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Author Topic:   What would change your belief?
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 18 of 35 (537631)
11-29-2009 8:48 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
11-10-2009 5:28 AM


I’m very curious about religious people who dismiss stories such as Adam and Eve, Noah’s Ark, etc on the basis of scientific evidence, yet still believe in their God. They seem to be able to twist their religious story: Oh, those bits were only ever meant to be allegories.
Yeahright!
So, it makes me wonder: How much more evidence that is contrary to your religious texts would be sufficient to completely undo your belief? Is there a tipping point? Or would you continue to twist and turn indefinitely? Or, indeed, have your texts and various interpretations of those texts actually been evolved to ensure that you have such a complex, self-contradictory and ultimately meaningless premise that there is nothing definable to be disproved?
As I read your post I realize that you do not realize what has happened to people who receive Jesus Christ. As an outsider observing this with your natural mind you simply don't know what has happened.
Before I studied Genesis, my faith was sealed by exountering deep within me a living Christ. Though I didn't understand at the time, latter I read from First Corintians 15:45 "the last Adam became a life giving Spirit"
Jesus Christ [the last Adam] put Himself in a form after His resurrection, in which He could enter into the vessel of my spiritual being. I knew nothing about Genesis. But I knew that this man Jesus was alive and mysteriously had enfluence over my being.
Cahnging my belief would have to be a matter of getting this Person out of my heart. I don't think you can do that. He is "organically" joined to my innermost being.
Now here is what He taught. And PLEASE notice the QUESTION that the writer John records as having been asked by one of His disciples:
Judas, not Isacariot, said to Him, Lord, and what has happened that You are to manifest Yourself to us and not to the world?
Jesus answered and said to him, If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him." (John 14:22,23)
If we read through the New Testament and begin to love Jesus, He and His Father as the Divine "We", the Triune God, will come as a life giving Spirit and make an abode within us. And from within, though the world does not know it, Jesus the Son of God will MANIFEST Himself to that one.
You would have to stop this internal process of the Triune God manifesting Himself within my being. That would change my faith.
As it stands Christ is manifesting His being the living God from within. And Paul's last written words of the New Testament are in Second Timothy 3:22:
"The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you."
The Lord Jesus Christ is literally with my innermost spirit. And thus, the grace, the enjoyment of His Person is with me.
That is what you would have to go after, But you cannot reach it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 11-10-2009 5:28 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 19 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 11-30-2009 4:57 AM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 20 of 35 (537735)
11-30-2009 5:05 PM
Reply to: Message 19 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
11-30-2009 4:57 AM


