As a religious person....
Human sexuality is associated with reproduction -which is taking part in the birth of beings who will one day be like God. There is no greater art I can imagine -except for the wonderful things we will all create and do throughout the universe -once we learn to do things correctly.

The shared experience can be wonderful in itself... a way to express love by making each other feel reeeeeeally good...

Not all humans are distinctly female or male -and religious people need to realize that adherence to religious law is not as simple as assumed for many.

I have been wondering lately if we are actually becoming less distinctly binary overall -and whether it has anything to do with human activity (in similar manner as we adversely affect many other things).

Probably like hearing a real wolf ....

"Ohhhhhh, cool! .....wait .... should I be worried?"

Undawears

The spirit returns to God who gave it, but it also says in quite a few places that they are "those who are asleep" -and though Christ will bring them (their spirits) with him when he returns, they will not have known the passage of time while since their death. The dead in Christ will rise first at his return -then the living in Christ will be caught up with them in the air -and all made immortal. Then they reign on Earth with Christ for the first thousand years.

After the thousand years, the rest of the dead are raised to the judgment. Those who did good works will receive eternal life then -and those who did not will be purified -then given eternal life (saved, yet so as by fire, as it says)

We did go on to sin, but removing all those people made a different world by removing all of those people who were doing evil at the time as opposed to Noah, etc.

By righteousness I mean the plan to cause it -which required the old covenant -then the new, etc... which would have been more difficult had those people not been removed.

Even confusing speech at Babel simply postponed our inevitable self-destruction while God worked out his plan.

That plan is to make "firstftuits" who will literally be the government under God in the "world tomorrow" -under which all who died will eventually live and learn God's ways.

That is a good topic.

Biblically, though, all of those dead will be raised again and purified.

It created a more favorable environment for righteousness in the meantime.

He also continued with his plan -having declared the end from the beginning. Because we can make choices, there are unknowns -but not significant ones in the end.

I am trying to resist building a gaming rig -but I am bored out of my gourd -gonna try playing games on phone and older ones on laptop

Not quite sure what you mean.
Perhaps he could be content or happy alone -but he certainly enjoys our creativity and company when we do well.

There must have been some reason he did not decide to remain alone, I suppose.

Awesome! I have not heard others talk about the origin of Christ.

It is so awe-inspiring to think of God's anticipation for the wonderful future he imagined and is making real even though he realized it would require a temporary period of unhappiness as we learn. No matter, because he will then make all things new -and the former things will eventually not be remembered or called to mind.

I think of his words about Adam... that it was not good for the man to be alone.

It is not good that God should be alone, either -so he is making new beings forever. That is as opposite to being alone as imaginable!

"and of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end"

Isaiah 45:18 For thus saith the LORD that created the heavens; God himself that formed the earth and made it; he hath established it, he created it not in vain, he formed it to be inhabited: I am the LORD; and there is none else.

Rom 8:18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. 19For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. 20For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that h the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

That means the entire universe! We will order it and create throughout it.
The meek shall inherit the Earth first -then subdue the rest unto themselves under the government of God and Christ by employing those new powerful bodies! (Similar to the glorious body Moses saw the back parts of -and in which Christ will return -though not bound to that particular form -and which allowed the Word to create all things in the first place) The only way we can have access to the entire universe is to have bodies which are not bound to this Earth!


John 3:7Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. 8The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.


(The scripture Christ referenced was Psalm 82:6 "I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High")

The Father will always be "The most high God" -and the Word who became Christ will always be our God with the Father -but we will be made much more than human.

John 10:34Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? 35If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; 36Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?

Phil 3:21Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.

more later

Meanwhile..... people think about living forever, but have you ever wondered what you would DO forever?

Trying to think of a legal, moral, can't lose, no risk or downside get rich quick scheme.

She was probably voted most likely to take a pillow fight a little too far. lol

(just teasing)

I have noticed that many assume that God -or the divine -or the soul, etc., are mysterious to the point of not being able to be understood -as if being able to describe them would make them less holy or divine.

Not only is that an impossibility, but it misses the point of the purpose for our existence.

