Whats even attractive about Christianity anyway that people want to stay in ignorance

[Voltair]

People who look but haven't found God were either mislead by others (sadly) or looked in the wrong place--themselves. The true God takes a humbling of the mind with the help of the Holy Spirit. In order to find God you need to take off your reason hat and take a leap of faith. We, as humans, look for religions that benefit us personally. Instead, close your eyes and ask Jesus to reveal himself to you. Read the Gospels. The combination of God's help and your application will show you the truth if you wish to find it. There is no single statement I can give you to convince you why all other worldly religions are wrong. You have to find it yourself, but I'll tell you now that it has nothing to do with your natural tendencies. All fake religions are law-oriented, meaning the follower has to earn their way to heaven by doing good works. It is our natural desire to want to earn our way, because then we can take the credit. Christianity is different, for Romans 3:23 says, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." And Romans 6:23 adds, "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life." Wages are what you earn. But since we have all sinned we can never do enough to reach heaven on our own. Knowing this, God came down in the form of a man. He paid the punishment for our sins on the cross. He died in our place. And that is another difference in Christianity. Not only does it promote relying on another's grace instead of your own strength, it shows how much God is seeking us. We are the lost sheep. He is the shepherd actively pursuing us. Ask a follower of any other religion and they'll say they are concerned with who else joins. The few beliefs that include gathering followers do so for selfish purposes. Mormons think they need to do it to be saved (and get their own planet). The Quran tells Muslims to conquer countries and make followers by force. Christian missionaries evangelize for as many people to know Christ's love as possible.

To find God I have to take a leap of faith. Does this mean that you do not truly know if you have found God? Again the problem with throwing off reasoning and taking that leap of faith is any religion could say that. So perhaps the reason you are not a Muslim is you aren't willing to take the leap of faith that is necessary? I have not investigated all world religions but for you say all of them are based on fake laws that are worked base makes it sound like you are saying you have.

Christianity is not technically work based although if you don't do good things your faith is dead so in a sense it is work based. Your salvation isn't based on good works but do you still go to heaven if you sit and warm a pew your whole life? If you say no then you are contradicting the idea that salvation and works are not connected. If you say yes then you are saying complacency is perfectly acceptable and will not be punished by God.

Christian missionaries also do what they do for partially selfish reasons. Or are you going to say that Christian missionaries feel no obligation by God to do what they do? Again with the complacency idea do you think that a Christian who does nothing will receive the reward of heaven? Also I would like you to tell me how Buddhism, the resident Buddhist here can answer this better, gains by getting converts? I also think that you probably haven't read the Koran very much because I am pretty sure it doesn't just simply say "force them to be Muslim". Maybe it does but I doubt it.

Also many Christians do what they do to avoid punishment. Take away the punishment of Hell and how many loyal workers would you have? Sorry but doing something for self preservation does not make you selfless or good in of itself. Are there Christians who are absolutely pure in their motives? I believe that there are but Christianity is not as pure as you are painting it out to be as a whole. Now I understand that no one is perfect but it is partially due to how the religion is set up. You follow Christ OR you get punished. When something is setup that way it is bound to create followers out of fear. People may very well love God as well but there is a good part of them that does it out of fear as well. God couldn't simply have people choose to love him, he had to threaten them. I find that interesting since one of the basic concepts of love is being able to choose without being punished.

It would be like me falling in love with a girl and telling her that she didn't have to be with me while holding a gun to her head. She does not have to be with me but if she doesn't she dies. Sure she can CHOOSE to die but those two options are hardly equal because I am using coercion. God uses a much larger form of coercion in the form of eternal punishment, whatever your definition of Hell is it is still supposed to awful.

The only reason we are lost in the first place is God CHOSE to dictate what he did as sin and he CHOSE to deliver the harshest form of punishment available. If God did not choose this then he is not all powerful and something is greater than him. So God CHOSE to set things up and so we are therefore lost. I don't feel too good about a figure who set up the problem in the first place but then says "Hey I know you were doomed to this and I made you to where you would be.... but good for you that I decided to forgive you for it anyway". The idea of sin/punishment/God's wrath in the first place seems so much at odds with what makes sense.

