The bible

Frank Apisa said:
There was a period of my life when I went to church EVERY DAY. I decided that I wanted to become a priest. (I decided the vocation was not for me...and, thankfully, gave up the idea.)

You claim to have been chosen by the Holy Spirit for an epiphany.

How do you know you are not deluding yourself?

Why does you god not choose everyone?

Not enough room in Heaven?

Why?
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Those are questions for God,I haven't a clue why I was chosen.
 
Defender of Honor said:
Again you listen and follow what organized religion says.
And completely ignore the words of Jesus.
This is why you live in spiritual babble.
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We don't have the words of Jesus.

We have the words of men who were interpreting Jesus decades after he was executed.

There is a clear chronological interpretation of Christology, moving backwards in time:

At the end of the first century John is the only Gospel which claims Jesus is coequal and coeternal with God.

Earlier, Mathew and Luke seem to claim Jesus became son of God at birth, but he was not coeternal with God.

The earliest gospel Mark makes no mention of a miraculous Virgin birth, and Mark seems unaware of it. Mark's interpretation is that Jesus became son of God at his baptism by John.

Son of God in a Jewish context is a human who is adopted by God and infused with divine favor. But they are not God themselves, nor coeternal with God.

The pre-literary Christian tradition which Paul seems to quote in Romans, is that Jesus was only made son of God upon his exhalation after the resurrection.

As far as I know, in the synoptic Gospels Jesus never refers to himself as God, and certainly never says he is coequal and coeternal with God.

The concept of the Trinity only seems obvious to us two thousand years later, because that's what a bunch of men decided in the fourth century.

But if history is carefully studied earnestly, it is obvious that in early Christianity there was a considerable range of views of the nature of Jesus' humanity and divinity
 
Cypress said:
We don't have the words of Jesus.

We have the words of men who were interpreting Jesus decades after he was executed.

There is a clear chronological interpretation of Christology, moving backwards in time:

At the end of the first century John is the only Gospel which claims Jesus is coequal and coeternal with God.

Earlier, Mathew and Luke seem to claim Jesus became son of God at birth, but he was not coeternal with God.

The earliest gospel Mark makes no mention of a miraculous Virgin birth, and Mark seems unaware of it. Mark's interpretation is that Jesus became son of God at his baptism by John.

Son of God in a Jewish context is a human who is adopted by God and infused with divine favor. But they are not God themselves, nor coeternal with God.

The pre-literary Christian tradition which Paul seems to quote in Romans, is that Jesus was only made son of God upon his exhalation after the resurrection.

As far as I know, in the synoptic Gospels Jesus never refers to himself as God, and certainly never says he is coequal and coeternal with God.

The concept of the Trinity only seems obvious to us two thousand years later, because that's what a bunch of men decided in the fourth century.

But if history is carefully studied earnestly, it is obvious that in early Christianity there was a considerable range of views of the nature of Jesus' humanity and divinity
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It's impossible to reach you,you're blocking any and all evidence that Jesus was exactly who he said he was.
"Before Abraham I AM"
I AM is the name God told Moses his name was.
 
Defender of Honor said:
It's impossible to reach you,you're blocking any and all evidence that Jesus was exactly who he said he was.
"Before Abraham I AM"
I AM is the name God told Moses his name was.
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You have to cherry pick from the Gospel of John to reach that conclusion.

I look at the whole literary record.

I would be foolish to try to understand Albert Einstein by only knowing about or cherry picking one paper of his on the photoelectric effect.
 
Defender of Honor said:
It's impossible to reach you,you're blocking any and all evidence that Jesus was exactly who he said he was.
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Many come in his name... well, you know the rest.

There are always folks around to tell us that they have the REAL TRUTH [sup]tm[/sup]. They are a dime a dozen. They tell everyone they got the inside track from the Big Man Himself.
 
Perry Phimosis said:
You seem to only thrive when you can oversimplify a point.

Before Nicaea there were a wide variety of ways in which different Christian churches saw Jesus in relation to God.

Some saw him as a DIVINE BEING but not the same as God. Some saw him as a lesser-god type. Some saw him as only an inspired fully human man.




But they weren't heretics until one group decided that anyone who disagreed with THEM was going to be chucked out of the church. That process of developing and agreeing on what was the actual faith took CENTURIES.




Not necessarily true. But it would require you to read a LOT more Church documents throughout it's history.

While I understand you are not a Catholic (that's the "wrong type of Christianity") but if you were to read through say "The Catholic Encyclopedia" from the 1920's (HERE) you can learn a LOT more about the various councils, their history and the various creeds that were established over centuries which ultimately became standard Christianity.

Then you can read up on the history of Protestantism and how it attempted to break a lot of that in the 17th century. Then you can read up on how YOUR SECT was founded probably some time in the 1800's in the US (I am guessing here because I don't know what sect you are a member of).

Just know that what YOU think is "eternal truth" wasn't really arrived at 2022 years ago. It took centuries and centuries to come to you in its current form.
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I don't have a problem with people believing the post-4th century church teaching on the Trinity.

