Please Read the Whole Thing Before Posting.

Well, guess what? I’m gonna try to prove to you God’s real and Christianity is really worth following. I don’t want to start a flaming argument or anything like that and would appreciate that you wouldn’t comically dismiss my points. I also want to prove some things which I believe are misunderstood.
The Proof
Okay I am not getting into anything about evolution/age of the earth or anything like that. There’s a pretty big chunk of evidence for those things, and idk what to believe in yet. I just don’t want you guys focusing on those topics while I’m trying to explain my more important points. I think it’s kinda nitpicky and really just removes an aspect of God, not disproving his existence.
#1 The world doesn’t make sense without God.
How did we come to exist? Why did everything that ever existed ever exist? Why are we here? Why wasn’t there nothing? Science points to a beginning of the universe. Science can’t explain why we’re here. But Christianity offers a very straight-forward solution, God created it. Pretty easy to understand right? Now assuming the universe did somehow exist, how did life appear? By chance? Practically impossible. All the complex code and cells and whatever, all point to an intelligent creator. Okay I do realize this type of evidence isn’t really hard and just suggests it should of happened like that but no real hard evidence of it. Still, it’s hard to imagine this all happened by chance.
#2 Near Death Experiences
I know I’m gonna get bashed for this. Oh, it’s just something funny going on in your brain. Oh they’re lying etc etc. Trouble is there are millions of cases, and it’s really not plausible to suggest every single one of them was a lie. At least some of them honestly thought they saw something, you get me? That leaves two possibilities, they really did see part of the afterlife, or that something went wrong with their brain. Now I’m not a brain scientist but the fact that so many atheists and doctors have been convinced of the afterlife through their own NDE or hearing others pretty much convinces me. And sometimes they people who have the NDE report several details that they couldn’t haven’t possibly know. Explain that, how could they know what happened down there if they were unconscious and had no way of knowing? There are so many cases that’s it very hard to refute.
#3 Bible Prophecies
I’m not gonna quote any verses(you can look it up yourself).
There are hundreds of prophecies in the Bible, many of them extremely detailed and hundreds of years later, they came true! How? The chances are astronomical, it’s impossible they guessed it right by chance. How did you explain that these prophecies, written down hundreds of years before they happened, came true? Obviously God knew and God told them. Disprove this.
Done with the evidence.
Is it worth it?
Some people don’t like the idea of following all these rules or praying all day long etc.
Are the rules really that bad? Moral rules like not stealing and killing are pretty common sense. You can still have fun, Christianity allows that. Just remember to take your time with God every day. It can be just 30 minutes every day at night and a few hours on Sunday.
And in the end, if you really are Christian, you know you’re going to Heaven, a better place than Earth, so why worry about your life here?
Some people especially dislike just submitting to God and doing his will. Well frankly he created you, so he didn’t even have to give you Heaven in the first place. But he chose to let us put our faith in him. So you can have a happy life and a happy afterlife. Whatever happens in Heaven, it will make you happy. You cannot know what happens in Heaven, to people who think they do, it’s incomprehensible. Jusut know that God has prepared it and you’ll happy forever.
Misconceptions
#1 Religion =/= Faith in Jesus
Well I’m not exactly trying to state Christianity isn’t a religion. I’m trying to de-emphasize just doing rituals and praying and going to church for the sake of it, because it doesn’t work like that. Many people who call themselves Christians aren’t really Christians. Just because they go to church or because they celebrate Christmas doesn’t mean they’re Christian. Being Christian means have an open relationship with God and accepting him.
#2 Christians are idiotic jerks
Wut? Kinda ties into the above paragraph. People who call themselves Christian might not be, I happen to go to a school that is religiously neutral but most of the students are real Christians and actively attend a youth group outside of school. They are nicest people I have ever known. Our school is surprisingly decent(if you know what I mean). There’s no bullying and people aren’t immature here. The Christians here are nice, they help out other people, always making people laugh, overall good people. We respect atheists too. We don’t look down on them, all though we do encourage them to become a Christian. And I know atheists can be good people, because some of them are, many of them in fact. But in the end that’s not gonna get you to heaven.
#3 Christians discourage sex
They do, before marriage.
Only do it in a committed relationship.
Pretty much cleared up here. Hope you guys don’t yell at me.
One thing, actually counter argue my points. Don’t just take one sentence, refute it, and leave at that. Cause guess what? That didn’t defeat my argument. You’re just trying to play it off. So please actually give sufficient reason when you’re going to argue.

I am in no mood to play your fucking games, lad. Having read that pile of drivel...which you doubtlessly think is profound but I assure you there have been others here before you who said the same silly shit and did it better.

