Why won't God convince atheists?

[Hatuey]

Many atheists are so for valid and defendable reasons. Why would a punishing deity choose not to make himself known to reasonable people who do not believe he exists?

A decent god would know how to convince decent people to believe and care for him as he cared for those decent people.

What sort of god doesn't care to convince sensible people that he exists?

[tam]

Peace to you!

You know, I actually misunderstood the question, and wrote a post in response to what I thought was being asked. Here is the question actually asked of me by two posters:

I was just curious about what has convinced you that you are so bad, evil, stained (whatever word that should be used) that would make you OK with the idea of an innocent person paying the price for you.

and

What have you done to warrant an innocent man being nailed to a pole and left to die so horribly?

Took me a while to know how to respond to this. I am sure that some of you have heard the question or a variant of: If evolution is true, why are there still monkeys.

That question is based on false understanding of evolution. To answer it, you need to first explain evolution,

You are over thinking it then. No need to fully understand evolution to counter this nonsensical statement.

Think of it this way. If Americans came from Europe, why are there still Europeans around?
To come from, does not require the other to vanish. No lesson on evolution needed.

Could be that I should have said it was like responding to the statement: 'if evolution is true, and humans evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys'.

I don't know if you knew that is what I meant to say or not. If so, then the response you advise giving is misleading... allowing the reader - who obviously does not know what science states about evolution - to continue to believe that science does state that humans come from monkeys, but that some monkeys just stayed the same.


If not, then my apologies for not being clear the first time around.

and that can be a lengthy process.

Keep it simple then. Perhaps, "I committed vehicular manslaughter", or "my religious beliefs tell me that I suffer from the sin of Adam, and if I'm not accepting of the medicine for this sin, I deserve eternal torture in hell".

But I did explain it... and you quote it below. If there is something you do not understand in that, then ask as to that.

Similar to that, there are assumptions made that bring one to ask the above question asked of me. I will attempt to address one of those assumptions here as I have learned from my Lord. Although that is not accepted as evidence in this part of the forum, I believe that since the question I was asked is based upon a teaching in Christianity, and upon what is supposedly written in the bible, that I can at least use the bible to support the content of what I learned from my Lord. (if it does indeed support that content)


So... to the first assumption, that the 'level of badness' has anything to do with this issue:


Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ [Jesus] our Lord.

The level of badness of sin has no bearing on this issue. Because the wages of sin (no matter what kind or how bad) is death.

Nor is this a punishment, but a wage... a consequence... of sin. The wages of sin is death. Same as eating of the tree of knowing good (life) and bad (death) brought death as a consequence, not as a punishment.

"If you eat, you will die."

NOT,

"If you eat, I will kill you."

So the first question then becomes 'what makes you okay with the idea of an innocent person paying the price for you?'



Because that person offered to give His life that I may live (John 10:18 - No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.").

Because there was no other way for this to be done (Matthew 26:39 Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." and Matthew 26:42 He went away a second time and prayed, "My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.").

And because this gift - that I do not deserve and have done nothing to earn - is not for me alone, but also for my children and my loved ones; and not them alone, but also others and their loved ones; and also all those Christ loves, and all those God loves.

And that is just not one of those gifts that you gives back. Or at least it is not one that I give back, but accept in gratitude and humility.

Gratitude and humility. Lest's address gratitude. Why would you be grateful to have an innocent person tortured and killed? Did a religion convince you that you are sick and it just so happens to have the medicine, or perhaps, you have done something so evil that the idea of an innocent being tortured and killed for it seems OK. This is what I'm trying to get clarification on, because the idea of an innocent being tortured and killed should not be something we should celebrate nor be grateful about IMO.

Religion did not convince me of anything like what you have described. I never even considered anything about this 'original sin' as religion defines it. It did not seem to matter anyway because I personally sin all on my own.

I am grateful for what Christ DID for me - out of love for me, and not just me but also my loved ones, and others and their loved ones - for the reasons that I stated above.

For me to say that I am not okay with what He did, is for me to throw His gift, His sacrifice, His love, everything he suffered for us back into his face. I cannot and will not do that.

Nor is it all about me.

God sacrificed His Son - with that Son's agreement (just as Abraham would have had Isaac's agreement, even though nothing is written on that either way; but Isaac is a forerunner to Christ and Christ went willingly) - as a ransom to buy us back from DEATH - the one Adam sold us TO when he ate of the tree of knowing good (life) and bad (death). Death is the one who demanded life. Christ is the One who paid that price FOR us. Life... for life.

Can I take this as admission that you are OK with an innocent being tortured and killed on your behalf due what your religion tells you? For whatever reason, you seem to have accepted this sickness, it would be no wonder you would take the medicine then.

