What to live for

[bobarian]

Followthereaper --

may I ask you a question? Do you agree with the basic Christian morality? Because you seem to be at the same time condeming the Christian church for disobeying the Bible's morality and at the same time saying the Bible is wrong.

This may be contradictory, I'm not sure.

One more thing -- I, along with Areopagite, do not really go along with the hierarchy of the Catholic church, and there are certainly many Christians who are not Catholic. I am an evangelical.

[Areopagite]

Yeah, so you all know, I'm an evangelical Christian as well.

[roninjotatan]

I am a good friend of followthereaper and he will be away for a bit so let me answer this

bobarian you must relize that we hate christians more then we hate the ideals they follow. Christian faith is nothing but a set of human rules of how to live that are used to control the slow minded subservent human. They are passed off as (god's) law and the penilty for disopbeying is supposly hell. Now you christians cant even follow this simple rules you set for yourself and thats where all the diffent sects of chritianity comes from. How can you excpet some one to think any better of you people if you cant agree on somthing that is supposly gods law. If i had faith i would follow his words to the letter but for some reason you people think there are so many hidden meanings to the bible and your so much smarter then god cause you figur it out that you all need to veiw it a diffent way. Their is one true bible, the rest is shit and if you cant follow it to the letter your a hypacrit cause if there was a god you would be deffing him.

also the bible is a joke cause it was written by men. No jesus, no god . Its based off one man who spole well and had very convincing parlor tricks. If it was not for marterying himself on that cross nothing would of come of it, sadly there are still people today who think there deaths are for there gods. There called radicals and the world has a grim veiw on them (by world I mean christians cause those radicals are muslems).

ps joelhaldeman It nice to know that you understand that the America's goverment does use god as a reason for what it does, Its good to know that even if you still have faith in a god (there is nothing wrong with faith as long as you know that its only one of many possiablitys) you wont let the American goverment control you with it. that probley what we hate the most, people belifes hung along side a flag that trys to kill and ruin lives. mabey its not the faith i hate but the goverment that uses it for its own ends!

[FollowTheReaper]

RoninJotatan explained it pretty well but i will throw in my two cents now. He didnt know i was going to be around... im leaving tonight and wont be home till sometime sunday. dont miss me too much. anyway, i do agree with christian morality but it doesnt seem to work when christians and even the church themselves dont follow their own moral codes. I do believe the bible is wrong, i think every word of it is no more factual than Lord of the Rings but that doesnt mean there arnt good messages in there. Like i stated before, im most against the fact that the christian church and most christians disobey they bibles morality even though they claim to live their lives by it. if your going to devote you life you a faith, you should actually follow it instead of picking and choosing what you do and dont want to do. most christians i know just pick and choose and then say "its ok if i dont follow every word, god is forgiving". if i were a god, that would piss me off. people would be using me because im a nice guy... thats what most christians do with god. i guess this will be it untill sunday. keep posting and i will probably have a lot to respond to when i return.

[Areopagite]

roninjotatan said:

also the bible is a joke cause it was written by men. No jesus, no god . Its based off one man who spole well and had very convincing parlor tricks. If it was not for marterying himself on that cross nothing would of come of it, sadly there are still people today who think there deaths are for there gods. There called radicals and the world has a grim veiw on them (by world I mean christians cause those radicals are muslems)

What exactly do you consider convincing parlor tricks Roninjotatan? Do you mean feeding five thousand people (Matt. 14:15-21) so that they were full, with five loaves and two fish, with enough left over to fill twelve whole baskets? If that wasn't a miracle what was it? Feeding that many people takes a lot of food.

Or, maybe, you meant Jesus walking on water (Mark 6:45-52). I mean, I'm pretty sure that holograms hadn't been invented for use at the Sea of Galilee. Or, maybe, raising Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-45) after he had been dead, wrapped in burial wrappings, and laid in a tomb for fourdays. If Lazarus wasn't really dead, he must have been pretty amazing to be wrapped in burial clothes, fed no food and given no water, and to remain in the dark for four days. What an amazing conspiracy!

It amazes me that people on this message board can believe in some of the worst crackpot conspiracy theories imaginable (such as what happened on 9/11), yet can't believe that these miracles are possible.

