Figuring Out Religion

[moda0306]

Xan,

That helps a ton.

Thanks.

However, aren't there plenty of denominations of Christianity that DO tell you that you have to behave a certain way, or, at the very least, if you DON'T behave a certain way, you must confess your sins to God or a Priest? 

I really never got the impression that Christianity was different in that way.  I knew "forgiveness" was a mechanism inside of it, but I always thought this "forgiveness" came at a cost of repentance.  Which is a behavior to get to heaven, is it not?

And isn't it convenient in a different way to say, "Hey, no matter what you've done, just come to us and say you're sorry, and continue to apologize to us for what you do wrong, and you'll go to heaven?"

That seems awful convenient to me as well.

[Xan]

Shoestring,

Thanks for your help!  :-)


Moda,

I wouldn't say that repentance is a work that earns redemption; I'd say it's a result of hearing what God expects, and what He's done for you as a result of your falling short.

Repentence (literally, "turning away") is a matter of being turned from being self-focus to looking at God.  Which is all part and parcel of trusting Him for your salvation.  The result is that you WANT to do the right thing.

I'm sorry I haven't been able to read everything here and answer all the questions.  To a lot of them, the answer is that I don't know, and I can't prove it to you.  And there are paradoxes here.  But that's true in a lot of areas of life.

[Pointedstick]

I have tried to become religious several times in my life but can never seem to make it. Whenever I ask religious friends for help, they tell me these nice stories and make all sorts of assertions about what their religion says on the matter, but can never seem to avoid doing so in a self-referential manner; that is to say, for a reason that isn't some permutation of "because my holy book says so" or "because God told me or my minister/priest/pastor/rabbi/etc".

I see it happening right now as Xan is answering moda's questions in ways that presuppose belief in the religion that moda is asking about. It feels like the believers and the non-believers are speaking different languages, and even if they like each other and are being civil, there's just this fundamental miscommunication. Believers want to think in terms of their religion while non-believers are trying to understand the religion in terms of things wholly outside of it.

It doesn't seem like this works. You can no more prove or disprove a religion in a non-religions manner than you could explain a religion using examples from itself to someone who doesn't believe it.


The jump of faith required to believe these stories in the absence of outside evidence, or in the face of contradictory evidence or alternative religions that say other things is just something I don't feel like I'm capable of doing. And sometimes it makes me sad, because I know a lot of really happy religious people, and I think I'll never understand what makes them so happy or be able to experience it myself.

[Mountaineer]

Xan and shoestring are far more eloquent than I.  So, with that in mind, it would help me help you (i.e. give my perspective) if each of the questioners (MT, moda306, dual stow, etc.) would pose the ONE question that is of most value to them.  That way I can maybe take small bites at a time and we can go down the list from there.  I understand there are a plethora of questions and once one starts to think about them they just roll forth; at least it was that way with me.  Anyway, I'll try to share as best I can.

I'll start with one small one that seems to be about Biblical things that happened "thousands and thousands" of years ago and don't seem to make sense and jive with science.

According to Scripture, the fall (a behavior of doubting God?) and subsequent curse (the consequence of that behavior) resulted in all creation being cursed by God; that means people, animals, the earth, and the universe itself.  If you can believe that, then that means that all testing methods available to us including C14 dating, etc. is subject to error.  Of course, the presupposition I'm holding is that of Biblical inerrancy with the Scripture being interpreted in context - no verse cherry picking.  Immediately after the curse, God also gave a promise.  That promise was fulfilled in Jesus defeating sin and death.  The promise is also ours.  I expect this will add some more things to discuss and question.

.... Mountaineer

[Pointedstick]

According to Scripture, the fall (a behavior of doubting God?) and subsequent curse (the consequence of that behavior) resulted in all creation being cursed by God; that means people, animals, the earth, and the universe itself.  If you can believe that, then that means that all testing methods available to us including C14 dating, etc. is subject to error.  Of course, the presupposition I'm holding is that of Biblical inerrancy with the Scripture being interpreted in context - no verse cherry picking.  Immediately after the curse, God also gave a promise.  That promise was fulfilled in Jesus defeating sin and death.  The promise is also ours.  I expect this will add some more things to discuss and question.

.... Mountaineer

My question would be, "how do I know any of that is true and not just a nice made-up story?" And I fully understand that my very asking of this question means that I am not in the proper mindset to understand a religion. But religious explanations that stand on the pillars of other religious explanations aren't very satisfying to the non-believer.

[Xan]

PS, I think that's a pretty spot-on analysis of the situation.  I'm not sure how I would go about explaining it in terms of things wholly outside of it, as you eloquently put it.  I doubt it's possible.

But, can anyone explain the universe (or indeed, even one single thing about the universe) in terms of things wholly outside of it?

[ns2]

For anyone trying to approach Christianity intellectually I would recommend C.S. Lewis. His own conversion story is interesting. One day he walked to the zoo and when he left he didn't believe in Christ but when he returned he did, and he didn't really have much of an explanation for how that happened. He just knew he did.

[Kshartle]

Xan,

I respect the heck out of you for coming to my rhetorical aid as a Communist Atheist Redistributionist Statist Fascist

You left out socialist puppy-killer.

J/K

[Kshartle]

But this seems awful similar to my Private Property debates with Kshartle where he just KNOWS that there is this fundamental right of self-ownership, and that it transfers very simply to the world around us, that animals have NONE of it, etc, etc.

The difference is I don't just "know" it. I don't just say it's right because I "know" it, I don't take it on faith either. It's logical deduction. The argument against self-ownership can't be made without falsehoods and contradictions as far as I've ever seen. I approach it from multiple angles and that's just another one, the obvious impossibility of arguing that humans don't own themselves. Not trying to re-start that one over here, but the belief in God is very very different from the arguments I've made for the existance of property rights and self-ownership. I take none of the latter on faith of anykind.

