Why Question God's Existence - Page 3

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When questioned in the scriptures as to what was the greatest of the Commandments, Jesus answered them saying; Love thy neighbor as thyself.

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Unless we can truly love ourselves we can never truly love anyone else! Jesus was not saying that we must be self absorbed but that we must truly be at peace with who we have been created to be.

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Oh....two minutes later and the computer is still working....miracle! LOL

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Yes if you are running on Windows! LOL

I do not believe that Jesus is the son of God any moreso than we all are. I believe Jesus was a wise man, educated well, and should be congradulated for combining his energy with the talents he learnt and had naturally.

Tracing back; I come to a point where I ask myself; why do people ask if there is a God...why do we question whether we or God exist? t it is probably just our brains reacting to information. We, as humans, actually have consiously realised we exist...animals know they exist but never actually realise it.

I am fairly sure that the instict of a human, above all else, is to reject pain. It is to prevent ourselves suffering. Second to this is the idea we try and accept pleasure. Now Christianity actually advocates love first. Christianity teaches hope: positive attributes to go beyond this.

However, if you think about it, what Christianity actually does is:

To fill the void of the unknown with the idea of God---why? for comfort maybe (just one answer)

However, its greatest acomplishment is in Jesus' words:

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'to love thy neighbour as thyself'..

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Humans are selfish...they are animals...without education we are just more intelligent political animals....and when I say selfish of course it is more an extension of the self rather than just the self...i.e. protection of close friends and family/ people of similar kind etc.

What Christianity does is say; if you believe in God and do as He says then good things will come to you (now and) in the afterlife. By doing so it is doing this for the purpose of people helping other people out; a virtue which is of the greatest assets-if not the.

Now I don't believe that the Bible is God's love letter. I believe it was written by man, possibly inspired by God, but God's inspiration we can all touch if we open our eyes.

So it's a method for the sheep to give them comfort and to allow a good society to go on. But one which is necesaary because it does teach good and 'do unto others as you would want them to do to you' answers sufficently that it promotes good!

Now, as for me, I do not need Jesus between me and God because He is in me, and I in Him.

Satanism used to be seen as a belief in the self and still is sometimes.

However, I don't buy this either. I believe that the Bible's code of practice...to help others above all is the greatest thing. Beyond that I don't buy into its defintion of God or the afterlife: I see these as a method to help the average person feel comforted when bad things happen and to stop people going crazy!

Now realising this requires great strength becuase few people see past it once taught..again largely through mental blocking and fear. I recognised as a kid that just through the way of the words and what was being taught, that Biblical truths were probably just made up by man.

So I think the best religion for me...and one which allows my freedom is to go by the moral code of the Bible (would that not be spirtual guidance in a way?) but to always question things, to always be open, and to believe in myself too (even though this was seen as satanism) because after all that is my greatest true reference through time.

heyjme1 you have said some very good statements but you have missed the essense of the Christian message

The Cross

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I do not believe that Jesus is the son of God any moreso than we all are

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Others have died for their beliefs too!

There is a magic to Jesus though and the evidence is still living in the Bible's existence.

remember though it has been translated at least three times before we see it and I strongly suspect the Vatican are holding some strong secrets.

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What is factual reality?

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The opposite of you or anyone else simply stating the bible having been given from God.

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Until we can find what we were created for we will never fully know our purpose!

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And what purpose have you come to understand through the bible?

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The Bible has basically been rejected not because it has been tried and found wanting but rather it has be found difficult and left untried!!

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Rejected? Rejected are many claims within the bible as well as the source.

As for the contents, we see fables and moral stories with themes of common sense that are by no means exclusive to the bible, nor is the bible the origin of these morals, ideas, rules, or even many of the stories.

To reject these elements is to often defy common sense, which is not attributable to the bible.

I guarantee that in your idea of your accepting and practicing the teachings of Jesus and the bible that you are wrong.

Unless you are a vagrant peasant freely giving away all "posessions" and ignoring or even rebelling against capitalistic and abusive societies and governments, I'm afraid you are just another damned individual sucking on a pacifier called faith while being blinded by self righteousness.

Leftwood, have you actually read the Bible?

It rather seems you havent!

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Rejected are many claims within the bible as well as the source

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Which ones?

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Debate is hindered by random unsupported statements.

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Sound like something you would say?

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Which ones?

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Mainly all miracles and interactions with God, statements claiming God's will, text representing God's thoughts, intentions, or words.

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Leftwood, have you actually read the Bible?

