Who can be saved? A Christian perspective

quote:

---

Shraf - be reasonable, you must see that if a footballer who used to plat football - only now plays tennis - then the definition of footballer doesn't become: " person who plays tennis ".

---

There are universally-accepted criteria for the playing of football and tennis.There are not hundreds and hundreds of different sets of rules for playing football or tennis which are followed by various groups all claiming to be the "authentic" and "true" players of football and tennis.No, the rules of football and tennis are pretty much agreed upon by everybody who plays the games in any professional or serious way.You cannot say that this is true of Christianity.Each group thinks the others have it wrong about what the "teachings of Jesus" were and how to follow them.You have a particular way of thinking about it, which disagrees with quite a few sects of Christianity.Why should I consider you right and all of the others wrong?

quote:

---

Is it reasonable and logical for me to deduce - that one who intends to murder and then does it - is a murderer or a christian?

---

The above doesn't answer any of my points at all.The Christian pro life killers of abortion doctors would say that yes, they are indeed Christians, saving thousands and thousands of babies by killing the baby killers and bombing clinics.This is a crusade, they say, in which the ends justifies the means. [qs]Who are you to say otherwise?[qs]

quote:

---

Now - I don't judge who is a christian - or who goes to heaven, so please don't strawman my position. Indeed, all I did was offer a definition of what being Christian is - and it's not playing tennis.

---

Mike, you have judged that people who murder cannot be true Christians.

quote:

---

Shraff - All scotsman believe in porridge - but disagree about how tastey it is.

---

Answer the question.Do Christians disagree over interpreting the Bible literally or as allegory?Yes or No?

quote:

---

Listen - Christ isn't under the rule of Shraff - and what she says. Shall I say it again? God's ways/thoughts are higher than ours.

---

Do humans know the difference beween good and evil?Is God held to at least the same moral standard as humans are?Is God both all-powerful and all-loving?Why won't you answer these questions? I've asked them three times now.

quote:

---

BBBBzzzzt. Wiz's wager - lower thinking - un-omni Shraff makes an attempt to say what God is and judge him add futility.

​

This above quote is all Shraffy opinion.

---

You are avoiding the tough questions by falling back on the "mysterious ways" business.That is a illogical, weak, unfalsifiable argument. Anytime you don't have an answer to a difficult question, you just throw up your hands and say "we don't understand how God works!"You seem to be very sure of how God works when one of your prayers is answered, though, or when something good happens.Funny how that is, huh?

quote:

---

I answered those questions previously. But our knowing good and evill won't give us the right to judge God -

---

Wrong.The Bible says that because Adam and Eve ate of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, we are "as gods", knowing what God knows.According to the Bible, the good and evil we know about is the same good and evil God knows about.Is God held to the same moral standards as humans?

quote:

---

They probably do. There are testimonies from doctors etc. --> I seen a man who looked like an elephant from cancer - and now he is healed. But I have no link - I seen it on the God channel on "Sky television" - I don't even know if it's the same where you live - but you MUST have heard of miracles which your bias has ignored.

---

Call me sheltered.Why don't you find one for me?

quote:

---

Why not just admitt that you think God doesn't exist?

---

I don't know if God exists or not, because I have not ever seen any reliable, verifiable evidence for the supernatural in any form.Additionally, I have no reason to think that, if the supernatural or God/s exist that we would be able to comprehend that being/entity in any way.So, god is not impossible. God is, however, highly improbable based upon all available evidence.

quote:

---

BBBBzzzt, Wiz's wager - you've earned a chat with God - where are u sending him for his Shraffy-perceived wrong doing?

---

Stop avoiding the question.A simple yes or no answer is all that is required.

quote:

---

There can only be one answer to specific requests.

---

Right. Do you do it?

Mike you avoided addressing my analogy:

quote:

---

You are right - this is bad. But if God doesn't act when you want him to - does that mean he doesn't act.

---

Do we know the difference between good and evil or not, Mike?Is god held to at least the same standards of moral responsibility as we humans are?

quote:

---

Remember - it's A and B that count!

---

Do all Christians completely agree on how to follow the teachings of Jesus?

quote:

---

Notice how mike is being attacked. Let's sit back and look at this then; mike and Jar are discussing who will be saved, and now Shraff and co r against the truth of Christ, and are fighting hard with rhetoric tongues and fruitless endeavours against the most High.

---

Look, you are the one who chased me down in another thread to come over here. This line of conversation is your making.Your complaints of "being attacked" ring quite hollow, mike.

quote:

---

That's insulting to my belief Shraff - as I believe earnestly that Gos is unfathomable - after all - he created the heavens and the earth - and who can locate him?

---

But when your prayers are answered, you believe that it's God working, right?God isn't unfathomable to you then, right?Sorry, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot point to answered prayers and say "God is definitwely at work here! See what wonderful things he does!", and then when something bad is going on say, "Gee, we just don't understand how God works."That is post hoc reasoniong and wishful thinking bias at it's most blatant.

quote:

---

Don't you watch 700 club in the USA? They sometimes have a testimony.

---

I have seen testimonies of people who say that their dead pet came back as a ghost to save them from a fire. I have seen testimonies of people who say that they have been abducted by aliens.Are these the kinds of testimonies you are talking about?

quote:

---

So basically you've just admitted that on evidence, God is highly improbable to you - despite having preached that science doesn't have a say on God.

---

Science has a say on evidence, though, and probabilities.I'm also incorporating my non-experience of those "special feelings" of being connected to the Almighty that believers talk about in my personal conclusion.

quote:

---

I say - that based on evidence - it is an absolute certainty that God exists - and my view is just as scientific, because you preach that science says nothing about God.

---

What evidence is that?

quote:

---

I mean, if Christ says love your enemy?

---

Mike, do all Christians completely agree on how to follow Christ'a teachings?

quote:

---

Statistically - we don't exist, because chance wouldn't allow it.

---

Irrelevant to the argument. (and wrong)Please stop trying to avoid questions and distract from the argument being made.

quote:

---

"Indifferent"? - Says who? - Says you.

---

No, says MATH.Are you going to deny that math is valid now, as well as logic, as well as reality?

quote:

---

The universe might be made a certain way - by God.

---

...and God seems to have made the universe with the appearance of being indifferent if you look at the MATH, the statistics.If you were being mugged and beaten, and a dozen big police officers walked by and didn't help you, wouldn't you be kind of confused, angry, and indignant?And wouldn't you be even more annoyed at the police captain, when you went to complain, who told you that those police officers really WERE helping you, you just couldn't tell how, or pointed to the fact that they helped somebody else just the other day?Do we know the difference between good and evil or not, Mike?Is god held to at least the same standards of moral responsibility as we humans are?This message has been edited by schrafinator, 10-18-2004 08:22 AM