Once again I have no religion telling me anything. The above -the true meaning of life for life that my Lord gave me that I shared more about in the below quoted words - that is one of the most beautiful things that He has revealed to me, though there are many others.

That is the nature of my God, and my Lord. Giving, serving... a King leading by example, showing us that we have nothing to fear, not death, not men, nothing.

Moses allowed the men to divorce their wives with a certificate of divorce because of the hardness of their hearts - but it was NOT what was TRUE from the beginning, from God.

You do realize don't you that Moses may have just been claiming to speak on behalf of a god so that his subjects would take him serious. Such things seemed very common back then, still to this day actually. Consider if you wanted to have the land that belonged to someone else. You could claim that your god is ordering the genocide. Perhaps even claim that said god is allowing his soldiers to keep the virgin girls for themselves for some additional incentive.

I am not sure I understand what that has to do with Christ correcting something. I actually think your suggestion here would even help make my point if it were true (though it is not): that not everything written was as God wanted it or even said it.

That same hardness of hearts and lack of mercy (and lying pen of the scribes, so that the people were further misled into believing God demanded life for life), brought about demanding 'eye for eye' in vengeance. But Christ is the Truth of God, and Christ corrected that erroneous teaching, and Himself fulfilled the requirement of this law by GIVING His life in payment for ours. As well as by showing mercy and asking forgiveness for those who killed Him. He did not demand eye for eye against those who killed Him. He asked FORGIVENESS, and because HE did what was right, because He obeyed, HIS request is heard, and granted.

I have never done anything in my life that would justify me being OK with the torture and killing of an innocent. Perhaps if I once again bought the idea that I'm sick through Adam, then maybe I would be OK with something that I would hope we would all find appalling.

I do not know who one could disagree that we do have sickness and death in our flesh (some of us more than others)... however we explain its presence. If there was no death in our flesh... it would not get sick, get old, die.

I don't know how soon cells start to die after we are born, but eventually, the body loses the battle, and death wins.

So we all have this 'sickness', and it has nothing to do with what we deserve.

Now, in answer to all of what is written in the OT that people take issue with God demanding... if Israel (and all the other nations) could misunderstand this... then how big a leap is it to see how they misunderstood so many other things that they believed God wanted: kill their enemies; bash babies heads against rocks; fly into buildings and blow themselves and others up; stone or burn or torture sinners; etc, etc.

Once again, you highlight the dangers of listening to people whom claim to speak on behalf of god concepts. You are not immune to this.

I am immune to this actually... so long as I am listening to Christ and not to men.

Christ is the One who has kept me OUT of religion, and kept me from listening TO men.


We will disagree on this perhaps, but I cannot deny it.

[

quote]All of that serves DEATH. Not LIFE. Not God.

I have done none of those things and don't find myself feeling like I deserve to die. Does all of this really stem from believing that Adam and Eve were real and sinned?

[/quote]
I think you misread what I said. I said serves... not deserves.

All of that - kill their enemies; bash babies heads against rocks; fly into buildings and blow themselves and others up; stone or burn or torture sinners; etc, etc - SERVES death. None of it serves LIFE. None of it serves God.




Peace to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[tam]

.

Noah acting in his faith saved his entire family.

Rahab acting in her faith saved her entire family.

The blood of the lamb on the doorposts in Egypt caused Death (the Destroyer) to pass over the entire house, saving everyone IN that house. Even the Egyptian houses if the Egyptians had exercised faith in Jah instead of in Pharaoh.

There are stories that tell of such things. Can those stories be shown to be true accounts of actual events that really happened? Honestly? Without evasion? Without claiming "God told me" (which is meaningless in debate -- which is what we do here)?

I hear you, Zzyzx.

I personally can't show that they are true events without drawing on personal evidence which does not hold water on this part (or perhaps any part) of this forum, I know. But those stories are from the same book that others in this thread have drawn on to talk about hell, or sending loved ones to hell, etc, and even to talk about Christ's torture and death... so I just used the same book to dispute that interpretation.

Peace to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[KenRU]

Noah acting in his faith saved his entire family.

Just out of curiosity, how can wiping out all living things on the entire planet (save for Noah, his family and some animals) qualify as the act of a loving entity?

Drowning every other living thing on the planet seems like a pretty heinous act to me, its something that a megalomaniacal James Bond villain might do.

Loving god - Biblical Flood. These two seem contradictory to me.

I can reconcile them becuase to me, they are both fictiticous. But when I was a believer, it was something I could never reconcile completely.

That's quite alot of suffering caused by god.

Plus, we lost the unicorns : (

-all the best

[JoeyKnothead]

From Post 486:

You do know (because I've written it so many times) that many Christians reject this characterization of Christianity as a strawdog, all bark but no bite, no Christian truth in it at all.

Plenty fair, and I commend you for speakin' up on it.

