Does God exist? (15 Viewers)

[volition]

Well? any takers? Do any theists want to tell me why their interpretation of the Bible is correct?

 

[*yooneek*]

what do you mean- interpretation?

interpretation of the whole message- or a particular chapter?

do you mean in regards to the whole situation of basically all of humanity needing saving, and Jesus being that means?

Jesus was a person in history- thats got plenty of evidence... if He is who He claimed to be, then what He said and Him dying means a whole lot...

sorry, could you go on a bit with what you mean by interpretation of the bible?
thankx <3

 

[withoutaface]

Yes Jesus probably existed, but what evidence do you have that he was the son of God? None? Thought so.

 

[*yooneek*]

Yes Jesus probably existed, but what evidence do you have that he was the son of God? None? Thought so.

if i said yes, what would you say?

 

[withoutaface]

I'd ask you what evidence.

 

[*yooneek*]

Jesus said He was...so either He was... or He was completely insane...

 

[Wilmo]

Perhaps the best way to answer that is the bible is not up to a "theists interpretation" as many people try to argue.

One cannot claim that the book is the Word of God and then say that it is open to our interpretation. Surely, if we believe God to be perfect, then every word he says is perfect and spoken for a reason. For us, an imperfect people, to interpret what I think the bible means would mean i'm corrupting God's Words.

In that sense the bible should not be interpreted.

But how then does someone understand what God wants to say? If it is God's interpretation, then only God can interpret it right? Right.

I cant speak for other religions but I know that Christians believe God gives them the gift of his Spirit to dwell in them. The Spirit is a guide and a councellor who uses the word of God to teach us. And since he is God, he is capable of interpreting the word of God. Therefore it is not the Christians who should be doing the interpreting.

But that begs the question: Why do christians believe in differing things? And if they all have this same Spirit, why are there so many different churches who disagree with each other?

The only way I can explain that is that Christianity has core values which the Holy Spirit convicts us of. Stuff like Jesus being the sacrifice for our sin and being the Son of God etc.

On top of that are issues that arent necessary for salvation and as such Christians usually make more of a personal conviction about that. These are things like God choosing Christians, and people being born naturally sinful. They are cool things to think about, but in the end dont lead you any closer to salvation.

If you look around most bible based churches (places where the God's word is taken as authority) you will find they generally believe the same sort of stuff. That is because they believe that these are the perfect words of God and that the Holy Spirit teaches us using these words.

Its when people start interpreting their own ideas from the bible or when they don't even look to the bible at all that you start to get lots of weird crazy stuff being thrown around. I would not go so far say such people have not recieved the Holy Spirit, but the Spirit uses the words of God to teach us. And if we are not studying the words of God then we're not going to let him teach us much are we

It is our human nature that causes the divisions in the church. We would rather be proved right about the little things than worry about all christians being up to date with the important things. And as such Christians look silly from all angles.

The people who have good theology argue with the other churches who have good theology, and the people who have bad theology look stupid because they have bad theology.

But in the end it doesnt matter (well it does matter if Christians dont read the bible!), but it's the salvation issues that the Spirit convicts Christians of that really matter.


Sorry for the long winded response but i guess i wanted to answer a pre-emptive question while I had time

 

[withoutaface]

Or he was the biggest con artist ever, and you've yet to explain why it's not possible that he was completely insane.

 

[withoutaface]

Perhaps the best way to answer that is the bible is not up to a "theists interpretation" as many people try to argue.

One cannot claim that the book is the Word of God and then say that it is open to our interpretation. Surely, if we believe God to be perfect, then every word he says is perfect and spoken for a reason. For us, an imperfect people, to interpret what I think the bible means would mean i'm corrupting God's Words.

In that sense the bible should not be interpreted.

But how then does someone understand what God wants to say? If it is God's interpretation, then only God can interpret it right? Right.