Also Jesus dying on the cross wasn't really a sacrifice. Sacrifice means you actually have to lose something and Jesus knew that he was going to be fine. Jesus may have lost equality with God but I really don't see that as a huge sacrifice because he still didn't really suffer. He lived 30 years or so and died a painful death that OTHER people have died as well. What was so unique about his pain other than his supposed deity?

Logically, either one religion is right or they are all wrong. There is only one truth and naturally people create all kinds of other ‘pseudo-truths’ to win fame and money. Even atheists believe their atheism is the only truth. To say we should dismiss all religions because there are so many to choose from is like saying science has many theories for one phenomenon so they must all be wrong.

I completely agree either one is right or all are wrong due to the idea of contradiction. As far as there being one truth I would agree in the sense that either the sun exists or it doesn't exist, not both. As far as other people simply creating pseudo truths for fame in money I would like to go back to Buddhism. How many super rich Buddhist monks do you know? In addition to that I was speaking to a Chinese student here who told me that there are monks who believe they going to Hell to fill the places there so others don't have to.

So you have a group of religious people who deny themselves many pleasures in life AND believe that they will sacrifice their souls so others don't have to suffer. Sorry but that right there is FAR above any love/sacrifice Christians can offer. No Christian believes they can give their very soul for the sake of others and if they did , would they? Granted though the Apostle Paul mentioned such an idea in scripture.

Look at the founder of any major religion and examine their motives. Muhammad gained fame and power through war, as well as the right to his followers' wives. Hinduism makes a caste system with priests at the top. Every faith has a selfish motive behind it but Christianity. All but one of the Christian apostles were martyred, and many more lost or feared for their lives. Instead of creating a system where one group of people is more powerful or influential, the Bible calls for a brotherhood of equals who work as the "body of Christ" to spread Jesus' love and news of the resurrection. Philosophically, thinkers have a hard time reasoning how a cruel God could create such beauty in creation and why we still exist in a balance of goodness and sin, as well as how a group of gods could function together to produce an operating world with one moral code. That leaves a single, loving God, and Christians call him Jesus.

You mentioned two faiths for your example and left out many other religious beliefs. Again Christianity's motivation is not pure either as it is the avoidance of torment and the gains of ultimate happiness in paradise. Do Christian's love people? I suspect many do but there is still the punishment/reward system in place. Christianity is not a selfless religion because it was setup with the do good and get eternal bliss or do bad and suffer torment. It is not fair to point out other religious motivations when Christianity's base message is come to Jesus to be saved from damnation. It is about AVOIDANCE and GAIN along with the idea of helping others. You cannot separate the above two though because they are stressed in scripture.

The martyrdom of the apostles seems to based on writings of people that lived way after the supposed death of the apostles anyway. So how do we know they are not repeating rumors and hearsay? We know James was martyred through Josephus and he was contemporary to the time. You mention the idea of equality and brotherhood. Even if that were unique to Christianity it does not make it any more likely to be true. I would again ask how much equality there is in a Buddhist temple or other religions. I seriously doubt you have investigated the thousands of religions out there and neither have I so you no other religion has that equality doesn't really prove it true.

As far as struggling with the idea of bad and beauty existing I don't know how much of a struggle there really is about that. Perhaps it is a struggle among Christian philosophers. As far as us existing in a balance of good and sin I am not sure what you mean by that. You impose the idea of sin on what you see as bad perhaps and that may mean you are saying a balance of good and evil. I don't really see how that balance proves anything as there are many forces at work to check what is seen as evil. I will say it straight, I seriously doubt without laws/protection/fear of loss that that balance would be maintained with JUST Christianity. Unless of course that Christianity was militant like the catholic church of old but then again it is force not faith keeping the peace then.

Also just because people struggle with ideas does not immediately default your position as the true one. You would still have to defend your own position even if all the other proposed ones fell apart it doesn't mean yours doesn't get scrutinized.

