I know for a fact that Jesus does not love me, but he does think I have a nice personality.

If you truly believed this statement, there would be no need for you to "defend" yourself for the accusation of "your current spitting in His face"
Perhaps this analogy was in poor judgement of the OP. I take this sentence as meaning "your actions which are displeasing to God", as I know that spitting in his face is impossible.
Nowhere did "YourWordisTruth" claim to speak for Jesus. Nor was he "Grossly Misrepresenting" the Gospels like some do.



To use your own quote...
John 12:47-48
47And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.
(but you forgot to add this...)
48He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.

Mark 16:16
16He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

John 5:21-29
21For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will.

22For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:

23That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him.

24Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.

25Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.

26For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;

27And hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man.

28Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice,

29And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.


If you believed THIS statement, you wouldn't be calling the Bible and Christianity "absurd", "ludicrous", "insane", "hearsay", "false" or even posting yet another reply to try to disprove the Bible.
I , on the other hand, AM trying to convince you that the Word of Jesus is the way to Salvation.


A few things that should be known:
1. There is a difference between "gods" and "God", check the dictionary.
2. Insinuating that the actions of a few Christians represent all of Christianity is incorrect. I am deeply sorrowful for whatever Christians may have done to a person for them to feel this way.
3. Every man is fallable, including myself.
4. Every man is a sinner.
5. Every man IS worthy of Salvation.
6. The Bible is based on FAITH...


Ab, if you would like to continue this discussion, please be open and honest. I still get the feeling you are trying to disprove the Bible.

..All I can say is..

"Illegal, illegal!"

How on earth can Jesus love me when he died 2000 years ago ?.
Also how can he love someone he never met ?. Did he meet over 6 billion people ?!!!. Jesus was a simple, primitive man with all man's anatomy to say the contrary is just to lie to yourself and to others .

double post folks .

..maybe he had a secret lab with the internet..
..and he used Mingle, Myspace, and Facebook..

Just a guess..

And let's not forget to add:

John 5:23 "For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:"

Sorry, but the Bible is a joke.

We could easily create two Jesus marionette dolls and create a play having Jesus arguing with himself using nothing more than the very contradictions printed in the gospels.

The real truth is that the bible doesn't even contain a single solitary word from the man named Jesus (assuming that he even actually existed)

So Jesus isn't even in the Bible at all. All we have in the Bible are a very few people repeating a rumor and not even agreeing with each other on precisely what the rumor is. The entire Christian religion is based on the hearsay rumors of about 4 or 5 authors of the New Testament (and even the Jews reject this)

So to even say that 'Jesus said this, or Jesus said that" is actually a misrepresentation. All we can truly do is say, "Matthew said, this and Luke said that, and Mark said this other thing, and John had something altogether different to say".

The bulk of the New Testament was actually written by Paul anyway and most of his writings were rehashing crap from the Old Testament. Stuff that that even the gospels suggest that Jesus most likely wouldn't have even supported. Even the gospels have Jesus clearly disagreed with teachings of Yahweh on several major issues.



I don't need to disprove the Bible, it's already been disproved by the universe.

The Bible is entirely founded on the idea that mankind "fell from grace" and needs to seek repentance for his evil ways. The Bible accuses mankind of being responsible for bringing imperfection and death into the world due to man's fall from grace.

We now know that imperfection and death existed on planet Earth for eons before mankind even came onto the scene. So the authors of the Bible are caught red-handed in their lies. The claim that mankind is responsible for the "evil" in this world is clearly false. So I don't need to disprove the Bible. As far as I'm concerned it's already been proven to be a lie by factual evidence from the real universe!

What should I believe? The real universe, or an ancient manmade myth?

A book that has God commanding people to make blood sacrifices to him to appease their sins, and even has them judging each other and stoning heathens, sinners, and unruly children to death? A God who has mortal men doing his judging and executions for him?

Why would a genuinely all-powerful creator ever ask anyone to do that?

As far as I'm concerned that's just further proof that the Bible had to have been written by men. They were clearly trying to get the masses to murder "heathens and sinners" because they knew that no all-supreme God existed who would do it for them.

The very idea that the divine creator of this universe would ask mortals to stone sinners, heathens, and even unruly children to death is utterly absurd, IMHO.

Speaking about HONESTY:



Exactly!

Now I ask you,...

Why should I want to have "faith" that all of humanity fell from grace from our creator?