I will say this. You stick to your silly-assed bible. It's obviously all you can handle. Leave the deep thinking to others.




Oh, and before you go away mad try to understand that we have muslims here who make the same claims about allah. They don't need your jesus any more than I do.

(August 30, 2012 at 2:46 am)Minimalist Wrote: They don't need your jesus any more than I do.

We do believe that Jesus was a prophet, though. It's just that we don't ascribe any of the God-like attributes to Jesus as Christians do.
To us, Jesus was only a messenger of God and Muhammad was the last and final messenger.

I find it interesting how both books negate the possibilty of others.

(August 30, 2012 at 2:30 am)CBA222 Wrote: #1 The world doesn’t make sense without God.

Carl Sagan said it better than I ever could.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag6fH8cU-MU

And I have a question for you. Why do you assume that it was the christian god who created the universe? I say it was actually the goddess Ilmatar, on whose knee a duck laid it's egg, and when that egg fell it broke into two halves, it became the earth and the heaven. True story, it's said so in the Kalevala.

Quote:#2 Near Death Experiences

Read up on neuroscience. If conscious people can have a hard time separating imagination and the real world, don't get me started on unconscious ones.

Quote:#3 Bible Prophecies

I predict that it's going to rain tomorrow. You know what? I'm right. That must make me a prophet.
You can basically take any text and twist it into a simile to something that is happening now. That doesn't prove that someone could foresee the future, it merely means that shit happens all the time.

Quote:#1 Religion =/= Faith in Jesus
Many people who call themselves Christians aren’t really Christians. Just because they go to church or because they celebrate Christmas doesn’t mean they’re Christian. Being Christian means have an open relationship with God and accepting him.

Oh, so you're a True Christian™ then, are you? So devout muslims, who have an open relationship with God are suddenly Christians? What about Jews?

Quote:#2 Christians are idiotic jerks

Good people are good, bad people are bad. It has nothing to do with religion.

Quote:#3 Christians discourage sex
They do, before marriage.
Only do it in a committed relationship.

I'm in a committed relationship, but not married, so I should not have sex then? If your god made us sexual creatures, why put limits on something so wonderful?


I'm sorry, but I can't take you seriously, you just textwalled all the most ignorant ideas and fallacies and you're not the first one to do so. You could at least come up with something new..

Oooooo! I don't know that much about the Kalevala Kayenneh!

Fascinating stuff...... *Kichi goes off into Kalevala land ..... still reading. I do love myths and legends.

(August 30, 2012 at 2:30 am)CBA222 Wrote: #1 The world doesn’t make sense without God.
How did we come to exist? Why did everything that ever existed ever exist? Why are we here? Why wasn’t there nothing? Science points to a beginning of the universe. Science can’t explain why we’re here. But Christianity offers a very straight-forward solution, God created it. Pretty easy to understand right? Now assuming the universe did somehow exist, how did life appear? By chance? Practically impossible. All the complex code and cells and whatever, all point to an intelligent creator. Okay I do realize this type of evidence isn’t really hard and just suggests it should of happened like that but no real hard evidence of it. Still, it’s hard to imagine this all happened by chance.

I think your fundamental flaw in thinking is here, in the bolded. You're after the quickest explanation. The problem with your answer is that the pillar of it all, Jesus Christ, can't be proven. Therefore your entire solution comes crashing down around you.

As for all your questions, there's nothing new really. Man has always been asking the 'tough' questions and before you know it, science can explain it. Why should it be any different this century?

Quote:#2 Near Death Experiences
I know I’m gonna get bashed for this. Oh, it’s just something funny going on in your brain. Oh they’re lying etc etc. Trouble is there are millions of cases, and it’s really not plausible to suggest every single one of them was a lie. At least some of them honestly thought they saw something, you get me? That leaves two possibilities, they really did see part of the afterlife, or that something went wrong with their brain. Now I’m not a brain scientist but the fact that so many atheists and doctors have been convinced of the afterlife through their own NDE or hearing others pretty much convinces me. And sometimes they people who have the NDE report several details that they couldn’t haven’t possibly know. Explain that, how could they know what happened down there if they were unconscious and had no way of knowing? There are so many cases that’s it very hard to refute.

So in your opinion, this is undeniable proof of not Zeus, not Odin, not Raksasa, but the one-in-three God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit?

I don't see how short circuiting brains make you pick that god over the other 3 000 ever created.

Quote:#3 Bible Prophecies
I’m not gonna quote any verses(you can look it up yourself).
There are hundreds of prophecies in the Bible, many of them extremely detailed and hundreds of years later, they came true! How? The chances are astronomical, it’s impossible they guessed it right by chance. How did you explain that these prophecies, written down hundreds of years before they happened, came true? Obviously God knew and God told them. Disprove this.

