Now to answer some of the questions/comments that were made. The comment about the 10 Commandments; “women are property” It says in ex 20 17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” Here it is, the wife in a list of possesions equated with things/property.

The Two Greatest commandments. Love God…, and love yor neighbor AS YOURSELF. If I can’t love myself, how can I love someone else? If I don’t take care of myself, how can I take care of someone else? It is not prideful to eat properly, wash, seek to stay healthy and so on. It can and does happen with people and has nothing to do with pride/ego. I spent the majority of my adult life hating and loathing myself, I was not a nice person to be around. But when i came to accept me and love me, my whole attitude changed and I also became more loving towards other people, simply because I learned to love me and apply that to others.

Ex 21:7-11 “If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as male servants do. 8 If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself,[b] he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her. 9 If he selects her for his son, he must grant her the rights of a daughter. 10 If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights. 11 If he does not provide her with these three things, she is to go free, without any payment of money.” This passage addreses selling a daughter as a slave. There are many passages that regulate the sale and treatment of slaves in the OT and NT.

Deut 21 18 If someone has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, 19 his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. 20 They shall say to the elders, “This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.” 21 Then all the men of his town are to stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you. All Israel will hear of it and be afraid.”

I understand the “sun rise, sun set” thing. It comes from a prospective/point of view. In the greater wrelm, we know that the earth is orbiting the sun. But I don’t think this has anything to do with the sun stopping in the sky, or moving backwords as it says in another passage of the OT. I just don’t believe either story to be a historical event, just a myth.

I don’t want this post to get too long, so I will say just a little bit more. It comes down to Christians saying that the bible is th e”whole councel of God.” Then they go about saying that this or that part is not for us, it was for the Israelites, and such. It seems like they are picking and choosing verses that they don’t like or think don’t apply to this “dispencation of grace.” Then when un-believers come along, it seems to them that the christians have a double standard. They pick and choose verses out of the OT to condemn some peole (gay people in particular), while overlooking or dismissing other verses (about eating unclean fish – shrimp and catfish) that seem equally valid. If there are any other things that you think I should comment on, just let me know. These things can be reconsiled, so they have to be addressed so that unbelievers can understand and not dismiss the whole thing. I am in that in between place. I love it, and I am willing to leave it as well.

We are enjoying the conversation and hope to be able to continue it. Would be interested to hear your answers to some of the questions we have posed to you instead of just getting a website to visit.

I am afraid that you have missed the point of the words of Jesus Christ. He does NOT tell us to love ourselves so that we can then love our neighbor. He tells us to love our neighbor as we ALREADY love ourselves. Pride is no longer a major factor in the lives of humanity today. For centuries, pride was a huge issue. However, we have “evolved” to such a state that we now have a huge problem with self-esteem. We do not love ourselves enough; therefore, we cannot possibly love others or love God until we have learned to adequately love ourselves. Sorry, but this is nothing but new age drivel and is what most so-called Christian psychology is based upon such as the teachings of James Dobson.

True love cannot be found within ourselves. Our depraved sinful natures have no desire to love others. We are always first on the runway to the exclusion of others. Case in point – how many people check on the well being of their entire families and their neighbors before they brush their own teeth in the morning, take a drink of water, eat a bite of breakfast, and get dressed before heading off to try and acquire more of the American dream? So, when we are learning to love others in the way that we are willing to take care of ourselves, we will only then begin to understand what it meant to be a Good Samaritan in the parable told by Jesus.

Look forward to hearing back from you.

TDP

You said, “However, the law that Jesus Christ pointed to revealed two main aspects that ALL were to obey, 1) Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and the 2) love your neighbor as yourself. There is no #3) Love yourself. This is automatically assumed that we do this very well because of our pride and our depraved hearts.” It is important to hav love for the spiritual in all its greatness. It is also important to love our neighbor AS WE LOVE OURSELVES. If I don’t love myself, them how am I supposed to love my neighbor. Love flows out, like water, where it is soaked in and then flows out to refresh again. The energy of love is in its flowing out, thus it is objective. The loved one is subjective to it. Then that person objectifys it and flows it out again, objectivly.

This is a good conversation. Many times I have tried to engage in conversation with christians on touchy subjects, and they ‘close their bible and walk away’ so to speak. Maybe they are uninformed or are afraid to take a risk. It’s like taking ones ball and going home when they get mad.
Thanks a bunch. Coyote
p.s. that is my real name in case you were wondering, says so on my drivers licence and passport. :)

Maybe you could tell me what part of the history parts you do not like. That normally tells a lot about what a person is thinking. In other words, is the “stories” of judgment from a holy, righteous God that do object to as being literal? Or, is it maybe that you object to a God you cannot control and that does not take your thoughts into account as He does control the universe He created? Or, maybe it could be that you object to the “stories” because they show the truth of God’s Word and that is that man is NOT in control no matter how hard he tries?