Why should I want to have "faith" that our creator is appeased by blood sacrifices?

Why should I want to have "faith" that our creator told people to murder heathens, sinners, and unruly children?

Why should I want to have "faith" that our creator is at war with an evil boogieman who is out to steal my soul?

Why should I want to have "faith" that our creator always solves his problems using utterly stupid violent methods as the Bible describes?

Why should I want to have "faith" that our creator couldn't find a better way to 'save' his creation other than to come up with a gory sacrifice of his "only begotten son" being nailed to a pole to pay for our sins?

I personally would rather have faith that God is at least as intelligent and wise as myself and doesn't have the mentality of a barroom drunkard who's always finding utterly stupid and ignorant ways to solve his problems.

Let me ask you this?

If you discovered that the Bible was absolutely false would you be thrilled or saddened?

Would you be pleased to discover that you're not truly at odds with your creator as the story suggests?

Would you be pleased to discover that Jesus was not a sacrifice made by God to pay for your sins?

Or would you be disappointed?

Moreover, if you would be pleased to learn that it was all a lie to begin with, then why place your faith in something you'd that rather not even believe in the first place?

After all, if it's entirely faith-based why bother believing something so gory and depressing?

Would it possibly be because you feel that, if it's not true, that means there is no God at all? Then this would leave you desperate and hopeless with nothing left to face but pure empty atheism?

Do you cling to this gory story because you see it as the "only possible hope"?

It seems to me that this would necessarily be the case unless you actually like the idea of a God who had to have his son nailed to a pole to pay for your nasty attitudes.

I personally feel that such a scenario isn't even divine enough to have ever come from a divine creator. It could only have been the invention of the demented sick minds of men, IMHO.

So when you speak of "Faith" may I sincerely ask you why you even bother putting your faith in such a dismal picture of a sick demented God who always solves his problems using violent methods?

With all due respect if our creator is as inept and unwise as the Bible suggests I personally find that to be far more depressing than atheism. I would rather there be no God at all than to discover that God is truly as cruel, heartless, and ignorant as the Bible demands.

What sense does it make for a God to send his son to earth and say to mankind, "Here. Brutally murder my son and I'll forgive your sins!"

What sense does that even make?

