I'm trying: a stairway to heaven?

Maybe I should quit using analogies - because they lead to expansion the analogy didn't intend. In this case you decide the M4 is closed - but the M4 isn't closed. All the driver has to do is follow the instructions as given: follow the directions to the letter and you will get there. The onus is on the driver to follow them - not the giver of the deadly accurate instructions.And all of us here gathered know that we cannot follow them. But the problem is our not following the instructions - not the instructions themselves.

I was talking to my mother this evening. She is a Christian and was the one "that led me to the Lord" We're having a bit of difficulty at the moment about healing and deliverance from curses and the like. For example: my mother looks at "by his stripes we are healed" as a 'backup' for her contention that we can claim healing and that God wants us to do this. I look at the whole passage, 1 Peter 2, at the end of which this verse.. and can see no reference in it to physical healing. So I must reject, with regret - she is my wonderful mother afterall - her theologyThere are many things about "how Goddidit" which we just don't know. Some will latch on to this "Aha - Gotcha" But it can't helped. Some things ARE mysterious and beyond us. Omnipotence is one. God is good and "in him there is no darkness at all" It seems darkness, evil etc cannot be in God. Is this because he is subservient to something else or is it that it is logically inconsistant with who he is. I take the latter view.And it is off topic "I'm trying a stairway to heaven" is the one.Tell me this CP: What would you make of a God whereby your salvation had absolutely nothing to do with your behaviour but on your hearts reaction to your behaviour. I mean: you act 'bad' but somewhere inside you know it's bad and even though you can't seem to help acting bad and it is this not wanting to act bad even though I can't help acting bad is the thing that matters?Would you think him a mightier or lesser God for this..?

Nope. I'm the one asking for a biblical backup to the "eminently logical" case your making. At the moment I have 'commands'. We know we don't love our neighbour as ourselves. Most would have a problem with figuring out how to "love God with all our heart soul and minds" when they don't even know God in the first place.There appears to some difficulty and papering over the cracks as you do. "What appears rational and sensible to me" is not exactly what the OP requested.It was a biblical case - not a logical oneThis message has been edited by iano, 31-Oct-2005 10:46 PM

Which is why I got in with the question first. The onus (according to the OP) is on you - not me. Now if you posted "salvation by Faith and not by our striving?" you would be on a possible winnerBut not here If only you had included the rich mans response in your rather truncated quote Like I said...context uber alles.... Two options here: the were righteous because they lived according... or [b] lived this way because they were righteous.

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One cannot tell from this text which it was....Chicken and egg scenario

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This message has been edited by iano, 31-Oct-2005 11:05 PM

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This message has been edited by iano, 31-Oct-2005 11:09 PM

See response to Legend. Legend closes the M4 for some (biblically) unknown reason. He makes the problems be with instructions not the driver.Anyway mrx. A biblical case for trying?

Off-topic away. It's not that I can hold my hand up to being an on-topic junkie. When/if you get on-topic I'll be all ears This message has been edited by iano, 31-Oct-2005 11:27 PM

I would agree that this is evident from scripture You have a logical conclusion of your own above. For what it's worth. I don't see anything wrong with this man-made logical conclusion. But we're not on man-made logic here. We're on biblical logic...

I would rather slit my own throat...slowly The devil (sic - it's really salvation) is in the detail. I have said Jesus gave instructions as to what was required for man to do - in repsonse to a question by man as to what he must do to be saved. "Jump over the moon" is an honest answer if that is the question asked. We can't talk about Jesus lying or deceiving if he has answered the question honestly. Can we?The thing is to stop extrapolating out to include things that AREN'T there. Look at what IS there instead.Note the couple of verses that follow this. Jesus gives his 'rich man through the eye of a needle' analogy and the disciples, somehow (and they are in a better position to note it than we are, come to the conclusion "who then can be saved" Do you see it Legend (you great husband you ):"Harder for a rich man..." specific to rich men
"Who then can be saved..." universalWhy did the disciples universalise the analogy? Remember the crucifixion. There was a reason for it. This was itIt's not like these were the only words Jesus ever spoke. "I am the way and the truth and the life. Nobody comes to the Father except through me" seems like a decent alternative to motorway guidance illiterates. Or anybody who sees "FOLLOW COMMANDS AND BE SAVED" alongside "I CAN'T FOLLOW THE COMMAND THUS I AM DOOMED" Q: "How do I buy a F1 racing car?"
A: "$5,000,000"
Q: "But I haven't got $5,000,000"
A: "I must be lying then"This message has been edited by iano, 01-Nov-2005 12:03 AM

1 Corinthian 2:14 "Those who are unspiritual do not receive the gifts of Gods spirit, for they are foolishness to them and they are unable to understand them for they are spiritually discerned"Now if I was spiritual and you weren't then I would discern things that you would not. Not because I am smarter but purely because I am spiritual. Mans logic would seem to play second fiddle in this case. The worlds 'dummy' who was spiritual could discern things that the worlds 'intellectual giant' who weren't spiritual, couldn't.Last call Ringo. Biblical case - not your own non-biblical exratpolations as to what must be - but which aren't in the bible.

I know...it seemed like a bit 'batty' a question to ask such a die-in-the-wool atheist... but to persevere:If there was a God and if there was sin and if damnation was the default situation for all mankind. And there's two God options. Which do you think best fits with the concept of Good Newsa) a God where you've got to try your..er.damndest in order to avoid damnation?b) a God who realises your trying your best isn't good enough and sorts it for you?

I didn't say anything about the M4 being closed. I said the man couldn't read. The M4 is open. In both cases NO.I had to retype the above to correct your modificaton back to fit the oringinal analogyThe rest of your post inserts closed M4. It isn't though. The problem purely lies in the fact the person can't read. But in order to give directions you cannot but point out the signposts. You can twist the analogy again and say why didnt he say 3rd right, second exit, 5th right etc.I would then be allowed modify the analogy to say that the person driving was blind. The problem is never in the instructions. Whatever instructions given, we are always outside them. The only way is to be led there by someone else. Not get there on our own."Salvation is of God" As long as we think we can get there on our own we remain independant of God. Which is the problem. God wants us dependant on him precisely because we have shown - in full measure - that we can't get along without him

? He crucified his own son. And you say he is not a sadist. So why did he do that then? Surely if he could lower his standards so that we could fulfill them then Jesus crucifixion would have been unnecessary.Why kill Christ? Nobody has shown 'try' biblically. All they have inserted is "it seems reasonable to me (and the rest of the world who aren't watching". Sure, any old fool can have an opinion But you nor I nor anybody else follows them. This is the OP by the way. There is no try The bible details people who were righteous and upstanding and in whom there was no fault etc. You need to tie that to this being result of them following the law.

The only way we can know that is if the bible is God-breathed. There is no way to infer that from the world around us. In which case we know a fair bit more about him.This message has been edited by iano, 01-Nov-2005 01:12 AM

The OP asked folk to make a biblical case for 'trying'. Legend, as far a can recall hasn't used the bible to make the case. Putting up something that reads as a command and saying that it only means try - based only on own rationale as to what it must mean - is making a case from own rationale not the bible. I don't see why a new thread is necessary. Just because many have so far have not dealt with the OP but have diverted off into own opinion into what it must mean doesn't mean you have to.

I think I must have misunderstood you. You said "the only things we can know for certain", IIRC. I assumed you meant that these things were true: ie: God exists in fact and these are things we know for certain about him.If it is only Jewish claims then we don't know anything for certain - just what some people claim - for certain.Which is a different thing altogether