by Norm 103 Replies latest jw friends
You know, Mike, your defense of your beliefs would be a lot more believable if you actually dealt with solid refutations such I posted and you've ignored. You can't hide behind "I'm not out to convince those who don't want to believe." The refutations stand, whether you deal with them or not. Failing to deal with them only proves to unbelievers that Christians are to a large extent blind believers.
AlanF
As a side thought - this discussion is highly interesting to those, like myself, who don't know what they believe about God. We just know we don't believe the WTBTS's concept of God anymore.
I've found this entire thread fascinating, in a deep sort of way. If aChristian, aka Mike, and RR don't continue - what are ones like myself to think? I've stayed out of this conversation because it was already good and the thoughts were building quite nicely without me.
But if it stops abruptly - then ones like me will ask why? Who cannot defend their position?
waiting
Java,
I do not believe the Bible teaches that God is "omini-benevolent" toward all His creations. It only teaches that God has a very great love for mankind.
So far as God loving sparrows goes, I don't see that Jesus taught such a thing. He asked, "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows." (Matt. 10:29-31) To me, this passage indicates that it is actually the will of God that sparrows die. Jesus' point was that God is all-knowing. So all-knowing that He is even aware of the death of every sparrow, even though sparrows mean very little to Him. Jesus' words convey the thought that because God is fully aware of everything, even the deaths of sparrows which He cares for far less than he does humans, He will certainly not forget any of us. I believe Jesus' words here indicate that, though God is all-knowing when it comes to sparrows, He is not all-loving when it comes to sparrows.
Jesus also spoke of sparrows in Luke 12:6,7. There he asked, "Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows." Again, his words here, "not one of them is forgotten by God," only indicate God's being all-knowing when it comes to sparrows, not His being all-loving towards sparrows.
These things being so, I do not believe it is accurate to say that the reality of what takes place in the animal kingdom is inconsistent with what the Bible has to say about God's love.
Mike
Alan,
You wrote: Your defense of your beliefs would be a lot more believable if you actually dealt with solid refutations such I posted and you've ignored. You can't hide behind "I'm not out to convince those who don't want to believe." The refutations stand, whether you deal with them or not. Failing to deal with them only proves to unbelievers that Christians are to a large extent blind believers.
I believe you have made only one previous post to this thread, which I immediately answered almost line by line. In my reply to you I never said anything like, "I'm not out to convince those who don't want to believe." Maybe you missed my reply. Or maybe you didn't like my answers to your objections. But to say I "ignored" your "solid refutations" is untrue.
I guess I will leave it to lurkers like Waiting to decide if I "ignored" any of your "solid refutations." If you or they will point out which ones I may have missed I'll be glad to respond to them. Right now I don't think I "ignored" any of your objections. Neither do I think that any of them were "solid." But again, that's something for the lurkers to decide.
aC:
Hey buddy.
What is your view of the homosexual sex that African Gorillas sometimes share amongst each other? (male and female)
BTW, If you want references, I can't give them to you, as I saw it on the Discovery Channel.
Hello Optimist,
(I assume that since you have now reversed your acronym for I Am Not An Optimist you must now be an optimist. :) )
You asked: What is your view of the homosexual sex that African Gorillas sometimes share amongst each other? (male and female)
Though this seems to be a topic for another thread, I'll try to answer you briefly and hope my doing so does not turn this thread into a debate on homosexuality. Some people point to such behavior among animals to prove homosexuality is "natural." And they say that since it is natural - created by God - it can't be wrong. There is, however, a problem with this logic.
First of all, there is no such thing as right and wrong for animals. God has not told animals how He expects them to behave. Second, we must remember that even if homosexual behavior does come "natural" to some people that does not make it right. A desire for multiple heterosexual partners seems to come "natural" to many people. But the God of the Bible says that following such "natural" impulses is wrong. I could here list many apparently "natural" desires and "animal instincts" people have which the God of the Bible tells us are not right for us to give in to. He expects people to behave better than animals. He has also promised to give Christians power to help them do so.
My point is that just because a certain type of behavior seems to come "natural" to animals, or even to people for that matter, does not make it right.
Mike
Hello, all!
I, like waiting, am finding this thread very interesting, indeed Am rethinking everything about my faith and have to agree with both aChristian and JAVA that the Bible does NOT proclaim an ALL-benevolent God, which could explain much and refute some of JanH's claims.
Alan F, I do think aChristian answered your post. If there were some items important to you that he missed in rebuttal, perhaps you could restate those?
