The Tension of Faith

So we come down to the same basic question again: Which is more important to God? To punish us for not doing our duty? Or to get us to try harder to do our duty?

Remember Robin Rohans plays? I could see a scene now...It is a classroom. Faith is the teacher, while the rest of us at EvC are students.
Class has just started.FAITH: As all of you must know, I have been allowed to teach the truth based on Gods benevolent authoritarian nature through His Son, Jesus Christ. There will be no questions.PERCY: First of all, why am I in this class? I dont believe that Jesus even existed and the stories in our textbook are all lacking evidence. And why am I paying for this school, anyway?JAR: GOD if GOD exists likely expects us to run this class to the best of our ability, using logic, reason, and reality.FAITH: Oh but God has already told us how this all works. Lots of people know it. Lots and lots and lots and lots. And there is no "Us" jar. There is only God and He chose Me to teach you, poor leftists, how to think.*Her jaw is set, and she is almost ready to continue talking in ALL CAPS.*ringo raises his hand.FAITH: Put your hand down, mister. I smell leftist in you and I DONT like it!PHAT: Aw give him a break, Ma'am. Deep down I think he believes. He is just a contrarian.FAITH: I have records. He has shown me severe leftist tendencies and I plan on flunking him.PRINCIPAL TRUMP enters the room.TRUMP: At ease, students. I have a meeting with the thought police in five minutes, so I expect nothing fake to be taught in this classroom. We are planning on giving Roy Moore a raise and firing Al Franken.RINGO: Since when are the teachers expected to all wear Red?*The bell rings. Faith throws up her hands and stomps off. Phat tries to start up an argument with jar, the same one he tried yesterday and the day before.Scene Two, anyone? Edited by Phat, : No reason given.

A declaration would be sufficient, but it isn't necessary. Context can help us understand if the author intends for the words to be understand as an assertion of truth. He is, yes. Then it isn't evidence for the 'utterance'. I agree. But that doesn't alter what I said about it increasing the probabilities. I haven't. Anyone who does can answer for themselves, I suppose. Since you understand probability, you can either see that any non-zero number would still result in the same conclusion or you can prove a non-zero number would not result in the same conclusion.

And Jesus, I assume based on the Matthew quote, would retort - you have committed adultery in your heart which is sufficient to run afoul of the commandment. He may even remind you that 'thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife' is also there, but since his point was to stick his finger up at legalism he might not. He was saying that sticking to the letter of the law is not sufficient, but the spirit of the law.He might point out that it is a sin to try and fail to sin. You set your heart upon a sin, but fail to complete it - its still sin. This specific sermon is only in Matthew, but

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And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the sabbath day that which is not lawful? ... And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath

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Mark 2

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And he saith unto them, Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill? But they held their peace.

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Mark 3

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And Paul gives us this:

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Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit

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2 Cor 3

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And I think there's other likewise references about. So in Matthew, Jesus is saying that spirit of the law against adultery and murder can be thought of in light of "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10 and a combination of deu 6:5 and Lev 19:18)

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And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. {Deu}

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Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him.

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Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD. {lev 19}

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While expanding the concept of 'brother' and 'neighbour'.

I don't use the words "testimony" and "attestation" the same way you do. It doesn't make it correct, either. Oh, so you call them both testimony. Well, to me neither are testimony. Would you accept a value of zero? There's a flat earther in the recent news. Is the probability of a flat earth zero? Is the probability of truly empty space zero? Is the probability I just got back from Mars zero? The probability of the impossible *is* zero. I know you think otherwise, and I understand your tentativity arguments, but it doesn't mean nothing's impossible.--Percy

It's the position Paul described when he said the Law was given as a tutor to bring us to Christ. Meaning we learn from attempting to obey it that we can't, and that causes us to understand we need the salvation from it that Christ offers.

And I pity the Christians that see what Paul and the others wrote as pieces parts, bumper sticker, carny freak show one liners.Jesus message was for THIS life; it is the snake oil salesmen that sell the afterlife.

I guess one can make fictional characters say whatever one likes. Faith was still incorrect to say that Jesus changed the meanings of those commandments, e.g., "Reemember that Jesus explained that the commandment against adultery forbids adultery in the heart and not just outward behavior,..."--Percy