Please correct me if I'm wrong, but to me your explanation of "receiving Jesus Christ" is quite a separate thing from literally believing in the creation story of the Bible.
In my case I would not even read the Bible immediately after receiving Christ. I went instead to read some rather sophisticated theology. But I simply did not have the biblical backround to understand what was being discussed.
I mean what did the author mean by "Grace - God's power in man" as distinct from "Grace - God's power power over man."
In my complaining prayer to God something said to me "Why don't you read the Bible?" So I decided that if I humbled myself to call on the name of Jesus I could also humble myself to read that Bible.
That was a beginning of the greatest adventure of my life. As I read through the New Testament, a patch of light here, a patch of light there, I said "I understand that."
Now I only first read the New Testament four Gospels. I had a BIG FILTER on my mind when it came to Genesis. Gradually though, it appeared to me that Jesus took the Old Testament seriously. So I decided that if it was good enough for Jesus it must be good enough for me. The integrity of Jesus Christ was beyond question to me.
So I came with my Big Filter to the book of Genesis and knew that I better get some commentaries to help me. At first I picked up some biblical science stuff. They seemed interesting but not too helpful.
Eventually, I discovered a book by G.H. Pember called "Earth's Earliest Ages". I read that and said to myself "Now this makes sense." If you labelled me I suppose I would be labelled a Old Earth creationist type with an understanding of Genesis which some call "Gap Theory".
I have little problem with the talking snake for a number of reasons:
1.) God's job is to communicate to all generations of man very profound cosmic and spiritual mysteries. One of these is that there exists a super human evil fallen angel who is an advasary to God. He's existence pre-dates the creation of human beings.
Since this is not a human, yet it is an intelligence, one way in which God could allow things to occur so that generations of people could comprehend something of non-human intelligence, is to allow this being to approach the first people as a speaking serpent.
So, briefly, I think that God allowed matters to happen in such a way so as to be able to impress the meaning behind them to all ages of people. We know that a snake is not suppose to talk.
But behind this, a rebellious and evil fallen angel is not suppose to talk to us either. God allowed it to happen as it did. Rather than Genesis three being preceeded with a long explanation of this being's nature and pre-Adamic history we are presented with a lying, speaking, and advasarial snake working to derange God's plans and ruin man.
This can be grasped even by a child. Details of Satan's origin are provided latter in the Bible.
2.) In the study of miracles I noticed that they often come in the Bible in pairs of two. It is as if God is saying "That's right. You read it right - an ANIMAL that spoke."
The unusual things of the miraculous often come in the Bible in pairs. The speaking serpent of Genesis is matched with the speaking donkey in Numbers.
I don't know about you, but this scheme gives me a feeling of deliberateness and intelligence behind the writing.
3.) If I search the rest of the writings of the author of the Torah, there is scarce little to indicate that this was a person given to gullibility or foolishness. The details of the construction of the tabernacle and it related furnishings is technically as sophisticated as any Software Operating System manual I have read. The writer displays an intelligence and dedication to detail that does NOTHING to enfluence me to think the writer was excessivly given to mythological flights of fancy.
The TONE of the whole Five books of Moses is not that of nonsense or fairy tale to me.
These are some of the reasons why the speaking snake may be problematic, but not overwhelmingly so in the whole scheme of the Bible.
Lastly, I think recent tendencies of scientific theory are inching closer TO Genesis rather than farther away. Ie. mass instinctions and catastrophy theories of the ancient past seem to inch closer to Genesis teaching that after the creation of the heavens and earth the earth was found in a condition of waste and void.
Something cataclysmic happened to this planet before the arrival of human beings. So I see science growing closer to the Bible rather than furnishing contrary evidence to my understanding of the Genesis creation account.
That's not to say that you couldn't "receive Jesus Christ" in the way you describe and also believe in the Adam & Eve creation story (many obviously do, you may be one of them).
I would strongly suggest to anyone not to wait to accept everything in the Bible BEFORE they as ask Jesus to come into their hearts for the forgiveness of sins and the gift of salvation.
It is Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved ..."
There is no demand that we believe in anything else for this redemption and eternal life. We are commanded to believe into Christ Who is alive, living, available, real, present, and contactable.
This is the higher priority. In my case I became persuaded after a gradual process, that the whole Bible seems to stand or fall together. But this was a gradual process.
A good Bible student has to pay attention to the Scripture and not traditions for their own sake. "What does it actually SAY ?" is the first question. Then "How are we to understand this?"
And allegory does not always mean "not historical". God in His wisdom can use both history and allegory in the same account. I avoid false dichotomies.
I suppose to a large extent you answer my question quite well, it's just that I do feel that Christians who dismiss the fantastical stories of the Old Testament in favour of scientific evidence could be braver and more honest and dismiss those stories altogether. To me they seem to hang on to them as a sort of buffer zone to protect the story of Christ from proper analysis.
The other possibility is that God has communicated with us in a book designed to weed out the proud who trust in themselves and lean on their own understanding.
No one like everything they read in the Bible. An uncanny characteristic of the Bible is that it steps on everyone's toes at least somewhere. There is always something in this book that even the most devoted wishes was not there.
The Bible's characteristic to FEED the spiritual side of man and also offend at times his self reliance and pride, is unique.
I have no major problems with anything written in Genesis. And I take it prayerfully and seek mostly life and truth.
What undisputed and universally accepted science fact do you positively KNOW that should be of concern to me as far as the truthfulness of Genesis is concerned ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 19 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 11-30-2009 4:57 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 21 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-01-2009 5:16 AM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 22 of 35 (537844)
12-01-2009 7:53 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
12-01-2009 5:16 AM