I cant speak for other religions but I know that Christians believe God gives them the gift of his Spirit to dwell in them. The Spirit is a guide and a councellor who uses the word of God to teach us. And since he is God, he is capable of interpreting the word of God. Therefore it is not the Christians who should be doing the interpreting.

But that begs the question: Why do christians believe in differing things? And if they all have this same Spirit, why are there so many different churches who disagree with each other?

The only way I can explain that is that Christianity has core values which the Holy Spirit convicts us of. Stuff like Jesus being the sacrifice for our sin and being the Son of God etc.

On top of that are issues that arent necessary for salvation and as such Christians usually make more of a personal conviction about that. These are things like God choosing Christians, and people being born naturally sinful. They are cool things to think about, but in the end dont lead you any closer to salvation.

If you look around most bible based churches (places where the God's word is taken as authority) you will find they generally believe the same sort of stuff. That is because they believe that these are the perfect words of God and that the Holy Spirit teaches us using these words.

Its when people start interpreting their own ideas from the bible or when they don't even look to the bible at all that you start to get lots of weird crazy stuff being thrown around. I would not go so far say such people have not recieved the Holy Spirit, but the Spirit uses the words of God to teach us. And if we are not studying the words of God then we're not going to let him teach us much are we

It is our human nature that causes the divisions in the church. We would rather be proved right about the little things than worry about all christians being up to date with the important things. And as such Christians look silly from all angles.

The people who have good theology argue with the other churches who have good theology, and the people who have bad theology look stupid because they have bad theology.

But in the end it doesnt matter (well it does matter if Christians dont read the bible!), but it's the salvation issues that the Spirit convicts Christians of that really matter.


Sorry for the long winded response but i guess i wanted to answer a pre-emptive question while I had time

But if God was perfect he would have written it in a form which was incorruptable.

 

[Wilmo]

But if God was perfect he would have written it in a form which was incorruptable.

The form is incorruptable in a sense.

The word of God is truth, or if it changed by sinful it is untruth. So the only two options are that it is the word of God or it is the word of man.

The question is then how do you sort the two out. If it were up to us, we could not tell the difference because both would seem indistinguishable.

But the safeguard God has in place is his Spirit. Since the Spirit is God, it will accept nothing less than the truth of God. It is God's interpretation of his own work. And therefore it is a perfect interpretation.

In a sense, God's word can be corrupted... but if that happens it is no longer God's word and God will have no part of it.

 

[withoutaface]

But why could he not write it all out in an explicit sense, for example "thou shalt not kill" is pretty much incorruptible.

 

[Wilmo]

Because the command is not what God want's you to see. If everything he said was a command, you would have a checklist for righteousness. "I've done this this and this right, i've done that wrong, but if I do this this and that then I'll be right."

The whole reason God gave all his commands was to show people "These are my standards, you can't live up to them." Then when they realise they can't do anything to save themselves then they turn to God and say "I am nothing, you are everything. I cant do this, you can."

Yet because he gave those commandments the Jews, over time, felt as though they got pretty good at doing what God had commanded. But it doesnt matter how good they were at keeping the commandments, they still fell short of God's perfection.

I cannot kill someone, but I can hate them all the same. By not killing them, I have not broken the command, but by hating them I have cemented the fact that I am not God because God cannot hate.

A command is good. But to understand the reasoning behind following the command allows it to be applied even better.

Think of it like this: Why do you think God would say "Thou shalt not kill"? I'm sure you could think of heaps of reasons. Now follow the command because of one of those reasons. I'm quite sure you could not kill anyone because of that one reason. BUT how do you know that is God's reason for giving the command? You don't and because of this your ability to follow the law correctly is diminished.

Now think "If God could tell me his reason for saying this, what would it be?" And there would be only one answer. It is the only true answer. Your guesses from before might have had some elements in common, but they were nowhere near God's reason. Now you understand why God gave the command, how much better would you be able to follow it?!

That is why the New Testament is like that.