Even with the miraculous signs, many people didn't believe. All spiritual forces were more visible then, including Satan's, making it more difficult to discern between the two. God doesn't currently do obvious miracles because he believes we have enough to go on as it is. He created nature; he doesn't have to fight it to accomplish his will. He also has a new way of communicating-- the Holy Spirit. Before Christ, only prophets spoke out about God. Now God's spirit is in everyone, and we are able to witness to nonbelievers using the words he gives us. We are no longer restricted to learning from prophets and miraculous signs, but from every other Christian on earth. In addition to this, we have a full completed Bible in most every house. Back then that had a few scrolls written by the prophets, and the Torah. Some would argue it is easier to believe now. Whether that's true or not does not matter. What matters is we have enough. God is seeking us. Seek him back, and you'll find the evidence more overwhelming than you ever imagined.

He may believe we have enough to go on as is but the scene is changing if I am not mistaken. The youth of our days are no longer satisfied with "because I say so and because it just is that way". They are seeking answers and are finding that in many cases there may not be any answers. So God's way of doing things may start to crumble in which people may scream the last days are here and Jesus will return soon. However it wouldn't be the first time people say it and find out it doesn't happen and it won't be the last.

As far as learning from other Christian's etc that has NOTHING to do with proving that is actually true and that God is real. I could act in such a way to where people couldn't believe how nice/helpful/benevolent/self sacrificing I was. I could then say "It was the golden fleece that taught me to do so". My actions don't prove with any likelihood that the golden fleece did anything or even exists just that I attribute my actions to it. What is interesting is you say seek God. I have seen this supposed evidence and examined it. I would like for you to propose a piece of evidence I have not considered.

I am talking of general categories of course because I have not heard of every single little archaeological find or something else someone touts as proving something. Around 8 months ago or so I lost my faith due to asking the hard questions and going where the answers led me. I remember even praying to God during my times of struggle to show me if he was there. I will say he did answer me question by not answering me. His lack of action helped prove his non-existence and I could call him out even now and he would still fall silent. He would fall silent most likely because either he is not the Christian God or because, as I suspect, he wasn't there in the first place.

The evidence is very underwhelming and usually deals with some form of speculation/attribution instead of actual proof. I do welcome a discussion about these proofs if you like though. I even wrote a 34 page document explaining my views that I can send you if you like that deals with a lot of these proofs. If God is seeking me then he may want to seek a little harder because his presence has gone unnoticed if he is there. You may say I am simply closing my eyes and I would say to you prove it.

And what would you say if you wrote a diary about your flat tire becoming full (because of a pump you don't mention), and people 2000 years from today said, "That doesn't make sense. He must have made it up." Who are we to presume we know better than the people who actually lived in the time of Christ? Are we going to call all the 1st century Christians fooled by something that happened right under their noses? The number of converts must have exploded for a reason, and it couldn't have been because of a long-developed legend.

First of all with you example of a flat tire it is possible that I made it up. However tires being able to be flat is something that can readily be proved in reality. However how would you like to demonstrate that miracles/spiritual beings can happen/exist? Also even if I did lie the question is have their been flat tires before and is it possible to have flat tires? Yes to both so even if I did lie it doesn't really matter.

If you are going to argue that the ancients simply knew better than you better believe in the Egyptian God's too. You also should believe any ancient story that the ancients believed. After all who are you to presume that you know better than those ancients? Your standards you are applying are inconsistent, if you are going to apply them then apply them universally. I am not saying that to attack you but to point out an inconsistency. Just because rapid converts happen doesn't make something true either. Also volume of converts doesn't either unless you are going to argue that an Indian guru named Sathya Sai Baba really was who he said he was and really did miraculous works.

I would wikipedia him if you want to know more. This guy had people convinced he could do miraculous works etc and no he wasn't a Christian. By the way he died in April of 2011 so this is very recent. So do I think that people who were highly superstitious, largely illiterate, etc 2000 years ago could be fooled/mistaken? Well do I think people who are highly superstitious, largely illiterate (I think), about one year ago could be mistaken? Absolutely to both of those questions. You are willing to trust the Christians because they lived closer to the events but unwilling to trust ANY other theological doctrine that is outside of Christianity. Your standards must be applied universally in that sense or you are just picking and choosing.