I'm a bit concerned about answering this for a number of reasons. One is that this thread is not about what atheists like myself believe, it is about religious people who have accepted some scientific facts contrary to the Bible's account, but who continue to believe other parts of the Bible.
But you are a bit concerned to provide me with an example give me an example?
If you submit an example to me probably one of two things is likely to occur:
1.) I'll explain why it isn't a problem to me.
2.) Acknowledge it as a problem to me.
But the Adam & Eve story vs Evolution would be the most obvious example.
A total Evolutionary process on a macro level does not make sense to me even if I were not a Christian.
As a Christian I suppose the most significant difficulty such an idea would pose would be the obscuring of the event of a FIRST man and a FIRST woman. That would pose a problem for me of Paul's explanations of the first man, the second man, Adam and the last Adam.
But even as an Agnostic I don't think I could ever swallow a total theory of macro evolution. I have no major problem with the idea that life changes or adapts.
If I were a scientist who really was convinced of Evolution I would explore the whole possibility of sudden changes, like what is proposed by Punctuated Equlibria. Total gradualism, I think, is unrealistic.
Now I don't want to start a full debate on that subject under this thread.
Neither do I want to do that. I am doing more reading these days about the theory of Evolution to try to understand where some of these thinkers are coming from.
I would just say that the vast majority of scientists accept Evolution as a fact, which means that we evolved from other species, we weren't made directly from dust and a rib. For me, the scientific evidence is sufficient to say that "I positively know" evolution to be a fact.
Okay. I don't share your conviction to that degree.
And actually some things Evolutionists ask me to believe are no less miraculous IMO.
Thus the quip - "If a frog turns into a prince, its a fairy tale. But if a frog turns into a prince and it takes 10 million years, its science."
Anyway, I mentioned in my OP that many religious people already accepted evolution as a fact and therefore, like me, they regarded Adam and Eve as just a fictional story. I was asking what further evidence that might be contrary to the Bible stories would be sufficient to change their belief. However, I suppose on further thought, there probably is not much room left for science to disprove anything else. It is impossible to imagine how science might either prove or disprove small scale local events that only affected a few individuals, such as the miracles. What evidence could we ever find to prove/disprove that Jesus cured anyone of disease, walked on water, or rose from the dead? In that sense I suppose my question was really a theoretical one.
I think there was a FIRST man and a FIRST woman. And I think that what happened in the creation of man must have in part been passed down BY that man.
I am pretty convinced that SOME of Genesis must be what Adam passed on to his children.
I know that people like you consider Christians to be naive, unsophisticated, and intellectually inferior to Atheists. I'm happy to accept that suspicion. For with Christ I have found what I was looking for in life. And I have yet to meet an Atheist who possessed this peace or could tell me why he is here in this universe.
This goes back to receiving of Christ inwardly as what He became - "the last Adam became a life giving Spirit" (1 Cor. 15:45)
Have you visited "Reasons To Believe" by Phd. astrophysicist Dr. Hugh Ross ? He takes on most science theories head on as a Christian scientist. (Not endorsement on all he teaches. But gets one thinking about some science issues )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPl0FoTbGk4&NR=1
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 21 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-01-2009 5:16 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 23 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-01-2009 9:32 AM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 24 of 35 (537897)
12-01-2009 2:56 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
12-01-2009 9:32 AM


