so based on the initial acceptance of that claim. Thus the initial claim perpetuates the premise... not evidence.

For example:

Prophecy has been fulfilled. How do we know that? Bible tells us. How do we know the Bible is inerrant? Bible tells us.

If not for their use of Biblical quotes for supporting their assumptions about God, most of the Christians in this world would be mentally castrated. They really would not know what to do. There are no other accounts of fulfilled prophecies or resurrection of Christ that we have today. It's historically absent, rather than in the Bible, and the claims that later derived from reading of the Biblical account. If there were in fact other claims, the Christians would wave them left and rights. And because of the weight of the accounts, and the amounts of miracles recorded... there should be a likelihood of surviving evidence of the eyewitnesses other than that written 30-40-50 years after these things took place.

I hope you can see what I'm talking about here. Our faith does not rests on evidence, but on belief and hope in something better. Thus our attempts to influence the world should not originate with proving to other people that we are correct or that Bible is inerrant, but rather with functional demonstration of our belief of better world through principles outlined in the Bible.

So far, religion has managed to do the opposite.

I have to strongly disagree with the above position.

Why?

1. The only document in all of archeology that gets the treatment that it is in fact not a valid historical document is the bible and its books.

This is a standard atheistic bias that you seem to be accepting.

Why should the bible be dismissed as an historical document?

On what rational basis?

It has shown again and again it is a valid historical documents despite the attacks of its enemies.

How?

Archeologically.

For instance, many used to claim the bible was false, because they could find no evidence of the Hittites outside of the bible.

They used to crow that this was evidence the bible was nonsense.

They were silenced however, when the capital city of the Hittites was found...

This has happened many times.

Do not buy into the propoganda that the bible is invalid as an historical document.

It is a lie of the enemy.

-----------------------

2. Jesus Himself used the prophecy of the bible to show that He was who He said He was to the disciples.

This was His logical argument.

If that was self evident to them, then it is self evident for us, if we will allow ourselves to see this simple truth.

Note: Jesus had to open their minds to understand this truth, after 3 1/2 years with them.

It was on that basis that Jesus built His credibility.

It is the whole function of the prophecy of the bible, to give us rational reasons to trust God.

To trust Jesus is the Son of God.

Because the bible proves it.

If you deny that, you remove the very foundation that Jesus Himself ordained as the foundation of His own identity as the Son of God.

------------------------

3. Once we have that foundation of prophetic truth on which to build, we can place our faith on that foundation.

Upon that basis, those things that we cannot comprehend, we receive by Faith.

Aka the indwelling of the Holy Spirit etc.

So it is simple logic.

The Bible proves by prophecy its logical inherent right to be deemed as Absolute Truth, at the same time irrefutably revealing Christ.

The Christian Faith is the most logical stream of thought process known to man...

---------------------------------

Problem is, God does not open it up to the proud athiesticly motivated mind and those that will not be humble in His sight.

So they just cannot "get it", the enemy will not let them and whilst they continue in sin, sin that wants to set themselves up as the judge of God, sin that denies any accountability to God, satan maintains his control and they are trapped.

Some of them then come on boards like this, gain some support from some confused Christians, who think it "enlightened" to support the attackers of Christianity, then they go about trying to destroy the faith of many immature Christians under the guise of trying to enlighten the rest of us...

With a caged mind that is incapable of pure rational thought, due to its captive nature, they are more dangerous than many can imagine.

-----------------------------------

And Christians should not be cheering them on from the sidelines...

If you are, then you are just as guilty of destroying another Christians faith, as if you had done it yourself.

It would be better to have a millstone cast around your neck and be thrown into the sea than face the judgement with that type of sin against ones name...

[Twilight]

[

It's a waste of time presenting evidence to you because if you can't understand or refute evidence you either dismiss it as "a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss" or you present some triumphal announcement or you attack the character of the person or persons presenting the evidence or you make up something you think they are saying or you exaggerate or you misrepresent the other position or you bait or you keep asking for more proof or you flat out ignore the evidence.

