I couldn't help it

[Terminal Idiot]

But, I can tell you this, I rely heavily on the scriptures, through prayer, for the wisdom I need in life. This also depends heavily on how closely I'm walking by the Spirit.(I know you will probably have questions about that but can't elaborate right now)

Given that you and SFD have disagreements on your religion - why wouldn't god guide you guys in the right direction as to who is correctly interpreting the Bible? When you pray and receive wisdom, why wouldn't that wisdom include the proper understanding of the text you rely on to guide your life and properly serve your lord and savior?

 

[Artfuldodger]

Given that you and SFD have disagreements on your religion - why wouldn't god guide you guys in the right direction as to who is correctly interpreting the Bible? When you pray and receive wisdom, why wouldn't that wisdom include the proper understanding of the text you rely on to guide your life and properly serve your lord and savior?

Maybe God gives different paths to belief by offering the various denominations. That way one can pick a path they are comfortable with and in this way more believers are formed. It allows more people a chance at salvation.

Oneness, Trinitarian, freewill, election, works based, and/or grace only salvation.

 

[red neck richie]

Fine. never mind dreams. How does God talk to you? In a voice? Just a thought in your head? Whose voice is the thought in?

By the way, when you read something, whose voice do you hear? I hear mine mostly. Sometimes if I read a book by an author whose voice I know, like Sam Harris, I hear his voice. When you read the Bible, whose voice do you hear it in? Yours?



What does it feel like when you're walking with the spirit?

Ambush I wont speak for my brother Welder but I will tell you how it feels for me when I feel the presence of the holy spirit. First I get the chills from head to toe no matter the temperature in the room. Then I get this overwhelming feeling of love that is coming from his presence. My mind is clear and at peace. I often have clarity to things that I am thinking about. He brings me to tears that such a love could exist. And I am often brought to tears of joy knowing that I am a sinner and he loves me anyway. But I'm sure others experiences may be different. As everyone is different. There are no two souls that are the same.

 

[Artfuldodger]

Sure. But I get the predestination thing crystal clear because it's a logical argument. I also very clearly understand that when you start with the premise that everything that God does is 'good' and 'loving', you have a different definition of those words in regards to what God does.

What I'm curious about is, is it more righteous to think about the relationship between predestination and omniscience logically or would you be better served trying to hear what God says about it to you personally through prayer or discernment like SemperFi does?

The predestination/election argument is more logical considering God is omni-everything.

This makes it hard for the freewill believers to see and justify God such as creating a man capable of sin and knowing full well that he would sin. The Word, plan, Jesus was with God in the beginning. Then we have the freewill problem of man getting the Word to the world which we have failed to do. The predestination plan has God calling all as individuals even on small islands and in Hindu nations.
Predestination takes man out of the salvation equation. That way God can save and elect whom he has already. It's really the better way of reaching everyone than depending on man.

 

[ambush80]

Ambush I wont speak for my brother Welder but I will tell you how it feels for me when I feel the presence of the holy spirit. First I get the chills from head to toe no matter the temperature in the room. Then I get this overwhelming feeling of love that is coming from his presence. My mind is clear and at peace. I often have clarity to things that I am thinking about. He brings me to tears that such a love could exist. And I am often brought to tears of joy knowing that I am a sinner and he loves me anyway. But I'm sure others experiences may be different. As everyone is different. There are no two souls that are the same.

Would you believe someone else if they said the same thing about the presence of Allah coming over them? Failed suicide jihadists claim to have felt the embrace of God and a feeling of peace like they had never known come over them the moment they thought they were about to commit suicide. Is it possible that the feelings you have happen just the same to all other kinds of people for all other kinds of reasons? How about people who feel those things on drugs?

I know you can only speak for yourself but do you think it's at least possible that other people can feel that way for different reasons?

 

[ambush80]

The predestination/election argument is more logical considering God is omni-everything.

This makes it hard for the freewill believers to see and justify God such as creating a man capable of sin and knowing full well that he would sin. The Word, plan, Jesus was with God in the beginning. Then we have the freewill problem of man getting the Word to the world which we have failed to do. The predestination plan has God calling all as individuals even on small islands and in Hindu nations.
Predestination takes man out of the salvation equation. That way God can save and elect whom he has already. It's really the better way of reaching everyone than depending on man.

You use language in a confused way.

"Jesus was with God in the beginning" There is no "beginning" to an eternal being.

'Then we have the freewill problem of man getting the Word to the world which we have failed to do." I didn't fail, you didn't fail to do anything. It was predestined. The plan succeeded. It was never going to fail.

"That way God can save and elect whom he has already." He can't save anyone. There is no tense to an infinite being.

I'm not sure you've absorbed the concept completely.

 

[red neck richie]

Would you believe someone else if they said the same thing about the presence of Allah coming over them? Failed suicide jihadists claim to have felt the embrace of God and a feeling of peace like they had never known come over them the moment they thought they were about to commit suicide. Is it possible that the feelings you have happen just the same to all other kinds of people for all other kinds of reasons? How about people who feel those things on drugs?