If further evidence arose for the Theory of Evolution, so much so that it became undeniable to you that humans evolved gradually from other species, and so there couldn't have been a "First Man" and "First Woman", how would that affect your beliefs?
I would do what I would do in any crisis. Go to God in prayer to get an idea of guidance.
I guess that is the best I can give you. I don't know how I would react. I do not like to react without touching the living God.
Please don't think my Christian life has been one smooth bed of roses with no crises.
Are you expecting such undeniable evidence falsifying Genesis to be say, just around the corner ? Let me ask you what you will do if in the next 30 some years scientists decide they were going down a dead end street in this ape to man scenario.
Were you disappointed that no evolutionary link between Neanderthal and Human Homo Sapien has turned up? We have DNA spanning about 100,000 years for Neanderthal and about 40 thousand years for Human homo sapien. When I was a kid we thought for sure Neanderthals were the missing link. The genetic evidence I don't believe has confirmed that.
What does that do to your faith?
Would you then completely dismiss the Adam & Eve story but still believe everything else in the Bible as being real events; would you re-interpret the story to be a metaphorical tale but still believe the rest of the Bible; or would you then think you can no longer have faith in anything in the Bible as being a reporting of real events?
My belief is that science is man's invention. And the Bible is God's revelation. If there is a discrepency between the two, a REAL discrepency after it is carefully examined WHAT is actually SAID in the revelation of the Bible (not what we assume), then I think the error must be on the side of science, because I believe that God knows all the facts.
Another hypothetical example might be scientific evidence for life starting on Earth by chance. If that was undeniable, how would that affect your belief?
I can't imagine intelligent people coming to that conclusion. I'd tried to find out what they were smoking.
Okay seriously. I really do not know. But I do not think there is a problem with me going back to the Bible and studying what did it actually say.
You're talking in a way like "We just know we're going to catch the bible in a lie. Just wait."
I would go to the Lord and seek guidance. That's the best I can give you.
I suppose what I'm getting at is, what events reported in the Bible are sacrosanct to your belief? I.E. if they were to fall from being considered to be real events, your whole faith would fall with them?
It is very hard for me to deny that I have met Jesus. Two thousand some years of obstacles, opposition, attacks, open warfare, slicing up, dicing up, higher criticism, Hume, Voltaire, Russell, Marx, Darwin, Dawkins, Hitchens, they have not managed to destroy our faith yet though some promised that they could.
It is hard for me to think that I have not encountered the resurrected Christ. To deny it is for me to lie.
"The church of God is an anvil that has worn down many hammers."
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
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Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-01-2009 9:32 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 30 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-02-2009 5:39 AM jaywill has not replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 25 of 35 (537900)
12-01-2009 3:11 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
12-01-2009 9:32 AM


If further evidence arose for the Theory of Evolution, so much so that it became undeniable to you that humans evolved gradually from other species, and so there couldn't have been a "First Man" and "First Woman", how would that affect your beliefs? Would you then completely dismiss the Adam & Eve story but still believe everything else in the Bible as being real events; would you re-interpret the story to be a metaphorical tale but still believe the rest of the Bible; or would you then think you can no longer have faith in anything in the Bible as being a reporting of real events?
If there was no Adam then Paul would have been wrong. Romans chapter Five would be all wrong. Seems simple enough to me.
If there is not Adam through which sin and death came into the world than I think that would be devastating to much of the basics of Christian theology.
Others might disagree with me. Or let us say that science recovers the body of Jesus.
Now that would be devastating to the Christian Gospel I think. That would falsify the resurrection, don't you think ?
Then we would all have to give up the New Testament. I can hear em salivating !
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-01-2009 9:32 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 27 by iano, posted 12-01-2009 6:40 PM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 26 of 35 (537909)
12-01-2009 4:13 PM


