From atheism to Christianity? How so?

[agapelove]

I'm claiming that the Jesus story, the miracle claims, were embellishments made to the life of an itinerant Jewish rabbi. Yes, the connections are superficial; such things are. It's just another evolution of an old story, nothing more. To be clear, your only proof of its authenticity is that it's so wonderfully unique as to be divinely inspired, and when you're shown other places where similar themes and teachings pop up, your only response is that these are superficial. Well, yes... they're similarities, not literally the same story. It doesn't need to be identical to prove the only claim you've made wrong.

How do you explain the martyrdom of the disciples? They all gave up their lines, endured intense persecution, and died horrific deaths for what they all knew was a lie? Doesn't really make sense. I don't see any reason to believe their testimony in the New Testament isn't authentic.

Better tell that to all those televangelists and miracle workers who film and screen prayers being "answered," then. I guess they were wrong all along. Rolleyes

What you're seeing there is a circus and has nothing to do with biblical faith.

Also, what is it that your god has to hide, here? Why's he lying?

How is He lying? God isn't obligated to produce results so that men come to certain conclusions; it is His perrogative to answer prayers in any way He chooses for any reason. Those who know Him will come to the right conclusions, so it is only those who ignore His revelation who will not correctly interpret the results.

And misrepresenting the facts is still a lie, something god can't do, so one way or another, someone's wrong here.

What facts are being misrepresented? All He is allowing people to do is come to a conclusion based upon their acceptence or rejection of Jesus Christ. The facts are that He exists and did answer all of those prayers; the conclusion that men come to is based on the revelation they already have.

Yes, that's rather the problem; the only evidence you have is the things you feel inside your head. Convincing yourself that something's true does not make it so.

That's simply not true and if you read my testimony and my replies you'll see that it's not all just something I feel but something I have directed witnessed in the real world. Whether you feel you can explain it all away or not is a different discussion.

So, this is important: they don't all believe in the same god. See, you can't just conglomerate every deist and theist together when it suits your purposes, because these are not the same experiences. They're different ones, owing to experiences with different gods, not always the one you believe in, and even with regards to the ones that are about the christian god, there's major disagreements as to what he's like. You're just pretending, here; there's no corroboration involved, because the vast majority of those people disagree with the god you're pimping.

Almost everyone believes in God; whether they believe in the same God is immaterial to the fact that most of them have some kind of supernatural experience which points them towards God. I didn't mean the material facts of my beliefs are comfirmed, but my belief that there is a God and the supernatural experiences which point to Him are confirmed.

You can't say god is self evident because if he was you wouldn't have such disagreements over what he's like, and besides, I disagree with your fiat assertion. Now you're just lying, which is absolutely a sin according to your religion.

If God exists then His existence is the most basic axiom and without it how could you understand reality? It seems to be self-evident to the majority of the population, and whether we have disagreements about who God is is immaterial to the fact that He is nearly universally perceived.