The Bible Says So

[unfogged]

The bible is a map that tells you how to approach and find God.

Fuck him.  Let him shoot up a flare or something.

[Angrboda]

Where in the bible does it say this?

it is an observation The bible does not speak of itself as it was not compiled while written. the bible does however speak of the scripture as a whole being given by God.
14 But you should continue following the teaching you learned. You know it is true, because you know you can trust those who taught you. 15 You have known the Holy Scriptures since you were a child. These Scriptures are able to make you wise. And that wisdom leads to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is given by God. And all Scripture is useful for teaching and for showing people what is wrong in their lives. It is useful for correcting faults and teaching the right way to live. 17 Using the Scriptures, those who serve God will be prepared and will have everything they need to do every good work.

Well, then that becomes a supposition you have which may or may not be correct. Before I go any further, I want clarification on a few things. First, since this is Paul, I believe, who is speaking, then by teachings and scripture he would be referring to the rabbinical tradition and the old testament, would he not? And he says that the wisdom in those things will lead you to salvation through faith in Christ. I'm not sure the scriptures and traditions he's referring to can do any such thing. Can you clarify? Another problem is the idea that anything, faith in Jesus, notwithstanding, can lead you to salvation. From what I understand, salvation is a free gift from God, and is not earned, by faith in Christ or anything else. Is this not true? I also note that this passage precedes the gospels, including the Ask/Seek/Knock passage in Luke, which you have claimed is a similar map to God. Do you have anything referring to the gospels themselves in this vein? I may have further questions, but it doesn't appear that this indicates that the bible is a map so much as it is simply truth that can make you wise, and that wisdom can lead you to faith in Christ, which may or may not result in salvation. A map is a representation of the territory, so at minimum, that analogy doesn't hold given what I have so far. Especially is it is referrring to 'scripture' here, meaning the old testament, as that truth leads to a very different God than Jesus. Do you have any examples of Paul referring to his own writings as scripture, so we might at least ponder a self-referential statement? Given that these were letters he was writing, unless there is some explicit reference from him that his letters are scripture, that would seem to leave us with the old testament.

Asserted, but not proven.  I've listened to your arguments a long time, Drich, and they all fail by the same objection that Hume used in his argument against miracles.  For any thing you can cite as evidence of God, there is a more probable natural explanation.  That makes believing in God on account of your evidence irrational.  A smart apologist would attack Hume, but I doubt you're that smart.

it is proven on an individual level. If the bible did not deliver ever it the religion would fall by the way side as every other unproductive religion on earth has. Which is why I say every viable religion is supported by something. It keeps it's promises. Every current religion does. the only question is can man manifest those answered promises or is it a god level thing.

Having a no intermediary relationship with God is God level only that is the center of this religion. if this promise was not full filled every single generation for the last 2000 years Christianity would be a mention like gnosticism.

Unfortunately, the evidence does not support your assertion. It's known that movements prosper for many reasons, not necessarily because they contain truth. You haven't shown that the bible actually delivers, as you haven't addressed the Humean objection. You have to do that before you make any arguments as to its fulfillment of promises validating it. Confirmation bias, perseverance of belief, and other psychological mechanism put the whole of your hypothesis in doubt. People do convince them of things that they shouldn't be convinced of, and people do follow movements after having convinced themselves of such things, even for thousands of years. So this amounts to several errors. First, a failure to overcome the Humean objection. Second, an ignorance and misguided view of human nature. And third, an unsupported hypothesis that unsupported religions fail. Something which experience teaches us is actually the contrary. I find it interesting that you assert that every viable and current religion has something undergirding it which is genuine. Ignoring for the moment that this is basically begging the question, this statement is one of those, "heads I win, tails you lose," type propositions. If the religion continues for some arbitrary period, then it is genuine; why did it persevere, because it is genuine. If it doesn't last that long, then it was not genuine; why, because it didn't meet your arbitrary standard. But you have no way of knowing that Christianity will continue, any more than the acolytes of the Eleusinian mysteries knew that their religion was going to end after them. So this is something of a prediction, that Christianity will continue to prosper and not fail. And you are not a prophet. Your predictions have no value. And the example of the Eleusinian mysteries shows the hollowness of your claim. Their religion lasted 1,500 years or so. You have no way of vouchsafing the success of Christianity any more than they had of their religion. So the Eleusinian mysteries presents a counter-example to the claim that a religion will persevere if it is genuine, as the Eleusinian mysteries both did and did not persevere, yielding the conclusion that they both were and were not true, according to your argument, and that's absurd. Any other interpretation of your argument seems to embody nothing more than a lottery effect. Some religions were bound to persevere, it just so happens Christianity is one of those. Its persevering tells us nothing unless you can establish that it persevered for justifiable reasons, and that leads us back to Hume and human psychology. So, no, your claims and your argument for the truth of your beliefs does not hold up to inspection.

