I've come for you

[coffeem8]

Hey y'all

Let's play a game.. you tell me why you don't believe in God, and I will attempt to change your mind!

If you already believe in God + Jesus, we can talk about that, too

Yay! It'll be fun, lol

[Divine Insight]

Hey

I really love this game.. ty for humoring me, divine insight

Don't mention it. Humoring evangelists is my favorite hobby.

Evangelism is listed as one of the gifts.. how could it be against God?

Against God?

That doesn't even make any sense. I never suggested that evangelizing was "against God". I simply pointed out that the only people who would ever do such a thing are people who don't trust God to get things right on his own.

What are your thoughts on the spirit of antichrist?

I don't believe in a "Christ", so why should I believe in an antichrist?

Clearly the Abrahamic religions are all doomsday religions. They all seem to believe that "God's Plan" is to have humanity culminate in a war of good versus evil. The problem is that this war will most likely be conducted between Christians, Jews, and Muslims, whilst the rest of the world has to put up with it.

This is why these religions are so dangerous to humanity. Those of us who don't believe in these Hebrew fables are stuck living on a planet with those who do. And those who do are lusting to have a Holy War in the name of their jealous gods.

I don't see anything remotely positive about any of the Abrahamic religions to be perfectly honest with you.

I'm mean, I'm sure there are a lot of sheep who feel lost and in dire need of salvation. So these religions may play a psychological role for them to think they are somehow special and "saved". But other than pacifying this kind of egotistical vanity, I don't see any value in these religions.

~~~~

However, if you like playing evangelist, I'll give you a hint: Before you can even begin to convince me that I need to be "saved" from an angry wrathful God, you must first convince me that there exists an angry wrathful God who is out to harm me.

And by the way, you're also going to need to convince me that this angry wrathful God is totally righteous, loving, and trustworthy, otherwise you're asking me to believe in a demonic boogieman.

I don't see how you can possibly hope to win this game. I can't imagine why any genuinely righteous, loving, and trustworthy God would be out to harm me.

If you claim that God is righteous, loving, and trustworthy, then why is there a problem?

Why should I need to be "saved" from a righteous, loving, and trustworthy God?

With all due respect that's absolutely ridiculous.

[coffeem8]

[Replying to post 20 by Danmark]

Hey Danmark

Are you playing the game with me (you tell me why you don'tbelieve in God, and I will attempt to change your mind), or am I being moderated?

I straight said already I believe in God.. so, of course I have reasons. Why is personal testimony not evidence? Has anyone seen any other thing creating anything? Has chaos produced order, yet?

Idk, but I love this game, and if you wanna play, we need to start over with you telling me why you don't believe.

Then I will attempt to change your mind.

[coffeem8]

[Replying to post 21 by Divine Insight]

Well sir I'm no evangelist, but, I love talking about God:)

I gotta go for awhile now, talk to ya soon (I would pm you this message but I haven't posted enough yet)

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 21 by Divine Insight]

Well sir I'm no evangelist, but, I love talking about God:)

I gotta go for awhile now, talk to ya soon (I would pm you this message but I haven't posted enough yet)

There's no need to PM me. I have no desire to play this game in private.

You seem to love more than just talking about your personal beliefs in a God. You seem to be far more interested in trying to convince other people to believe in the religion of your choice.

You see I realize that religion is not God. I have no problems with God. But I have a lot of problems with various religions, especially the Abrahamic religions.

I've already told you that as far as I'm concerned, if a God exists Taoism is a good candidate for a plausible philosophy of what "God" might be like. I have no problem with the God described by Taoism. In fact, many people wouldn't even consider that description to be a "God" because it doesn't describe an egotistical jealous Godhead. But I don't think of God in that way.

I'm a very honest person. I will freely confess to everyone and anyone, including myself and any God that might exist, that I do not know whether a God exists or not.

You, on the other hand, seem to think that you not only know that a God exists but you even know that it is the jealous egotistical God described by ancient Hebrew mythology. Apparently you also believe that the Christian off-shoot of the Abrahamic religion is the correct offshoot.

I can't say that I'm surprised by that. There are a lot of people who have been convinced that the Christian myth is the only correct picture of God.

Furthermore, if this is why you believe for yourself, I say more power to you!

I'm not the one who asked you to play a game with me so I could try to convince you to believe in my concepts of God. It's not important to me whether you believe in a God or not. I trust that if there exists a God that God wouldn't care either.

I can't imagine a God being angry with anyone for not believing that it exists. Especially if it's a God who is purposefully trying to hide from people. That alone is not a bad trait. But a God who purposefully hides from people and then would unleash his immature wrath upon them for not believing that he exists would be nothing short of criminally insane, IMHO.