But it requires intellectual honesty and a historical education to recognize that the practicing christians who lived closest in time to Jesus had various divergent interpretations about his humanity and divinity.
 
Frank Apisa said:
You are so wrong it seems unfair to call it "wrong." "Absurdly wrong" might do.
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... the typical response from someone who is being intellectually spanked...

Frank Apisa said:
I do not "believe" the Christian god (whatever that is) DOES exist... and I do not "believe" the Christian god DOES NOT exist. I have absolutely no idea if ANY gods exist...
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For someone who claims to be an "agnostic" (an atheist before the word atheist was hijacked), you sure do seem to "have it in" for the Christian God, meaning that you seem to care about, as you phrased it, "putting him in a horrible light" even though you are claiming here to be unsure whether or not he exists. Why do you care so much about something that you claim to be uncertain about?

Frank Apisa said:
and neither do you.
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I can't prove Christianity to be true/false (as it can only logically be accepted/rejected on a faith basis), but I "know in my heart" (iow I have strong faith) that the Christian God exists. I pray to him in Jesus' name and he hears/answers my prayers. I study his Word, and his Word "speaks to me" through said study. I can't prove the Christian God's existence, but I know (via faith) that he exists.

Frank Apisa said:
You choose to blindly guess that at least one god exists...
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I have faith that God exists. That faith is not "blind". It is very evidenced, actually.

Frank Apisa said:
and you choose to further guess that the god you blindly guess exists
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... not blindly. It is very evidenced.

Frank Apisa said:
is accurately described in the Bible.
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Yes, I believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God.

Frank Apisa said:
If the god you blindly guess actually exists...
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... not "blindly"... there is much evidence for his existence.

Frank Apisa said:
you and I are in for a rather uncomfortable eternity,
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Speak for yourself.

As for me, I am confident that my eternity will be quite comfortable, thanks to the gifted salvation through Jesus's perfect life that he lived in order to save me from my sinful nature.

Frank Apisa said:
because there is no way either of us will ever meet the required standards of that god for avoiding that fate.
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Correct, hence the necessity for Christ Jesus and his perfect life and sacrificial death on the cross. Through his perfect life and sacrificial death, the price for my sins has been paid for. Through his perfect life and sacrificial death, my sins have been forgiven.

Frank Apisa said:
If "avoiding that fate" is what you aiming for when you use the term salvation...you are fools.
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Nah. I HIGHLY suggest that you read through the book of Romans and learn what it means. It explains in great detail why Jesus was necessary. It answers the question that you are supposedly seeking the answer to (although you've admitted that you already have your own answer to that question).

Frank Apisa said:
I have read Romans.
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It is obvious to me that you haven't.

Frank Apisa said:
Romans does not answer the question I asked...
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Yes, it does.

Frank Apisa said:
and you, as usual, have just been evading the question.
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I told you where the answer is. Read Romans.

Frank Apisa said:
You are a silly person, gfm...a pompous, arrogant ass doing the silly walk of John Cleese...and supposing you look classy and intelligent while doing so.

But you are entertaining...and for that, I thank you.

winking-face.png
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Your issues, not mine. Read Romans.
 
Frank Apisa said:
Obviously you may be deluding yourself, DoH.

It is OBVIOUSLY that you MAY be deluding yourself.

Even you should see that.
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So according to you one night out of the clear blue me someone who could careless about religion, than for the next two years learned about Passover and how it relates to the cross and the second coming Without any books or teachers! Where did the information come from?
 
Cypress said:
You have to cherry pick from the Gospel of John to reach that conclusion.

I look at the whole literary record.

I would be foolish to try to understand Albert Einstein by only knowing about or cherry picking one paper of his on the photoelectric effect.
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I spent two years learning from the Holy Spirit before getting a Bible.
So much for your "cherry picking" theory.
 
Defender of Honor said:
So according to you one night out of the clear blue me someone who could careless about religion, than for the next two years learned about Passover and how it relates to the cross and the second coming Without any books or teachers! Where did the information come from?
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Obviously it came from somewhere, DoH.

So you say you learned about Passover (and how it relates to the cross)...and "the second coming"...without any books or teachers!

You didn't learn about those things. You took them on as truths for some reason, even though there is no way to do so logically. Why you took them on as truths? I have no idea. You may have had mortality frights of some kind...and decided that the Holy Spirit was going to cause an epiphany in you.

Matters not.

BOTTOM LINE: Your supposed epiphany MAY be a delusion. For you to suggest there is no chance it is...is an absurdity.

If it is important to you to insist that your blind guess that a god exists (a particular god, at that) IS CORRECT...and that you are now favored by "The Holy Spirit"...do so. If it makes your life more fulfilling...YOU SHOULD CONTINUE WITH THOSE THOUGHTS.

But if you are going to come into an Internet forum and discuss them...understand that they are going to be questioned.

And if you INSIST that your blind guess HAS TO BE CORRECT...that there is no chance that your supposed epiphany at the hands of a holy spirit is a delusion...you will PROPERLY be laughed at.

If you want to keep going...fine. I'm here.
 
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