Also, you say "If it was not for marterying himself on that cross nothing would of come of it". This is also incorrect. Christianity was not born out of His death, as much as it was His resurrection. What good is faith in a dead man? No good at all. It is because we have a living savior that we have fellowship with God.

Lastly, you state "sadly there are still people today who think there deaths are for there gods. There called radicals and the world has a grim veiw on them (by world I mean christians cause those radicals are muslems)". This makes little sense. First of all, Christians are hardly the world. The world is under the dominion of Lucifer (Satan). The world hates Christians because the world is under the bondage of sin, and continues to serve Satan rather than God.

Secondly, this statement makes little sense because Christians are dying for God right now. Just this week, I believe, 1500 Christians were martyred in Nigeria. Stephen (Acts 7:60) was the first Christian martyr. In the time of Nero, hundreds of Christians were fed to the lions and other wild beasts in the Colosseum, while others were burned as living torches to light Nero's garden.

[bobarian]

well I think I can clarify this misundestanding.

The center of Christianity is not the law. It is blessing. Blessing is the overflow of love and joy in the spirit. It is the continual progression towards God and His goodness. That is the reason for the amazing scenes of God in revelation- He must be truly amazing.

The law merely exists to preserve this relationship between man and God. In and of itself it does not lead to perfection - in fact, in a fallen world, nothing can. Rather, we are inwardly re-created (new men) by being released from the one thing that is constant in this life -- the rebellion against God to become like God. When we no longer need to be like God we can be servants, even friends, of God. Then the law is not a weight or a burden that some must carry, it is a principle of joy that is a guide to the new life -- to the life God desires to give us.

Thus I understand why some who are Christians sin. We are sinful. But God is not a God of wrath He is a God of grace. And He is also just. So just that the only punishment for our sins was death itself, eternal separation from the Father of humanity. But in his infinite love He decided to change things... He came and died... physically and rose again physically...

So here I am today.

The world has been changed. The offer is extended for everyone. Will you come to Christ in humility today? It is a promise of re-creation for all who "repent." Turn and run away from this world.

If there's anything I want to do, it is most certainly to run away from this world.

[joelhaldeman]

Areopagite,
first:
okay my point was that i hate the fact that the catholic church has a reputation of raping boys. I hate the fact that this is what the church is known for. Im not in any way saying it is a teaching of christianity to rape boys or anything like that. I know it is wrong, i know they arnt perfect.
second:
you missed the point of my sentence about hating sin and hating the sinner. maybe i communicated it wrong but my point was when i was in church i hate how they taught me to hate the sinner. Of course i hate sin and the bible most defenetly teaches us to hate sin. But unfortunetly i grew up thinking that sinners were terrible people and whenever i would see someone who didnt believe in god i would point at them. You must understand what i am talking about. I absoulty agree with you about all that stuff with the bible verse. Yes i want to hate sin i just did a bad job communicating what i was trying to

roninjotatan,
Please, understand this. Christian faith is SOOOO much more then following a set of rules. SOO much more. In fact this is why Jesus died on the cross. Yes God wants us to obey the rules but in his eyes we are clean, washed with the blood of Jesus. We do not need to worry about paying for our sins, He wants us to focus on loving him and deepening a relationship with Him. Once this relationship comes, the sins will begin to leave our lives. This is what the body of Christ has a hard time interpreting to people. First comes a relationship THEN comes the lifestyle change. God does not expect anyone to stop sinning before the relationship with Jesus. He wants us to take hold of the relationship and then to truely want to get ride of sin.

[Areopagite]

Joel, thanks for clarifying what you meant in that previous post.

[FollowTheReaper]

wow, you people sure do reply fast. i have a little time before i leave so i figured i would check to see if anyone replied and there was like 6 new entires. so, i will post again and maybe this time it will be my last one.

let me give my opionion on what roninjotatan calls "parlor tricks" and what Areopagite calls "miracles". I believe that none of that stuff ever happened. there were no tricks and there were no miracles. all those stories are just that... nothing but stories. i believe there was a person named jesus who once walked the earth but he was nothing more than you or me. in fact, i believe he was less because he was clearly mentally insane. he believed he was the son of a god that never existed. if anyone today claimed to have any relation to god, there would probably be a few nuts who would believe that person but they would be thrown in a mental institution. unfortunatly, there was no such thing as a mental institution back then, so a few nuts believed him and over the last 2000 years the whole thing has been blown out of proportion.