I reject the idea of fog in the case of the miracles of Jesus, as I already explained.I'm so beyond doubting the clear testimony of scripture I just can't understand how anyone manages to deny it. You have to imagine people being amazingly stupid or evil to think such a thing. Pretty simple people too, not the Machiavellian geniuses they'd have to be.It's actually funny to think you believe the miracles of Jesus were not electrifying enough to make an impact on history, when Christianity grew to dominate the western world for two thousand years, fully embracing all the miracles as reason for us to believe in His salvation as John intended. Paul of course was a major agent in its spread but all Paul did was teach Christ anyway. Christianity does not worship Paul no matter how hard people try to make him the leader of the religion. Oh and Paul could be credited with one miracle, shaking the viper off his hand into the fire though it normally would have killed a man.Just stories about witnesses?. Oh my aching head. Again you have to imagine people evil enough to invent witnesses to invented miracles and able to succeed with such a subterfuge in transforming the western world from paganism to Christianity. And agreeing enough with each other to avoid major conflicts. The world does not work that way. What reason would they have to invent a new religion anyway? And why pick Jesus who failed to save them from the Romans which so many had expected the Messiah to do? And was so critical of the Jewish establishment? Why not one of the other wannabe Messiahs who showed up around that time? Oh and they had to invent such interesting characters as John the Baptist and Simeon and Anna who prayed constantly in the temple and so on. All you guys who think you know what reality is come up with the weirdest fictions. How pathetic.Yes I have faith that the gospels passed the tests, but as I've said, I could not possibly have faith in anything that didn't pass such tests. Sheesh. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

As you just pointed out, I DIDN'T say He changed the meaning of the commandments, He revealed their true spiritual depths.

I've noticed. But since I'm the one who used the term, the important thing is what I meant by them. Pragmatics beats semantics in this instance. The point being that your argument against my argument doesn't impact my argument. So your argument fails. If there is an argument against my argument, you should present that instead. I don't think such a thing is possible, but I can't say its impossible No. By definition. I wouldn't argue nothing is impossible. I would only argue that we can't say what those things are with 100% certainty.

Erm. So?I'm simply explaining why what the character said doesn't contradict what the God character said earlier. Faith didn't say that.

I knew Paul had done miracles but couldn't remember specifics. So I found this reference:Paul heals a cripple Lystra Acts 14:8-10
Paul casts out a spirit of divination Philippi 16:16-18
Paul and Silas's prison doors opened by an earthquake Philippi 16:25, 26
Paul communicates the Holy Spirit Corinth 19:1-6
Paul heals multitudes Corinth 19:11, 12
Paul restores Eutychus to life Troas 20:9-12
Paul shakes off a viper Malta 28:3-6
Paul heals the father of Publius and others Malta 28:7-9

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I reject the idea of fog in the case of the miracles of Jesus, as I already explained.

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Rejecting the idea that human beings - transmitted and recorded the story is hardly a sensible position. You can assume that Divine Inspiration made the stories absolutely accurate but you’d be begging the question (as well as being wrong).

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I'm so beyond doubting the clear testimony of scripture I just can't understand how anyone manages to deny it. You have to imagine people being amazingly stupid or evil to think such a thing. Pretty simple people too, not the Machiavellian geniuses they'd have to be.

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Not really. As I pointed out earlier Arthur Machen created a false miracle story without any intent. Normal human tendencies - and the circumstances - are quite sufficient.

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It's actually funny to think you believe the miracles of Jesus were not electrifying enough to make an impact on history, when Christianity grew to dominate the western world for two thousand years, fully embracing all the miracles as reason for us to believe in His salvation as John intended

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The reality of course is that the alleged miracles did not electrify the world. If they had they would show up in non-Christian sources, and they don’t. If they were just exaggerated or even made-up stories they could easily have had the same effect.

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Just stories about witnesses?. Oh my aching head. Again you have to imagine people evil enough to invent witnesses to invented miracles and able to succeed with such a subterfuge in transforming the western world from paganism to Christianity.

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That is just your love of conspiracy theory talking. Quite frankly you would probably find it plausible if you weren’t a Christian. (But the Book of Mormon is an outright fake and the Mormons have still been pretty successful.)

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Yes I have faith that the gospels passed the tests, but as I've said, I could not possibly have faith in anything that didn't pass such tests. Sheesh.

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So the logic is that the Gospels must have passed your imaginary tests BECAUSE you have faith them ?No, it doesn’t work that way.If you have faith in things without definite knowledge that they did pass the tests - which you don’t and can’t have for the Gospels - then you certainly CAN have faith in things that didn't pass the tests. That is simple, obvious fact.And that’s without mentioning your faith in Alex Jones and Info-Wars and quack medicine and conspiracy theory....

People tend to believe what they want to be true. I believe in God partly because I could never imagine a life without Him. I need Him and Want Him. Others disbelieve for the opposite reason. They may claim they would believe if they saw "evidence" but they likely would find new reasons to doubt. They don't want Him. The story of Jesus has made an impact on History, though some would argue that it's not good for everyone. I believe that the story was never designed to be evident. it was designed to touch hearts rather than convince minds. God knew that not everyone would believe. Jesus Christ provides us with Hope...not a free ticket to immortality and comfort. No, but it often misquotes him in context. Paul is only part of the story.
Christianity is the effect of the story. Everyone on earth was affected by the story. How each of us takes the story determines to a degree how we allow it to affect us.