I would like to try to clear up a few things that you have a mistaken belief about. First, the moral law as given by God and validated by the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ refer to the Decalogue or Ten Commandments. There is nothing in the Decalogue that views a wife as mere property. Second, the full law (613 commands) given to Israel were not binding on the nations around Israel. The Church today is NOT Old Testament Israel, but we are two separate and distinct entities.

To summarize, the full law given to Israel also presents ceremonial and sacrificial laws that while very much literal, in no way apply to us today. We can eat a bologna sandwich or a plateful of pork chops, if we so desired and would not be punished by God. However, the law that Jesus Christ pointed to revealed two main aspects that ALL were to obey, 1) Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and the 2) love your neighbor as yourself. There is no #3) Love yourself. This is automatically assumed that we do this very well because of our pride and our depraved hearts.

Nothing in Scripture commands true believers to sell a daughter into slavery, or to own slaves, or to commit genocide, or to stone rebellious children, or even to stone somebody for working on the Sabbath. Again, these were commands given to the nation of Israel to obey, and they were given to them under a theocracy (rule by God). In fact, your statement of condemning “gays” does not even line up with Scripture. We, as true believers, are given the command to love our neighbor as ourselves. This means that while we can hate their sin and their abominable practices, we are still commanded to show them the love of Christ and pray that God will do a wonderful work of grace and save them. It is the lifestyles that are condemned by Scripture. We do not have the ability or right to cast a final judgment on anybody for that will only be done by God at the final judgment when they stand before Him.

I understand why you would question what you read, but I also understand that it is by faith we believe the worlds were framed by God. It is by faith that we believe there really is a God. It is by faith we truly understand that the very and ONLY begotten Son of God took upon human flesh, actually came into this world, and did die on the cross of Calvary so that the wrath of God could be assuaged. We were not there and cannot independently verify the events of that day, so we MUST believe it by faith.

In conclusion for the time being, you mention you cannot believe the “story” about the sun stopping in the sky. This defies logic and physics. This would require you to turn off your brain, logic and reason in order to believe such a statement. So, here is the question – do you ever watch the weather report? It is an incredible show. Every night the weatherman defies logic and physics. His report requires us to turn off our brain, logic and reason. The reason is simple – the weatherman’s report includes the time of SUNSET and SUNRISE – every day! Too bad they are not educated and too bad we are all just gullible enough to believe that the sun SETS or the sun RISES! (Just a little tongue-in-cheek humor for you this morning, but I hope you get my point!)

By the way, maybe the real reason children come home atheists is because people like James Dobson make little of sin. They insist on using the world’s viewpoint and the world’s philosophies to answer life’s questions, then when the children come back to their “Christian” home, the parents struggle and whinge about how their kids “left” the faith. Is it not possible that the children never really saw the truth of God revealed in the home, in the parents, or even sadly in their church??

TDP

Hope you had a good Thanksgiving Day. I did. May your path be peaceful and blessed as you walk out your faith. Mine is.

First, the Bible must be able to provide within its context what is literal and what is not. Is the literalness of the Bible left up to the standards of those who wish to pick and choose the parts they like and reject as theory, allegory, etc. the parts they do not like?

Second, the Bible is either the Word of God or it is not. If it is not, then how do we learn about God? What provides us with the answers to understanding morality and what God demands in order to come to Himself?

Third, if the Bible is not God’s revelation of Himself, then God is a liar. He cannot be trusted and the Saviour is no real Saviour. If God was not able to reveal Himself and preserve that Word for humanity, then God is not as powerful as His Word proclaims. This results in the only possible logical conclusion that some mere human wrote about one of his own gods and left the results of this super-deity for mankind to decipher as real or not.

You state that you were “born again” at the age of 21, yet live today with the rejection of all that God states is His own. You reject His Word as non-literal which requires you to actually believe that it is a lie. If you were “born again”, what part of the Bible is literal enough for you to believe? In other words, are you really willing to trust your eternity in a God that hates you and would give a false word about Himself in order for gullible fools to gain hope of fellowship with deity? Or, are you willing to live by the faith that comes only from God? It is a faith that says if God is truly God and there is no other, then we must by faith believe that He is able to make a way possible for salvation. There is a way for us to escape from the wrath of God, but not if we cannot take the Bible literally.

