Following Jesus - a no-brainer?

[Masterblaster]

A message of compassion

What else were you doing today?
Exactly, it's a no-brainer!
If not, why not?
What logic makes it otherwise?

[Masterblaster]

Hello
7% of the world are non believing atheists and TRANSPONDER concludes that the rest have succumbed to snake-oil salesmen. That is not a strong argument. Belief in God is the default and no-brainer position.

[boatsnguitars]

Hello
7% of the world are non believing atheists and TRANSPONDER concludes that the rest have succumbed to snake-oil salesmen. That is not a strong argument. Belief in God is the default and no-brainer position.

It can still be true that all religious people are deluded, and that it is not a strong argument.

Belief in a lot of silly things is quite popular.

So, are you going to give me your house or not? I'm asking for it. Jesus said to give it to me: Luke 6:30.

Go on, prove you are a true believer. I'm sure God will reward you in Heaven. If you don't have a house, I'll take your car and your money.

If you refuse, I'll assume you are one of the 7%... we may, by the end of this experiment, find out that only a very small percentage of people actually believe...

[Masterblaster]

Hello boatsnguitars

Are you saying that I can't be a very poor follower of Jesus. Jesus spent alot of time with regard to failure, trying again, and improving. You sound like a thief trying to take advantage of me. If you were lying on the ground at the bus stop outside my house ,I would hope that I might check your condition. I would hope that I would ring the authorities , be it police, ambulance crew or social services. I might take you in to my house for a hot drink while waiting. I might try to contact your friends. I might even do more.

[boatsnguitars]

Hello boatsnguitars

Are you saying that I can't be a very poor follower of Jesus. Jesus spent alot of time with regard to failure, trying again, and improving. You sound like a thief trying to take advantage of me. If you were lying on the ground at the bus stop outside my house ,I would hope that I might check your condition. I would hope that I would ring the authorities , be it police, ambulance crew or social services. I might take you in to my house for a hot drink while waiting. I might try to contact your friends. I might even do more.

You don't know my situation. I've asked. Jesus says give. In fact, he says give more than asked.

Are you going against Jesus? You are being very judgy. I wonder - do you not believe that God will provide for you? Can you find the part in the Bible where Jesus says you should amass wealth?


Maybe you don't believe the story of Job?
https://www.biblestudytools.com/bible-s ... f-job.html


Maybe ye are of little faith? Luke warm?

[Masterblaster]

Hello boatsnguitars

The story of Job is an interesting theological hypothesis. I like the account of the young man who wants to assert his commitment to Jesus. Jesus says go and pray, he says did that. Then he asks to be tested harder, Go and help the poor, Did that. What else. Go and sell all you have and follow me. The poor guy leaves deflated. Surely there is a lesson there for anyone. Everything has a breaking point, that does not make it worthless. We are challenged to do the best we can within the parameters of human frailties.

[TRANSPONDER]

Hello boatsnguitars

Are you saying that I can't be a very poor follower of Jesus. Jesus spent a lot of time with regard to failure, trying again, and improving. You sound like a thief trying to take advantage of me. If you were lying on the ground at the bus stop outside my house ,I would hope that I might check your condition. I would hope that I would ring the authorities , be it police, ambulance crew or social services. I might take you in to my house for a hot drink while waiting. I might try to contact your friends. I might even do more.

That's good to know. What you wouldn't do is pray for me to heal because you know it won't happen, apart from the medics who use knowledge and science shoving you aside with a muttered "make way, witch - doctor' so they can do their job. Of course you wouldn't think of doing that. No, common humanist moral behavior and science, medicine and technology is fine, fine, fine - so log as it doesn't upset religion.

And you can be a follower of anyone you like, even Elron Hubbard. Just don't try selling it to me.

Hello
7% of the world are non believing atheists and TRANSPONDER concludes that the rest have succumbed to snake-oil salesmen. That is not a strong argument. Belief in God is the default and no-brainer position.

There was a time that everyone believed the earth was flat and only a few people worked out it wasn't. The fact is the easy answer - a big invisible human made it all - is the sort of thing the majority might well swallow, but the minority who doubt and question may well be right., in the end

Bottom line - appeal to numbers is a fallacy.