It doesn't make any sense at all, IMHO.

~~~

I don't restrict myself to only choosing between atheism or an idiot jealous Godhead who solves all problems via such disgustingly gory methods.

And then he's going to get peeved at me for not believing those idiotic stories are divine? What sense does that even make?

Fortunately there are better choices that trump both of these ignorant philosophies. So I've chosen to place my faith in those truly divine alternatives.

If God turns out to be as sick as the Bible demands, then I'll just have to face that fact that God is indeed a inept idiot and things were hopeless all along anyway.



I couldn't worship the biblical God anyway. That would be like worshiping Hitler just to avoid his wrath. I'm not going to worship a gory demented Godhead just to avoid its wrath. If I'm morally superior to God, I guess I'll just have to go to hell for it. There's no way that I'll condone the actions of the Biblical God just to appease it.

What did Hitler want to do? He wanted to become the King of Kings and chose the people he liked, and rejected the people he doesn't like, and send those people into fiery furnaces.

What dose the Biblical God want to do? He wants to become the King of Kings and chose the people he likes, and rejected the people he doesn't like, and send those people into a fiery furnace.

Eerie similarities doncha think?

And you expect me to put my FAITH in this?

No thank you!

You're gonna try and quote the Bible yet again to try and discredit Christian beliefe?
Sorry, but all you discredit is yourself... You show with this quote how much of a hipocrite you are.

Sorry Ab., but i'm done, you've done way more damage to yourself than I ever could have.
Like I said, be honest and open and I'll dicuss this with you. untill then, stay out of "General Religion Chat" please, because you obviously have no religion...


Ab, I sense an aprehension to your words. Just remember, if u ask for forgiveness on your deathbed, ALL sins will be forgiven, just have a little bit of FAITH....

The purpose of General Religion forum is for people of all belief systems to discuss their beliefs. If you want to talk to people who don't disagree with you, you have the Christian forums for that.

Oh, please. The gospels have Jesus contradicting himself. What more do you need?

What you are calling "Christian beliefs" have nothing to do with Jesus. All they consist of is distortions that pick and choose the parts of the gospels that can be used to belittle anyone who doesn't agree with their version of the religion. Just look at the history of Christianity over the past millenia. The hypocrisy of Christianity is not in question.

You talk about honesty. Try looking at the religion as a whole for a minute.

It starts out with a Zeus-like Godhead, who is appeased by blood sacrifices.

Why should the creator of this universe be appeased by blood sacrifices?

Why should the creator of this universe just happen to be almost identical to preexisting manmade mythologies?

The Christian God, Yahweh, is also clearly male chauvinistic against women. At one point in the Bible he proclaims that women are only worth half as many shekles as a man. He also demands that women remain silent in public when it comes to religious or important social issues.

I don't know about you, but the real male chauvinists who wrote this crap aren't pulling the wool over my eyes. No decent divine creator could possibly be that ignorant.

When you worship the Bible, what you are actually worshiping is the culture who invented this mythology.

You said earlier that you are out to convince me to accept Jesus as my savior. Well, I suppose in a sense I'm out to help you to see the absurdity in that.

The Old Testament has Yahweh teaching people to judge each other and stone sinners, heathens, and unruly children to death. It's absolutely necessary to judge others to be sinners, heathens, or unruly before you can stone them to death for those things. So Yahweh clearly commanded the people to judge each other and carry out these punishments of death.

Or to put that more realistically: The men who wrote this false doctrine of God claimed that this is what God wanted people to do.

Like I say, it should be clear already that no genuine supreme creator would have every asked people to do his judging and excutions for him. The reason the mortal authors of this fabricated tale had to ask people to do these things is because they knew there was no all-powerful God. They were just using that idea to brainwash the people into doing THEIR WILL (the will of the authors of this tale), not God's will. No God would ever ask people to judge each other and stone each other to death. Especially an all-wise all-merciful God.

What sense would it make for an all-wise God to tell mortal idiots to pass judgment on each other?

Yet this is what God is like, for the Bible tells us so.

This same God also taught men to seek revenge and take an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. So seeking revenge was not only condoned by God, but it was actually a directive of God.

Then we come to the New Testament.

Some guy named Jesus comes along and denounces all this crap. He denounces the violence. He teaches us not to judge others, and not to stone sinners to death.

This is a complete opposite view from what Yahweh stood for. There's no way that Jesus could have been the son of Yahweh, he didn't even agree with the ways of Yahweh.

Jesus also taught people to turn the other cheek and not to seek revenge. Jesus taught forgiveness. Once again, this is the complete opposite from the mentality that had been attributed to the mythological Yahweh.

Jesus was murdered for blaspheme. Then for many decades there was much confusion and rumors about who Jesus really was and what he stood for. Many people saw him as a man who denounced the old doctrines as being totally false and overly violent. They saw him as a man who taught love and forgiveness.

So the old doctrine was losing it's grip on the people. People were starting to reject the old ways just like Jesus had taught.

The authoritarian who depended on those old doctrines needed to do something so they wrote the gospels and tried to make out like Jesus was the Son of Yahweh who had been sent as a 'sacfificial lamb' to pay for the sins of all mankind. They were setting up Jesus to be used as a patsy.

The only reason they were able to get this farce off the ground was because they had armies and swords. They simply murdered everyone who refused to agree with them. And they did all their murdering in the name of Jesus "The Christ", son of the great Yahweh.