You also stated that you have grown and changed your ways as has your understanding. In what were you actually trusting, Coyote? If you were a true believer, then the Holy Spirit would reside in you and would reveal the truth of His infallible, inerrant Word to your heart. 2 Corinthians 5:17 states that when a person becomes a new believer, they are a new creation. Our salvation cannot be earned for it is a gift from God. Therefore, as it comes solely from God, then it cannot be made secure by anybody but the God Who provides the salvation.

To conclude, it is not feasible to believe that every facet of those who claim to be Christians is truth. Truth is absolute if it comes from God. Again, as I stated previously, if truth is not absolute, then we cannot possibly believe in a God that is absolute. It matters not what we think is the right way, but it matters what the Bible says is the right way. If every way is “right” in its own eyes, then we have absolutely NO HOPE.

Thanks for stopping by. Please continue to ask questions.

TDP

Incidentally, a God who can create the Universe in 6 literal 24 hour days and can become incarnate as fully God and fully Man in Jesus Christ, has no problem making a donkey talk. And the serpent being indwelt by Satan for the purpose of tempting Adam and Eve is no surprise when we see that demons often possessed people and animals in scripture (consider Jesus casting the demon Legion from a man into a herd of swine). These supposed objections are not actually problematic when you understand scripture expects to be read and understood literally. So when I say that it does not allow you to, I am saying that the authors expected that when they wrote the various books, they expected that the readers would read it literally. There is no indication within scripture, whatsoever, they expected it to be read as a fable.

Coyote, please understand, the reason you are comfortable with picking and choosing is that you now can reject those parts of scripture that make you uncomfortable. Rather than acknowledging that you are a sinner without any hope of saving yourself, thus you need Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, you can ignore those passages and relegate them to myth/fable. And since you presuppose truth is relative based upon your perceptions, you can create a buffet line style of religions, picking and choosing that which makes you “feel” the most satisfied. In the end, you become the final arbiter of truth, creating a mish mash new system that satisfies you.

Be at peace on your journey. Coyote

My point is that you, like Peter, have a presupposition that dictates what you believe. Because you think absolute truth is unknowable, you allow yourself the comfort of thinking you can interpret the Bible as a collection of stories, rather than historical documentation. This allows you to pick and choose what you accept or reject. Yet, the Bible declares itself to be authoritative, inspired and sufficient. You have to deal with that. To simply say, that’s true for you, but not for me is not intellectually honest.

May it go well with you. Coyote

2 Timothy 3:16-17 states, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” And 2 Peter 2:20-21 says, “knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.”

God Himself inspired and directed His word. For the Christian, God’s word is the only Truth and all other truth claims must be compared against it. If a claim does not fall in alignment with the Bible, it cannot be true for it conflicts directly with what God has said.

Our opinion does not change what IS, but it can keep us from adjusting our thinking to accept what IS. This applys to you as well as me. Yet because you/christians believe that you/they HAVE the truth in the form of the Word of God, you/they can not deveate, for to do so would be to move into error. I say this, not to be contentious, but to get your responce/thoughts about it.

Sincerly. Coyote

When we are a true believer in Christ, then we cannot help but find other true believers to fellowship with. We will not be bothered about practicing the ways of tradition, but will lovingly desire to practice the ways of God. I can understand the frustration that people have in dealing with hypocrisy in the church, but this does not preclude us from living in a way that reflects Jesus Christ.

There is a saying, “He is so heavenly minded that is of no earthly good.” The truth is that ONLY when a person is heavenly minded will they then be of any earthly good. Truth, by the way, cannot be relative. Truth is based on God because God is truth. Therefore, all truth is absolute. You cannot have varying degrees of truth. A half-truth is still a whole lie.

Feel free to ask any more questions you may have. We welcome the opportunity to try and address the truth with those who are seeking, and we do so from the Word of God.

TDP

This is not true because you refuse truth. You refuse to answer the questions we have posed to you to gain a further understanding of your own position. And ultimately, you do hate a God that is the only possible answer to absolute truth. You hate that truth must proceed from God, and that you cannot force Him or others to accept what you would like to make Him into. Your responses show you do not really want new information for if you did, you would have answered our questions.

If you ever wish to come back and speak with us again, you are welcome to do so. In the meantime, as with all who stop by, our prayers will continue to be that God will enlighten the heart of each individual we have the privilege of speaking to, even those like yourself who do not believe in the God Who holds all things in control by the power of His Word.