[Drich]

Why do I have to find god?

Because he is hidden from you, as we are not born sinful but born to sin which seperates us from God. Otherwise If God's glory was an absolute, (You were perfect and could see God) you could not make the decision you were placed here to make. You would be overwhelmed by his love grace and the hope of a fulfillment in eternity with him as well as a fear of hell that would keep you from being honest with yourself. The question is do you want to serve God for eternity? I'm sure anyone could serve for a few thousand years without complaint but ultimately in the back of your mind or rather in the back of some minds an idea of freedom will over take you. Or at least that is what happened to 1/3 of the angels and Satan. And since we are no better than angels we can assume the same would happen to us.

So God gives us this moment out of eternity to choose to seek him, or to seek our self want and desire. without knowledge of his glory looming over us we are free to make this choice. If we seek and find God the choice is made for us.

As far as I've heard he's everywhere, and has an inside knowledge of me, why not save me directly for the error of my ways?

To what end? to drag you into heaven kicking and screaming? or to invite you in now and in 10,000 of cleaning up elephant poop in heavenly prades to rebell because you do not like to serve God in the only job you are tasked to do???
Why not take this life and decide once and for all whether or not you want to be a slave of God? If you think slavery is never a good thing thenyou might not like heaven.. So again why should God save you of your sins if heaven is 1700's american to your west african origins? Rather than capture slaves and drag them into service kicking and screaming God is providing each potential slave an opportunity to research life over there and how well we will have it (We as slaves over there will have it better than kings do here) Even so some may not want to serve.

Why would he use a book in one tiny area of the planet, ignoring the vast majority of the human race?

Who said he only used one book? what if the other parts of the planet simply rejected God and Jesus? See how Japan and china both greeted missionaries and converts to christianity.
In truth it is through Jesus the world is saved. Meaning because of what Jesus did those who did not know him (noah abraham David soloman Daniel as well as Tanaka Sobe or a big little foot or a james smythe or a koonta ponte all get judged by Christ Himself and not by the arbertairy rules of a religion.
(I am the way the truth and the light, no man comes to the father but by me.) meaning Jesus is the final judge not Christianity not judahism not any other form of religion ever. Christ and christ alone will judge us and our Serviceability. Did we honorably serve in this life with what God gave us, or did we throw away any knowledge or blessing?

Why would he let his message be written and twisted by corrupted faulty humans?

If you ever studied the bible there are hand written manuscripts that where written before the time of Christ ((hundreds of years) that verify books of the bible that were previously in doubt. the only changes would be grammatical differences given the time span and spelling errors. What changes do you believe you are talking about? As it is not we have 2nd and 3rd century manuscripts that have been vetted by many other sources. In fact last I saw there were over 25,000 different confirmed manuscripts that all confirm our holy Bible.

Why did Jesus not write the updated bible himself (why would a perfect being's bible need to be updated anyway), again allowing his message to be distorted by faulty humans? Why did he then have to send Mohammed to fix what presumably the Jews and the Christians got wrong ?

what's to write? He literally gave us 2 commands. Love God with all of our being and Love our neighbor as our selves. he said in keeping these two commands the whole law is full filled.

The reason for this was Jesus DID NOT WANT To Set Up Another Religion! He was looking for personal relationships, which will be different from group to group and even person to person.

Why does this book have to be interpreted & re-interpreted all the time

because it was not written in english.

causing so many different types of Jewish, Christian & Muslim groups?

Judaism is not an off shoot. Judaism was the original religion with rules and tons of laws. Jesus came to free us from these rules and laws as a way or a means to righteousness (being found right or up standing before the Father.) Once Christ died He took the law away as a means to righteousness and replaced our way to righteousness with love. love for God and love for our neighbor. Did the law go completely away? as a way to righteousness yes, but Jesus also said if you loved him you would keep his commands, not as a way to earn heaven but as a way to show your love to God.

Muslims/Mohamad did not like this lovey dovey crap.. He wanted strict rules and a return to a more brutal crime and punishment system as a way to control the people who followed him. So he set up that system to suit his people's desire to be ruled.

---

So i can call you Gae?

Gae as the "Dae" is long..

For those of us living in the 21st century gay is not an insult. Some of us old farts even figured this out way back in the last century.
[/quote]

yeah, but a gae bologna?!?! There is irony on 10 different levels here! when you are trying to represent yourself as a ultimate spear/God killing weapon.. (which is what his screen name means) but you conjure a mental image of a semi flaccid tube of gelatinatious gae snouts tails and pigs feet... can't help myself, not only that, he stuck with this screen name for the next year!!!

Plus these are not gay jokes the are gae like sundae jokes!!!

[Drich]

[Angrboda]