It rather seems you havent!

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Oh, what makes you say that? Any reason at all?

I've read much of the bible, some far more than once, researched quotes and chapters, been made to memorize and the like, and been continually assaulted with quotes and recitings of scripture in countless debates and conversations, church, sunday school, church youth groups, whichever church boy scout type thing I was in, boy scouts, even just watching 700 Club and televangelists, so keep up with your brilliant assumptions.

I've also looked into the history of the bible and other religions and there texts, your ignorant lapping up of recycled pagan stories is amusing to no end, and sad and disturbing on many other levels, you will probably never know of this, but you are but a broken record anyway thus far with nothing to say.

At least like some you tend to try to stick to the possitive, except when defensive, which is the best thing we can do sometimes, so enjoy your ignorant bliss and I guess let those who feel the need to address "evil" in the world be those who can stand on their own two feet as God intended, instead of those additcted to promoting tools of "evil" without even knowing it.

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Sound like something you would say?

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Yep, especially when exhausted by others doing so continually.

Got a point to make yet?

Oh, and since your getting feisty and want to try to point out hypocricy...

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You may not admit this in this discussion but the reason you are in this chat room is because you are searching for a reason for your existance.

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Does this apply to you? Even though you "believe" so strongly you know it already, though you didn't bother to answer my question of what it was, but I expected as much.

To the detractors... pointing out shortcomings and crytical analysis are not as difficult as coming up with a method of communicating the concepts behind moral codes that hold our society together.

Give some example of how you would like to see that done.

Story telling is our oldest tradition. Replace it with what? From culture to culture there are stories designed to stimulate, inform and define the conscience; that inner voice of self guidence.

Ethics are what they are, and how do you put a reason behind them?

Morals and ethics are fine, calling the stories that convey them factual is not.

That would be lying which is unethical.

Is that clear enough?

The concepts behind moral codes are quite simple, its a means of promoting peaceful and safe, perhaps giving and loving environments and social interactions, there is no mystery here. Its a method of survival in a social setting.

Large social structure problems arise mainly when people take more than they need leaving others without creating imbalance.

Past that we seem doomed to suffer mental, emotional, and physical characteristic imbalances that fuel social tension, especially in overly vain and judgemental societies, some of which is just nature and instinct, some of which is promoted by selfish, greedy, and power hungry societies creating cycles that breed imbalance over generations which causes us to forget how it starts let alone how to fix it or be willing to change to do so.

Leftwood, I am very sorry to hear that you have had such a negative experience of Christianity!

But to answer your question: My purpose?
To worship God and to be transformed into Christs likeness by following His plans and purposes for my life!

I do not believe leftwood had "such a negative experience of Christianity" I think leftwood's experience has powered him to overcome the falseness and corruption of the Christian faith. I think its made him stronger so that he does not need something/someone to fall back on when times get rough like most other Christians. I have come to the realization that people go to churches and do all their churchy things to have meaning to their lives. Why don't you go out and make your own meaning? You worship God and his plans...why? because you were told to or scared into (hell) following the Good Book. It has just made life easier to say oo God did this or God did that or God will do this or God will do that. DO IT YOURSELF. Make your own plan and path in life. The weak follow while the strong lead.

Leftwood said some of the stories in the bible that convey the moral messages are untrue, which is correct. a lot of the moral stories were as they say stories told by jesus. but a lot of the rest of it is supposed to be a history of the jews, and of jesus and his disciples. those bits are true at least to some extent. the jews did the totally believable bits that the bible tells us of, and there is more proof that jesus existed and was crucified, than that julius ceaser was ever a roman emporor, (and by evidence i mean documentation other than the bible).

the thing i have to most dispute is hyjme's comment about thinking jesus was a good man and a prophet, and nothing more. you can only accept one of two things about jesus, either he was the son of god as he claimed, or he was a loony/fraudster because his claims were false. if he was the son of god, then what he said was good and right, if not, then it was all lies, but all the morals set down seem to be good, dont they? so which would you think? not the most convincing arguement for the divinity of jesus, but something for you all to have a ponder over.

Three answers:

1. We are all the son of God
2. Sometimes a little bit of evil is necessary for the greater good. We are all constrained by the reality in which we exist to some extent.
3. He is the son of God.

There is a fourth:

4. Jesus was bad.

to me, God isnt a person, and to believe in God means to have faith, and i think thats the point, cuz faith alone a lot of times when ur not doing good gives u the energy to go on.