The Desert Pastor

I will now consider this correspondence closed.
As you must have realised your answers and those of your colleagues mean absolutely nothing to me because I am an atheist.
This simply means that I do not believe that any gods exist.
I do not hate any gods or any people, and I am genuinely trying to get some new information.

Ah well, back to Ezekiel!

1. Are you going to hell? Yes, if your faith is not placed in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.
2. Do we personally think you deserve this? From a human standpoint, we do not know you personally. We have never met you and quite probably never will. But that is the wrong question to ask. The question is – does God personally think you deserve this? The answer is a universe-shattering YES! You have rejected the truth He has made available to you; therefore, because He is a righteous and a just God, you must pay the price if you die in your sins.
3. Does evolution render a saviour unnecessary? Yes, for if we merely evolved into what we are today, then we will continue to evolve to the point where we will be better and better. We do not need a Saviour if we can reach the ultimate goal of sinless perfection by ourselves. Evolution demeans everything God stands for. The two are totally and completely incompatible.

In our answers, we are talking about you or about what you think, for we do not know what you think. We are seeking to address the questions of life and you continue to choose to ignore them. In the end, while we are willing to speak with anybody who desires to know the truth, we have no desire to continue addressing questions and answers to those who will not respond.

Finally, your question to which you demand an answer:

Error: there are no gods
Answer: ??????

This has been answered succinctly, but you do not like the answers. You refuse to answer the questions we in turn have provided to you. My question must therefore be: why are you here? Why do you remain at DefCon if you only accept the answers you like or that fits your belief system?

The erroneous statement that there is no god cannot be addressed adequately to human wisdom or understanding. The things of God are foolishness to those who do not believe. Unless you can see God with your eyes, hear Him audibly with your ears, touch Him physically with your hands, you think you cannot believe in the existence of such a deity. It is no different than when Jesus was on the earth. The people demanded miracles in order to believe. He produced the miracles and they still did not believe because of the hardness of their hearts. The issue will never be what does God have to reveal in order to prove that He exists. The issue is what will you do with the truths He has already revealed about Himself and that is engraved on the hearts of every human being who has ever lived?

TDP

Instead of constantly talking about me and what I think, I would find it more helpful if someone would address my original question to you:

Where is the answer to

Error: there are no gods
Answer: ??????

Maybe you could, in passing, address some other points I’ve raised, viz,

Am I going to Hell?
Do you, personally, think that I deserve this?
Do you think that evolution renders a saviour unnecessary?

I am not trying to prove anything or to convert anyone from one flavour of religion to another or none.

As ever,
wishing peace and love
Peter

You ask for a straight answer to a subject you do not believe in, namely, hell. You want to know if you are going there. What difference would it really make if we said yes or if we said no, for no matter what our answer you will once again throw out an illogical presupposition judging us by your own judgmental standards. You want like to be good and to work for you within your own set parameters because the alternative is too awful to consider. What if you are wrong? Are you willing to accept the consequences of being wrong? If you do not believe you are wrong and you are not willing to accept the consequences, then you hold to absolute truth. That is, you hold to the truth you have created to be right for you.

For the record though, if you are still reading, it is not our opinions that matter but the unassailable Word of God. The Bible reveals to us through the Holy Spirit that truth is not what we want to make of it, but is based on God for He alone is all truth. Jesus Christ said of Himself in John 14, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no man comes to the Father but by me.” This means that we must consider only one of two options. Either Jesus Christ was Who He said He was, or He was a liar. He cannot be both. He cannot just be a good man, or a moral man, or a good prophet, or a wonderful rabbi. Either He is God Who came in the flesh, walked the dusty roads of Israel, went to the cross of Calvary and there died for the sins of all who come to Him in faith and repent of their sins – OR, He was a mere man who was a liar, a thief, and the lowest of all criminals for inducing people to put their trust in someone or something that does not actually exist. If the latter is true, then there is no hope for the past, for the present, and certainly none for the future. There is no more reason to live looking for a better life or even in looking to others when life deals us with a bad hand. All is futile. All is vanity of vanities. King Solomon of Israel could only truly be right about one thing in Ecclesiastes if the latter is true – there is a time to die!

However, if the former is true, then we have a responsibility as humans to seek after God, to plead with Him for mercy while He may be found. We must recognize that there is a purpose outside of ourselves and this gives us hope. We do not have to wonder whether those we face on the street, or at work, or at college, or in our homes have evolved a different set of moral standards or not. We can learn to trust in the One who created all things by the simple power of His spoken word, and because He created it all, it gives us the reassurance over and over that He alone can keep what He chose to create. Nothing is by chance.