There are reasons why the God of Taoism doesn't reveal itself to us. But that's ok, because it's not threatening to hurt anyone for not believing in it.

The religious paradigm that you are trying to convince people to believe in here is a very underhanded religion, IMHO. It basically claims that if you don't believe in the God of this cult this God will hurt someone (i.e. most notably the non-believers).

So it seems to me that you are attempting to convince other people to believe in a religion that proclaims that God is an extremely untrustworthy and dangerously insane jealous egotist.

I just see no reason to even bother with a religion that claims that God is so horrible.

It makes no sense to me. If it makes sense to you that's fine. I just hope it doesn't cause you to support religious bigotry in the name of Jesus, or support a Holy War against an imagined antichrist either. Both of those activities could be dangerous for other people as well as for yourself.

I don't see why you reject the idea of a truly loving God. There are plenty of religions that portray God as being loving: Taoism, Buddhism, Wicca, even European Faery Lore, although many people are probably unaware that the latter is actually viewed as a serious religion but those who believe in it.

In any case, you need to make a case for why I should need to worry about the wrath of a genuinely righteous, loving, and trustworthy God. That seems to be the Abrahamic paradigm and especially the Christian paradigm.

So good luck with that. But don't bother me with PM's I'm not interested in wasting my time discussing anything with you on this matter privately. Keep it public or give it up.

[coffeem8]

[Replying to post 24 by Divine Insight]

I mentioned pm-ing you because the rules warn against short messages that do not have to
do with topic, like a message that says I gotta go for now.

God is loving and perfect and always right. In my opinion.

Would I get banned if I were to ridicule Wicca, or evolution in the same way that you have ridiculed God? Nah. Surely not..

The rules forbid me to declare the Word as truth, they forbid me to say the Jesus Christ is the only way to peace, and they do not allow me to employ my own sarcasm toward anything I consider to be foolish. Can't use scripture as fact, but I can use another publication as hard cold evidence. Can't go by personal testimony, but I can refer to any count made by any .org. I musnt remark on the cruelty of humans, but its OK to judge the Gods.. oh wait, just thevabrahamic god.

Every sentence I wrote about the Lord is carefully meditated, weighed, and considered.

I got demons cast out of me in the name of Jesus. Knocked me on the ground right where I stood.
(Murmer of endless data stops abrubtly..)

About the war you speak of:
Its coming whether anyone wants it or not. I do not want war.

It will find me prepared. Each to his own.

Let all things be confirmed in the mouth of two or three witnesses.

[Divine Insight]

God is loving and perfect and always right. In my opinion.

If that's the case then surely I would have no need to fear this God. Right?

Would I get banned if I were to ridicule Wicca, or evolution in the same way that you have ridiculed God? Nah. Surely not..

I'm not a moderator, and I don't have anything to do with this forum other than the fact that I am a member just as you are. But I can't imagine you getting in trouble for ridiculing Wicca, or Evolution. As long as you aren't attacking a member you are free to comment on these things concepts to your heart's content insofar as I am aware.

I have no need to defend Wicca. In fact, I'll be the first to confess that the very term has a very wide range of meanings to different people. To the best of my knowledge it also does not claim to be a dogmatic religion. Therefore there is nothing to defend (or attack) general.

As far as Evolution is concerned, if you say things about evolution you better be prepared to back them up as there are many people on these forums that do "defend" evolution. I do not feel a need to do that. I feel that science has proven that evolution is true beyond a reasonable doubt. They don't need me to defend them.

The rules forbid me to declare the Word as truth.

I'm not certain what the mods will allow or disallow. But my understanding is that if you proclaim something to be true you need to provide evidence to back up that claim.

I do believe that you are permitted to say things like "I personally believe that the Bible is the Word of God and is True". But if you are going to proclaim that this is a fact rather than a faith-based belief on your part I think you need to present evidence to back up that claim.

After all, who are you do say what's true?

they forbid me to say the Jesus Christ is the only way to peace, and they do not allow me to employ my own sarcasm toward anything I consider to be foolish.

Again, I don't know precisely where they draw the line. I think it's ok for you to argue that the Bible claims that Jesus is the only way to Yawweh and the Christian heaven. Because after all, that's what the Bible does seem to claim. I wouldn't even argue with that.

Can't use scripture as fact, but I can use another publication as hard cold evidence.

That's right. Scripture isn't automatically accepted as fact. If it were we'd all need to confess that Allah is God and that Muhammad was the last prophet. Because, like it or not, that's written in "scriptures" too.

