A Working Definition of God

God is self-existing eternally existing, beginningless and endless uncreated invisible Spirit, Mind, without physicality, pure consciousness, a Who not an It, a Who that pervades all things but is not all things, who made all things and knows all things intimately, down to the smallest part of an atom, out to the reaches of the universe and way beyond that, knows the thoughts of every human being far better than we know them ourselves.A start?

Which would also adequately describe the Shadow King, sworn enemy of Prof. Charles Xavier. Perhaps we can narrow the field a bit more?Never heard of this personage so have no idea how to narrow anything.

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Second, though they won't admit it, none of the world's religions, institutional or otherwise, have any knowledge of God.

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Hm. How can you KNOW that these religions have no knowledge of something you yourself know nothing about? Isn't it possible for other people to know things you don't know?This message has been edited by Faith, 04-18-2005 04:29 PM

First off, I didn't say anything about my own knowledge. I asked a debate question.Second, you would have a point about any claim of mine to know God personally if I'd made it up myself, and made Him up, but I am simply believing what God Himself has told us in His word, and following His directives that His people have followed for 3500 years. People who dismiss what He has said to us and make up their own God are the arrogant ones.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-18-2005 06:09 PM

Apparently the comicbook creator was trying to make a point.

Just wondering, would you say that you "choose" to believe in evolution, or that you simply believe in it because you are convinced it is the truth? But the point in response to brennakimi was that since I am believing an established body of teaching about God, not an idea about God that I dreamed up on my own, and that since that teaching includes that He is a God who communicates with his followers and desires that His followers may know him, it is not arrogant of me to claim to know him.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-18-2005 11:08 PM

That is true you did say it was your opinion but then you phrased it so unequivocally I forgot that. Sorry.

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Those who really know something can point to objective evidence for what they know.

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Is it at all a possibility that there really are invisible beings about which there is no way to point to evidence other than witness evidence or testimonies of personal experience?

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Is it at all a possibility that there really are invisible beings about which there is no way to point to evidence other than witness evidence or testimonies of personal experience?

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To whom are you asking this question?

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I'm asking Percy specifically I believe. It's a question about what constitutes evidence basically.

Nothing of what you say is relevant to the point I was making, which was simply that if one follows a well established body of teaching it is not right to accuse the person of arrogance as if she made it up.

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Faith writes:
Just wondering, would you say that you "choose" to believe in evolution, or that you simply believe in it because you are convinced it is the truth?

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You shouldn't mix the terminologies of science and religion in this way. Focusing first on the phrase believe in, when someone says they believe in double-entry bookkeeping, or that they believe in the principle that a good defense defeats a good offense, or that they believe in evolution, these are not statements of religious belief. This is a common confusion of Creationists, and so many evolutionists have gotten into the habit of being more precise in their terminology by saying that they accept the theory of evolution based upon the available evidence, and they believe in God out of faith. This pretty much describes my position.

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Let me rephrase it then. Do you "CHOOSE" TO BELIEVE THAT EVOLUTION IS THE TRUTH OR DO YOU BELIEVE IT BECAUSE YOU BELIEVE IT *IS* THE TRUTH?The idea was that saying that I CHOOSE to believe what I believe is tendentious.I don't choose to believe it any more than you choose to believe evolution is the truth. I believe it IS the truth just as you believe evolution IS the truth.I believe I have the best of grounds for considering it to be the truth. Same as with your taking evolution as the truth. It's not a matter of mixing terminology.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-19-2005 12:03 PM

All that is simply another subject. I came to my faith in Christ in midlife by reading a ton of books about all kinds of religions, not by being brought up in a culture. I was an atheist for most of my life in this Christian culture.And there are certainly an awful lot of people brought up in this Christian culture who end up being Buddhists or following some other kind of nonChristian religion which you aren't taking into account. There are also lots of Christians in Asia, which is not a Christian culture.But again, this is another subject. The point was about being accused of arrogance for believing I can know God personally. I think it MIGHT be arrogance if somebody just made up their own God as so many seem to do, but if a person gets the idea from a well established teaching then it's not a personal idiosyncratic belief but something with a history and a social framework.This message has been edited by Faith, 04-19-2005 11:56 AM

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Of course you are mixing terms. You believe in christianity in spite of a glaring dearth of evidence, which is certainly your right. Percy (if I may be so bold) and I and others accept evolution because of the available evidence.

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I don't expect to convince anybody here of course, but I totally disagree. I have a LOT of evidence, and the evidence becomes more apparent to me daily, it's just not physical evidence.

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Don't waste your time. Mike's fundamental dogma is elementary principles of naturalism. He only accepts evidence if it fits his premise of naturalism. If it doesn't, it doesn't exist in his world.

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That seems to be the case with many on this site. Sad but true. I don't know if it's a waste of time. I may come to that conclusion eventually but up to a point it can be an entertaining challenge to try to explain something to people from a totally other frame of reference. You never know who's reading and may get the point in spite of this nutty naturalistic dogma here.

Right you are.I haven't been around that long. I registered years ago but only recently started posting here frequently, in the last couple of months. So I'm not burnt out yet. Maybe soon So what are we to do? Pray of course. We don't have the power to break the enemy's strongholds but we know who does. God may yet have mercy on these poor deceived people, but that's up to Him in His timing.Meanwhile what a GREAT place for learning PATIENCE and FORBEARANCE and DYING TO SELF and AGAPE LOVE and all those virtues I don't have!

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Then you don't have evidence, you have opinion. Again, do you fail to see the difference?

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Absolutely "fail" to see the difference. You have a silly artificial idea of what evidence is.