So, the final answer is this – Will you go to hell? The Bible says that those who by their very nature reject God and close their eyes in death apart from faith in Jesus Christ must pay the price for their own sins. The law of double jeopardy does not permit two punishments to take place for the same crime. So, either Christ paid your sin on the cross of Calvary, or you will pay for your sins. The sins that you have blatantly committed against God and against others. The penalty for the wages of sin is death and death for all unbelievers is the door that leads to eternal punishment. We do not say these things out of arrogance, but out of love and concern for those who do not know Christ. Why should we wish to live unto ourselves and not be willing to share the glory of a Saviour Who loved us and gave Himself for us. This is not something to keep to ourselves but to rejoice and share with the world.

The Desert Pastor

The other thing that I see is the reason for any of this, andthat is the “eternal consequences” that was mentioned above. You people are passionate about your faith/belief and you don’t want others to suffer those “eternal consequence(s)”. I understand that. I was raised a Catholic, then, after I left home, went too Pentocostal churches and then to Baptist or non-denominational churches. I could tell more of the story, but now is not the time for that. But I will say that I don’t go to church much, if at all, any more. (I quit going when I got forced out of a church that I liked attending) The athiests I have met make more sense and are more compasionate then some of the christians that I used to know. There is so much focus on the “eternal consequences” that there is no time to work with the “now”. But, if God’s love is truly unconditional, then I am IN, for I have been “born again”. However, I don’t associate much with christians or practice their ways.

There are other things that I would like to get into, but I don’t want to go down any bunny trails now.

So, you claim to be a good person, yet you lie, which can hurt others deeply. You lust over women, which could be another man’s wife. This is a bit like stealing, is it not? You desire to have someone in a sexual way that does not belong to you in the covenant of marriage. Lusting can be very hurtful to others.
You brag about using profanity, as well as the Lord’s name in vain. If a small child were to hear your foul language and pick up on it and repeat it, would you still be so proud?
You claim you used to be Christian, which is a lie. If you were truly born from above by the supernatural power of God, you would STILL be a Christian. You dabbled in a form of religion, then you moved on; this dead religion you briefly followed had a god, or higher power, or form of deity, but it was not the God of the Bible. If Almighty God had re-birthed you, you’d be a true follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, not a wannabe.
You desire to have what others have, being jealous and wanting what you have not worked for…this is good?!?

Just what is your definition of being a ‘good person’ Peter? All that you have confessed doing is indeed hurtful and could have a serious affect on others. It would seem your definition of good is a strange definition.

Perhaps this will clear things up, here is the definition of ‘good’…
‘having the appropriate qualities to be something or to fit a purpose, of a high quality or standard, either on an absolute scale or in relation to another or others, morally excellent; virtuous; righteous; pious’.
It would appear that a good person strives for moral excellence and high standards, as well as striving for virtue. Certainly a lusting, lying, foul mouthed jealous bigot would not meet any of those standards, thus such a person is not good at all.

The human heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, causing one to think more highly of him/herself that one should. How tragic!

Yet, two comments previously you state, “Knowing the difference between right and wrong is a human, innate, evolved ability.”

So, we have a problem. The difference between right and wrong is a moral issue. You claim there is no god, but believe in evolution. You are irrational at best, because the very foundation upon which you stand (namely evolution) defies the position to which you say you adhere.

If morality is an evolution, you cannot limit the work of evolution just to what you like or what you would like evolution to explain. For instance, you cannot say that evolution produces morality without producing the emotions that must have caused those morals to evolve. Even Coyote states this belief in his attempt to tie morality’s beginning to evolution because “somebody is hurt, therefore, society shuns anti-social, dishonorable, and disrespectful behavior.”

As an example, it has been proven that the line of primates (of which humans are supposed to be a sub-species) have similar emotions. Monkeys, gorillas, and orangutans respond to stimulii that can produce forms of happiness, anger, discontent, etc. However, no group of monkeys, gorillas, or orangutans have ever evolved a system of morals that go along with those emotions. They can be anti-social, dishonorable, and disrespectful to each other, but it has never once produced a law that says, “Thou shalt not kill or commit adultery.”

So, to believe that evolution caused a difference in humans, you have to be able to isolate the effect from the cause. Either morals come from emotions, or emotions about what is right and wrong are brought about because we understand the morals behind what makes us happy, anger, discontent, etc.

Morality is a black and white issue. There is no in-between. If is merely a matter of evolution, then why have our emotions not evolved to the point where our morality has changed to the point where we no longer need the laws that emotions supposedly are the precursor to?

The Desert Pastor

Do either of you believe in Absolute Truth? Or are you both just Relativists?