Not only are we being asked to have faith in a God that never shows up, but we are also being asked to have faith that an unreasonable book that has no real answers somehow makes sense in the mind of God even though we can't make sense of it ourselves! ...abra


yup.

Churchianity ar its best. Good that you escaped it, abra.

you would most certainly be part of the problem, had you elected to continue in things not convincing to your heart in your own judgement.

To that, I am grateful. That shows some sensitivity for others.

But according to your works, now, you are bashing the whole dismissively as a myth ; in that you hold that Jesus is impotent, a liar, a mirage, a fable, and a fraud.

But your conclusions that brought you to a self propelled oxymoronic epiphany are still but an assumption based on the condition of your heart and mind, and not as a result of a revelation of God, in Christ.

God may have been asking you the questions that led you to jump to your conclusions, but if that is so, then why didn't you wait for the answer that comes from God?

You think about that, my friend.

You see, it doesn't get any better than that, ultimately. And that is ther point. God answers for God.

Just in sheer terms of aconversation with God, it doesn't get any better than that, as a conversation goes, in fellowship and relationship.
We don't control the answers others give, only our jedgement of the intent as understood in the conversation. With God, we aren't asked to have all of the answers ; but rather, we are being asked to consider His answer as well as our own judgement, and share the same. To end the conversation with the last word in not bremaining open of heart, we leave ourselves bereft of God's answers. He doesn't leave us, we leave God.

When I was a child, God said to me, "the strength of wisdom is spontaneous, just as every tree has one less seed to slight." I knew it was God, but couldn't control it. I also sorrowed over the conundrum of being told something that left me no basis for understanding fully how to tap into that, though it made sweet sense on the surface as being something inarguably revealing. But revealing what? That was in '69.

the seed is faith. The faith given every man. I didn't realize how it can be slighted, until the time came that I was given the victory of perspective of having NOT slighted it in coming to God, in Christ. But it was after the fact that I was afforded the knowledge of what constitutes not sligting a seed.

In '94, God said to me, Is that why I died?. He said that after asking me to talk to him. He wanted to talk. I chose to praise him and just offer affirmations, but that wasn't what He wanted at that moment. He wanted to have a conversation. He had said prior to the other, "talk to me". Apparently, I didn't want to chat. Thus, "is that why I died".

He didn't have to answer that question for me. I didn't have to answer that question, either.

Lesson learned. But that conversation was over.

I was on the wrong foot, and God knew I needed to contemplate why I had been sequesterig our ongoing conversations.

The relevance of that conversation of mine to this point I am making about yours is that we do not have the answers for that which God has given other men in times past. But the times past and the record of conversations with God is not the very system of belief being taught. The record merely establishes that a conversation with God is a coherent one, not a contrivance of the imagination.

It is the question that God poses to every man.

Who has the answers then?



the man?




or God?

Bashing Christian thought because it has not been suitably answered for by God on your terms creates a dilemma by virtue of your pantheistic stance which is completely hypocritical for you to have engaged in and entertained, based on the methods you employed to utterly diregard Christian thought altogether by virtue of your own judgement, and not God's, which is the point of the teaching, not the one that you had assumed for it.

The hypocrisy is this :

you suggest that pantheism is an inclusive concept of all that is God, yet you give no place to Christian thought in that view of God.
Yet, you expect there to be room for a pantheistic
Jesus.

Again, on your own terms, you put God in box.
But you insist that God not put you in a box.

You are making judgements about God, apart from God being involved in the judgements, and postulating that God's judgement is only sound on your terms.

And yet, you insist from time to time that you just do not know what shall be in the end of the matter once your chains of your flesh are broken and you are freed from the bondage of the flesh.

It is an entirely inconsistent conjecture which you premise as a basis for your insistences, as you see fit to express.

Clearly, you have many questions.

And no answers which you are certain of.

So....

quit bashing Christian thought.

You are only succeeding in tormenting yourself and annoying the inarticulate.

The sum of your discourses only breeds hate and discontent and that is precisely what motivates you. It is the attention that you seek. You have faith in that, not in God, especially not in Jesus Christ.

You do not want answers from God.

You want to answer for God.

That is vanity ; folly.

simple villification.


No way out of that, is there?












or is there?

"Again, on your own terms, you put God in box.

But you insist that God not put you in a box. "



among other things...




interesting observations...Wouldee


i love you Abra... whether we agree or not...

all that MorningSong is saying is that all Abracadabra has to do is to expell those naughty lust demons from his heart and let the god or abraham fill that void and accept Jesus Christ as his lord and savior and then he will see the light ...

Hallelujah ....can I get a witness???????????????????

