The way that I'm imagining the situation, based on your description, seems to present and inconsistency, and I'm curious how its reconciled. Does Satan have to leave his cell to tempt us, or can he tempt us from within his cell?

God, Satan, and all the angels are in the spirit world if you may say it that way. They can be in many places at once. As in God could be helping someone in USA and Australia at the same time. And same with Satan, can cause terror in USA, Australia, and still be tortured in hell.

Because when your dead, your dead, game over

But that doesn't fit the Biblical Picture.

The Bible doesn't start out with a God who creates the Earth as a testing ground for new souls. That's just NOT what the story was originally about.

The story is about a fall from grace, not a TEST to get into some heaven.

Sorry, BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ! That's just plain wrong.

You people just make up whatever you like. But it just doesn't fit in with the original mythology. You're basically just making up your own religion and pretending that the Bible supports it.

Cowboy,

thank you.

Not exactly. Life in the original idea of what it was all suppose to be ment to be was to live in paradise yes..... Garden of Eden, then we fell from grace when adam/eve ate of the fruit. So now we have earn our way back into paradise. God is giving us all a second chance to get to where we were suppose to be.

No offense meant, but do all atheist and or people of other religions just take any particular part of the bible or something one said without the entire message out of context and try to use it against them in a way like trying to shove it in their face?

you're welcome.

I have no clue what atheists and people of other religions do. I was born and raised in the Christian religion. What I found was that the difference of opinions between Christians themselves is quite suffcient on it's own.

I defended the religion for many years against Christians themselves before I finally realized that it's impossible for Jesus to have been the son of Yahweh.

Even when I was a devout Christian I would have still argued with people like you. Because, IMHO, you totally misrepresent the teachings of Jesus and instead just dwell on obscessions of sin and and the need for salavtion.

It's truly sad that the religion ends up turning people into such negative thinkers. How often do you ever see the religion supporting people morally? Not very often at all. The main thrust of the religoin is to condemn people as being sinners. It's an extremely negative religion that is extremely difficult to make something positive from it.

Even if you e,try, the very FIRST thing you will get is opposition from Christians themselves. It's a self-defeating religion.

It is extremely rare to find Christians that actually preach positive things. Even after I had long-since quite the religion, I continued to attend services when my mother became too feeble to go to church on her own. I went with her to help her into her chair and sat through the sermons. All I could do is shake my head in disgust because the sermons were almost always focused on sin and the struggle to avoid it.

There's just nothing positive or uplifting about the religion.

Moreover, you claim that we need to earn our way into heaven is not supported by the bible. On the contrary the Bible demands that no man can EARN his way into heaven. The only way into heaven is throught the GRACE of God.

So your claim that life is about EARNING our way into heaven simply does not fit into the picture of Christianity. You've made up your own religion and you're just pretending that it is based on Christianity.

Earning heaven is just an expression. Heaven isn't a given. As in people can't go around disobeying God and still expect to receive heaven. That is all ment and or implied when i say earning heaven. And no heaven can't be "bought".

Romans 6:23 - "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Nottice again the "gift" of God is eternal. When your children disobey you, do you go out and get them gifts? or do they have to earn those "gifts" by obeying you?

Well, if that's you're view and understanding then good. I hope you win the gift that you so desire.



I'm neither obscessed with being obeyed, nor having anyone obey me.

I work from a totally different perspective of mentoring and understanding. I strive to educate so children can make their own decisions wisely. So clearly I'm not anywhere near like the God you seek. I wouldn't understand such a God, and therefore I most likely wouldn't be interested in any "gifts" he might be offering.

The only "gift" that I would offer my childern is the gift of their own sovereignty. Anything less that this would be a meaningless gift, IMHO.

no offense ment, but so you're alright if your children grow up to be disobedient heathens that spend their time in jail/prison because they weren't taught disobedience and don't know that with every choice of action they make in life there is a consequence?

You clearly are not ready for personal sovereignty. Apparently you can only think in terms of obedience. If you were my child, I'd take you to the hospital to see if they can find a medical reason for your inablity to comprehend personal responsiblity.

In the meantime, I doubt that my children would have had that problem. Being that they would have my genes they most probably would have turned out ok.

genes have absolutely nothing to do with obedience or disobedience. Weather that is with a parent, neighbor, and or government.

And yes obedience and personal responsibility go hand in hand with each other. It is our responsibility to follow the law, weather it be man's law and or God's law. It is still our responsibility to be obedient. And we will be responsible for the punishment we receive for either discriminants.

See, there's your obscession with failure. As well as an avoidance to confess that whether or not your "win" your gift of eternal life would indeed be your own responsiblity in your scenrio.

Apparently your entire life is driving by the concepts of reward and punishment with respect to obeying the wishes of some other entities whether it be a government or a God.

I would not raise my children to view life in that way. From my perspective that's a very unhealthy and restrictive way to think. Consider the concept of a government. If you physically move to a different location, then you'd be living under the laws of a different government. Things that were considered to be "improper" and therefore illegale in one society are not considered to be "improper" in another. So your entire moral structure is entirely based upon other people.

This is also true in terms of the religion that you just happened to chose to worship. Had you choosen a different religion your moral values would be quite different as well.

From that perspective, you are unable to think for yourself in terms of morality. You require that someone else do your thinking for you.

You keep comparing the biblical God to being a parent. Well, all I'm doing is attempting to explain to you why that very comparison just causes me to reject the biblical picture of God all the more. I totally disagree with the methods of parenting described in those stories.

