(February 2, 2015 at 1:35 am)Drich Wrote: But again you can..

The only reason you haven't is commitment.

As I pointed out, many times God follows the mirical outline.

If you look in the bible at the miricles performed by Christ to indivisuals, you will see this outline I have identified. In that whom ever Christ heals or 'fixes' has tried everything and all but completely given up... That is what makes the miricle so miriclous. Because everyone involved knew that this person's situation was without any recourse or hope. Then God steps in and carries the person out of thier situation.

Many of you ask why doesn't God work miricles now? Because many of you will not faithfully endure a trial long enough to come to the point where their is no other hope or explaination than God saving you from situation.

Again, that is what it means to knock.. To persist in asking and seeking even in the absents of any or all hope. If you can humble yourself enough to do this then God has promised to 'show up.'

What of the faithful who have prayed and begged for his mercy but were denied it? Your point suggests that the reason we have not witnessed any miracles is because we lack the faith to suffer through some trial from which god can save us. I have watched pious people, a couple of the most devout Christians a person could imagine, suffer and ultimately die from cancer. Why were their prayers not answered? Why did god not answer the prayers of the family and community? These were people who truly lived their lives based on biblical teachings and Christian ideology. If god were to intercede in the lives of mere mortals, they would have surely been worthy of divine intervention. Yet, he did not. They both suffered through terrible disease, one dying and then the other living without his wife until his death from the same ailment years later.

These were people who endured and died without receiving an answer or a miracle. They exhausted all medical treatments; only a miracle would have saved them. God never showed up as you say he promised to. Of course, you and others will explain this away. If their cancer had been cured, it would have been a miracle granted by god. Their deaths? Well, the good lord called them home.

It's unbelievable that people can think like this.

You can quote me at will Drich: "I don't believe in magic and that is what a god is."

(February 2, 2015 at 2:11 am)Stimbo Wrote: I'm pretty sure this subject has come up before. Assuming I didn't dream it, my answer is the same as the one I recall giving before: I do not give permission for you to quote anything of mine offsite, even partially or paraphrased. I cannot trust that my words will be represented accurately or fairly. Sorry.

That's a little bit hypocritical isn't it? haven't you posted my work on website that features 'crazy quotes' from Christians? Someone sent me a link and i saw my words, and they were out of context but you took the time to 'frame' them. (In the worst possible way)

Not that I am looking to use anything you have said specifically anyway. It just find it ironic that you are trying to sanction me for something you yourself have done.

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(February 2, 2015 at 1:54 am)Sionnach Wrote: My mind is open, but it is god who has never bothered to make an appearance.

And knocking, resorting to faith, is nothing more than deluding one's self that something exists when there is no evidence to support its existence. I am no more going to blindly have faith in god's existence than I would blindly have faith in the Tooth Fairy's existence. If you allow yourself the delusion that anything can exist, you will believe the most ridiculous things. Religious faith makes normally rational people rather irrational.

My Mind is open but....
knocking is:
delusional
blindness
without evidence
Like believing in the tooth fairy
delusional again
ridiculous
irrational...

But again "My mind in open."

Do you seriously think you mind is open?

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(February 2, 2015 at 10:35 am)Nope Wrote: Instead of quoting people here why not visit atheist blogs and leave a comment that you would like to debate on your blog? A few of them might visit your blog and then you can begin a discussion

The reason for the blog was to show the leadership of my church some of the different subjects I have spoke on and some of the better topical rebuttals, and whatever answers I provided. I was not going to mention anyone by name and leave links and post numbers to reference whatever I used.

Why? they want me to teach some classes and they want to see how some of what I said has been taken.

What kind of class are you teaching, Drich? Will your students be stopping by here?

I don't really want to know. We have enough material to bash 'Murica.

(February 2, 2015 at 10:57 am)Strider Wrote: What of the faithful who have prayed and begged for his mercy but were denied it?

Without a doubt denial is apart of the process. We were 'denied' for several years before our prayers were answered. Often time were are broken down and taken well past our limits. That is one way we can be sure that what happened is not from anything we can do. For instance with the herion addiction we struggled through we struggled many many years, and the night I had all but completely given up, so before i went to sleep I learned what it means to give something over completely to God. That night we got a knock on the door that marked the begining of the end of her addiction.

Again while the events were completely normal, our stepping through them after that night and subsequent sucess isn't.

Quote:Your point suggests that the reason we have not witnessed any miracles is because we lack the faith to suffer through some trial from which god can save us.

Faith has little to do with honoring a comitment to knock no matter what.

Quote: I have watched pious people, a couple of the most devout Christians a person could imagine, suffer and ultimately die from cancer.

Death is not a bad thing here. Christ likens it to a seed being destroyed in the germination process that ultimatly set forth a new life/plant. Meaning our death here is our birth into eternity.

Quote:Why were their prayers not answered?

How do you know they weren't? Maybe it is not what they would want for themselves at the moment, but without a doubt now they would not give up what they have been given to come back if all is as you say it was.

Quote:Why did god not answer the prayers of the family and community?

Because God answered the prayer in the way that was better for the indivisual. Their death also had purpose in that it made people/you question what it is you know about prayer and God. (Made you realize what you understood to be true was not true.)