Just as I thought.

You have no real evidence.

You just want to spend your time creating confusion amongst Gods people without having to actually prove anything would be the logical conclusion?

If you can prove your point, then make it.

If not, stop pretending you can and hiding behind objections that are based on nothing but hot air and a desire to evade a direct challenge to some illogical objections to the Christian Faith.

Your constant sidestepping reveals that you have no real argument to present.

[fccool]

Quote:

1. The only document in all of archeology that gets the treatment that it is in fact not a valid historical document is the bible and its books.

This is a standard atheistic bias that you seem to be accepting.

Why should the bible be dismissed as an historical document?

On what rational basis?

It's not merely an atheistic bias. I think you are making the same logical fallacies here that you are claiming to be triumphant on your side. Why don't you believe in historical accuracy of Quran or Aeneid?

Atheists don't have the problem with historicity of the Bible. They know that certain kings existed as Bible claims. The problem is with extraordinary claims that we don't observe today... the same problem you would have with theory of evolution, if it would be written by some guy who claimed to directly observe transitional forms, while citing the battles and kings that were around him for time reference.

The claim that people believe that in historicity of the Bible because of lack of Hittites is a very naive claim. Just because Bible references correct historical events does not automatically mean that every other Biblical claim is correct one.

You don't believe that Mohammad is Allah's prophet simply because there was a historical person of Mohammad, and that he acted out on his belief. Likewise you don't believe extraordinary claims of Quran because other historical info lines up. Do we believe in Greek deities directing certain historical accurate battles, because Greeks believed in them and ascribed their victories and losses to their doing?

I hope you can see the futility in argument from historical veracity. It's not "a lie of the enemy" , it's our basic epistemological limitation.

Quote:

2. Jesus Himself used the prophecy of the bible to show that He was who He said He was to the disciples.

But you forget the fact that we read about this account instead of experiencing it first-hand. Having Jesus in front of us, turning the water into wine... healing people who had no hope with whole crowds of people witnessing a specific prophetic fulfillment is quite different than a somewhat contradicting accounts of the eyewitnesses, that for some reason decided to write these 20-30 years after his death.

These are reasonable concerns that we should notice. You apply them to every other books that contain fulfilled prophecies. You don't believe in Egyptian Osiris who claimed to be the fulfillment of certain prophesies... and you don't elevate Osiris to same status as Christ based on prophetic claims.

So, the futility of you trying to the veracity of fulfilled prophecies that are only described in Biblical narrative is rather circular. It's nothing short of saying that Bible is right because it says it is.

3. Once we have that foundation of prophetic truth on which to build, we can place our faith on that foundation.

Our foundation is not based on prophetic "truths" in epistemological sense of truth. Our foundation is in belief in certain ontological reality as claimed by the Bible... claims of which we can't verify.

Having a historical account of the Battle of Waterloo is quite different from having a historical account of Nile turning to blood, and raining frogs, and death of every firstborn. There's no historical record of that happening outside of Biblical narrative. Likewise, the prophetic narrative exists purely inside the Bible.

To say that Bible proves itself by saying that the description of earlier written prophesies were fulfilled by the description of later written ones would be a great example of circular reasoning that boils down to Bible is true because it says it is.

It's not a simple logic, but rather a simpleton logic.

If Christian faith is indeed the most logical stream of thought known to man, then perhaps atheists don't appreciate logic

Quote:

Problem is, God does not open it up to the proud athiesticly motivated mind and those that will not be humble in His sight.

And now we back to the "King is not really naked, only stupid people can't see his clothes" defense. I can likewise say that God does not open up Mormon truths to the proud people who don't accept it.

The "stupid people can't see" is quite popular in any religious belief that you get into. It usually acts as the last resort argument when all else fails. It's nothing short of saying that you don't understand it because you are incapable of understanding it unless you believe it to be real.