You all have really got me THINKING -- which is something I am unaccustomed to doing, having just left the Borg. There is much that I just accept as "truth" because of my conditioning even pre-Borg, growing up in a WASP family in a small town where there were Protestants, Catholics and Jews and NO other religions to speak of.
Now, I've already come to the conclusion that the Greek Scriptures were early on corrupted to "fit" the predominant Christian thinking as it evolved. Yet, living a Christ-like existence is a very fine thing. Which, I believe, is why Jesus is having an effect on people 2,000 years later.
Jehovah's requirements of bans -- total annihilation of complete cities; human sacrifices, if you will -- is hard to reconcile with the Loving Father who sent His beloved Son to die for our sins (more blood). Yet the argument that He gave all life and thus can take it away and that He also offers mankind the gift of a better, eternal, spirit? life can resonate if we don't have the idea that because God is good/love that He is ONLY good and loving or good and loving all the time.
So much to ponder! (and now that I'm not going to 5 meetings a week and preparing for them, I have the time!
outnfree
aChristian,
Luke 12:6,7. There he asked, "Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows." Again, his words here, "not one of them is forgotten by God," only indicate God's being all-knowing when it comes to sparrows, not His being all-loving towards sparrows.
You're right, it seems God shows little love for sparrows if he is the creator of sparrows and hawks. However, I think others might disagree with your interpretation of "not one of them is forgotten by God" as only meaning God is "all-knowing." When visiting someone in the hospital I often say, "I'll be thinking of you." That doesn't mean I'm all-knowing; it means I care for them, love them, and wish them well.
I do not believe the Bible teaches that God is "omini-benevolent" toward all His creations. It only teaches that God has a very great love for mankind.
Well, the biblical God has a bizarre way of showing "very great love for mankind" if you're at the wrong place at the wrong time. For example, lets say I lived in Egypt, and I was the first born to Egyptian parents when God decided to murder me for the crime of being first born. As first born, I likely had nothing to do with the political and religious happenings in that part of the world, and of course the all-knowing God knew that. God's "great love for mankind" reached beyond the front door of my parents home and murdered me as if I was food for hawks. We call that genocide today, Mike.
Java,
You speak of God "murdering" people. However, as I indicated earlier in this thread, such a charge is without merit. Murder is the unlawful taking of human life. God's law says human beings are not permitted to take the lives of fellow human beings. But what is wrong for us is not necessarily wrong for God. We can tell our children that they are not allowed to cross the street. That does not make it wrong for us to cross the street. Though it is wrong for people to take the lives of other people, it is not wrong for God to take people's lives. God gave all of us our lives and has reserved the right to take our lives at any time He chooses.
Christians trust God. Though, we do not always fully understand all of God's ways, we believe that any time God has ever taken a life He has done so for a righteous purpose. And, as I said earlier in this thread, we should also keep in mind that Jesus Christ told us that everyone who has ever lived and died will be brought back to life by God. (John 5:28,29) That being the case, God has never really taken the life of anyone. He has only interrupted their lives.
aChristian,
We can tell our children that they are not allowed to cross the street. That does not make it wrong for us to cross the street.
If Hitler stood before a court of law for the atrocities of murdering killing the first born of an entire nation because he wanted to show how all-powerful he was, most of us would see that as the worst crime committed by any person. However, you're saying God can do the same thing and it's not a crime. The all-loving God can do despicable things, and it's dismissed by Christians with less than a jaywalking ticket!
A crime is never a crime if God does it because He can fix it, is the other argument. He gives life, and as the giver of life, God cannot be accused of killing or murder. I'll remind the judge living two doors from me that a mother can never be accused of killing her children because she gave them life. I'm sure he'll see the error of his ways.
However, the mother could use the argument "I can replace the kids I killed with other kids." It's a little like robbing a bank and returning the money the next day for a reduced sentence. That might work if you're God, but humans are held to a higher standard.
The argument that God can kill but it's okay because He can bring the person back to life is based on fantasy. Yes, I know scripture speaks of such things, but the fact is this; God has not demonstrated to anyone reading this post that He can do that or that He is interested in doing that. Just because someone wrote about it, and years later someone else called it a holy book, doesn't make the stuff written true. The fact is, none of us has ever witnessed someone raised from the dead. If Hilter said, "I'll resurrect the 6,000,000 people I killed in the New System a few thousand years from now"--I don't think anyone would buy his lunacy.
Bottom line Mike; I'm not trying to prove God doesn't exist, that is not my responsibility or goal in life. I'm an Agnostic, not because I don't want to believe--I'm an Agnostic because believers give me little reason to believe.