Not Jesus.... but somebody.. How can a myth be a Liar? Moot point.

I can think of no worse way to spend one's life than in the spreading of a lie, a mirage, a fable and a fraud to unsuspecting children of the Universe and fending off unanswerable questions from people seeking a reasonable truth.

I would never lie to children about Santa Clause either.

Freedom, peace, responsibility, truth, love,

JB

Drew;

You asked...



"How do we know the bible is accurate, without error, pure in every way?" You asked. Well - the response to that question, though not quite as simplistic as "It says so in the bible" as you've reasoned - points directly to what you understand or believe God to be. Either He is what His scriptures claim him to be, or else there's nothing that remains to support His existance - (outside of an individual creating a God to support and justify personal life choices.)

So... if we momentarily accept the premise that the bible gives us an acceptable and accurate picture of the attributes of God - I.E. All knowing, omni-present, Truth, existing outside of the realm of time, creator of the universe and all things in it, the list goes on... Then it would stand to reason that the God of the scriptures would be perfectly capable of not only moving men to write the bible, exactly how he wished it - but would have the power - as well - to assure it's accuracy throughout eternity. And to assure that his message be accurately interpreted, He in turn would have the power to fill his creation (man/woman) with the Holy Spirit - who's purpose it would be to lead all who are indwelt with such - to the truth. Not such a difficult task for a God who posses all power over His creation.

So - logically, it is not circular reasoning to claim that the bible is inerrant because it claims itself to be - it is inerrant because of the percieved qualities of God, and the matter of the choice He has made to speak to his creation through Prophets. Which is not unique to Christianity by the way, it is a fact of any religion.

So the argument - or question that I think is better examined, is how could the bible - if it is what it claims to be, be anything but true, accurate, without error, and pure in every way? Seems quite difficult to argue it could be - without lessoning the idea of God.

Therefore I would think that the issue lies not in how the bible was written, but as to how it is read. How does one know that what they think they have understood when they read it - was how God intended it to be understood when it was written?

As Samuel Beckett so aptly put it: "There's man all over for you - blaming on his boots the faults of his feet".

lj

I know we are all respectfully entitled to believe as we see fit...



and I, for one, cannot imagine my life without Christ in it



not the Christ that some greedy people market & profit from....


but the true essence of Jesus Christ apart from formal religion

Eljay...what a blessing to see you, Buddy...

and in light of your busy schedule

it is an extra special treat

Quotes from Morningsong:



quote from wouldee:

..."You want to answer for God.

That is vanity ; folly....."


I think everybody has a right to their opinions. And if Morningsong wants to speak her opinions about what she thinks her God thinks or wants, that's her business.

But then others should be able to speak for their God without being called vain, atheists, satanist, etc.

Morningsong assumes Abra is in the grip of Satan (the devil") and says so. Poor child, she knows not what she says. I forgive her. She does not know any better, but she means well.




The reason the argument does not make sense to people who believe in the Biblical God is because they claim that their God is the correct concept of God, the only God in existence.


That is just their belief. It cannot be proven. The accompanying story is not even reasonable. It cannot be reasoned.

This is for a reason. The flaws were probably put there to give humanity a clue when consciousness begins to be enlightened to the point where people begin to think as they were designed to do.

Or perhaps some lesser god simply did not imagine that the ignorant human beings would ever evolve to question them.

JB

Enlightenment is coming!!!

Cheers for enlightenment !!!

Eljay:

But your whole reasoning here is based on a temporary "IF."




If this were even accepted by religions, then they would be able to see the flaw of the Bible because it demonstrates a God who is Jealous, who incites men to War, who demands a blood sacrifice to enable him to forgive, on and on.

So right away, a reasonable person should be able to see inconsistency here.

The only conclusion would be that the description of God above is wrong or that the Bible was written by men who were NOT inspired by God hence is just a bunch of books pasted together (which it is) to be used as the basis of a religion.

Therefore, religion and the Bible are man made. But that does not mean that the pantheist concept of God does not exist. In fact, the description above is closer to the pantheist concept of God than it is to the Biblical depiction of the waring God you call Jehovah. (Jehovah is known as the God of war.)

Perhaps the reason the God of War became the top God to be worshiped on the earth is because he made war on all those who apposed him and demanded that there be no other Gods before him.

Indeed, this is what he did.

JB

Exactly....thanks.

Kat

Thank you so much Kat



Check your voice mail, please...I just left you a message

You have mail.
Kat

thank you Kat...


Peace and love, My Sister

What are we drinking?

Wouldee, I had to stop reading your post at the above quote. The reason was not because I disrespect you views, but rather because what you said here does not address that I'm saying in any way. It simply and clearly shows that you misunderstand what I'm saying.