Quote:These were people who truly lived their lives based on biblical teachings and Christian ideology. If god were to intercede in the lives of mere mortals, they would have surely been worthy of divine intervention. Yet, he did not. They both suffered through terrible disease, one dying and then the other living without his wife until his death from the same ailment years later.

we none of us have been promised a 'good' death. More often than not we meet our ends in ways we would not want for ourselves. However in death especially bad deaths those who are left are made to examine a faith they may not have thought about in sometime.

Quote:These were people who endured and died without receiving an answer or a miracle. They exhausted all medical treatments; only a miracle would have saved them. God never showed up as you say he promised to. Of course, you and others will explain this away. If their cancer had been cured, it would have been a miracle granted by god. Their deaths? Well, the good lord called them home.

It's unbelievable that people can think like this.

God showing up again is something that happens on the inside, if these people where who you said you were they had their prayers answered in their life times. Again what God does is to secure the eternal life of the believer and does what is best for them. Not what is best for everyone else, especially when they have a corrupt view of Him or prayer.

(February 2, 2015 at 11:40 am)Drich Wrote: But again "My mind in open."

Yes, an open mind is not about behaving as an uninformed child and believing in anything either for the sake of believing in it or because someone told me it's true. Having an open mind means weighing the evidence against the claim. If there is no evidence to substantiate the claim, it is unreasonable to place faith in the claim nonetheless.

(February 2, 2015 at 12:18 pm)Drich Wrote: Without a doubt denial is apart of the process. We were 'denied' for several years before our prayers were answered. Often time were are broken down and taken well past our limits. That is one way we can be sure that what happened is not from anything we can do. For instance with the herion addiction we struggled through we struggled many many years, and the night I had all but completely given up, so before i went to sleep I learned what it means to give something over completely to God. That night we got a knock on the door that marked the begining of the end of her addiction.

Again while the events were completely normal, our stepping through them after that night and subsequent sucess isn't.

The couple I spoke of were certainly taken past their limits.

Quote:Faith has little to do with honoring a comitment to knock no matter what.

Again, the couple I spoke of were wholly committed to god and their religion.

Quote:Death is not a bad thing here. Christ likens it to a seed being destroyed in the germination process that ultimatly set forth a new life/plant. Meaning our death here is our birth into eternity.

But their manner of death was heinous. They both suffered greatly. Christ may have likened it to a seed, but we're talking about living, breathing people withering away to nothingness.

Quote:How do you know they weren't? Maybe it is not what they would want for themselves at the moment, but without a doubt now they would not give up what they have been given to come back if all is as you say it was.

How do you know they were?

Quote:Because God answered the prayer in the way that was better for the indivisual. Their death also had purpose in that it made people/you question what it is you know about prayer and God. (Made you realize what you understood to be true was not true.)

I definitely agree with your point there. Their deaths proved that there is no reward for living life on your knees in awe of some divine being.

Quote:we none of us have been promised a 'good' death. More often than not we meet our ends in ways we would not want for ourselves. However in death especially bad deaths those who are left are made to examine a faith they may not have thought about in sometime.

Of course we haven't been promised a good death. If we were, even the faithful would have recognized it as a whopping lie centuries ago. Your second point is one that sticks in my craw; when confronted with a terrible death, we'll become more pliable to religion because of our fear of meeting the same miserable fate.

Quote:God showing up again is something that happens on the inside, if these people where who you said you were they had their prayers answered in their life times. Again what God does is to secure the eternal life of the believer and does what is best for them. Not what is best for everyone else, especially when they have a corrupt view of Him or prayer.

They were definitely everything I described. Suffering and dying from a disease is not what is best for anybody. Matthew 17:20 describes prayer as able to move mountains. Even if this is viewed as a metaphor, it means prayer is able to achieve the impossible. Surely, prayer is sufficient to remove cancer if this is to be believed. If he heard their prayers and those praying for them and failed to intercede when it was within his power then he is a cruel, malevolent being unworthy of allegiance, let alone worship.

Well, Drich, you can quote me on anything.
But... there's always a but... It would be nice if you would send me a PM with links to the posts you're quoting me from.
Just something along the lines of:
"Hey poca, I'm writing/wrote this blog post (blog-url) and I used stuff you said here (url1), here(url2) and here(url3).
Hope to see you there!
cheers
Drich"

(February 1, 2015 at 11:27 pm)Drich Wrote:

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My experiences are points of contrast for me. Reasons to keep knocking even when things are bleak. Often time when we seek proof the answer can be found in the formula in which Miricals of Christ day were experienced. Not that a herion recovery is considered to be a mirical now a days.

What I am speaking to is being placed in a situation that is impossible to get out of on your own.

Like with herion yes there are programs, but it they all still require the will to see them through.. 10 years of addiction means ones will to see a program through is all but non existent.

We had to endure a season, but when it was time to move past that trial God turned off a switch in my wife, and she did not need the multi thousand dollar programs, or the endless meetings or any of the other stuff we typically need to move past this sort of addiction.

Again, this may not be a mirical but it follows the pattern or outline miricals follow In That the outcome would not be possible without help. Now multiply these type events over and over and over again. Then mix in direction from the Spirit, which for me has produced unbelievable results and while maybe one or two of these things can be explained away, tens of not hundreds of examples can not all be explained away as 'good luck' or sheer will.

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But the point of sharing your experiences is to show that A/S/K works, right?