So, it's an argument of the clothes are real, but you need to believe and act as though they are real before you can understand them to be real and see them.

Atheists simply don't buy this argument, because it's not based on logic, and I agree with them that this argument is not very logical and works backwards. It's like saying that you need a certain medicine to be healed, but you can't take it unless you already have it in your system. It's rather paradoxical.

Quote:

And Christians should not be cheering them on from the sidelines...

And this is when you are mistaking on what our faith is about. We have this idea that our faith is to convict people of sin and turn them into carbon copies of ourselves.

We should be cheering the atheists on, just like we should be cheering and defending anyone and everyone. The key is understanding. God understands their ideas and objections. He really does. These are not unreasonable. Our understanding is not evidential, but based on hope for better humanity and for better future.

You are trying to do exactly what Jews expected Christ to do... to establish a kingdom of Christian law on earth through church hierarchy. He did not come to do that. What we are trying to do is in fact get everyone in church to obey our leaders who know God's will. This is not Christian objective.

Christian objective is to transform the world through new pattern of selfless thought. There's no "us and them" in terms of reasonable people who respectfully search for the truth. On the other hand, there is "us and them" in terms of people who would try to impose their version of truth by any means necessary.

We should avoid that, and instead seek intellectual honesty and understanding, and present our faith as such... without conjuring up an appeal to guilt, fear or claim of stupidity if someone does not see it the way we do.

[Bravus]

It's a waste of time presenting evidence to you because if you can't understand or refute evidence you either dismiss it as "a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss" or you present some triumphal announcement or you attack the character of the person or persons presenting the evidence or you make up something you think they are saying or you exaggerate or you misrepresent the other position or you bait or you keep asking for more proof or you flat out ignore the evidence.

Truth.

[Twilight]

Atheists don't have the problem with historicity of the Bible. They know that certain kings existed as Bible claims. The problem is with extraordinary claims that we don't observe today... the same problem you would have with theory of evolution, if it would be written by some guy who claimed to directly observe transitional forms, while citing the battles and kings that were around him for time reference.

The claim that people believe that in historicity of the Bible because of lack of Hittites is a very naive claim. Just because Bible references correct historical events does not automatically mean that every other Biblical claim is correct one.

[Twilight]

Originally Posted By: cardw

It's a waste of time presenting evidence to you because if you can't understand or refute evidence you either dismiss it as "a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss" or you present some triumphal announcement or you attack the character of the person or persons presenting the evidence or you make up something you think they are saying or you exaggerate or you misrepresent the other position or you bait or you keep asking for more proof or you flat out ignore the evidence.

Truth.

I will let God be the judge of that.

[fccool]

Quote:

And no, we are not talking about the miracles as they did not convince that many He was the Messiah.

You sort of shoot yourself in the foot when you say that. Fulfillment of prophesy is in fact a miracle of God. Yet, you postulate that people believe because of prophecy rather than because of miracle?

[Twilight]

Quote:

And no, we are not talking about the miracles as they did not convince that many He was the Messiah.

You sort of shoot yourself in the foot when you say that. Fulfillment of prophesy is in fact a miracle of God. Yet, you postulate that people believe because of prophecy rather than because of miracle?

The point was simple.

The miracles of themselves did not convince the apostles of Jesus' credibility. Although it obviously helped.

When He came to them after the ressurection, He taught them His prophetic identity.

Luk 24:27 And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

He had been trying to do this all along, but they never quite got it...

This was Jesus method.

He validated Himself from scripture.

Then the disciples had a focus on which to fix their faith, so the could receivy the more "spiritual" promises of the bible.

They had a logical basis for believing Jesus was who He said He was.

That was His method and if it was good enough for them it will be good enough for us.

[fccool]

Quote:

You are arguing (as a Christian), that if known historical accounts in the bible are confirmed archeologically, that does not prove all the others have any historical credibility?