Also, your constant use of the term "churhianity" shows that you don't understand what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a book, not about what churches do with the book. I'm speaking solely to the issue of whether or not a particular book makes sense. And that's completely impendent of the views of any church. In fact, the mere fact that church as in such disagreement about what the book says only supports my view that the book it completely and entirely ambiguous.

If it wasn't so ambiguous then all churches would have precisely the same ideas when they read it.

First let me address your erroneous and completely untrue accusations that I hold that Jesus is impotent, a liar, a mirage, a fable, and a fraud.

To the point,... I'm asking whether we should believe that the Bible is true. Question,... did Jesus write anything that is in the Bible? Answer, a resounding NO! (for once we have something that is completely unambiguous!) All, scholars, clergy and religious people I've ever spoken with seem to be in unanimous agreement that Jesus did not write a single solitary word in the Bible.

Therefore it would be impossible to use the Bible to call Jesus a liar. At best, all that a person can say is that IF these words really are the words of Jesus, THEN we might be able to say that he was lying or at the very least mistaken about certain things.

For me, one epiphany that should also come out of this factual observation is that if we can't use the Bible to call Jesus a liar, then we also can't use it to claim that he was telling the truth. When we put our faith in the Bible we are not putting our faith in Jesus, we are putting our faith in the words of men who claim to speak for Jesus. Authors that we can't even be sure they were who they claim to be! The gospels could have very easily been written by committees who had an agenda. In fact, there is actually good reason to believe that they were!

So when we question the Bible, we must question the motivation of the men who may have authored it, and clearly Jesus was not one of the authors. So it would be impossible to use the Bible to claim that Jesus was a liar, or to say anything about Jesus actually, for that matter.

In fact, this very notion raises humongous questions! If Jesus really was God, then surely he would have had the insight and wisdom to know how important it would be for him to write down his own message.

There mere fact that he wrote nothing flies in the face that he was a supreme being that came to earth with a message for all mankind. Although, there are historical rumors that Jesus actually did write things down, but later, the churchianity (as you call it) didn't like what Jesus had written so they denounced it as being unauthentic and quickly disposed of it. They then went on to write their own version of what happened, and that's what we have today that we call the Bible.

When we look at the Bible as a book, clearly we can't use it to either support Jesus or denounce him directly. All we can do is ask whether the book makes any sense.

In your overzealous defense of your beliefs, you automatically view any intellectual inquiry into the Bible as a direct attack on Jesus. You are so prepared to defend this God you have created in your mind that you can't even look at the book where you got this information objectively anymore.

You're clearly in the mindset of, "DEFEND JESUS AT ALL COST!". And that's precisely what the book is asking you to do. The authors of the book have convinced you that it's not about them, it's entirely about the man they wrote about. They have taken any suspicion that might be directed toward them and they have turned into a direct attack on the martyr-God that they want you to believe in. And yes, the story of Jesus most certainly is a story of a Martyr-God. A God who voluntarily gave his own life to save all of humanity from his own judgments.

I ask if the story makes sense. You accuse me of attacking Jesus? That makes no sense Wouldee. That's just a distraction tactic to take attention away from the real questions being asked and create an imaginary diversion that God is being attacked. This is precisely what the authors of the Bible are counting on. Divert attention away from themselves and get the readers to defend the God they have created.

As to the rest of your post

The rest of your post is nothing more than a feeble attempt at assassinating the character of Abracadabra.

I did read it go back and read it however, and I'd like to respond to the following.



My pantheistic view of the true nature of our essence came along many years later. It only appears from your perspective that this is some kind of an argument between pantheism and the biblical picture. It is not.

Once I realized that the biblical picture was false I had to move forward, and that movement led me to the pantheistic view. And even so, I only use that as the simplest of ill-defined labels. I don't consider pantheism to be a religion, and denounce any religions that claim they represent "Pantheism".

Pantheism is not a definition of God but simply and understand that God cannot be defined other than to know that everything that exists is of God, and therefore is God. God is not a person sitting on a throne keeping track of who's naughty or nice so he can even cast them into hell or invite them into his mansion to play with his toys. That's simply the wrong picture of what God is. That's the biblical picture.

You also say that I'm "Bashing Christianity here". But that is not at all what I am doing. That is actually a lie being that it is untrue.

What I am doing is asking if the Bible can be true? And offering my conclusions of why it can't possibly be true. Sure, you can claim that this is Bashing Christianity because I'm questioning the very book they chose to base their religion on. But from my point of view that book is also a historical document of humanity. I am simply asking WHY it should be believed.