'Til I read the rest of it, then boy-howdy, I'm lost as a cow at a square dance...

Of course I cannot dissuade you (apparently) from keeping on suggesting this bit says some thing about Christian foolishness which it would do but only to those few deluded Christians who might have been suckered into it. The thinking Christians that I know who know GOD do not accept any part of this characterization of Christianity.

So other Christians are "deluded" 'cause don't it beat all, you, ttruscott happen to know God. Or, "Y'all's deluded y'all, 'cause it is, I MET HIM!"

Other Christians are non-"thinking", 'cause it is, they disagree with you. Religious pride, religious arrogance, or both?


You'll please forgive me if I reject your unevidenced claim of having met a god that you can't even show exists to get met.

Our silly simple sins do not cause us to be sinful in HIS eyes but are the result of our CHOOSING BY FREE WILL to be an evil sinner in HIS sight by rejecting HIM or HIS ways, either temporarily or permanently.

Where one man's "silly" is another man's "strawdog"?

Until you can put some supporting data behind that claim, I can only conclude it's more preachin' than truthin'.

[Blastcat]

The 'christian hell' is neither biblical, nor of love, nor of God and Christ, nor real.

Just in the new testament, we have these verses.
Please review and tell me what you think they mean .. no hell?
No eternal punishment?

Some people in the Bible don't agree with you.

Matthew 25:46
46 "Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

Matthew 13:50
50 and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Mark 9:43
43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.

Noah acting in his faith saved his entire family.

It was do it or drown like all the rest. He obeyed. I would have too. This has nothing to do wit faith, though. Self-preservation maybe.

Rahab acting in her faith saved her entire family.

Rahab did what she had to do in order to not be slaughtered. So she was nice to some spies and they helped her back. I would have done the same thing. I don't LIKE to be slaughtered. I don't see where the faith comes in, though. Self-preservation, maybe.

This is as my Lord has revealed to me

Please provide evidence that your "lord" revealed something to you.

and so may not be Christian, and so may not rule with Him as king-priests in His Kingdom, but the sheep (from the sheep and the goats parable) are also not Christian, and they are invited into the Kingdom, as subjects of that Kingdom.

It's nice to know that Christians will be the bosses up in heaven.
I can't WAIT to be subjected.

Please provide evidence for what you claim.

So... yeah... no hell. That would be, as you have said, a bad deal for everyone.

Reality doesn't really care about our ideas.
Please provide evidence for yours.

[Clownboat]

For me to say that I am not okay with what He did, is for me to throw His gift, His sacrifice, His love, everything he suffered for us back into his face. I cannot and will not do that.

I am not OK with having an innocent person tortured and then murdered on my behalf. You are, but not only are you OK with such a thing, you are grateful.
I believe that if there was a just and loving god out there, he would approve of my position while despise yours. If there is just the god of the Bible out there, then I would not find said god to be just or loving.

If I tortured and killed one of my children for something someone else did, I venture a guess that you would not be grateful, nor would you find my actions loving or just. For this reason, I suggest a double standard is at play. If not, why can one father torture and kill a child on behalf of an innocent, while another cannot?

I just cannot be grateful for something I find despicable. Perhaps I'll be ruling with a god as some priestly class due to this. Just imagine if all these religions were just tests by some god concepts to see just who would be OK with what in order to feel forgiven. If that would turn out to be the case, I think my soul would be safe.

I do not know who one could disagree that we do have sickness and death in our flesh (some of us more than others)... however we explain its presence. If there was no death in our flesh... it would not get sick, get old, die.

I googled death in our flesh and still have no idea what these words mean. I reject this concept of having death in our flesh for it being nonsensical. Perhaps an explanation would help.

I don't know how soon cells start to die after we are born, but eventually, the body loses the battle, and death wins.

That would depend on which cells. You talk about death as though it is a thing. A thing in fact that we have in our bodies (death in our flesh). What is this death that invades our flesh and how do you know about it and why have you not informed the medical community?

So we all have this 'sickness', and it has nothing to do with what we deserve.

So death is a sickness that invades our flesh? If it could be cured with antibiotics for example, would we live forever?

And somehow this sickness of death in our flesh is cured if we believe on faith that an innocent human was tortured and killed on our behalf. All to cure this sickness? I'm not sure I can approve of a god that can create universes with words that would then cure a disease in such a deplorable way. I certainly cannot be grateful for it.

Once again, you highlight the dangers of listening to people whom claim to speak on behalf of god concepts. You are not immune to this.

I am immune to this actually... so long as I am listening to Christ and not to men.

So long as you are listening to Christ. Unfortunately for us, you are only claiming to speak to Christ, something we have both agreed to be dangerous.

Christ is the One who has kept me OUT of religion, and kept me from listening TO men.

religion
noun re-li-gion i-li-jn
: the belief in a god...
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/religion

I think the readers shall decide for themselves.