Yes I do. I suggest you look over

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasty_generalization

to understand where I'm coming from. Just because there's a mountain in Israel called Sinai... does not prove that Moses went up to meet God there. We have a partial evidence from valid location, the other part is up for grabs as far as whether you want to believe it or not.

I would certainly suggest you going over

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

Quote:

So if I eat a jam donut today, and buy one tomorrow, I cannot be sure, I will get a jam donut instead of a spinach donut, even though I have learned that the caterer always supply jam donuts...

This analogy is very poor when it comes to relating with what you are trying to prove. A better one would be reading about donut in the paper, and then giving 10% of your income for the rest of your life, believing that you will eventually get it, even though you've never personally met the baker... nor seen the bakery.

Quote:

Do you really believe that the bible is not historically accurate enough, inspired enough, to be trusted?

I believe that Bible is to be trusted, yet not because its account can be verified historically. That's my point. You should really learn humility in faith, instead of trenchant arrogance. It's much more honest to say that you believe in something that you have not seen, rather than saying that things are absolutely are as you believe them to be and that you can prove that claim by reading us the Bible and citing the prophecies.

Quote:

Remember, the OT was written before Christ was born.

Yes, and Christ intentionally went to certain places and did certain things for certain prophecies to be fulfilled. The atheistic problem with prophecy is that when contained within certain culture that is looking forward to it, the tendency is to look for it's self-fulfillment.

It's demonstrated well in film Matrix. Morpheus was looking for "the one" because a prophecy was made. Thus simple utterance of prophecy lead up to its fulfillment, and not necessarily because of deterministic nature of it. Thus Morpheus found Neo and told him that he is the one. Neo believed it, and became the one and learned all of the necessary skills thus fulfilling the prophecy.

It's a well-know sociological phenomenon and does not necessarily constitute "the proof", if you are intellectually honest about it.

I'm not suggesting that Christ was not the son of God. I do believe that He is. I'm simply pointing out that you making a rather simpleminded argument that Biblical prophecy proves beyond the shadow of a doubt the claims of the Bible. It does not. It's easy as a writer to tweak the account to make it very particular fulfillment. If you don't see it as a possibility, you are not being honest.

Quote:

You can argue this all day, but Jesus used a specific process, which you seem totally unwilling to consider....It was good enough for Jesus to use this principle. Please confirm to this simpleton, if you are denying that the bible is a verifiable and trustable source for the Christian?

Jesus did that in his society which revolved around prophesies and prophets. If He would have come today, He would use different process all-together rather than quoting a book most of the people have not read. He did not point to prophesies to people who knew nothing about them, neither understood these. He spoke in parables about certain truths behind Christian principles. The prophecies only made sense to Jews, and that was the reason behind entire theocratic state of Israel... to prepare the way. The prophesies were given to Israel, not to Romans, Hindus, or Egyptians. If Jesus tried to read Isaiah to any other culture other than Jews... it would be a simpleton logic... I hope that's confirmation enough.

Quote:

he Christian objective is to warn the world of the soon coming of Christ. To show them the experience of Righteousness by Faith. To reveal to them the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

To point them back to the Sabbath. To point them back to their Creator. To warn them they are in the time of Judgement, that soon it will be all over for them, if they do not repent and receive life. To warn them to come out of false Babylonian systems of thought and practice. Seventh Day Adventists, have been given this specific message, at this time. We call it the Three Angels Message. That is what God has commanded we share with the world.

The young man saith unto him, All these things have I kept from my youth up: what lack I yet?

If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.

What are you lacking?

[fccool]

Quote:

He validated Himself from scripture.

Then the disciples had a focus on which to fix their faith, so the could receivy the more "spiritual" promises of the bible.

They had a logical basis for believing Jesus was who He said He was.

That was His method and if it was good enough for them it will be good enough for us.

I believe that I've already made a point that He would not do this in our culture.