So now I ask you,... If there is a rock solid reason of WHY we should believe this book then why don't Christians just state it with confidence and be done with the issue? The reason they can't do this is because there IS NO REASON to believe it! Other than pure faith, which is nothing more than simply choosing to believe in it for NO REASON other than because you feel like believing in it.

My point, is that you are not placing your FAITH in God when you do this. You are placing your FAITH in a book. You are giving your FAITH over to the idea that this book knows what it's talking about and that the authors weren't ever attempting to deceive you! KEEP IN MIND ALSO that Jesus was not an author of this book!

You are placing your FAITH in a book, not in God. And my only point is that you have no reason to believe this book, and you can't even give me one that doesn't simply reduce to FAITH, that you would just personally like to believe that it's true. In SPITE of the fact that it is so ambiguous that it fell into three major parts, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, and a million different sects and denominations beyond that!

A book that is so ambiguous that even clergy can't agree on what it's saying!

That is what you are placing your FAITH in. Not God. You are placing your FAITH in the idea that this book correctly DESCRIBES God!

And your FAITH is so strong that if I question the book you claim that I'm attacking God himself!

I would never attack God, Wouldee, and the mere fact that you think that I would only goes to show that you don't know me at all. I'm not out to destroy God. Not in the least. I'm trying to get people to realize that they are worshiping a book, and not God.

But they flatly refuse to even consider looking at the book objectively. They are too busy defending it like as if it is God.

Well, there you go Eljay, by your very own reasoning the Bible has to be a fraud.

It's perfectly clear that there are already different versions and interpretations of the Bible already in print. Therefore your reasoning that God would assure the accuracy of his message throughout eternity fails and thus your very assertions suggest that the Bible cannot be the word of God.

Moreover, you can't just grab one interpretation of the Bible can claim that it is this preserved word of God you are speaking of. If there are any erroneous version out there then who's to say which one is correct?

The folklore that was at the foundation of the biblical story is also at the foundation of the Quran. Both can't be true, they diverge in far too many areas. Therefore the original folklore (which would have had to have been the original word of God) was tainted and twisted long before Jesus was even born! And the mere fact that the Christians then when on to tack on a New Testament, that other religions would not recognize as being the valid word of God once again flies in the face of your assertion that God would preserve his own word throughout eternity.

Based on the reasoning that you've given here I would think that you would have to conclude that the biblical picture of God then can't possibly be true because it flies in the face of precisely what you are claiming it shouldn't fly in the face of.

I must misunderstand what you are saying here because from my point of view you've just given a reason why the Bible can't be the word of an all-powerful God.

And I would be the first to agree with this reasoning!



And then you end by claiming that the Bible comes down to personal interpretation????? With that conclusion then everyone who reads it and decides that it makes no sense must be RIGHT! Because that's what they god out of it.

With all due respect Eljay, you're not making anymore sense than the Bible makes.

Abra wrote to wouldee:




Very clearly written Abra. It is crystal clear. Your writing is the best, the most direct and to the point clarity I have ever read.

And yet Abra, you will not get a reasonable response or answer from a Christian. Your points are too rational, too logical too reasonable for them.

The state they are in is similar to a state of hypnosis where their attention is focused on one thing and one thing only. They cannot take their attention off that one thing for fear of loosing sight of their faith or their idea of God.

Enjoyed the post.

JB

Thank you Abra!! I agree with JB. Your thoughts and ideas are wonderfully written and I could not agree with your asessments more. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us!

But that was not the argument to which I responded to. Drew stated that the reasoning of the bible being "accurate, without error, pure in every way" was an example of circular reasoning. I merely demonstrated that there is an argument for it's accuracy - outside of the bible stating it is so. But that aside, I will adress your post.



Excuse me - but what inconsistancy? Inconsistant with your criteria? What is reasonable about that? I'm not sure what you are setting up for a criteria - but as we examine history, as noted through scripture - and matched up against secular acounts, I'm afraid that the Pantheistic God - or any God one choses falls under the same indightment. So you are essentially saying that by your criteria - no God could exist.



By your own dismissive reasoning - the pantheistic concept of God cannot exist either. There is more substance for the argument that the God of pantheism is a creation of man to suit his needs, than could ever be demonstrated for the Christian God. Just the mere numbers of those that reject Him demonstrate that.



Actually - this "God of War" that you refer to, the one of the Old Testament, was not worshopped by all on earth. Only one race worshopped him. It was not until Jesus walked the earth that the concept of Jehovah was even introduced to the non-Jewish world. So your leap of logic through shifting middles does not have me convinced that the bible is flawed - or that somehow the God of pantheism is superior to the one of scripture.