Other publications may or may not be accepted. That can depend on who you are debating with. If it's clearly a Christian publication or a Creationist's publication probably not.

Can't go by personal testimony, but I can refer to any count made by any .org.

Your testimony is just as good as mine. I'll probably dismiss yours and you'll probably dismiss mine. And then we end up being even.

I musnt remark on the cruelty of humans, but its OK to judge the Gods.. oh wait, just the abrahamic god.

As far as I know you can remark on any "God" you want. If you dismiss a mythology because you think the God is stupid or absurd then this is the truth. Why should you not be permitted to speak the truth?

Every sentence I wrote about the Lord is carefully meditated, weighed, and considered.

That doesn't mean anything at all to me.

I got demons cast out of me in the name of Jesus. Knocked me on the ground right where I stood.
(Murmer of endless data stops abrubtly..)

Well, then it's understandable that you would believe in demons. I have never been possessed by demons so you'll have to excuse me if I see no reason to believe in them. Also since I'm not possessed by demons I certainly wouldn't need to call upon a demigod to cast them out of me right?

About the war you speak of:
Its coming whether anyone wants it or not. I do not want war.

I wouldn't doubt that. We see religious fanaticism causing wars right now in the middle east. This is why I feel that it's important to renounce these war-mongering types of religions.

It will find me prepared. Each to his own.

I've been prepared for everything including death for many decades. I'm prepared to die, and doomsday prophesies don't scare me in the least. None the less, I do think it's pretty sad if they are caused by a bunch or religious fanatics who are thinking they are going to war to fight for a jealous vengeful God.

You might be able to say bad things about Wicca, but I don't believe there is anything in Wicca that calls for a Holy War to end the world. But clearly the Abrahamic religions do seem to be calling for this kind of demise.

By the way, shouldn't you be happy that this war is supposedly coming? I mean, after all, isn't that the Biblical God's grand plan? You should be thrilled about it just like the ISIS extremists are thrilled to go to war in the name of Allah.

Let all things be confirmed in the mouth of two or three witnesses.

Sounds like gibberish to me. But I can imagine that to an Abrahamic theist this probably sounds profoundly awesome or something. I pretty sure the Islamic extremists are saying similar things in the name of their Allah.

For someone who claims to have found "peace with Jesus" why are you then preparing for a Holy War? That doesn't sound like much peace to me.

[Danmark]

[Replying to post 20 by Danmark]

Hey Danmark

Are you playing the game with me (you tell me why you don'tbelieve in God, and I will attempt to change your mind), or am I being moderated?

I straight said already I believe in God.. so, of course I have reasons. Why is personal testimony not evidence? Has anyone seen any other thing creating anything? Has chaos produced order, yet?

Idk, but I love this game, and if you wanna play, we need to start over with you telling me why you don't believe.

Then I will attempt to change your mind.

Post 20 was not a moderator post. I am simply pointing out you have not yet said anything persuasive. Your opinions about God and your personal testimony are simply not persuasive. What you might keep in mind, even tho' you did not post this in the Christian apologetics section, is the guidelines to that section point out that there are many experienced debaters here, many of whom have studied the Bible on a professional level. They have been to seminary, were former ministers of the Gospel, or have had educations similar to those who are professional Christians. You are not going to be able to engage them in 'play' as you call it, because your efforts may be seen as coming from an elementary school level they graduated from long ago. That is why I tell you, your 'Yay God!' arguments will accomplish nothing except to brand you as naive.

Do I really have to explain to you why I don't believe in the Tooth Fairy, astrology, Greek Gods, Islam or Leprechauns? The burden is on he who alleges.

If you are serious about 'playing your game,' I suggest you choose one particular topic or argument in Christianity and Apologetics and go at it. But a broad based, 'Let me try to convert you to my belief system' will be ignored, except to point out the futility of your 'game.' In other words, time for 'Candyland' and 'Chutes and Ladders' is over.

[Divine Insight]

But a broad based, 'Let me try to convert you to my belief system' will be ignored, except to point out the futility of your 'game.' In other words, time for 'Candyland' and 'Chutes and Ladders' is over.

I think they can be fun to play to a point. I mean after all, someone who wants to try to convince other people to believe in their view of God should have a playground on which to play. They can learn why it's not so easy. At least he did post this in "General Chat".

But back to Coffee. If you're going to try to convince me of Christianity, I can tell you right now that the very core of your convincing needs to begin with trying to convince me why I should believe in a God who is "Out to condemn me". Because, after all, isn't that the very foundation of Christianity? What good is Jesus if you don't first believe that some God is out to condemn you?