If you're going to run your life on a philosophy of obeying the opinions of other people, then I only hope for your sake that you never get involed with a dangerous cult. Although, based on historical evidence you are already deeply involved with a dangerous cult.

So now your so-called "obedience" is entirely in your own hands, based on how YOU interpret the scriptures of your cult. We've seen examples of people doing horrible things including murdering doctors at abortion clinics in the name of being "obedient" to their God.

So I'm not impressed with people who blindly obey others. That's the kind of thing that leads to Holy Wars, Holocausts, and the drinking of poison kool-aid.

So I can see the unholiness of this approach to life, and thus it is my conclusion that this method of parenting cannot be divine wisdom.

Only true education and a respect for personal sovereignty and the personal sovereignty of others can ever lead to true righteousness.

Blind obedience is just that - Blind.

In the end, you aren't really obeying anyone but yourself.

You're taking a book, twisting it's words into your own interpretations, then calling YOUR intepreations, "The Word of God", and pretending like as if youre "obeying" some other entity.

When in truth, all you're really doing is using the book to justify your own opinions and conclusions.

The danger with this method of obtaining personal sovereignty is that you have fooled yourself into believing that you are actually obeying some other entity. That can easily lead to danger because it's easy to convince yourself to do unhealthy things in the "Name of God".

This is precisely why this religion has been so destructive on such a large scale throughout history.

So what i get from what you say is we should all go back to how the world used to be ran, anarchy. No rules, nothing like that. But people could go around doing as they wish, weather that is giving someone a gift or slaughtering thousands of people. Ok i can see how your being controlled outlook on everything works very well. Good for you, i hope this all works out greatly for you.

Those examples gave with things such as christian crusades and what not are not of God weather one says it is or not. Plainly tells us not to murder in the basic concept of following God, the 10 commandments.

Satan works with manipulation, that is the only power he has on this earth. To manipulate us in anyway he can to disobey God.

Well, that's what I mean about the whole thing being a matter of personal interpretation. You point to the 10 commandments and say that the scriptures plainly tell us not to kill.

But that ignores the FACT that these very same scriptures have God commanding and directing people to kill heathens, sinners, and unruly children. This God also says that thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

So you'd need to ignore the bulk of scripture to uphold your personal interpretation.

Moreover, even the Gospels in the New Testament clearly have Jesus saying that not one jot nor one tittle shall pass from law.

So anyone who decides to personally interpret the biblical scriptures to mean that Christians are indeed supposed to murder heathens and witches cannot be refuted. They have a perfectly legitimate argument.

Does this mean that I believe God is on their side? Of course not!

It simply means that I reject the whole stupid book as having anything to do with any God.

The bottom line is simple. Anyone can use the Bible to support just about any personal interpretation they so desire.



Again you misundertand. I'm not rejecting rules. I'm rejecting the idea of teaching children that they should simply obey rules simply because they are rules. There's no value in that kind of parenting, IMHO.

My behavior is almost always within the limits of the laws. Not because I blindly obey, but simply because I have learned how to live life in a reasonable way.

In fact, if everyone were like me there would be no need for laws. Locksmiths and bank vaults would be non-existence. There would be no need for police, because there wouldn't be anyone around who even has an inclination to take something that doesn't belong to them, or harm another person or their property.

I don't obey the laws at all. I have no need to. All I need to do is be myself, and the laws are automatically fulfilled. That's the beauty of a true understanding and respect of personal sovereignty.

To believe like you do, I would need to believe that people are incapable of behaving in a well-mannered productive and respectful way unless you put a carrot of eternal life in front of their nose and a boot in their backside.

If humans are truly that ignorant, then I must not be human. I must have gotten here from some other planet by mistake. Maybe that's why human culture makes no sense to me.

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But that ignores the FACT that these very same scriptures have God commanding and directing people to kill heathens, sinners, and unruly children. This God also says that thou shalt not suffer a witch to live
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And before you go and judge following God, you have to have knowledge of our father. You referred to God commanding and directing people to kill heathens, sinners, and unruly children. The verses you get this knowledge from is in the old testament.

Before Jesus came and died for our sins, people were judged for their sins while still on earth, eg., stoning, killing heathens, sinners, and unruly children. The arrival of Jesus fullfilled the old testament. So it now holds no power over us.

This no longer is held to us. For since Jesus came to this earth and was crucified for our sins, Jesus is now the judge. We are no longer to judge anyone because in respect that is Jesus' job.

I understand your personal interpretations of these stories.

That's fine. And I'm glad to hear that you don't support the teachings of the Old Testament.

However, as I've already pointed out, the Gospels clearly have Jesus stating that he has not come to change the laws and that not one jot nor one tittle shall pass from law. Well a "jot and tittle" refers to writings, and in this religion the only writings that Jesus could have possibly been referring to were the writings of the Torah (or Old Testament).

So someone else's personal interpretation of these scriptures can easily be argued for and supported. Then the whole religion just becomes nothing more than a bunch of arguments over whose personal interpretaions are correct. In fact, this is precisely why the religion has fallen into such divisive disarray: Judaism, Islam, Catholicism and the myriad of disagreeing protestants.

The bottom line for me is quite simple.

Let me just ask you a simple question:

If you discovered that the Bible was indeed false and that the atheists are right, (in other words, there is no prize of eternal life to be had, and no God to obey), would you then become an evil unethical person?

In other words, would you prefer to actually break the laws of man and God if you thought there was no prize to be won by obeying them, and no punishments to suffer if you break them?

I've asked myself that very question, and my answer is that I am who I am. I would not change my behavior in any way. My morality does not require a prize or a threat of punishment.

Does yours?