He sent messengers to announce his arrival in advance.
You don't have to listen.
But you can't say he didn't let you know he was on the way.
What evidence is there for a biblical jesus?
by Touchofgrey 189 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Rivergang
And that your imaginary friend has a imaginary sword doesn't bother me either.
Very well said!
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TonusOH
FreeTheMasons: But you can't say he didn't let you know he was on the way.
People have been warning us that Jesus's arrival is imminent for the past two thousand years. With few exceptions, those warnings have had the expectation that the event would happen within the lifetime of those who first heard them. Those warnings continue to this day; I spent decades spreading this warning from door-to-door myself! I spent all of those years hearing (and believing) people say that the end was so close, that it might be any day now. My mother was convinced it would happen before the end of the 70s. Then the 80s. Then the 90s. She is convinced it will happen before the end of the 2020s.
The problem isn't that we haven't been warned. The problem is that we are constantly promised that he will arrive very, very soon. That his appearance is imminent. That it's closer than we think. That it may already be too late!!! When we point out that this has been going on for centuries, we are told that god works on a different timeline, and he is patient, and so on. It's a steady diet of "Jesus will return tomorrow, count on it" sprinkled with "don't be so impatient" when people start to get tired of it.
In any other facet of your life, you would recognize this as the classic "boy who cried wolf" scenario and ask people to stop wasting everyone's time. But this is religious belief, and the potential stakes are so high that behavior that we would otherwise dismiss becomes compelling. Think about how long these warnings have been made, how frequently they are made, the nature of these promises, and the fact that nothing ever happens.
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Halcon
Touchofgrey - is there any independently verified evidence that a miracle worker called jesus existed and did the things that the bible said he did?
It's the wrong question. You are confusing Jesus with something like Bigfoot.
You ask this question because you assume that only physical and tangible things are real, ignoring the fact that a person's mind and emotions are just as real as their flesh and blood. The concept of Jesus has nothing to do with a physical man that may have been independently verified by other people or not. It has everything to do with how Jesus moves and motivates the heart and mind of a person.
If a bonafide independently verified photograph and accompanying report was produced on Jesus people would simply keep debating the next point on him.
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Jeffro
Halcon:
You ask this question because you assume that only physical and tangible things are real, ignoring the fact that a person's mind and emotions are just as real as their flesh and blood. The concept of Jesus has nothing to do with a physical man that may have been independently verified by other people or not.
A tedious false equivalence. The problem (for the apologist) is that “mind and emotions” are contingent on ‘flesh and blood’ and can’t be demonstrated to exist independently of them. So the claim that Jesus “has nothing to do with a physical man” only further demonstrates that it is a delusion.
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peacefulpete
I agree with Halcon, that religious 'truth' is not hinged upon the tangible. For some of us, that's a deal breaker, for others it elevates the faith. Since I'm not the arbiter of what is a real religion, I can't argue the point. I can, and we have, argued whether the Jesus story as it appears in the relatively late Gospels can be defended with tangible evidence and the answer is, no.
It's a foreign field to die upon, historicity. In the earliest years of Christianity, knowledge (gnosis) and mystery took center place. Now it seems obsessed with shrouds and stone bone boxes.
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Halcon
The problem (for the apologist) is that “mind and emotions” are contingent on ‘flesh and blood’ and can’t be demonstrated to exist independently of them.
Dependent is not the same as equivalent.
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FreeTheMasons
There are some people born blind and deaf. They never see anything and never hear anything, and yet they still can learn that sound and sight exist without personally experiencing "evidence" in the way a seeing and hearing person does.
Jesus taught through illustrations for a reason.
The Bible says there would be a new covenant with laws written on hearts.
The heart of a person is in a place you and I cannot see. We can only see what comes out of the heart through a person's mouth or action.
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FreeTheMasons
Jesus has sent messengers ahead of his arrival to announce freedom to the prisoners, that he is coming to heal the blind and deaf.
He is on the way, children.
You've been sitting in the dark for so long. The night will end in time. The day is coming, and the skies will open up with light.
Jesus did not forget you.
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Simon
The closer you get to when he supposedly lived, the fewer mentions there are of him. They begin at least 100 years after his claimed life.
He's an invention, nothing more. Every claim is a fabrication from unreliable sources that were then built upon to create the myth.