If you say so... I'll do this in a way that will leave you baffled like you've left me; by giving you a hint of how Jesus 'fulfilled' these prophecies:

Jesus' last words on the cross.


Jesus' clothes get passed around at the crucifixion.


Jesus gets mocked on the cross.


It seems like Jesus' entire life is one big prophecy fulfilled. Strangely it looks exactly the same as someone grabbing OT verses and using them to construct a messiah's life. *hamster starts running on wheel inside head*.

Quote:Done with the evidence.
Is it worth it?
Some people don’t like the idea of following all these rules or praying all day long etc.

Because there's no need. There's a reason why it feels unnatural (strange isn't it... that the God of the natural world makes us do unnatural things?) and that's because the Bible is a bunch of baseless assertions that can't be proven, and I'm merely talking historically. Don't get me started on science.

I have yet to see evidence of any god. Once you have provided that, please go one extra and show me why it's undeniably the Christian god and not Shichi-Fuku-Jin, the 7 Japanese gods of luck.

Quote:#1 The world doesn’t make sense without God.

"God of the gaps" is essentially what you are trying to purport here. Just because science hasn't fully answered the question "How did we get here?" doesn't mean you can automatically assume goddidit. You have to support your hypotheses just like scientists do.

Quote:#2 Near Death Experiences

This isn't proof or even evidence of god for good reasons. Firstly, all NDEs are anecdotal in nature, which means they cannot be used as evidence in an argument. Secondly, a readiness to believe and a heightened emotional state doesn't make for a reliable recollection of events. Thirdly, a lot of people say their NDE involved going towards a light. Curiously enough, most times people nearly die, they are attended by an ambulance, with bright lights.

Quote:#3 Bible Prophecies

Where are all the accounts of these prophecies fulfilled? In the Bible.
Do we have any other source detailing the prophecies being fulfilled? No.
Is the Bible biased towards supporting it's own theology? Yes.
Do accounts only found in one source, which is biased, sound reliable in any way? No.

Quote:I am in no mood to play your fucking games, lad. Having read that pile of drivel...which you doubtlessly think is profound but I assure you there have been others here before you who said the same silly shit and did it better.

Explain, nuff said.

Quote:Oh, so you're a True Christian™ then, are you? So devout muslims, who have an open relationship with God are suddenly Christians? What about Jews?

Seriously? Are you seriously trying to troll me?

Quote:Mark 15:34
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Those weren't his last words

Quote:Where are all the accounts of these prophecies fulfilled? In the Bible.
Do we have any other source detailing the prophecies being fulfilled? No.
Is the Bible biased towards supporting it's own theology? Yes.
Do accounts only found in one source, which is biased, sound reliable in any way? No.

Actually, we do have other sources. It's universal among historians(Christians and non-Christians) that Jesus was crucified by the order of Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate, as predicted in the Bible. How do you debunk that?

Quote:"God of the gaps" is essentially what you are trying to purport here. Just because science hasn't fully answered the question "How did we get here?" doesn't mean you can automatically assume goddidit. You have to support your hypotheses just like scientists do.

I don't think science will ever answer that question. Why does the universe exist?< This question is impossible to answer through science.

Quote:So in your opinion, this is undeniable proof of not Zeus, not Odin, not Raksasa, but the one-in-three God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit?

I don't see how short circuiting brains make you pick that god over the other 3 000 ever created.

That didn't disprove my point at all? Make a real argument.

Quote:This isn't proof or even evidence of god for good reasons. Firstly, all NDEs are anecdotal in nature, which means they cannot be used as evidence in an argument. Secondly, a readiness to believe and a heightened emotional state doesn't make for a reliable recollection of events. Thirdly, a lot of people say their NDE involved going towards a light. Curiously enough, most times people nearly die, they are attended by an ambulance, with bright lights.

What is some people are honestly telling the truth? Out of millions of cases at least a few of them would be telling the truth. It isn't a small sample, it's a whole lot of people. A whole lot of people saying the same thing.
Some prominent atheists have has NDEs and changed their minds about the afterlife.
As for your last point, many of them end up in the hospital and your point really isn't any hard evidence anyways.
One question,
Do you wish there was an afterlife?

Gosh! A Hit and Run! Good for him he's not coming back. Otherwise Min would have made him cry Mama!

EDIT: Oh! He's back!!!

---

(August 30, 2012 at 4:48 am)CBA222 Wrote: Actually, we do have other sources.

Name them. And while you are at it, prove that your gewd exists...