(August 31, 2015 at 10:21 pm)Salacious B. Crumb Wrote:(August 31, 2015 at 10:11 pm)Godschild Wrote:
This is why the Bible is the authority and not man made doctrine, belief in the scriptures as truth from the first word to the last is the only way to understand and make sense of God's plan.
GC
Thanks for actually answering, but then, I can turn that back to, why believe the bible? I feel I won’t get adequate answers though from previous conversations, because of the things in it that every human should disagree with. You know, the things like slavery, misogyny, and I’m sure you know the drill by now. Also, the 10 commandments should have, honor each other, instead of honor thy father and mother. So, it’s hard for me to accept those as authority, and hard for me to believe in the stories of the bible, and discredit all the other stories in other religions. It would be dishonest, because I have no reason to believe one over the other.
The Bible is not a man made book/teachings, penned in man's hand yes but not man's teachings. What I said above really applies to those who want to know God or those who think they may want to find God.
There are terrible things in the Bible, why, because though it's not a history book it is the history of man and his sinful desires that result in things not very pleasant. If a person doesn't start at the beginning of the Bible and see God as the loving God He is then one will manipulate the scriptures to suit their own desired beliefs. The Bible is like a fine tapestry, it's a woven work that has to be studied as a whole or it want make sense. Like a tapestry you pull out some of the threads and you will damage it, ie. it's meaning of truth. Just like the way you see the Ten commandments, you say they do not tell us to honor each other, I say you are pulling out threads to make an argument to reject them. I see them telling us to honor each other by, "You shall not murder." "You shall not commit adultery." "You shall not steal." "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor." "You shall not covet anything your neighbor has." How are these things not honoring others, it's written all over them, unless you blind yourself to this truth. There is so much more about how the scriptures fit, but that would take many pages and no one read them anyway so I'll stop here because I believe it answers most of your question. Maybe not to your satisfaction but, it's the truth.
GC
God loves those who believe and those who do not and the same goes for me, you have no choice in this matter. That puts the matter of total free will to rest.