As Danmark had pointed out, many people on these forums are highly educated in religious theology. It's not like they never heard of these religions before and have no clue what they are about. Many of them, like myself, were born and raised into Christianity only to discover that the religion has no merit.

I've posted my story on these forums many times in the past, but if you're interested I'll give you a brief summary.

• I was born and raised into a very religious Christian family.
• Our particular denomination of Christianity was actually quit loving, I had no problem with the religion at all.
• In fact, I accepted Jesus as my "Savior" and I even decided to preach the Bible to others since this seemed to be what God supposedly wants us to do.
• It was when I started to seriously study the religion when I discovered just how truly absurd it is.
• I even considered that maybe it was just our denomination that got it wrong, or maybe the KJV Bible has it wrong.
• I looked into other Christian denominations, including Catholicism. What I found was no better.
• I even considered that maybe Christianity itself got it wrong and maybe the original Judaism was the correct version of the religion. But no, that didn't help either.
• I finally realized that the whole Abrahamic picture is absurd. I very briefly looked into Islam but very quickly realized that it wasn't about to resolve anything either.
• Further study of the religion along with looking at other Mediterranean religions confirmed that these Abrahamic religions aren't even unique. They borrowed many of their ideas from other religions, not the least of which was the idea of a demigod being born of a virgin woman.
• I finally realized that the whole Mediterranean thing is clearly all wrong. Not only could I never teach it to anyone on any serious level, but I also realized that it would be absurd for me to continue to believe in it.
• In fact, that last thought really got me thinking. Just why was I trying to hard to make it work? Well, because the religion itself claims that belief in the religion is paramount. But when I was honest with myself I could see that there's really no reason why I would even want it to be true.

So I have come to the very firm conclusion that Christianity, in fact, none of the Abrahamic religions can be true. Especially not verbatim in term of their dogma. If you want to talk about some extremely abstracted version of this religion that pretty much ignores the Bible verbatim and pretends to make something entirely different out of the religion, then I'll grant you that this is always possible. But, for me, such pretense seems like a waste of time. If I'm going to make up a different picture of God why even bother wearing the Bible like a ball-and-chain? Why not just look around at better religions to begin with.

And now here's a summary of what I did after I realized that Christianity and the Bible were false.

• First, I did not become a pure secular atheistic materialist. I personally can't see reality through that lens. For me life has always been mystical and I believe in a mystical reality intuitively. But a mystical reality does not require an angry jealous egotistical Godhead.
• So when I freed myself up from Christianity and the Bible I did not feel that I was suddenly living in a non-spiritual world. I just realize that Hebrew mythology has no more merit than Greek mythology. It was no big deal for me really.
• I continued to search for other religions, not in search of a "God". Religion is not God. But simply to see if anyone else had a concept of "God" that naturally matched my own personal intuitive feelings of what God ought to be.
• With that in mind I actually found, first in Buddhism, a religion that seemed to be far more inline with how I intuitively feel that God should be.
• I might add that there are many different views on Buddhism ranging from some quite religious ones to some that are almost atheistic or at least animistic. But all of these were pantheistic which fits in perfectly with my intuitive feelings of what God might be.
• Further study and much dedication finally brought me to Taoism which I feel is probably the single most convincing mystical philosophy mankind has ever created. Whether it's true or not is a whole other story. But I see no reason why it can't at least be plausible. (something the Christian picture of God could never be, IMHO).
• Taoism make a lot of sense, and it's also completely compatible with all known science. This is important to me since my life long career was as a physicist.
• Even though I embrace Taoism as one of the world's most rational pictures of a mystical reality I wouldn't call myself a "Taoist". I don't necessarily practice Taoism on a religious level. I just feel that it's the best mystical philosophy that humans have come up with.
• Much later in my life (and fairly recently in comparison with the span of my life to date) I have discovered a new perspective on "religions" called "Wicca" and "Faery Lore". I have since embraced these religions in term of actual ritual practice. I find that they are refreshing and psychologically uplifting. I would continue to practice these rituals even if I knew for certain that life is nothing more than pure secular materialism. In other words, for me, Wicca and Faery Lore are fun activities whether there actually exists any God or not.

