If the Amazon blurb you quoted is accurate, Enns seems to saying a lot of the same things we've been saying here for years. Not people like Faith and Buzzsaw, but the rest of us.
I'm a little concerned that the blurb might not be accurate because it describes him as evangelical but describes his views as anything but.
But for now taking what it says at face value, perhaps you can take his approach to the Bible and apply it to your stance on fiat currencies and gold and immigrants and the disadvantaged and criminals and all the rest.
So what does Enns say in defense of a God who wipes out all of humanity except a single family?
Perhaps we should start by asking what a "Biblical Christian" actually is and is not.
There's no need to confuse things. According to Faith a Biblical Christian is a fundamentalist, and everyone was fine with that. Biblical Christians take the Bible as the sole infallible authoritative source for Christian faith and practice (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sola_scriptura) . An evangelical is a type of fundamentalist.
I don't think he is misrepresenting what you say. I think he's demonstrated over and over that he's not capable of understanding most of what is said, by you or anyone. I think that's why Ringo felt it necessary to note the importance of Phat expressing Enns' views in his own words instead of just providing excerpts.
This is how you see yourself? Well, the changed part, sure. But humbled? You've become increasingly and aggressively irrational and arrogant over the past couple years.
So far my "evidence" is quite shoddy and inconclusive.
This isn't quite accurate. Your evidence is non-existent.
GOD could give you evidence if you would park your brain long enough to trust Him.
Seriously? The Tinkerbell argument?
But then again, you don't even know which one is the real God.
As has been said many times, the only difference between you and an atheist is that they believe in one less god than you.
Or maybe there is a slim possibility that you do, but just like to argue and challenge others to think. I certainly don't think that Satan has you just yet.
I WILL quote him directly. This is the Book Nook Forum...not the In Your Own Words Forum or the Science Forum. What do they feed you in Saskatchewan anyway?
What I think Ringo is saying is that we can't be sure you understand what Enns is saying unless you put it in your own words. None of us here want to argue with misinterpretations that you never articulate. That's why rule 5 exists. By the way, you can get a head start on reading the book because most of the first chapter is available online: How the Bible Actually Works
So let me get this straight. You have evidence that if God exists, (I am assuming this includes Jesus as God)this means God/Jesus is unlike anything ever taught or written about Him. Same with Coyote, Raven, Bunny, Armadillo, Spaghetti Monster, and Allah dat other human malarkey.
And this is an example of why it's imperative you put things in your own words. Jar's words were right there in front of you and yet you didn't understand them. His meaning is along the lines of something that's been said here many times, that where so many claim to be right (hence his twice referring to "ALL of the evidence") most likely all are wrong. (I see jar explained his meaning in greater detail in Message 51.)
Ethology can't be used to theorize about man because man isn't an animal. He was divinely created by God. Yes, animals were also created by God, but that was different because, uh, because, well, man was given dominion over them, even the extinct ones, and also ones that might come later, though of course that's impossible. Hope that resolves the confusion.
Don't be literal. No god can help you. If there really is a God then the lesson of your life is that God hates you but you're too self-deluded to see it. You're like, "Smite me, beat me, torture me, Lord, I'll never stop believing in You and that You are a loving and compassionate God. Yes, yes, hit me, strike me again, oh Lord."
There's a wonderful set of comic videos that begins with God creating the universe. When asked about various pestilences and disasters and whether He wants to include them in His universe He replies yes to each. When it's suggested that that might cause people to not believe in Him he replies they'll still believe. Give it a watch:
The part where his assistant says it's too much, that no one will believe in Him, and He replies, "Sure they will"? He's talking about you.
Of course, being an Ex-Mormon, Mr.Deity never really knew God anyway.
Mr. Deity *is* God. I think you're confusing the actor/writer with the character, and you've ignored the entire point of my post, that the suffering God has inflicted on you only makes you love him more and sing his praises more loudly.
In other news, my book came in the mail today. I believe that you already read Chapter 1.
I haven't read anything in your book. I was just trying to be helpful by making chapter 1 available to you before the book arrived. Make points that develop out of your reading of the book in your own words and provide book pages as references and quotes as appropriate. Do not quote long passages.
Note my extreme skepticism that you'll be able to properly interpret the book. Based on the Amazon blurb it appears to promote a perspective pretty compatible with my own beliefs, but I think you're well armed to bollox up the presentation.
What we think of reality could just be a brain dreaming in a bottle. It makes sense, because what science claims to have found about the real world is too weird to be true. I mean, come on, wave/particle duality? A standard model that stubbornly refuses to give up the secrets of the universe? Dark matter that throws its weight around but refuses to be seen? Dark energy that will eventually crack the universe apart? Time and space relative? Trillions of stars tantalizingly visible but with a speed limit that makes visiting them impossible.
And here on Earth, a dominant life form that would rather think itself right than live? That is destroying its home while denying all responsibility and ignoring solutions? Who can put a camera, a video camera, a phone, a video phone, and a powerful computer in a small thin rectangular disk that they use to rave like lunatics and share important information about yesterday's lunch and mining ethereal data bits in clouds.
There's no doubt it's a brain in a bottle. Or maybe an intelligent magnetic plasma cloud drifting through a space that rationally consists of only two particle types of opposite charge and where nothing is relative.
Some older people have a form of dementia that involves short term memory loss. Anything more than three, four or five minutes ago is forgotten as if it never happened. They can watch the same episode of the same TV show over and over again all day long and enjoy it each and every time.
I recall a conversation with a very old woman a few years ago. We were looking at a photograph from the 1930's showing a group of standing woman with this woman as a girl reclining on the ground in front of them. On the back the names of those in the photo were listed. She'd look at the front and say, "Oh, that's Mrs. Smith, she was much bigger when I knew her." After a while we'd turn the photo over and read the names on the back to see how many names she recognized, and she'd recognize a few and say a few words about them.
After a couple minutes we'd turn the photo over and look at the front again. "Oh, that's Mrs. Smith, she was much bigger when I knew her," she'd say again. After a while we'd turn the photo over and read the names on the back to see how many names she recognized, and she'd recognize the same few and say the same few words about them.
We repeated this a number of times, and she got great enjoyment looking at the photo and remembering the past.
The discussion with Phat feels much like this, but I think he's the only one enjoying it.
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