The Marketing Of Christianity

You're simply conflating the absolutely normal civilising processes of human development with a totally unnecessary and unevidenced assertion that these societal changes are god's progressive revelation.The New Testament climaxed with the death of Christ and the forecast of his IMMINENT return to fulfil prophecy. None of that happened. You're clinging on to a 2,000 year old proven mythology.Our development is the result of our own efforts, there's not even a hint of divine intervention - in fact the opposite, had this god of yours wished us to behave better towards each other he would not have set the system in place the way it is.

Most of what are usually considered to be prophesies about end times were actually political messages to the zealots and others who wanted to raise a military force to get rid of the Romans. Jesus was talking about what would happen within a generation if they didn't cool their heals. This actually did happen in 70 AD but I contend that was simply Jesus' understanding of His world at that time and wasn't based on supernatural knowledge.There was also mention of Jesus returning at the end of time and then just like today some people figured it would happen in their life time. That's pretty much human nature. The message is that whenever time as we know it ends Jesus will be there with us. We are simply going to disagree about that. Things are the way they are and we have now way of having certainty or not about divine intervention.If God were just to make the world that way out the outset then we would have been simply puppets without the will to make moral choices.

Of course you do; you want it everyway, when he's wrong he's human, when he's right he's godly. That's flat-out wrong.What is the purpose of creating 10% of the human race with inbuilt psychopathy incapable of empathy? Why make life compete for resource? Why make a food chain with the necessity for carnivores to kill to survive? This has absolutely nothing to do with puppetry or moral choice. The system is set-up to be what it is, a primitive and vicious survival system that our societies are only just learning how to overcome.

Which people refuse to call what happened to Lazarus a resurrection? Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Not true. The New Testament climaxed with the resurrection...which spread through the people as a progressive revelation of new hope. In a sense Jesus has already returned..in His Body which is we ourselves. How can you not believe in God on the one hand and then use the system the way it is to prove that He would not have done it this way had He existed? One side maintains that we are powerless without Him and need Him.The other side maintains that we are responsible for every success and/or failure that we cause.In my mind, our responsibility is His responsibility. In Him we breathe and move and have our being. But even if there were no way to prove the Bible or God, Tangle would be responsible for every success and/or failure, as would you as would I.The difference is that we believe God does it through us whereas Tangle believes its all a bunch of bollocks and we do it on our own!Edited by Phat, : fixed spelling

This is another example of meaningless religiosity, Phat. Just a jumble of relious sounding words which avoid the substantive point which was that Jesus did NOT return as he was expected to do and as he said he would. It's called debate. I'm taking the other sides argument - that god made us - and showing that if he did then he set it up so that we would be competitive, survival dependent preditors with a percentage of pychopaths and sociopaths to make it just a bit more unstable. That is not the act of a god you believe in is it? And yet that's the world you say he created. More religiosity. This stuff sounds great in church doesn't it? To me it's meaningless made up junk. Did god type this or did I?
(Serious question, when is god doing things through you and when isn't he? Why is this not just the puppetry GDR rejects?)

Actually I believe it is.Humans have the choice between following instinct or following conscience. Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

You think it right for god to create carnivores and the kill and be killed, survival of the fittest ecology that created us? You have a weird view of a loving god.Humans do NOT have a choice between conscience and instinct. The vast majority of our processes are unconscious. We need both sets of functions to get through our day and our reactions to different situations depend on a multitude of factors. If we talk of pychopaths, they are programmed to react in a totally different way than you. They follow their 'conscience' in a way the rest of us dislike intensely. Why did your god create psychopaths?

Does this relate to the broader philosophical questions such as

If God exists, why did He create evil?

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I believe that God allowed the possibility of evil---only to allow free will. Lucifer actualized evil by choosing it.

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As for humans, we are aware of both extremes. We are aware of when we do evil and when we choose good.

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Psychopaths, on the other hand have no conscience by nature the way that normal humans do.

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Thus you raise a good question. Why would God allow such a mutation to exist?

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Is there any evidence that humans grow stronger through facing adversity in life?

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Is the entire concept of satan not the story of how humanity gets stronger by resisting? (Weight lifting involves muscles growing through applied resistance)

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Is satan a necessary "mutation" in human development?

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Or...again..is it all a bunch of bollocks?

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All we know is that psychopaths exist.

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It is up to us to decide how to handle this reality.

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Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. —RC Sproul
"A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." —Mark Twain "
~"If that's not sufficient for you go soak your head."~Faith
Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.~Proverbs 28:26

No. Evil is yet another silly religious concept that we've got used to hearing. I,m asking specific questions of about real things.Why create pychopaths?
Why create carnivores? (Think about that Phat).
Why create a biological ecosystem that ensures that humans will evolve with survival, kill or be killed, predatory instincts?
Why create agression making hormones like testosterone?None of these things would create moral (ie freewill) problems if they didn't exist and all could be substited with friendlier alternatives. Your god created a hostile environment for almost all living organisms to merely survive in. This is not the act of a loving god.

I don’t necessarily attribute supernatural knowledge to Jesus. As I said earlier the prayer in Gethsemane doesn’t make sense if Jesus had absolute knowledge of what would happen to Him post resurrection. It appears as if He believed that God would somehow affirm and vindicate Him but it seems by the Gospel account that He went into Jerusalem knowing what the punishment would be for what He was going to do, as a great act of faith.
I see Him as God because He perfectly embodied the eternal Word and nature of God. Jesus embodied Yahweh’s return to the Jews and God vindicated and affirmed Jesus by resurrecting Him and making Him Lord. I don’t know why things are the way they are. We live in a world with time flowing in one direction and subject to entropy. Maybe it is the only way it can be, but we as humans have the God given capability to mitigate much of the suffering. It is interesting to note that it is the countries with a Judeo Christian heritage that are the forerunners in that mission, both in our own countries and in other parts of the world.

Yes, so much is obvious. He's only a god when it's convenient for him to be a god. This is just rubbish and you know it. This isn't the 'problem of suffering' it's simple, basic biology. The world is set up this way. It makes total sense to science and no sense at all to religious beliefs. You have no answers but the evidence of it totally contradicts the idea of a loving god. What???

There was a belief amongst early Jews that there would ultimately be a general resurrection, presumably just for the Jews at the end of time. That follows along to a degree with the story of the dry bones being re-enfleshed in Ezekiel. It was about new life not a continuation of the old which would still ultimately end in death.
Here is a link to a site where N T Wright talks about resurrection.
Resurrection of resurrection

No, Jesus was a man who experienced life as such. The miracles, as well as the message was God, who Jesus prayed to and called Father acting through Jesus. As I said earlier Jesus embodied the return of Yahweh. That is what you believe. We just disagree on whether it was "set up" by an intelligent agent or by an endless series mindless processes but we've been down this road before.

He was a man and a god and he sometimes knew the future and sometimes not, depending on whether it's convenient or inconvenient for the story. When he performed miracles it wasn't him it was god etc etc etc. All of this is just a bunch of stories that can be used to rationalise any incident to suit the occasion. With this setup you can make anything up and make it work for you. It's nothing to do with what I believe. It's self-evident that life on earth is competetive. All life competes to survive. The food chain requires nature to be 'red in tooth and claw'. We understand all this in considerable detail and you don't deny it.The assertion is that if the process was set in place by your god, then your god is a twisted imoral creature. There was no need to do it this way, free will does not rely on the necessity to compete to survive. There is no need to have a life process set up in this cruel way. The question 'why did god made carnivores?' has never been answered.