Before Christ & The Bible

[Lek]

You've got the choice of believing or suffering endlessly in hellfire to put it simply. It's easier for a lot of folks to not risk being wrong and play along. Ever heard of Pascal's wager? It happens more often than you'd expect.

Seems like a loving father.

God wouldn't require people who have never had the chance to know Christ to believe in him. They would only be responsible for responding to the light which he had given them, which would have been revealed to them through creation.

[ThePinsir]

So I had a dumb question.

What do modern Christians believe happened before the bible existed and before christ was born....I say this because, when I think of christianity, obviously it was a religion based on Christ, and there were so many religions existing before christianity.
So how do we expect other areas of the world to know of this christian god before his time, and before the time of his holy book?

I've honestly never heard this been brought up or talked about. Was just curious and wanted some others thoughts!

Pre-destination. They're going to hell regardless - nothing they can do about it. They're just S.O.L.

[Minimalist]

The world got along just fine with out jesus and his merry little quasi-jewish road show.

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Lek and his ilk like to forget that everything in their stupid bible happened in the little circle.



The rest of the world didn't need his fucking god.

[Vox]

They have a counter for that. Most of the Mormon crap went on in Mesoamerica, and there's plenty of stories of bilocating priests and marian apparitions happening everywhere from Portugal to Mexico.

[dreenbmp]

Seems like a loving father.

If you believe he died for the crimes of your race and is trying to save you from yourself he is. A lot of them tend to downplay the hellfire side these days, but it always gets pulled out if you express any doubt about a teaching or even the non-existence of God.

So let me get this straight....God creates a world and he is all knowing (regardless giving us freedom of choice, he still knows everything)....Programs us with a brain and "sinful" urges. then he says world isn't good enough, so he floods it. He then says the world isn't good again, and the only way to fix it is to send his own son which is actually him..but not really, to die on a cross to "save our sins."? I'm sorry..but that is just ridiculous.

[Vox]

If you believe he died for the crimes of your race and is trying to save you from yourself he is. A lot of them tend to downplay the hellfire side these days, but it always gets pulled out if you express any doubt about a teaching or even the non-existence of God.

So let me get this straight....God creates a world and he is all knowing (regardless giving us freedom of choice, he still knows everything)....Programs us with a brain and "sinful" urges. then he says world isn't good enough, so he floods it. He then says the world isn't good again, and the only way to fix it is to send his own son which is actually him..but not really, to die on a cross to "save our sins."? I'm sorry..but that is just ridiculous.

It's quite a lot to take in isn't it, although that said they don't quite see it like this..Let me try to explain.

God created the world, but most Christians don't belive things like disease and sexual urges are his doing. As one passage of scripture says "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23); prior to the fall of Adam these things did not exist and are the creation of human evil or Satan. When we do evil, evil is believed to materialize as either a reflection of the evil of humanity or as punishment.

If people stopped sinning, these things would vanish (that's the theory).

Now...God Sacrificing himself...This might actually be a bit interesting. I couldn't speak about protestants but most Catholics agree that God doesn't have free will. He is the source of all that is good (whatever he does is automatically good), but he's also totally lawful. Any violation of his law (sinning) deserves eternal punishment, because all sins are personal slights against the source of all good.

Because it's such a dreadful thing, and because he can't automatically forgive humans and not enact lawful retribution he sacrificed the only thing that was valuable enough in the universe/multiverse to be considered adequate compensation for a personal insult against God, himself.

It's kinda hard to condense for a small forum post. :/

[Fidel_Castronaut]

Seems like a loving father.

God wouldn't require people who have never had the chance to know Christ to believe in him. They would only be responsible for responding to the light which he had given them, which would have been revealed to them through creation.

So in other words, Christians are to blame for people going to hell because otherwise nobody would have heard of this god thing, right?

Is it thus not morally reprehensible to tell a young child about Jésus lest they come to a decision contrary to that which the person telling them holds?

[Vox]

God wouldn't require people who have never had the chance to know Christ to believe in him. They would only be responsible for responding to the light which he had given them, which would have been revealed to them through creation.

So in other words, Christians are to blame for people going to hell because otherwise nobody would have heard of this god thing, right?

Is it thus not morally reprehensible to tell a young child about Jésus lest they come to a decision contrary to that which the person telling them holds?

No, because Christians are told to preach to everyone (Mark 16:15), it's an expectation of them to testify, defend and promote their faith. They're ordered to tell people, and at least give them the chance of accepting the Gospel.

If God orders it, it's good. It's good by virtue of the fact God wants it.

[Losty]

I just don't understand how anyone can believe this nonsense

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hahaha. Regardless I appreciate his answer because that's what i wanted to know.

Minimalist tries to disregard me, but he's secretly coming over to my views.

Lmfao now that is the funniest thing I've heard today

[vorlon13]

God wouldn't require people who have never had the chance to know Christ to believe in him. They would only be responsible for responding to the light which he had given them, which would have been revealed to them through creation.

I believe that is BLASPHEMY.

BTW, why are so many of the religiousites here so prone to blasphemy ??

Can't God scrounge up a higher caliber proslyte to minister to the pagans ???