(July 15, 2014 at 1:41 am)whateverist Wrote: 1. How is the method by which you became a Christian reliable?

oooo. I like these threads!
Because I found God at the end of my quest, as promised.

Quote:2. Apart from church dogma, how can you know what happens when we die?

when we/you will die, and your questions will be answered.

Quote:3. What if you and your silly bible are wrong and there is no heaven, hell or afterlife of any kind?

then it will matter as much as everything before I was born.

Quote:4. If you are God's unthinking lacky, how can you call yourself moral?

BZZZAT. (Wrong answer buzzer sound) begs the question. Rephrase without defaulting to a logical fallacy.

Quote: Do you really think morality is simply a question of rule following?

"morality" it little more than whatever pop culture says it is.

Quote:5. Even if there is a God, you are obviously free to do what you want. The prisons are full of Christians.

because prisons are full of Christians we have evidence that we are all slaves to sin.

Quote: Do you or do you not believe God gave man free will?

no, He gave us but one choice. To find redemption for the sins we are slaves to or remain in our sins.

Quote:6. If all you do is follow God's rules, how does your life have any meaning? What makes it your life?

i think your describing catholism. This is not biblical Christianity. Biblical Christianity says we have no hope in following God's law therefore we must seek redemption. Once we have redemption for sin we live a part of or free from the law for the purpose of loving God with all the gifts and talents we may have been given.

Quote:7. Where did that which you believe created the universe come from? (And if anything can always have existed, why not the universe and all its prior conditions?)

the universe is a relatively small or limited point of time and space. Meaning it has a beginning an end and takes up a given amount of space. God exists outside that realm. To ask where did he come from is to think with in the confines of the linear nature of this particular time and space. If God exists outside this time and space then locating or validating point of origin is not a valid endeavor, as time as we know it exists in a linear fashion that only exists with in the confines of our existence.

Quote:8. What about miracles? Aside from the most ridiculous claims, wouldn't most of what technology makes possible today have seemed miraculous to the ancients? So what's the big deal?

then produce something technology can manifest with out the use of technology. Or rather will a result without technology.. That is the big deal. It's not the result, it's the how the result came about.

Quote:9. What’s your view of Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris? Do you read anything else but the bible?

confused, attackers of straw men and destroyers of religion. Which has little to do with the God of the bible. Accept this or not most of you parrot back the stuff these guys spout. To which anyone with basic knowledge of the God of the bible can easily refute if they speak where the bible speaks and simple remain silent where the bible is silent.

Quote:10. If there is but one God, then why does every society have a different religion? [Props to Jenny.]

Their is but one true God/creater. Their are many gods beings who pretend to be God or people looking to serve self or a god the can control.

Anything else?[/quote]

@Drich
-the universe is a relatively small or limited point of time and space. Meaning it has a beginning an end and takes up a given amount of space. God exists outside that realm. To ask where did he come from is to think with in the confines of the linear nature of this particular time and space. If God exists outside this time and space then locating or validating point of origin is not a valid endeavor, as time as we know it exists in a linear fashion that only exists with in the confines of our existence.
How do you exactly justify this comprehension? If God is really outside of space and time, He is above our knowledge. And if you go on saying that we know some stuff about God because He has revealed himself to us, then that means that He is affected by time just as we are. Time does not have to be a phenomenon exclusive to our reality. Discussing eternity without a beginning is inexplicably pointless.

-Their is but one true God/creater. Their are many gods beings who pretend to be God or people looking to serve self or a god the can control
How can you be sure that your religion didn't fall under this category? And what makes you sure that your version of the Creator is the true one?

(July 29, 2014 at 5:50 am)Baqal Wrote: @Drich
-the universe is a relatively small or limited point of time and space. Meaning it has a beginning an end and takes up a given amount of space. God exists outside that realm. To ask where did he come from is to think with in the confines of the linear nature of this particular time and space. If God exists outside this time and space then locating or validating point of origin is not a valid endeavor, as time as we know it exists in a linear fashion that only exists with in the confines of our existence.
How do you exactly justify this comprehension? If God is really outside of space and time, He is above our knowledge. And if you go on saying that we know some stuff about God because He has revealed himself to us, then that means that He is affected by time just as we are. Time does not have to be a phenomenon exclusive to our reality. Discussing eternity without a beginning is inexplicably pointless.

-Their is but one true God/creater. Their are many gods beings who pretend to be God or people looking to serve self or a god the can control
How can you be sure that your religion didn't fall under this category? And what makes you sure that your version of the Creator is the true one?

Because before the beginning God was. That puts Him in a time and space outside this one.

Nothing more the Him saying so.

(July 29, 2014 at 8:11 am)Drich Wrote: Because before the beginning God was. That puts Him in a time and space outside this one.