OT: God said in the law "Thou shalt not kill".
NT: And why did he say that? Because you kill someone when you hate them. This flaw in you is as detestable as murder to him because you are not perfect! So what action do I take now I know God will not tolerate my imperfection? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. How can I do that? You can't, but God can. Seek God.

When you seek God, you will find Him and you will know how imperfect you are. When you ask God to make you righteous, he will make you righteous. When you knock on his door, he will welcome you home.

Does this make the law redundant? I mean if God cant stand that I hate, do I still have the same obligation to follow the "Do not kill" law? Heck yes. You should follow it to the extent of not hating ANYONE. Is that humanly possible? NO! But God has given you his Spirit, and with God all things are possible. If you hate, repent and try again.

When you know the reason behind God giving his commands, and God's reason cannot be corrupted, then you are under the obligation to follow them using that reasoning. That is why the bible is not a set of rules to follow. It is a relationship to live.

 

[StGeorgeDragons]

The gospel is very interesting. 4 versions of the same story. Why would we need this? we could have one story which can include everything in it.
Im sure there is 4 versions for a reason. Has anyone out there come up with a reason. The 4 versions show some evidence to me of the life of Jesus, as it is documented by 4 men, we can see there stories are different, but in the end they all show Jesus' life and give the same message.

 

[volition]

When we say 'theist', we typically mean someone who believes in God, so 'theist' includes Christians and Muslims (for arguments sake). Now in your response you talked about how God guides his believers through the spirit.

Although you did address how differing beliefs could exist, in doing that you somewhat 'equalised' the probability of Christians reading from the bible and being right with the 'chance' that the Muslims reading from the Quran are right. In effect, for me to believe you, I would also have to be prepared to believe the Muslims because they also claim to be 'guided by god'.

Now, given that there are some factions of Islam that would kill women who have been raped (this might be an extremist example, but it's still valid because they claim to be 'guided by god'), it comes from the same authority that you have. Why should I believe what you believe and NOT what they believe?

 

[withoutaface]

The gospel is very interesting. 4 versions of the same story. Why would we need this? we could have one story which can include everything in it.
Im sure there is 4 versions for a reason. Has anyone out there come up with a reason. The 4 versions show some evidence to me of the life of Jesus, as it is documented by 4 men, we can see there stories are different, but in the end they all show Jesus' life and give the same message.

You do know that the other three all used Mark for reference, don't you?

 

[Bookie]

fuckin hell, be hindu. then youd all stop complaining

Eru > Ainur > Maia > you little fucks.

 

[malkin86]

The gospel is very interesting. 4 versions of the same story. Why would we need this? we could have one story which can include everything in it.
Im sure there is 4 versions for a reason. Has anyone out there come up with a reason. The 4 versions show some evidence to me of the life of Jesus, as it is documented by 4 men, we can see there stories are different, but in the end they all show Jesus' life and give the same message.

They were written for different emphasises (and different audiences).

According to Wikipedia:

Matthew showed Jesus as fulfilling the prophecies. (not only miracle prophecies - just confirming that Jesus was who he said he was)
Mark showed Jesus as miraculous.
Luke was for gentiles
John had more mystical stuff about what we now call the Trinity

 

[Lundy]

Jesus said He was...so either He was... or He was completely insane...

There have been many "messiahs" throughout history. Some of those those whose followers claimed they could perform miracles and would even rise from the dead. Sound familiar?

 

[rego2]

So many post and suggestion.. i cant be bothered reading it all... can someone make a poll? just a Simple Yes or No :rofl: i really want to see the statistic.

 

[StGeorgeDragons]

the 4 gospels provide evidence of the life of Jesus, the events concerning Jesus did happen. Find God through Jesus. Everyone is physically trying to prove God, this isnt going to work. After all this is why Jesus came, so you can all find God.


(ps i havnt been to church since christmas, so im not some radical religion guy)