Christ is called in scripture "the firstborn of many brethren". It is written that we will see him as he is -and be like him.
God said "Ye are gods".
It is also written that the entire creation will be liberated from its bondage to decay by the children of God -and that we will be given immortal bodies with extreme creative power (like unto his glorious body).

All of that requires that we increase in understanding of the nature of all things.

Finally... "It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and the glory of kings to search out a matter"

Anything that exists is inherently knowable. God is far beyond our present capability to know and understand certain things -but those things are still inherently knowable.

If any of our cells or even atoms can be replaced one at a time while still remaining ourselves, then we really are not those things -but a unique pattern/system/design made from such things.

The same would be true for any portion of what makes up our memories, personality, etc. We are not any individual component -or even a collection of specific components. We are actually the pattern/design/system.

If all components were replaced at the same instant, it would be no different.

If our pattern was perfectly recorded at a specific point -and the data was used to make an exact duplicate ...say a thousand years later ...there would still be no difference.

If you wrote "yourself" a note now for the exact duplicate later -explaining that the duplicate was made of no original components, it would not matter, as the duplicate would think, feel and remember exactly as you do because the pattern of the components -matter, energy, whatever -was exact. There would simply be a period of inactivity before you were set in motion again from the record of the previous state.


It would not make us any less special, unique, etc. -or our origin any less holy or divine, if you will, as such things are in the capability, complexity and artistry.
It may sound simple, but it is still very far beyond us -to day the least -and we are not in a position to do it for ourselves.

It would technicaly mean that any number of exact duplicates could be produced, but -as uniqueness is one of the most wonderful things about us (especially as we grow to be more unique as persons) -it would not be logical to do so.
Even so, identical twins are essentially a similar thing at an earlier stage -before experience -and grow as unique individuals from that point

Unsettling, perhaps -but not illogical.

I like music with lyrics in a language I can't understand

I am including all those things in "state" -and let's say at the greatest/optimal point of development.
Everything is something. A "soul" or spirit -as everything else -would exist as an arrangement of something. If it has a function, it is or is part of a system.

If there is a recording of "you" at any point in your life, but "you" cease to exist except as information which can be used to reproduce you -thoughts, feelings and all -as they would also be by states of something -then there is no loss of continuity except in your personal experience.

"You" would exist as something similar to a .zip file of a program -which is -for all intents and purposes except access and activity -the same thing in its compressed state as in its extracted state. The only difference is -as with a compressed program -"you" would not experience anything until extracted again to an active state -at which point it would simply seem like you woke up.

You would very much still be you -in a temporarily inactive state. Not really much different than sleep -or the contents of ram being stored on a hard drive when shut down (inactive) -then moved back to ram when restarted (active)

Once understood well enough, there is no reason our thoughts, experiences, etc., which are already stored and also presently dynamic -could not be stored in an inactive state.

We tend to believe it -or similar -could not be that simple -but it isn't simple at all -we are just growing more complex in our understanding.
Mysteries are not unknowable -only not presently known

Unless the specific computer and data could be perfectly reproduced....

On a physical level, our cells get replaced. We are not the same people we were in that sense.

That leaves memory and whatever remains overall as cells are replaced.

Though it might make us feel uneasy.... or less "special"....

......If memory, etc, can be PERFECTLY reproduced, the difference between an original and reproduction would not matter effectively.

It WOULD still be "us" -except for that negligible technicality.

Humans tend to believe either that they have some sort of eternal personal aspect -or that they will eventually cease to exist forever... but it really does depend on preservation or reproduction of states.

Nope -dont want a Sylvester/Tweety bird situation :p

Conflict and adversarial competition are obsolete -and could very well end us.

(If all nations did their best and cooperated, we could have kicked covid's butt. Instead, fears and distrust between nations, politics, etc., prevented it.)

Though nations and groups are at odds, humans have managed to build an amazing worldwide infrastructure for trade and information. There is presently no need to fight over anything as if there are limited resources.

We have the ability to eradicate much of human suffering -but we have also reached the point of being able to destroy all life and natural resources.
Worldwide conflict and adversarial competition must not -can not -continue -whether through warfare or greed.

A divided nation or a divided world cannot continue. Cooperate or fail.
Unfortunately, you can't make everyone cooperate.