So that's Christianity in a nutshell right there.



I'm as open and honest as I can be. I'm telling you precisely how I see this story historically. Jesus was used and abused by the "Christians". They don't speak for Jesus at all. They absuse Jesus to the hilt.

And now you're telling me that I have no religion. But what are you calling religion? Blind faith in doctrine no matter how utterly stupid and conflicing it might be? It that what you're calling religion?

If so, then you're right. By that definition I have no religion.

However, if you allow spirituality to be 'religion' then I'm an extremely religious person. Not only to I believe in Jesus, but I recognize him as my brother. He taught precisely the same moral values that I would have taught. I applaud his efforts, but I must confess that I feel bad that he went and overturned the money tables. He should have practiced what he preached and remained peaceful. That's truly sad that he let his temper get the best of him.

Do I believe in Yahwah? No way. Are you kidding? That story is ever more ignorant than the story of Zeus.

In fact, I had already described my 'religious' views concerning Jesus. I believe that during the missing years between the time when Jesus was 12 and came back at 30 he traveled to India and met with Deepak Chopra. Er,.. I mean,.. he learned of Buddhism and the ways of Buddha.

Once this is realized it's easy to see why Jesus taught many of the things that had been attributed to him. He was teaching the ways of the Buddha precisely. And he was clearly denouncing the teachings of Yahweh. If anything Jesus was more likely the son of Buddha than the son of Yahweh.

So, you see, I can be deeply religious and still see the utter absurdities of the Christian fable.

Using Jesus as a battering ram to continue to support the hypocrisy and lies of Christianity is something that you'll never get me to support.

I don't need to support that version of Jesus to be "Religious".



I have no sins that need to be forgiven, so that's the least of my concerns.

Besides if you stop and think about this for even a moment surly you can see how disgusting this scenario would be.

Imagine that you have a beauitful loving daughter. She brings a smile to everyone she meets. She volunteers to do humane work and helps people out all the time. She is totally devoted to humanity and ecology and she loves everyone including animals. She's even a vegitarian.

However, like me, she views the Christian story of Jesus as being utterly insane and unsupportable.

One day she is raped and murdered by a vicious man who has murdered and abused many other women and children.

After a life of creating such horror he finally dies, but on his death bed he has a change of heart and accepts Jesus as his savoir and repents all his sins with sincere remorse.

You finally die and go to heaven anxious to meet your daughter.

But when you get there she's not there. You see her rapest talking to Jesus. So you ask Jesus, "Where's my daughter? She was such a beauitful loving person, but I can't find her".

Jesus says, "I'm sorry but your daughter didn't believe in the Bible so I had no choice but to cast her into the hell fire".

What are you going to do now?

Accept this?

The Christian picture makes no sense at all.

Entry into heaven cannot possibly depend upon beliving in some stupid story. That would fly in the face of Justice, Mercy, and Righteousness!

It cannot depend upon such a trivial meaningless idea. It necessarily has to be false dogma. There's no question about it. Christianity necessarily has it all wrong.

Besides, if you're out to convince me that I need to be "saved", then what's wrong with me trying to convince you how utterly absurd that idea is?

It's just two humans trying to convince each other of different spiritual views. To claim that one is 'religion', and the other isn't, is absurd.

From my point of view it's the Christians who make Jesus out to be a monster. No me.

Can't we just say this dude before me won..?
He's like posted half the frikkin bible worth in posts..
I can't even read that much..
I go cross eyed.. >.<

Even better idea!

Michael: 1:1: "And God said to the crazy white boy from Pennsylvania, there shall be no more tongued speech about the Books and Ancient Days, because none of it can be proven!"

1:2: "So, write this in the last chapters of said sacred book and let none discuss this in the days of days that lead to the end!"


There..
That's in the Really New Testament..
God told me it.
I wrote in down.

THAT IS THE WORD!
You must ALL obey!

(Unless your lke agnostic or athiest then you don't care to discuss this anyway so totally irrelevant, eh?)

Soo....
That settled..

Next subject?

yes the bible does say that god is here for the sinners and not for those who are already saved! but when the day comesthat the lord rises again the sinners will be left behind and his followers will rise with him.
hes here to help the sinners become the followers!

And the difference between that belief and believing in Santa and unicorns is what exactly? Seriously, I wanna know.

Well geez. It's easy to see the difference.

One keeps a list of who's been naugthy and nice and the other one,...

Oops! Ok, let me try again:

One flies through the air riding in a sleigh pulled by reindeer.

The other one walks on water and rides a donkey.

See, there's lots of differences if you look hard enough.

Some people grow out of mythical creatures and fairy tales. The others have had it instilled so firmly in their minds that C4 fillings couldn't blow them out.

ah...riiiight....my bad, shoulda seen that....

for the latter ones...mores the pity...

WOW alot to read, and even less to take in.....

........so I guess this means I'm still alone in my darkness, sigh.

I was testing children in my Dublin Sunday school class to see if they understood the concept of getting to heaven.

I asked them, 'If I sold my house and my car, had a big garage sale and gave all my money to the church, would that get me into heaven?'

'NO!' the children answered.

'If I cleaned the church every day, mowed the garden, and kept everything tidy, would that get me into heaven?'

Again, the answer was 'NO!' By now I was starting to smile.

'Well, then, if I was kind to animals and gave sweets to all the children, and loved my wife, would that get me into heaven?'

Again, they all answered 'NO!'. I was just bursting with pride for them.

I continued, 'Then how can I get into heaven?'

A six year-old boy shouted out: "YUV GOTTA BE FOOKN' DEAD...."



..and there you have it..
:D