[swankshoez]

Ok I'm ganna jump in here. A couple nuts..... A couple nuts believed in Y2K and in years it will be but a faint memory of a couple crazy people. A couple nuts could not have made this religion last like it has! If Jesus was an insane person, he would have to be pretty smart to get his "insane" ideas to last this long!

[Areopagite]

well I guess I'm a Jesus nut

[FollowTheReaper]

do you realize that people were not very bright 2000 years ago and that they did and believed whatever their oppressors said because their lives depended on it? and im saying that it started off as a few nuts but it expanded. yes, there were nuts who believed y2k would happen and that didnt and there were a few nuts who believed that comet was going to take them "home". so is it that hard to believe that some people who fall for jesus's ideas? his ideas were more believable than a comet taking you to some other planet. my point is that a few nuts will believe ANYTHING. its just that rare occasion that those few nuts spread their nutty idead through a sociological term called "mass hysteria". if you dont know what it is, look it up. its a big part of history and religion is the greatest example of it known to man.

[roninjotatan]

ok the only reason your faith is bin around so long is cause you people cant accept death! If i say your afraid of death you say "I AM NOT AFRAID, I WILL BE WITH GOD." but for some reason you guys cant think of a life without god. You all fear death and i doubt you have ever tried to think about death as the end.

Your nothing but data on gray matter and like date your will be erased. Suck it up and except it that you dont possess everlasting souls. There is no god, no allah and no buddia and when you die you will be but dust.

And i doubt the world is filled with Satan lovers cause if that was true they would form there own country, launch an invasion into white anglo saxon america, occupie us and then complane about all there war causlitys when we form an underground militia and fight back!

[Areopagite]

swankshoez said:

Ok I'm ganna jump in here. A couple nuts..... A couple nuts believed in Y2K and in years it will be but a faint memory of a couple crazy people. A couple nuts could not have made this religion last like it has! If Jesus was an insane person, he would have to be pretty smart to get his "insane" ideas to last this long!

I'm going to jump in with that. The Pharaisee Gamaliel wisely mentioned that in Acts 5:33-42

33 But when they heard this, they were cut to the quick and intended to kill them.
34 But a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a techer of the Law, respected by all the people, stood up in the Council and gave orders to put the men outside for a short time.
35 And he said to them, "Men of Israel, take care what you propose to do with these men.
36 "For some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody, and a group of about four hundred men joined up with him. But he was killed, and all who followed him were dispersed and came to nothing.
37 "After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the census and drew away some people after him; he too perished, and all those who followed him were scattered.
38 "So in the present case, I say to you, stay away from these men and let them alone, for if this plan or action is of men, it will be overthrown;
39 but if it is of God you will not be able to overthrow them; or else you may even be found fighting against God."
40 They took his advice; and after calling the apostles in, they flogged them and ordered them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and then released them.
41 So they went on their way from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy o suffer shame for His name.
42 And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they kept right on teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.

[Areopagite]

roninjotatan said:

ok the only reason your faith is bin around so long is cause you people cant accept death! If i say your afraid of death you say "I AM NOT AFRAID, I WILL BE WITH GOD." but for some reason you guys cant think of a life without god. You all fear death and i doubt you have ever tried to think about death as the end.

Your nothing but data on gray matter and like date your will be erased. Suck it up and except it that you dont possess everlasting souls. There is no god, no allah and no buddia and when you die you will be but dust.

And i doubt the world is filled with Satan lovers cause if that was true they would form there own country, launch an invasion into white anglo saxon america, occupie us and then complane about all there war causlitys when we form an underground militia and fight back!

As Paul says in his letter to the Philippians "For to me, to live is Chirst and to die is gain. But if I am to live on in the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose. But I am hard-pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better" (Philippians 1:21-23)

Paul ended up dying for his faith, serving Jesus to the very end with the ultimate cost.

Roninjotatan, I also am unafraid to die, because I have nothing to lose on this earth, and everything to gain from death. But just like Paul, God has allowed me to stay on earth for a certain period of time to serve Him by doing His will.