Importance of Original Sin

Hey all! I have no claim to pools of wisdom or knowledge, but I saw the conversation and thought I'd shed some insight. arach it has been awhile, I don't know if you remember me or not, but i remember some good times in chat years ago with Jon and Phat I'm also here late, so sorry if I'm rehashing. But. Staying on topic. So here we see a fundamental problem. A God who claims to be just is, in reality, being called out for being unjust; for destroying the righteous as well as the wicked. But your quote fails to include the context in which it is included my friend. This is not a situation in which Abraham is "calling God out" for being unjust, this is something else altogether. Let's actually read the text: Abraham then goes on to continue bargaining with God, interceding on the behalf of these people. It gets to the point where God says, "yeah man, if there are even 10 righteous people up in there, I won't destroy anyone." (my words, paraphrase ). Here we see some of this God's character. He is not willing that any should die, but he is, by nature, the antithesis of darkness. "Wickedness" if you will, or even "Sin." But even more, he sees them living in this wickedness, a kind of "living death" as Paul would write. I have no claim to know the mind of God. But what does the text actually say?Here we see him leave a huge window for mercy, for grace. And if we were to continue to read this book, we might find that it is more about that than anything else. Please throw some text in with that claim man. I can't recall a text that says "you will all be punished because adam sinned." Rather, I see texs like this one: So sure, we could say that because Adam sinned, he deserved the punishment, not us specifically. But is it that simple? Maybe. Maybe not.What I do know is we underestimate the sovereignty of God. If you're going to quote scripture to disprove scripture, then I must ask, what is the standard for determining words like "moral" or "sin" or even "justice?" How can you even use the word "moral" in your question when, by the nature of your question, you are acknowledging that God is the standard for morality? If God is the standard, what business do we have asking if what he does it moral when he defines it? Just curious If you want to talk about morality, please give another standard outside of God to define what is "moral" and what is "immoral."Anyway. Why even hammer the holiness, morality, justice, and other qualities of God above ours when He dropped all the requiring us to be like that in a heartbeat just to save us? It's pretty sobering really, to think that no matter how "good" of a person I think I am, I will never live up to God's standard on my own. I dunno man. No matter how hard I try to sound as smart as you guys, I'll never be able to convince you with my human wisdom. Paul truly says it better than I ever could: Regards yall! And happy new year! - RaphEdited by Raphael, : No reason given.

Haha. You actually seem to have evaded my argument completely. This isn't about whether or not God feels "guilty" about anything, this is about something much bigger. What is your standard by which you measure what you describe as Gods "guilt?" Does he feel guilt because the text says "God felt guilt," or did you read that into the text?
Sure, we can use reason, make speculations and assumptions, and conclude that God felt guilt here, but what is guilt? By what standard do you measure guilt?That's called begging the question: assuming something to be true before you have proven it is, a logical fallacy. Let's not make any assumptions here Is that what I'm doing? Sure, perhaps that has been your personal experience with christians, but it is personal experience. We all exerience things differently, dont we? However I do agree with you haha, we all too often tend to throw out blanket statements and assume things to be true and obvious before showing adequate reason/proof. So let's do that here. I said "He is not willing that any should die, but he is, by nature, the antithesis of darkness." Is that an incredibly simplistic, black box idea of God? What does the text say? Here's what I read:"He is not willing that any should die:" "...but he is, by nature, the antithesis of darkness." And there are others. What does the text say? I seriously appreciate that arach, no patronization intended. I love it. I would say I have the same goal. If that is indeed your intention here, then let's be fair. I'll drop my presuppositions if you will do the same. If your intention is to disprove dogmatic misreadings of scripture, shall we not first begin with asking the Holy Spirit for the wisdom necessary in order to do so? After all: I mean, if you are a student of the scriptures, which i am assuming you are based on your obvious knowledge, competence, and passion, you therefore acknowledge the fact that our own human wisdom is not sufficient enough to do this on our own. Again, here you have totally evaded my argument and assumed something to be true without proving that it is. Let's look at what you are talking about:"blasphemy! for you to do such a thing! to kill the innocent with the wicked, so that the innocent are like the wicked. blasphemy! will the judge of all the earth not do justice?"
-- abraham, genesis 18:25.Here we see Abraham "judging" God in a way, being confused at God's actions, much in the same way you are. Abraham is running into the exact same problem. A better question would be: Where did Abraham get the idea that God is being immoral? or even: is morality a transcendent concept, or merely a subjective tool? Not even getting into the fact that since God created Abraham, he created him with a notion that certain things are innately right and wrong, I would say that having had an encounter with something that transcends himself and humanity (God), Abraham now has a concept of morality outside of subjectivism.I love it, and it brings us back to the question you have not addressed: What standard do you use to judge God as immoral? Yes, in essence. What do you use? Where did you get the idea of a "right" and a "wrong?" If biology, evolution, and neurology are where we derive morality from, how could there be any consistency within morality when there is such variance in at least the evolution, and neurology of people (All of which I know very little about so I will now slowly...back...away... haha)All I'm trying to say is this: If you cannot show there is a standard outside of God to account for morality, we cannot dive into the little "Abraham said this, God seems to feel like this way" details, because God is the standard. No matter what we feel, or how it appears, it really doesn't matter,because God is the standard. After all: That almost hurts to say right? Haha like it kind of rubs us the wrong way. It calls forth sentiments like: How could there possibly be a transcendent morality outside our subjective experience? "It seems so obvious that God is being "immoral" or "unjst" here, I just don't understand." But that's the hard pill for us all to swallow: Even when it seems unjust or immoral or even weird to us, it actually...doesn't matter...since God, and therefore, morality, transcends our reason and emotions. Blah that's hard right?How's that for OT theology? Haha.Hope that makes sense!- RaphEdited by Raphael, : No reason given.Edited by Raphael, : No reason given.Edited by Raphael, : No reason given.