blackobsidian said:
If I spend the rest of my life believing that there is no deity and that when we die there is nothing and when I do die I find myself in the presence of a deity who says to me "You did not believe in me... Why did you not believe in me?" I will reply quite simply:-
"You tell me big-guy... You're the all-seeing, all-caring omniscient being so you know full-well that I had no reason to believe in you. My suggestion would be that if you want people to believe in you, maybe you should do some of that Old Testament shit and kick-ass again so that people take note.
Tell me Big-G... (You don't mind me calling you Big-G do you?), in my situation, would you honestly and happily follow a book of which you cannot be sure of the origins? Would you join a world-wide community of people hell-bent (no pun intended Big-G!) on converting everyone to their way of thinking, irrelevant of the opinions and beliefs of those people?"
And to be honest I'd expect him to know exactly where I'm coming from... After all he can know exactly what I'm thinking and feeling at any given moment, can't he?
He sure can Black,
It's called faith.
Wouldn't it be easy if God gave us every answer to every question that was ever posed? My, how interesting of a life that would be. Faith would be out the window and this entire world would be believers in God.
So....
If God is all knowing and all of that other good stuff, then why did He not do it that way? Why does He make it so hard? There has got to be a reason right?
Redbema: So God, my grandmother dropped dead the other day, how come I never had a chance to tell her goodbye?
God: Because that is the way that I deemed it.
Redbema: So God, my best friend just died in a car wreck, why is that?
God: Because it was for my purposes.
Redbema: So God, how come you made it so hard for us to have faith in you?
God: Because I chose it to be that way.
Redbema: Why is that God?
God: Who are you to question me? Where were you when I laid the foundations of the world? Have you walked the depth of the sea? Spoke light into existence?
Redbema: Nope, I sure havn't.
I guess I am about to either confuse you, encourage your view on us "Christians" or become a heretic, lol, but here goes nothing.
Black, my understanding of the Scriptures is that God actually chooses people. You are right, He does know you, and He knows me. He knows everybody. Why did God choose the Israelites to be His people? Why did God choose Abram, Moses, or any of the other "Insert Blackobsidian's sarcastic version of how God spoke to us in the OT here" ways to speak to people? It's because He has a purpose for how He does things.
Paul would later write something to the effect that we are not "counselors of God." We will never understand all of His purposes, and we are not supposed to on this side of heaven. Many, even conservative, Christians will disagree with me on this, but I believe that God not only "allows" things to happen, but that he "causes" things to happen. In fact, He is probably causing you to disbelieve right now. For a reason beyond us, He has a purpose.
Difficult to swallow, difficult to believe. Maybe I am wrong, but it seems to be that God does what He wants. Does this make God a mean kid with an ant farm? I don't think so. I think that it makes Him all-knowing and us simply finite. We just have no concept of all knowledge. Nobody does. We will never fully understand why God does what He does, even causing people to disbelieve at times. Some say we are robots. I say that we are saved by grace. I look at God and I view Him as the sole creator of the universe, and I respect Him and give my life to Him. If I do not understand Him, so what. I do my best to understand. That is where God wants us to be, total trust in Him. Alot of people simply cannot do that.
In other words, if some of my "logical thinking" doesn't add up or make sense, then I will always trust His Word over my thinking.
God loves us enough to have created us, and desire a relationship with us. Some say that because He has let evil exist, it makes Him evil. But I say, how would we know good if there was no evil? God is good. He controls both good and evil for His own purpose.
And black, when you die, no offense man, but I honestly doubt that you will be able to stand before the Lord of lords and King of kings and debate Him. I think that your knee will bow and your tongue will confess that He is everything that He says He is.
He has His purposes, and they are for His glory. We just will not ever be able to understand it all during this lifetime. But that is why the Bible says that we live by faith.
Trust me black. I have taken alot of science and history courses and have come to question my very own existence. I have wrestled very roughly with my own belief in God, even to the point of total abandonment. But when it comes down to it, I do believe in God. I will always do my best to never be one of those Christian Extremist that go around and push people away from God by my evangelistic techniques. Personally, I believe that belief in God is very logical, however, I must understand that I do have faith in Him, and that this overrides alot of logic. However, there is no solution that will answer every single question in the world, except that of Christianity in my book. Evolution is not the problem solver. Archaeology is not the answer. Science is surely not the answer. Only belief in the One True God is when the world begins to make sense. When I discovered that is when I truly began to live.
My worldview was dead before that.