RE: How can a Christian reject part of the Bible and still call themselves a Christian?
October 10, 2016 at 2:05 pm
(This post was last modified: October 10, 2016 at 3:59 pm by Simon Moon.)
(October 8, 2016 at 6:44 pm)Lek Wrote:(October 8, 2016 at 3:49 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: If a god were to speak to me, it would have to do it in such a way as to not be able to be explained by something natural. And any god worth that definition would, would know how to do that.
Believing a god exists, and following said god are 2 different things. If the god was the one depicted in the Bible, and the Bible is an accurate description of his behavior and actions, I would hope that my morality would be strong enough not to follow him.
Okay. I was trying to determine whether or not you are still open to God. It seems you are no longer open to him because you've placed conditions on his revelation to you. Again I'm not trying to make a judgement about whether you're right or wrong, but rather to determine whether or not you're truly open to God's revelation.
I can guarantee that I am more open to your god demonstrating his existence to me, than you are to the possibility of other gods demonstrating their existence to you.
While I was still a theist, I was wide open to god demonstrating his existence to me. I was imploring such a demonstration. And no, at that time, I did not put conditions on his demonstrating his existence.
It seems, every time another theist describes their experience of god demonstrating his existence, it is indistinguishable from: misinterpretation of a natural brain state, hallucination, wishful thinking, warm fuzzy feelings while singing hymns in church, etc.
There was a time when gods were appearing to thousands, or more, humans on a consistent basis. It seemed easy to believe, because god demonstrated himself in an obvious ways. Yet now, I have the burden of having to be convinced for bad reasons (contradictory ancient texts, flawed philosophical arguments, personal revelation, "look at the trees"). And this seems to be a purposeful state of affairs created by your god. Forcing me to poorly use the brain that he gave me. Letting me discover critical thinking and skepticism, then punishing me when I correctly apply these tools to the god claim.
In other words, he gave me a brain, that is unable to be gullible, yet I have to be gullible to believe he exists.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.
