the god created science argument

[DeistPaladin]

God has chosen to make Himself know through His Son by the preaching of His word. Sometimes He supplements that by giving signs, dreams, visions, and healings.

The first three, even assuming they happened at all, can easily be attributed to coincidence, confirmation bias and hallucination. The fourth is a claim that might be objectively verified but hasn't been.

We can debate whether He does these things all day,

Or you could cut the debate short by providing evidence of any of these healings or other miracles.

but the point is that He doesn't need to openly demonstrate His power to reach people. The number of Christians in the world speak to that.

The number of Christians in the world do not require a divine or other magical explanation. The number can be explained by human efforts. It was humans, not God, who wrote the Bible. It was humans, not God who carried the book and brought copies all over the world. It was humans, not God who built churches. No divine hand is necessary to explain any of it. Also, argument from popularity is not evidence, it's fallacious reasoning.

In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son,

Who hasn't been seen in 2000 years, and I can't even find any accounts of that life outside of Christian mythology. If Jesus really did live, he was apparently not noteworthy to anyone who lived at that time outside of his band of followers. It's not until the 2nd century that there is any outside historical accounts and even these are brief and oblique.

The problem isn't evidence. At any time, God could make Himself known to you. You have made it abudently clear though, that you don't want to know Him.

OK, a bit of friendly advice, don't try to argue that you know someone who you've exchanged posts with on the internet better than they know themselves. It is neither convincing to the person you address nor is it likely to impress anyone who observes.

You give Him every reason to let you continue believing in your deistic worldview of a god that considers you on the same level of pond scum.

Beyond the fact that this is a total misrepresentation of what I wrote, I can't help but note that "pond scum" is still better than worthless sinner unworthy of love or forgiveness who deserves eternal torture.

These people all had a reasoned faith. They knew God was real and they believed in His promises. This is the type of faith that God is talking about; trusting in the Lord and what He has promised, even though He isn't right in front of us. We are sure of our hope in Gods promises, and certain that He did what He said He did, and will do.

Yahweh had spoken with each one of these people. This is not faith any more than you need faith to know that someone you know really exists. This brings me back to my original point. Why has Yahweh gotten so shy lately?

1 Corinthians 1:21

(Translation: You annoying skeptics keep asking for evidence but you should just take our word for it or you'll be sorry)

I'm not impressed.

What you have is faith. You can call it instinct or whatever you like, but to believe in something you have never seen is faith.

If you like. You're not going to go all Tu Quoque on me are you?

Now you criticize me for my faith, which is reasoned, when you have admitted that you have blind faith, which is not based in reason.

Oh dear, it looks like you are.

First, I've yet to see any "reasons" for your faith. Second, my "blind faith" as you call it is a belief in a fantastic natural universe (which really does exist) and some wonder about a mysterious mind behind it. While the latter isn't proven, my spirituality is still grounded in the natural world. You on the other hand, not only posit that a creator exists but that you know the mind of it, have a personal relationship with it and know what it wants and hates.

Strange, that. I don't believe in the bible because someone told me its true. I believe in the bible because God confirmed its truth to me before I ever read it. So when I read the bible I found it to be about the God I already knew. I came to Christianity completely independently, and wasn't led by anyone. I had never even once been witnessed to in my entire life.

If you say so but I find that story implausible to say the least. "Hey, it says here in this book that God the Father had to send his son who was also himself as God the Son down to earth to bleed on a cross because this cruel sacrifice was the only way that he could convince himself to forgive us all for being such sinful beings which we are because one of my ancestors (who lived 6000 years ago at the dawn of time but after the Sumerians entered the Bronze Age) who was made from a rib ate a magic fruit after speaking with a talking snake and anyone who doesn't believe this story will be tortured forever by the god who loves us so much. Oh, and love is evil when the body parts are similar. Makes perfect sense to me. It's what I'd suspected all along."

Science cannot even prove itself as being a rational method for determining anything which is true.

How about we just employ science and reason because it produces results that we like? If you like religious and superstitious thinking as a means to live your life, by all means eschew technology. I'm sure the Amish could use another member.

Compare the accomplishments of science in the last 300 years to what Christianity did for the 1200 years prior.

What you suppose is a being powerful enough to create and manage a Universe, but one that is powerless, oblivious or callously disinterested in the creatures it created.

Or powerful enough to get the ball rolling, which doesn't necessarily indicate omniscient, omnipresent or omnibenevolant. How can we expect such a being to relate to us? And if It does, I see no reason to think so. If I'm wrong, God can contact me any time. Live to serve ya God but please do it in front of many witnesses who can verify that they heard it too and I'm not crazy.

The scale of the Universe has no bearing on an all powerful being, who is not limited by the constraints of matter. It also has no bearing on whether he would care for his creatures, individually.

What do you base this assertion on? I think the size and time scale of the universe are humbling enough to speculate that if I were to stand next to God, It would not even be aware of my presence.

Such a being, allowing great suffering and evil and delusion to take place with no intervention and no justice, is morally bankrupt.

Wait, are we talking about your god or mine?

Because I don't have the problem of evil the way your god, who IS omniscient, who DOES have a personal interest in us, who IS powerful enough to stop evil and suffering, who IS supposedly perfect and omnibenevolent but chooses not to do anything about it.

You see, I can skate by the problem of evil by saying clearly God is not perfect, not omnipotent, not aware of our individual plight, who still gave us reason and an indomitable spirit that we can triumph over adversity and build on the foundation we are given. God did the best It could and the rest is up to us. God begs our pardon but never promised us a rose garden.

Your god, on the other hand, has a lot of explaining to do. Forget the tsunamis, earthquakes and plagues. Forget the evil we do to one another in life. Just focus only on the atrocities that his churches, both Catholic and Protestant, did in his name. If Jesus is who Christians say he is, it means he watched the Inquisition, the burning of Witches, the Crusades, the modern televangelists making money off the poor and gullible, the bigotry and persecution done in his name. And he did nothing to stop any of it. He couldn't even be bothered to ensure that his church was an example for the rest of us to live up to. If Jesus is real, he is the least fit being in all the universe to sit in judgment over anyone. It is he who should beg our forgiveness and not the other way around.

That we are so much less than he is is just greater evidence of how morally bankrupt this creator really is.

I don't follow your logic at all.

A God who did have power to intervene but did nothing but watch his creatures suffer and die is evil.

Yeah, how about that?

Or wait, you were talking about my god, not yours. So, is your god evil by your definition? If not, why not?

We shouldn't expect anything different from a god that is morally bankrupt. And you haven't been given all you need, because there are no guanatees. You could lose your life today having gained nothing but a meaningless death, one that your god wouldnt even note.

I have touched some people's lives and made them better. Just to give one example, I'll never forget how my wife once look up at me from the hospital bed and told me she couldn't have made it without me. I have saved a failing business and kept people employeed. My employees are making better money and working in a less hostile work environment since getting rid of a certain middle manager. Sure, I've made a lot of mistakes too but I've found my meaning in trying to make my own little corner of Creation a little better. This is where we find meaning, that when we inevitably leave this world, that it is better for having known us. This kind of monument to God is far superior to all the sung hymns and constructed churches. And if God is never aware, the results are real all the same. It needs no validation from us and we don't from It.

The God you speak of may as well not even exist, and he doesn't, because God is personal.

And we're back to why isn't this "personal" god of yours making himself known. In a real way, not by dreams and beliefs. The way this god supposedly did in the Bible.

You reject a loving God,

All evidence to the contrary. Either God doesn't exist or isn't aware. It's you who have some explaining to do.