I know you can only speak for yourself but do you think it's at least possible that other people can feel that way for different reasons?

If It came from love maybe. Look I'm not about to tell you I have it all figured out. I can just share my experiences with you.

 

[ambush80]

If It came from love maybe. Look I'm not about to tell you I have it all figured out. I can just share my experiences with you.

I appreciate your input, Richie. I think you represent many believers.

 

[Terminal Idiot]

Would you believe someone else if they said the same thing about the presence of Allah coming over them? Failed suicide jihadists claim to have felt the embrace of God and a feeling of peace like they had never known come over them the moment they thought they were about to commit suicide. Is it possible that the feelings you have happen just the same to all other kinds of people for all other kinds of reason

According to Artful, this is a highly plausible theory - giving many outlets for religious belief - all leading to the same God.

 

[welderguy]

Given that you and SFD have disagreements on your religion - why wouldn't god guide you guys in the right direction as to who is correctly interpreting the Bible? When you pray and receive wisdom, why wouldn't that wisdom include the proper understanding of the text you rely on to guide your life and properly serve your lord and savior?

How do you know that is not exactly what He's doing?
Like I said earlier, iron sharpens iron. You may be sharpening my iron right now. Or vice versa.

 

[welderguy]

Fine. never mind dreams. How does God talk to you? In a voice? Just a thought in your head? Whose voice is the thought in?

By the way, when you read something, whose voice do you hear? I hear mine mostly. Sometimes if I read a book by an author whose voice I know, like Sam Harris, I hear his voice. When you read the Bible, whose voice do you hear it in? Yours?



What does it feel like when you're walking with the spirit?

Only voices I've ever heard in my head were my own, that I know of.
When I'm walking in the Spirit, it is more like a very strong influence, in a good way mind you.(no crazy impulses to kill people or do evil, just the opposite.)

 

[Terminal Idiot]

How do you know that is not exactly what He's doing?
Like I said earlier, iron sharpens iron. You may be sharpening my iron right now. Or vice versa.

Because you have different takes on the same subject, which is what lead to my question in the first place.

 

[welderguy]

Because you have different takes on the same subject, which is what lead to my question in the first place.

Exactly. That part is obvious. My question to you is how do you know God is not using him or me to help the other out of the ditch. It's obvious we both cannot be right on this particular subject. One of us is in the ditch. My belief is that through prayer and much labor, these things will be resolved in due time.

 

[1gr8bldr]

I have never claimed to be holy, nor ever had any illusions of being so. I am nowhere near holy. I'm very imperfect, but generally a good-enough guy, like the majority of folks. I still don't see why a loving god would decree that I should have to burn in horrible torment for eternity because he created me to be imperfect, then punishes me for my imperfections.

The he11 concept is not in the bible. It's been added. Good people die and are no more just as bad people are. May all unbelievers go to their rest in peace

 

[Terminal Idiot]

Exactly. That part is obvious. My question to you is how do you know God is not using him or me to help the other out of the ditch. It's obvious we both cannot be right on this particular subject. One of us is in the ditch. My belief is that through prayer and much labor, these things will be resolved in due time.

Well, I guess I can't say I know anything for sure, but I could say that it seems that it is a poor way of teaching your children. Hundreds of generations of his "children" have lived and died disagreeing with each other on the meaning and interpretation of the Bible(s). And none of them seem to be resolved. The questions we are asking on this forum have been asked for a long time - and yet there are Mormons and Baptists and Jews and Catholics, etc. Everyone believes their own version of history. Everyone knows they are right. Yet they can't all be right.

So, let's say you are a father of three children. And they all have a different answer to 6+4+8. When they ask for help (prayer), do you throw them all in a room to sharpen each other's iron? Or do YOU help them understand the answer. As a father of two wonderful kids, I try to guide them the best I can everyday. No riddles, no half stories, no threats of eternal d@mnation.

 

[welderguy]

Well, I guess I can't say I know anything for sure, but I could say that it seems that it is a poor way of teaching your children. Hundreds of generations of his "children" have lived and died disagreeing with each other on the meaning and interpretation of the Bible(s). And none of them seem to be resolved. The questions we are asking on this forum have been asked for a long time - and yet there are Mormons and Baptists and Jews and Catholics, etc. Everyone believes their own version of history. Everyone knows they are right. Yet they can't all be right.

So, let's say you are a father of three children. And they all have a different answer to 6+4+8. When they ask for help (prayer), do you throw them all in a room to sharpen each other's iron? Or do YOU help them understand the answer. As a father of two wonderful kids, I try to guide them the best I can everyday. No riddles, no half stories, no threats of eternal d@mnation.

I am in agreement with you. I wish every problem was as easy as 6+4+8 though. Some take denial of one's own agenda and the agenda of the world to be transformed into something better.
Some of the world's problems will not ever be resolved in this life, but they will be resolved in the next. Revelation tells me in heaven there will not be anything that makes a lie.The crooked ways will be made straight.