Though Belief in a god or gods is a quick and easy answer - which god it is can be sorted with a few Holy wars - after science established that a lot of stuff worked fine without a need for a god, the materialist option became the default, and a god (name your own) wasn't.

Keep going, you are doing great.

[TRANSPONDER]

Hello boatsnguitars

The story of Job is an interesting theological hypothesis. I like the account of the young man who wants to assert his commitment to Jesus. Jesus says go and pray, he says did that. Then he asks to be tested harder, Go and help the poor, Did that. What else. Go and sell all you have and follow me. The poor guy leaves deflated. Surely there is a lesson there for anyone. Everything has a breaking point, that does not make it worthless. We are challenged to do the best we can within the parameters of human frailties.

But again, apart from Which god and religion - this is just human aspiration but perverted to suit the needs of the religion, wealth and power as a quick guess.

[Masterblaster]

Hello TRANSPONDER
You say - "after science established that a lot of stuff worked fine without a need for a god, the materialist option became the default, and a god (name your own) wasn't."

9 out of 10 people doing something and that is not the default position. That is a very hollow debate soundbite.. Atheism is an indicator of enquiry and human resourcefulness. I do not think that you are in any danger by virtue of your position as a non follower of Jesus. I thank you for bothering with this discussion.
I was hoping that someone would have attempted to highlight the terrible dangers of this faith. It has not happened yet.

When microwave ovens became common I was on a crusade against their use in my house. They are dangerous, they emit radiation, they do not cook food properly, they are untested, etc, etc
I was 100% wrong/incorrect!
Now I find them indispensable, and my ideological history is being rewritten.
Maybe following Jesus is a useful thing to do and your protestations are a trivial ill founded whim.

[benchwarmer]

9 out of 10 people doing something and that is not the default position.

Sorry to intrude on the conversation. Haven't been on the site for a while and thought I would read what's up lately. This caught my eye.

9 out of 10 people doing something is the POPULAR position, not the default position. Any theism requires a belief in something (name your god(s) or ideals) so the default position is actually what comes before any of that belief. i.e. non belief. We don't come out of the womb believing anything. We develop, change, refine, etc. our beliefs as we gather input from our environment.

So, while it may currently be popular to be a theist of some sort, that doesn't make it the default (or correct) position.

I was hoping that someone would have attempted to highlight the terrible dangers of this faith. It has not happened yet.

Well, a danger of any faith is that it might be misplaced if not grounded in solid evidence. I know this doesn't apply to all theists, but I know that some theists will simply believe whatever their faith tradition (via holy books, priests, pastors, etc) tell them and call it a day. This can lead to them behaving in a way that may be dangerous to themselves and/or others (pick any holy war in history).

Do I think most Christians (since we are talking about Christians here) are in immanent danger? No, of course not. If they are simply trying to be good people and are not trying to force their views or ideals on anyone else via laws/actions/etc, then they are free to believe as they like and are not hurting anyone. Worst case, maybe they have wasted a lot of time and money on something that wasn't true.

To the title of this OP: Is it a no brainer to follow Jesus?

Well, that depends what you mean by that. Examples have already been given in this thread about what Jesus says in the Bible. I have not met a single Christian (including myself when I was one), that followed everything Jesus said in the Bible. There might be some out there, but every Christian I know/knew wasn't really following everything. i.e just the convenient bits and ignoring the inconvenient ones.

So, to answer your question, you have to refine what exactly it is you are asking. As others have stated, it's a no brainer to be a good human and do good things, but that has nothing to do with "following Jesus" even if he happened to want you to do these nice things too.

[boatsnguitars]

[Replying to Masterblaster in post #25]

You didn't show me where Jesus said to amass wealth. In fact, Jesus said get rid of almost everything. Camel through the eye of a needle, god takes care of the birds in the fields, etc.
Go and proclaim your faith, and God will provide. No?

Seems most Christians only want other people to suffer for them: Jesus, Lot, Job, martyrs, missionaries, etc... They are inspirational, but only to a point for the modern Christian. The modern Christian talks a big game about being willing to suffer for their faith, but they don't mean it.

Don't get between a modern Christian and his Mammon!

So. Give me your house or admit you don't really believe.