... Or in a place unobservable to us within this universe. Or rendering himself undetectable within this one. Or chilling out in human form before the second coming. Or dead. Or...

See, this is the problem with making declarative statements based upon no evidence, Drich.

(July 17, 2014 at 1:50 am)whateverist Wrote: What interests me here is the assumption that what God wants, God gets - without any expertise or skill involved. From God's point of view wouldn't you think there was something He'd do to cause the Red sea to part.

I understand. No offence but I think you've made a false assumption here. I do think there was something God did to cause the Red sea to part. People who argue against miracles call them 'magic'. Terms can be used to bias a conversation, but we could use the word(s) magic, or supernatural, or super logical, or unscientific. Bottom line I don't know how specifically God parted the red sea but I do believe that He did something in order to part the red sea.

Let's look at the rainbow to illustrate. The rainbow is a sign of the covenant that God made with Noah promising to never again wipe mankind off the face of the earth. Through technological advancements, men have discovered that the visible color spectrum can be viewed due to white light refracting.

If God is the creator/designer of naturalistic properties (such as refraction) then discovery of said properties are not contradictive but rather revelatory of God. There is a difference between understanding how something happens physically and what it means non-physically.

If God is the creator, and He designed light and water in such a way that refraction occurs under certain situations, and that one specific situation occurs when the sun comes out after a rainstorm, and that refraction is viewed as a rainbow, and the rainbow is a symbol that it will never again rain in a global catastrophe, I would say this is hardly without expertise or skill.

I would argue that scientific discovery is a revelation of God's expertise and skill.

So back to the red sea parting. Perhaps God spun the electrons of specific water molecules in such a way as to create an electromagnet, and the electrons of other water molecules in such a way as to create an electromagnet of a like pole. This would cause the water molecules to act in such a way as to repel one another, and as a result a pathway on dry land could be created in the space between the repelling water molecules (much like there is air space inbetween two magnets when their like-poles are lined up).

The above hypothesis isn't necessarily meant as an exercise in science. It was given as an illustration that there are some who think more deeply about how certain miracles could have been achieved through natural laws than you might think. They (the miracles) would, however, still require a miracle worker (or designer) to begin the process.

I'm sorry, are you suggesting that god changed the properties of light at some point in human recollection?

(August 1, 2014 at 12:07 am)Rhythm Wrote: I'm sorry, are you suggesting that god changed the properties of light at some point in human recollection?

No, why are you suggesting that?

-All of that. Were there no rainbows at some point? If so, when, if not - in what way is it a "sign of the covenant"?

(August 1, 2014 at 12:34 am)Rhythm Wrote: -All of that. Were there no rainbows at some point? If so, when, if not - in what way is it a "sign of the covenant"?

I honestly don't know if there was a point in history when there were no rainbows or not.

In speculation, if there never were rainbows until after the flood that doesn't necessitate that God would have had to change the properties of light. You still need rain followed by sunlight to get a rainbow and not every rainstorm produces a rainbow. If it rains and you don't see a rainbow, that doesn't mean the properties of light have changed, just that they (the properties) weren't observed (by a person) at that time.

Or it could be that there have always been rainbows but after the flood God gave the rainbow special significance. This leads into your last question.

"Sign of the covenant" is a remembrance. We see the sign, we remember the covenant.

(August 1, 2014 at 1:13 am)orangebox21 Wrote: I honestly don't know if there was a point in history when there were no rainbows or not.

LOL, well, if you'd like that cleared up, definitively....

Quote:In speculation, if there never were rainbows until after the flood that doesn't necessitate that God would have had to change the properties of light. You still need rain followed by sunlight to get a rainbow and not every rainstorm produces a rainbow. If it rains and you don't see a rainbow, that doesn't mean the properties of light have changed, just that they (the properties) weren't observed (by a person) at that time.

I'm not sure that it's really all that reasonable to suggest that people had never observed a rainbow at any point since homo sapiens were on this earth until whatever timeframe you care put this flood myth in. That would be like me saying to you..."well....maybe no one had ever seen a cloud"-arguing that humans mistook clouds for gods, and that this in turn explains your faith.

Yes, a god would have to make changes, either to light or the human eye. That's the -how-, that's thinking "more deeply about how certain miracles could have been achieved through natural laws".

Quote:Or it could be that there have always been rainbows but after the flood God gave the rainbow special significance. This leads into your last question.

"Sign of the covenant" is a remembrance. We see the sign, we remember the covenant.

Right, so..."it could be" is probably not a strong enough way to phrase this. I assume that Noah took a shit the day the rain stopped. That's as much a sign (as a rainbow) - in this case, isn't it? I want to stress here, that you are taking a very liberal turn with a just-so story. What's wrong with the just-so version?