 

[Israel]

Well, I guess I can't say I know anything for sure, but I could say that it seems that it is a poor way of teaching your children. Hundreds of generations of his "children" have lived and died disagreeing with each other on the meaning and interpretation of the Bible(s). And none of them seem to be resolved. The questions we are asking on this forum have been asked for a long time - and yet there are Mormons and Baptists and Jews and Catholics, etc. Everyone believes their own version of history. Everyone knows they are right. Yet they can't all be right.

So, let's say you are a father of three children. And they all have a different answer to 6+4+8. When they ask for help (prayer), do you throw them all in a room to sharpen each other's iron? Or do YOU help them understand the answer. As a father of two wonderful kids, I try to guide them the best I can everyday. No riddles, no half stories, no threats of eternal d@mnation.

If that were it, if it were a matter of getting something right in our math...(but, to what?)...the gaining of an approval...the gaining of a check mark next to our work as though "now you can go on to the next level of math...we shall be doing a thing called geometry"? Perhaps we should then, rightly struggle in our lessons.

What if is our very "need" to feel as though we are progressing, our longing to be gaining over others...that is being addressed? What if it is really our own questions that are the most severe discipline...?

What if the question we somehow come to see plainly..."How can Daddy love us both the same...me struggling to get "the right answer" and brother there, neglecting his books for playing at the creek with frogs and snakes, and pollywogs?" Who, or what, has tasked us with being "the more right"?


Yes, the prodigal had his lessons to learn. But we see, so did the seeming good "stay at home son" who, surely as much as the prodigal, needed to learn a thing. One could even see that, if not for the prodigal, the stay at home would never be brought to know what he needed to know. And that, a thing too wonderful for him to have even imagined.

What sounds like riddles, half stories, strange parables, are only so because our own hearing, and seeing, are so distorted.

The one hired at "the last hour of the day" gets all the first hired in the morning...who thought they were bearing a burden...working through the heat of noon, gets. It was never to be burden, at all. It was all to bring to the last hour and discover just how gracious is the Lord of the vineyard. Whether any of us "could have known" better at first light that this was the sole labor becomes moot...the Lord has appointed to each his call to be heard...when it is heard. But, a good lesson might be the testimony of our own sweat, are we rejoicing in it, or bitter at what is being worked out of us?

 

[WaltL1]

How do you know that is not exactly what He's doing?
Like I said earlier, iron sharpens iron. You may be sharpening my iron right now. Or vice versa.

Yes iron sharpens iron.
But here's the thing -
Iron sharpening iron doesn't mean you have come to the truth/facts/reality.
It just means you are getting better at arguing your views and anticipating the questions and arguments the other is going to make and being prepared for them.
Its what we do here on this forum every day.
You can both be completely wrong and still sharpen each others iron.

 

[Miguel Cervantes]

What if is our very "need" to feel as though we are progressing, our longing to be gaining over others...that is being addressed?

Self Righteousness among Christians is the hidden sin that will slap us in the face when we are on our knees before the throne of judgment. This we should fear above all else in our struggle to understand and live out a life worthy of the New Covenant.

How can any man claim to be a "New" man, slain in the spirit and covered by Salvation while thinking his mission as a Christian is to be the judge of others through application of an old Law that was fulfilled and no longer applicable. Nothing the Christ said or lived said or implied was directing us to ignore the Mosaic Laws of the OT, but instead He gave us a more simplistic, yet apparently most complicated Law over all others to abide in.

LOVE - We learned it by reciting it as a child. God IS Love.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

"but rejoices with the truth"

What is "the truth"

But what is the "truth"? Is it the Laws of the OT? Is it "My interpretation of the scriptures are more accurate than yours"?

No, it is simple. The truth IS the very paradigm that IS Jesus Christ and the way he lived his life as an example to us for how to live ours.

John 14:6

6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Do not interpret this "truth" to mean that any man that does not know Jesus during his life on earth will not pass through the pearly gates. Remember this;

Romans 14:11

10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:

“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,
‘every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will acknowledge God.’”

Every man will have his day before our Savior and have the opportunity, before all of his grandeur, to confess or deny, setting then forever his destiny.

I am to merely sow the seed, only God can germinate it and make it grow. It is not necessary for me to condemn or curse the seed for it not bowing to "my will" for it is not my will being the reason I sowed that seed to begin with. It was merely the direction of my Lord & Savior that I do so.

Remember, The word of God IS sharper than a double edged sword. It cuts both ways. Be careful how you use it.

Hebrews 4:12

12 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Who among us wants to slay a mans spirit in our quest to deliver the "truth"? Sadly, many a Christian is guilty of just this type of murder.

Cast the hook, cast the net, sow the seed. Let God reap the harvest and do not succumb to the frustration of the human spirit because you do not see the gains of your efforts before your very eyes. He will make the harvest plentiful to His liking when His time is right. Not for Our own gratification.

 

[WaltL1]

The he11 concept is not in the bible. It's been added. Good people die and are no more just as bad people are. May all unbelievers go to their rest in peace

That's true.
But ask the vast majority of Christians who were indoctrinated by their parents/church/Christian school/ every day life....... if they know that.
So which becomes "reality" for the typical Christian -
He11 was added?
Or...
There is a Heaven and He11 (the hot place with a really nice campfire)?