[cardw]

Originally Posted By: cardw

It's a waste of time presenting evidence to you because if you can't understand or refute evidence you either dismiss it as "a lazy link that is full of poor arguments that require little thought to dismiss" or you present some triumphal announcement or you attack the character of the person or persons presenting the evidence or you make up something you think they are saying or you exaggerate or you misrepresent the other position or you bait or you keep asking for more proof or you flat out ignore the evidence.

Just as I thought.

You have no real evidence.

[LifeHiscost]

We have to make up such words to escape the conclusion that God did it and we do not know how...

I wish I had enough time to spend in answer to many of your comments. As to this your last comment, even if I believe differently, the comment reveals something only God can give to to His creatures. This state of humility that is completely contrary to the prince of darkness and those he leads around by his deceptive practices.

Blessings!

[Bravus]

But God does not require us to embrace our ignorance. We will never understand Him or his ways and powers completely, but I believe the quest to understand His Book of Nature is an honorable one.

[fccool]

As a Christian, there recently has been some thinking on my part, as I kind of quit my job and started my own company... thus have more time to think and reflect, and perhaps re-think some of the things that I simply accepted based on dogmatic "it is so" from my professors/preachers. So, I tend to catch some of them off-guard in regular conversations.

Recently, I've spoke to one of the pastors here. He is a well-aged and well-read guy. I've slipped a question into conversation... "Who did Christ pay the debt to?", and the extended pause kind of caught me off-guard. Here's a spit-fire preacher who not so long ago was telling everyone that Christ paid our debt so that we may live, and yet he seemingly seldom pondered the implications of such theology. He told me that he has to think about that, and that it was a good question.

And it really disturbed me. Here's the guy who apparently was using this illustration his whole life as a preacher, and he did not work that question out for himself enough to give me answer on the spot. So, I've made a point to ask that question to every preacher that I meet... and you would be surprised to know that there seems to be no consistent answer even within our denomination.

So far I've had : to God the Father, to death, to sin, to us, to the judicial system of the law, and to Satan (although to be fair, "to Satan" guy had very peculiar ideas and claims)

_________________________________

It almost seems though that this reality is shaped in such a way to keep us continuously guessing. Sort of a variation on the infinite liars paradox... i.e.

(1) THIS SENTENCE CONTAINS FIVE WORDS

(2) THIS SENTENCE CONTAINS EIGHT WORDS

(3) EXACTLY ONE SENTENCE ON THIS CARD IS TRUE

So, we sort of face an infinite number of statements such as these that seem to cancel each other out... be it a religion or science or philosophy. So, what we tend to do is contextualize certain things that don't fit in, and ascribe them a new meaning... i.e.

Well, number 3 does not really say what is says, or does not really mean that... or it can't be that because of the #1 and #2. Or #1 and #2 should not exist because of #3

Yet, perhaps the solution to the above paradox is the final humility that comes with acknowledgment of our limitations of knowledge. I.E., the idea that we really know something true when we know that we can't know the truth (in epistemological sense of knowledge)... thus we have to believe that something is true rather than knowing that something is true... and therefore place a best-educated bet and run with it.

I guess, the other side of this issue is that truth is seemingly different from a concept of "reality". Our perceived reality is essentially a "lie", because nothing truly is the way we see it in a physical sense. It only is in a subjective sense of interpretive brain function. So, the congnitive reality is rather limited and subjective, because our brain and cognitive abilities are rather limited and subjective.

So, probably belief in something other than perceived reality is actually not so illogical as it may seem.

[Twilight]

Yes, and Christ intentionally went to certain places and did certain things for certain prophecies to be fulfilled. The atheistic problem with prophecy is that when contained within certain culture that is looking forward to it, the tendency is to look for it's self-fulfillment.

It's demonstrated well in film Matrix.

Your argument is in invalid on so many levels.

But here is a simple one.

Christ was born of a Virgin (unless you want to take the common Rabbinical argument against this that is circulating the internet).

How did Christ construct that?

Christ was crucified on a certain day, at a certain time, in a certain year.