We will disagree on this perhaps, but I cannot deny it.

It seems so. I will point out that religion entails the belief in a god (as well as other things), you will claim to not be religious.

All of that - kill their enemies; bash babies heads against rocks; fly into buildings and blow themselves and others up; stone or burn or torture sinners; etc, etc - SERVES death. None of it serves LIFE. None of it serves God.

As soon as someone claims that a god ordered this and finds followers to believe such a claim, then it serves a god. A false one of course, but none can be shown to be true, not even your favorite god that you believe in without being religious somehow.

Peace to you Tam.

[PghPanther]

[Replying to Dropship]

Not a test for the infant or fetus that dies.......according to most Christian theology they get a straight ticket to heaven.

So what is the point of even living in this world if we risk the rejection of Christ's salvation. Better we all die before we have the rational to understand the salvation story and possibility reject it than and get that one way stamp to heaven.

What a bizarre deal the Christian world view is......

[PghPanther]

[Replying to Hatuey]

Yeah I have a bad habit in doing that...................oops!

But I'm glad you see my point. So let me try here without the grammatical jigsaw.

So here's another one.

For the Christian the claim is salvation through Christ and Christ only. So if you raise a child as a Christian and they deny or reject such salvation and end up dying before you as a parent die and you know on their death bed your child never accepted Christ do you get to live the rest of your life in mental anguish knowing your child is burning in hell?

Or when you die and go to heaven where all tears are wiped away are you given a spiritual lobotomy from your memory on Earth of your child's existence so you aren't aware of their suffering in hell while you are in heaven?

Or does a window from heaven allow you to relish and rejoice in the pain of the damned as some interpret from scriptures?

Seems like a bad deal around for everyone saved or not.

It has occurred to me that an inspired and directed canon of scriptures into a Bible would have covered the bases in such nonsensical theological snafus if it had any divine guidance behind it.

As it is, the Christian faith has had centuries to put this all together and they still can't get a consistent or logical theology out of it all.

That is some revelation by some personal God there. Sounds just like if the stuff was all made up by superstitious ignorant humans to me.

The 'christian hell' is neither biblical, nor of love, nor of God and Christ, nor real.

Because what you state above is accurate: who in the world could have any peace in this world or the next, knowing that your loved ones are burning in hell? From what is written (even though the christian hell does not come from what is written, but rather what has been extrapolated from what is written, based on traditions of men and a lack of knowing God/love):

Noah acting in his faith saved his entire family.

Rahab acting in her faith saved her entire family.

The blood of the lamb on the doorposts in Egypt caused Death (the Destroyer) to pass over the entire house, saving everyone IN that house. Even the Egyptian houses if the Egyptians had exercised faith in Jah instead of in Pharaoh.


This is as my Lord has revealed to me (and not only to me of course). But these things that are written serve as examples so that anyone can see - as well as hear - that we do not have to be afraid for our loved ones. True, our loved ones may not all be in Christ, and so may not be Christian, and so may not rule with Him as king-priests in His Kingdom, but the sheep (from the sheep and the goats parable) are also not Christian, and they are invited into the Kingdom, as subjects of that Kingdom.



So... yeah... no hell. That would be, as you have said, a bad deal for everyone.


Peace to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

Your doctrine as "Christ has revealed to you" is complete damnation and heresy to most Christian doctrine...........

Yet theirs is unbiblical to you.

There is no supernatural personal revelation.............it is all within your own conscious thoughts you assume these things.

If it was genuine the doctrine of all believers would be as consistent as the natural laws of science...as it is, none of you know what in the world is going on.

Sorry to be so bunt but I deal with reality not with what I hope or want to be real.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to Dropship]

Not a test for the infant or fetus that dies.......according to most Christian theology they get a straight ticket to heaven.

So what is the point of even living in this world if we risk the rejection of Christ's salvation. Better we all die before we have the rational to understand the salvation story and possibility reject it than and get that one way stamp to heaven.

What a bizarre deal the Christian world view is......

I think you just made a great case for Christian abortions.. STRAIGHT to heaven with them. Do not pass LIFE do not collect 200 sins.

[ttruscott]

Noah acting in his faith saved his entire family.

Just out of curiosity, how can wiping out all living things on the entire planet (save for Noah, his family and some animals) qualify as the act of a loving entity?

...

This statement does not require GOD to be unloving or to not do such things to accomplish being a GOD of love, merely that HE does NOT love everyone as some emotionally minded but narrow thinking Christians assert, ending in the mud of inconsistency.

Some people are born condemned already and some born to be saved from condemnation based upon their prior true free will decisions. A world of those unloved by GOD, born condemned, can meet their condemnation though HE still loves those not under condemnation.