The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty 2596 Replies latest jw experiences

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  jgnat

  I've started a Jesus helpful thread.
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  OnTheWayOut

  I bet God calms a dozen tsunamis a day without taking any credit for it. Probably prevents hundreds of tornadoes a day and a couple of earthquakes a month. But sometimes, he's probably sitting on the toilet and takes a break and lets one slip by.

  That's about all I can figure from people that insist that God is only great and wonderful and never responsible for delivering any type of "evil" upon people. Have they read their own Bibles?
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  EdenOne

  doofdaddy:

  So could you pleaes clarify this point? god does not provide his holy spirit to you in any shape, form or manner??

  I don't have any more holy spirit than any other Christian who asks God for it. I don't have "special knowledge" nor "special insight", nor does God or Christ come speak to me, nor do I have dreams and revelations. When I ask God for holy spirit, is to let me be guided by His spirit, namely, to understand the Scriptures, and then let my conclusions be guided by that, so I can acquire wisdom to guide my actions. There's nothing miraculously supernatural about it, I think.

  What I believe the spirit has enabled me is to see through the deception perpetrated by the "organization" in doctrinal terms. What I do, I suppose that anyone can do also.

  Eden
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  adamah

  EdenOne said- What I believe the spirit has enabled me is to see through the deception perpetrated by the "organization" in doctrinal terms.

  A goal which could easily and more-effectively be met sans any Holy Spirit, simply by studying contemporary logic and rhetoric, such as THIS EXCELLENT and practical textbook used in many college courses (and notice there's a preview available on the page):

  http://books.google.com/books/about/Logic_and_Contemporary_Rhetoric_The_Use.html?id=_IIVhDlcCy4C

  OR, one could simply continue to pray (which is ALOT easier, actually accomplishes nothing, but only allows for one to experience the illusion of telling yourself you're taking action when you're actually doing nothing but taking the lazy way out and making excuses for it).

  Adam
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  cofty

  Hi Eden. When you get a minute...
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  caliber

  That's about all I can figure from people that insist that God is only great and wonderful and never responsible for delivering any type of "evil" upon people. Have they read their own Bibles ~~~ Onthewayout

  You obviously haven't bothered to read the thread.

  Earthquakes happen because plates get stuck, plate tectonics do not require earthquakes. Your god is a buffoon.

  You STILL haven't explained how the 250 000 deaths is linked to human choice. ~~ cofty

  How many times on this thread has cofty hammered home on this point ?

  The point is Cofty ( who by the way has a perfect right to do so, ) wants the focus on this one event

  Sodom and Gomorah for example would be "off topic ?"
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  cofty

  Yes Caliber the topic is "natural evil".

  So far it seems to be an intractable problem for theism.
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  caliber

  There are so called "natural disasters" like S&G that God does take responsibly for... Cofty ethic's

  required that he be responsible for all of them .

  Isaiah 55:8-9

  New International Version (NIV)

  8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
  neither are your ways my ways,”
  declares the Lord .
  9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
  so are my ways higher than your ways
  and my thoughts than your thoughts

  Cofty does not accept the Bible as the word of God so it means nothing to him however...

  He insists christians must break their faith or acceptance of this as fact ( scripture above ) and give him an answer ..then he calls then excuses

  I don't have "special knowledge" nor "special insight", nor does God or Christ come speak to me, nor do I have dreams and revelations ~~EdenOne

  Do you insist also that as Christians , God must give special knowledge to some above and beyond ? Yet you condemn poeple like Tec who feel that messages are received from God for christians ....so which is it you want ?

  Why can't the answer be ? we don't know or understand at this time ? ( I think you called this a non-answer )
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  cofty

  Of course it is a non-answer.

  Christians make so many grandiose claims of knowledge about god. They claim to know all sorts of things about his personality and his likes and dislikes. They claim to know what he thinks about every topic imaginable, right down to what he does and doesn't like humans to do naked.

  Then when you take three of their own claims about god - he is knowing, powerful and loving - and ask them to reconcile these with reality, they want to be allowed to take refuge in inscrutablity.

  This is thoroughly dishonest, special pleading and no reasonable person is buying it.
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  confusedandalone

  Not to derail this thread but it seems to really be tiresome to even try to understand the diehard Christian mentality. I was also a Christian obviously, but there were things that I can admit that I IGNORED or just REFUSED to ponder because I could not have an answer to these things and did not want to believe that god would allow them to happen.

  I could never successfully defend any questions because when trying to explain or rationalize gods evil and inadequate means of handling things a person sounds ridiculous. There just isn't a reason that a god who cares about what he creates would allow them to be destroyed in random natural disasters. Why would he even need to or allow natural disasters to take place? It is just ridiculous. He has a plan for the earth but lets llowly humans derail or delay those plans??? The individual who sets the laws of gravity etc... can't create an earth that can exist without these things happening???