How did Christ construct that?

The details of the crucifixion were explicitly stated in Isaiah and the Psalms.

How did Christ construct that?

His place of Birth.

His fleeing into Egypt.

How did Christ construct that?

I fear sir that you have totally failed to grasp a fundamental aspect of the Christian faith.

Christ was a fulfillment of prophecy that is saturated throughout the Old Testament.

It is a foundational point.

If we do not grasp this, then we have nothing to base our faith on.

Like it or not, this is what Jesus taught.

To say that Jesus constructively met all of these prophecies, when they were beyond His control, is so illogical, that the only conclusion one could come to, is that you have misconstrued what the Christian Faith is built on.

It is not built on a warm happy feeling.

It is built on Christ.

On a prophecied Christ.

On a fulfillled prophecied Christ.

To deny that, is to deny the very basic foundation of Christian logic and thought...

[cardw]

Yet, perhaps the solution to the above paradox is the final humility that comes with acknowledgment of our limitations of knowledge. I.E., the idea that we really know something true when we know that we can't know the truth (in epistemological sense of knowledge)... thus we have to believe that something is true rather than knowing that something is true... and therefore place a best-educated bet and run with it.

I guess, the other side of this issue is that truth is seemingly different from a concept of "reality". Our perceived reality is essentially a "lie", because nothing truly is the way we see it in a physical sense. It only is in a subjective sense of interpretive brain function. So, the congnitive reality is rather limited and subjective, because our brain and cognitive abilities are rather limited and subjective.

So, probably belief in something other than perceived reality is actually not so illogical as it may seem.

[Twilight]

No matter what I present you won't call it real evidence. Sidestep one

I give up Cardw.

You obviously have no intention of backing up your spurious claims.

[Twilight]

Originally Posted By: Twilight

We have to make up such words to escape the conclusion that God did it and we do not know how...

I wish I had enough time to spend in answer to many of your comments. As to this your last comment, even if I believe differently, the comment reveals something only God can give to to His creatures. This state of humility that is completely contrary to the prince of darkness and those he leads around by his deceptive practices.

Blessings!

And this is my argument with Bravus.

Claiming to know how the universe started, when clearly we do not, is akin to saying that we understand the creative language God used to call the universe into existance.

Unless there is some night school class, I have missed, on understanding Gods Creative Language and power, we do not have this power.

You are right, it is arrogance and pride, that comes from the father of lies, that disables a man from being humble in these matters.

[Twilight]

But God does not require us to embrace our ignorance. We will never understand Him or his ways and powers completely, but I believe the quest to understand His Book of Nature is an honorable one.

Not when you go to the Devils library and borrow a book to learn about Gods ways, "Origin of the Species"....

I can assure you, that is not in Gods library...

How about checking out some books from Gods library?

The Bible being the tome of choice of course.

[Twilight]

Agree, I believe God wants/desires us to understand our whole world and explore it to the best of our abilities. He did not just give us a free choice and a mind to just single channel it, is my belief. It is the desire to learn all things that gives us our uniqueness over lower forms of life. We were made in the image of God according to the Bible, so lets stand up and except the challenge of learning and exploring this world, as well as learning of Gods desires for us. The two go together, we will never have perfect understanding of either.

No one is arguing with that.

But we are arguing that taking a phd in the Devils athiestic dogma is not exactly the same thing...

[Neil D]

Originally Posted By: cardw

No matter what I present you won't call it real evidence. Sidestep one

I give up Cardw.

You obviously have no intention of backing up your spurious claims.

After perusing your conversation with Bravus, I'd say you've got room to talk too...

Your audacious declaration sets you up for a lot of these type of posts.....Get down to brass tacks there Twighlight, ol' buddy and apply yourself....

Answer Bravus' question, or admit you don't know nor know where to find the answer in the bible....

[SivartM]

Claiming to know how the universe started, when clearly we do not, is akin to saying that we understand the creative language God used to call the universe into existance.