You skeptical guys almost have me sympathizing with you. The liberal side of me is usually for the underdog.
This is what you need to do to change my faith. You have to come up with the body of Jesus Christ in some tomb and undeniably prove that this HAS .... HAS to be the corpse of Jesus of Nazareth.
Then, I guess I am going to have to assume that we Christians have been misled.
Now having that said that I want to caution you. When the Antichrist comes, he will probably be the biggest stumbling block to man believing in the Gospel. The Bible promises that this Antichrist to arrive on the scene with his devoted false prophet will lead millions of people away from the Christian Gospel.
He seems to be resurrected himself. He is a worker of miracles. He will be extremely intelligent like everything everyone always wanted to be. He has a stout appearance - a muscle man. He'll do wonders and have a false prophet to confirm him.
Some scholars believe that the false prophet will be Judas Iscariot come up back to life. They have their reasons.
This guy will be a champion to those wanting to devastate the Christian faith. If you are not grounded in the word of God and in knowing the Spirit of Christ, I am afraid that the current of hysteria will be too strong for you. You will be swept away in the hysteria of following.
But this guy, the Antichrist, will be given all the authority and power of Satan. So the last ditch attempt by the powers darkness to rid the world of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is still to come.
But, my friends, I DO NOT BELIEVE THAT WE ARE ON THE WRONG TRACK TO BELIEVE IN THE SON OF GOD.
I think Jesus is too wonderful to not be real.
I mean think about it. Would man invent a character like Jesus even if he could ? I don't think so.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
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jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 28 of 35 (537924)
12-01-2009 6:46 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by iano
12-01-2009 6:40 PM


I can hear 'em excavating all over the Holy Land! Dig bubba! Dig!
LOL ! Stop. One of us should be sober! LOL.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by iano, posted 12-01-2009 6:40 PM iano has not replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 29 of 35 (537926)
12-01-2009 7:01 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by iano
12-01-2009 6:40 PM


I can hear 'em excavating all over the Holy Land! Dig bubba! Dig!
I would not be surprised if someone is working on a good forgery.
Think of the millions of dollars you could make for selling some archeologists a skeleton with wounds in just the right places.
"Could this be the skeleton of Jesus ??"
National Geographic would provide you royalties you could live off of for the rest of your life.
The eagerness to secure such a artifact would pay handsomely. Give em what they want, whoever they are.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by iano, posted 12-01-2009 6:40 PM iano has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 31 by iano, posted 12-02-2009 6:41 AM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


Message 32 of 35 (537966)
12-02-2009 7:55 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by iano
12-02-2009 6:41 AM


Sheesh, that never occurred to me - but of course! If the significance of finding water on Mars can be parlayed into meaning "We are not alone! (perhaps)" can you imagine what a skeleton with traces of Romanesque iron oxide found in holes in the wrist could be capable of.
Paleontology suffers from this matter of forgeries. And so does archeology.
This year I saw a program about the problem in South America where a local artisan was very skillfull at creating fake ancient coins. To him it was strictly business. He knew that this was what they were searching for in the jungles, so he made replicas and sold them.
You really don't even have to say very much - "Hey I found this. Do you want to buy it?"
Buyer beware.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

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 Message 31 by iano, posted 12-02-2009 6:41 AM iano has not replied

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 Message 33 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-02-2009 9:17 AM jaywill has replied

  
jaywill
Member (Idle past 1941 days)
Posts: 4519
From: VA USA
Joined: 12-05-2005


(1)
Message 34 of 35 (538054)
12-02-2009 9:22 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee
12-02-2009 9:17 AM


Then there was that certain shroud from Turin.
I never paid the slightest attention to that. Nor a chalice. Not even an alledged ark on Mt Ararat.
Christ became a life giving Spirit to transform the believer from within. It is this transformation of life by the indwelling operation of Christ which is most important.
I am happy that occasionally archeaology does turn up things to confirm the Bible. I expect that things will turn up also to cause doubts. We will get a little of each.
But I have to one day stand before this God. Actually God could examine a billion people's lives simultaneously in one moment. But any way I know that I will have to stand before the One who lives in me.
In that day I do not think He will ask me much about Adam or Noah or a talking serpent. I think He will examine how much of His life and nature got wrought into my personality. How did His love become manifest in my life?
While a science contradiction to the Scipture might cause me some concern I am a little more concern with how much I allowed Jesus to fill my personality conforming me to His image.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 33 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-02-2009 9:17 AM Jumped Up Chimpanzee has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 35 by Jumped Up Chimpanzee, posted 12-03-2009 4:30 AM jaywill has not replied

  
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