Start Believing and Start Telling The Truth.

In an earlier post I wrote that your Salvation was assured, assuming you were a Christian because you were an ordained minister. Perhaps my assumption was incorrect for even among the ordained ministers there are many who speak the words but don't have Christ in their heart. I suspect you can be accounted amongst them.

By your words you stand in the darkness, there is no light in you.

 

If you think so then pray for me, but save the personal attacks. They are against the rules.

 

Your going to have to explain why Jesus is credited with many miracles and why his disciples all died horrible deaths proclaiming his viablility.

 

The miracles are simply recorded by others. I can credit myself with a miracle on this thread and it is the same amount of evidence.
The martyred deaths of the disciples are almost all stories that first emerge decades after their deaths. They are not recorded, they are retold.

 

You do not go down in history as Jesus has without reason. Take away his miracles and witnessed assention, Jesus would have been just another babbling human.

 

And so to you that means is not true, is that it? My family background are from Scotland, German Jews, Indian from India and African. None of my parent were born in any of those Countries....not even my grandparents. I have no proof that all of that is true other than what I am told by my parents. So does that mean it is false because it's stories to me?

 

But that doesn't show that they happened. It shows only that your belief depends on them.

 

Not at all. It simply means there is reasonable doubt. I am an agnostic, not an atheist. It simply means that I don't know the truth. I have no desire to undermine your faith, but I won't pretend that you have any evidence that can be tested and depended upon. It is your faith. Enjoy it, but don't try to sell it as fact. What would be the need of your faith if the facts were self evident and demonstrable.
In the case of your family history, there will be an evidence trail that you will be able to follow to the old countries and corroborate the stories. Or maybe you will find that you were actually divinely conceived.
Good luck in your research.

 

The OP is attempting to establish my religion as a farce. She has 0 proof that it is illegitimate.

I'm not asking you to accept my faith, I am asking you to accept its possibilty. I'm not the one here claiming fact without proof, the OP is.

 

I agree. The OP has zero proof that your faith is legitimate.

 

And why not?

We can verify what we can about Jesus can we not? We know that the details of Jesus life are true, that he existed, was a religious leader with a following, etc. and we know this from sources external to Bible. These external sources strongly corroberate these details in the Bible.

Now, in your reasonabe doubt, how exactly do you think Jesus amassed a following and fame greater than any other first century following? That question is never answered by the ... doubters - and never will be.

If everything we can test is accurate and true, then why doubt those things that cannot be tested? Why say that they are most likely not true but everything else is?

Why, you only say it when your intent is to deny rather than affirm or find answers and solutions.

That too is a choice, but never acknowledging anything that you do not wish to? Well, good luck with that.

 

Just the assembled expertise of the historical and eccelesiastical community.

YOU have no reason to doubt the veracity of the claims in the Bible, nor do you offer an alternative solution.

All this is, is the usual atheist attempting to use someone else faith as a weapon - under the guise that they are being reasonable. It isn't, it just mean spirited.

 

His fame and following during his time was matched and eclipsed by others at his time. Messiah's were abundant at the time, and he was one of many.
If I told you I went to Phillips Exeter Academy and Harvard University and I also once flew over the Grand Canyon without the help of any kind of apparatus, would you give all of those the same weight for credibility?
If not, why not?

 

We have a lot of documentation in books and film and other media concerning Spider-man. According to what we know, Spider-man, really a man named Peter, lives in New York City, dabbles at different times in science and photography, has had a model for a wife and been a school teacher. Since the name Peter, New York City, science, photography, models, marriage, schools and teaching are all real, why would we not believe Spider-man is real as well?

 

The majority of the historical will not support the veracity of the miraculous, and virtually all the ecclesiatics will as they start from a position of faith. There are many reasons to doubt the Bibles claims. The fact is the only reason not to is faith.
And that's ok.
I'm not attacking your faith or suggesting you lose it. I am saying don't try to pretend there is proof or that it can't be denied. Enjoy your faith and embrace it as you like, but never imagine faith is not the basis, and not fact. It requires believing the impossible. That's what miracles are.
I am not an atheist. I'm an agnostic. There is a difference.

 

And the 8 year old showed up.

 

I know my parent enough not to have any doubt. Plus, there are physical features in our family that backs up what they say.

I can't show God to you because He is not a physical being. But the fact is that we see His handy work, and it tells us that He exist.

Romans 1:20-22 (GW)
20 From the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly observed in what he made. As a result, people have no excuse.
21 They knew God but did not praise and thank him for being God. Instead, their thoughts were pointless, and their misguided minds were plunged into darkness.
22 While claiming to be wise, they became fools.


Nothing can create itself.....it is completely illogical to believe that something can come into existence out of inexistence. It either had to be always been there or someone that has always existed to created it. And no scientist would dare suggest that the universe always was. That's the reason why those who talk about evolution never go beyond the Big Bang, because there theory would fall apart.

If someone were to use the same argument to explain anything else other than the universe, people would say that person has lost his/her mind. Somehow, in the mind of evolutionist the creation of universe is the only thing where logic and common sense does not apply. It’s as if they have made the universe their god, the same way the true God is our God and is beyond explanation.

 

Just responding to how the response was phrased grammatically. If you want a better response, master the language.

 

The reasonable doubt is regarding the miraculous aspects of Christ, not your family background.
Much of what you say is why I'm an agnostic and not an atheist. But it does nothing to support the specific vision of God as laid out in the Bible. That is a completely different thing, and for me requires enormous flights of imagination to be able to embrace.
Your post doesn't address anything that I'm talking about, but does lay a foundation for agreement between us.

 

You see I don't believe that God exist only on the physical evidence. The most important evidence why I believe is a spiritual one.....it is the Holy Spirit that God gives to those that He personally calls. This evidence cannot be seen, taste, touch, heard or smell. It cannot be fully explained, but one knows it when they have it and they are sure that exist, because of the Holy Spirit that they received or was working with them before they were baptized.

 

I think there were a myriad of lies told throughout history with a myriad of religions telling them. However, only the Abrahamic religions remain. Why?

Could it be that the lies have been filtered over time? I say lies may be told but history often filters truth from such lies.

 

I know the rhetoric. I used to preach it. But you are making my point. It is completely dependent on faith, not any quantitative information that would settle the debate.
Enjoy your faith. Just don't suggest it is anything other that that. Faith. The substance of things unseen.

 

Where did you get the idea that only the Abrahamic religions remain? A distinctly Western cultural bias, and factually massively untrue.

 

Very true, I was refering to world wide religions.

I suppose you could say the same for Buddahism, but that is more of a philosphy than religion. As far as Hinduism, it is large and old but for the most part it is confined to one specific geographic location that is stuck in a time warp.

 

They all are.