I would typically just forget about Christianity entirely if it wasn't for the fact that there are many people like yourself that want to play the "Game" of "Let me convince you to convert to Christianity".

And these people who want to play this game take themselves far too "seriously". They might claim that it's just a fun game, but when it comes to losing this game they can become dead serious and sometimes quite emotional, and even angry because the person they are trying to "convince" is actually exposing just how absurd Christianity truly is.

I mean, think about Coffee. If you want to "play a game" to try to convince me to believe in your religion, then why should you become upset when I point out all the reasons why I feel that the religion is absolutely absurd, ignorant, and immoral?

If you didn't want to hear my reasons for rejecting the religion then why are you playing this game with me in the first place? :-ki

Am I trying to convince you to believe in Buddhism? Or Taoism? Or Wicca? Or Faery Lore?

No I'm not. And if you think all those religions are stupid, that's perfectly fine with me. I have no problem with that. I don't care what you believe. If you want to believe in Christianity please be my quest.

But if you want to "play the game of converting me to Christianity" then you better be prepared to hear precisely why I feel that Christianity is the most pathetic and disgusting religion on Earth. Save for possible Islam. I'm really not sure which of the two is worse. But IMHO, neither of them are worthy taking seriously and to be perfectly honest I think they should both be outlawed as "Hate Cults". They try to spread "Emotional Terrorism" in the name of their vengeful jealous Gods.

I just don't see any need for religions that spread "Emotional Terrorism" in the name of a God and then try to pretend that this God represents the epitome of love, trust, and compassion.

So my bottom line for you is quite simple: "If your God is out to get me in a negative way, or threatening to condemn me for whatever reasons, then I have absolutely no need for your God, nor do I respect your religion".

I have no need for any religions that have made a monster out of "God".

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to coffeem8]

So, if one tells me that they do not believe in God because
here is no evidence, I tell that one, there is no evidence that disproves him. I ask that one, where is there no evidence of him?

Folks, in 2003, I made the decision to read and then observe the bible, to see if itbwerevtrue and good.. it is.

If you were to choose, for reasons that make sense to you, to conclude that Clement Moore's "The Night Before Christmas" represented an actual historical occurrence, that would establish, unequivocally, at least in your mind, that there necessarily must be flying reindeer in the world. The fact that it can be easily observed that reindeer do not possess the necessary requirements for controlled flight, and the clear observation that NO flying reindeer have ever actually been produced should, in and of itself, stand is evidence of a sort, wouldn't you agree? Do you recognize that there might yet be some room for doubt in the minds of the rest of us? Those of us who recognize that sometimes people chose to make up stories for purposes of their own? A rather common practice actually. One which we commonly refer to as "make believe," at least if we are being gracious. And there is no evidence to disprove the existence of Santa Claus either you will notice, outside of the unrealistic aspects of the story itself. But again, that SHOULD reasonably act as a type of evidence of it's own sort, one would think. You personally choose, for reasons of your own, to believe that a corpse came back to life and flew away. Yet many of us notice that there are strong viable reasons to suppose that corpses do not return to life and fly away in much the same way that we notice that reindeer cannot fly, and that it is physically impossible to visit all of the children of the world in a single night. Such stories are simply insupportable in the light of reason and common sense. By insupportable, I mean that neither claim can be supported by observation, experience, or any appeal to actual supportable fact. The method by which these things are supposed to have occurred, both the claims of flying reindeer and flying corpses, satisfy all the requirements for that which represents pure make believe. And your personal decision to believe that a corpse came back to life and flew away remains just as clearly insupportable as the story of flying reindeer. Ultimately just as insupportable as the historical Christian claim that the end is at hand and Jesus is about to return at any moment now, despite an unbroken 2,000 year record of being completely fulla bulla on that score. 0 for 2,000 years IS perfectly good evidence you see. Insupportable claims which violate all observation, experience and frankly, all common sense, and for which no hard factual evidence exists to support them is in itself evidence of a sort. It's very clearly evidence to the NEGATIVE.

[Zzyzx]

.

The rules forbid me to declare the Word as truth, they forbid me to say the Jesus Christ is the only way to peace, and they do not allow me to employ my own sarcasm toward anything I consider to be foolish. Can't use scripture as fact, but I can use another publication as hard cold evidence. Can't go by personal testimony, but I can refer to any count made by any .org. I musnt remark on the

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