Even if my arguments suck /-\55, they are never based on faith. To me that is the lack of basis for belief.

I think I discussed that some with MT, that I don't think anyone believes something just because they believe it. There is another reason they hold the beliefs. It makes their life easier in some way. They don't have to question the way they were brought up, it makes them feel better, the belief alters their behavior and improves their lives etc. etc. So many possible reasons, and this is speaking as a Catholic turned evangelical. I'm not saying that my "conversion" to atheisim is evidence of anything. That's a false argument known as "Statement of conversion". That one is occasional used here. "I used to believe that money printing was inflationary and now I know better....." My point is I know a lot of believers and they have many different reasons, the act of believing though is not one of them. Again it's like saying "I ran to the store because I was running to the store".

I know I still need to weigh in on the (non existant imo) "moral dilema" of property ownership. This were getting too heated and personal so I needed a break. The high standard Xan set where I need to be able to perfectly explain every detail so that every can have the perfectly same understanding without exceptions kind of sapped my strength since it's an impossible standard. I'll get to it now that I've re-charged some.

[Mountaineer]

According to Scripture, the fall (a behavior of doubting God?) and subsequent curse (the consequence of that behavior) resulted in all creation being cursed by God; that means people, animals, the earth, and the universe itself.  If you can believe that, then that means that all testing methods available to us including C14 dating, etc. is subject to error.  Of course, the presupposition I'm holding is that of Biblical inerrancy with the Scripture being interpreted in context - no verse cherry picking.  Immediately after the curse, God also gave a promise.  That promise was fulfilled in Jesus defeating sin and death.  The promise is also ours.  I expect this will add some more things to discuss and question.

.... Mountaineer

My question would be, "how do I know any of that is true and not just a nice made-up story?" And I fully understand that my very asking of this question means that I am not in the proper mindset to understand a religion. But religious explanations that stand on the pillars of other religious explanations aren't very satisfying to the non-believer.

PS

I also understand your questioning - I think is is completely normal.  In addition to Xan's comments about proof, I found this Q & A on our LCMS website.  I think it somewhat addresses your basic question about "how do we know". 

My comments:  Faith is a gift from God and it is strengthened by frequently hearing God's Word.  God's law shows us how impossible it is for us to be righteous on our own.  God's Gospel says, OK, you are a sinner as is everyone else; don't worry, I provided the answer already.  Turn away from your sin and follow me.  No matter how hard you work on "getting faith" by your own efforts, it probably is not going to happen.  Maybe this contradicts what I just said, but when I started having a lot of questions about Christianity many years ago, I began reading about it extensively.  After thousands of pages of various authors trying to address why one should believe, I came to the conclusion that the Christian worldview is a better explanation than anything else and actually requires much less faith to believe than any other worldview ... for me.  After reading extensively, and studying the Bible it all began to make so much sense.  I could not really find any serious discrepancies, but that required a lot of study to get to that point for me.  I truly believe that God wanted me badly enough that He never gave up in spite of my rebelliousness.  Why I believe that, I don't really know for sure as it deals with the "hidden side" of God, not the "revealed side" described in the Scriptures.

... Mountaineer

Q:  How can we be sure the Biblical accounts of Jesus' death are accurate? I understand the books of the Bible were used for basis of fact for the movie, The Passion.  If so, were not they taken from the Biblical author's best recollections "decades" after the event? Even if these recollections were the "inspired" word of God, how then do we know for sure these Biblical accounts were not "skewed" because of the author's cultural/spiritual prejudices of his time, or simply subject to error because of the length of time after the fact?

A:  First, it is important to recognize that belief in the Scriptures as God's Word and the certain conviction that they do not lie to us come to an individual only when the Holy Spirit works in that person's heart as a result of faith in Jesus Christ created through the Gospel. No amount of reasonable, historical arguments-however helpful they may be-will ultimately convince anyone of the truth of the Scriptural writings. Skeptics, whatever their intellectual or personal presuppositions may be, will never be convinced on the basis of reason. We need to remember that even the religious authorities in Jesus time, who always sought "signs" to prove everything, would not  be convinced even "if someone should rise from the dead" (Luke 16:31). This being said, anyone who has carefully looked at the history of the biblical canon will quickly discover that the biblical writings were not mere "recollections" that came into being decades after the events recorded in the sacred text. Those who want to disparage the Bible have long used this argument, which is easily discounted even with casual familiarity with the way the biblical writers approached their task. Take for example, the first four verses of Luke's Gospel. They reveal a careful and meticulous historian at work. It will always be mystifying to Christians why the skeptics among us are far more ready to accept as historical other ancient documents, the texts of which date centuries-not mere years-from the date of their purported happening. All this said, however, in the end the conviction that the Bible is God's truthful Word is a faith-conviction arrived at apart from merely intellectual endeavor.

[Pointedstick]

My comments:  Faith is a gift from God and it is strengthened by frequently hearing God's Word. 

How do I know if I've heard God's word? At many points in time, I've felt like I've been open to hearing God, but nothing happened. I guess you would know God's word when you hear it, so that probably means from a religions explanation, that I haven't heard it yet.

So does that mean that God has not spoken to me? If faith is a gift from God, why has He not seen fit to give it to me?

[Mountaineer]

My comments:  Faith is a gift from God and it is strengthened by frequently hearing God's Word. 

How do I know if I've heard God's word? At many points in time, I've felt like I've been open to hearing God, but nothing happened. I guess you would know God's word when you hear it, so that probably means from a religions explanation, that I haven't heard it yet.

So does that mean that God has not spoken to me? If faith is a gift from God, why has He not seen fit to give it to me?

The best advice I can offer is to find a church where the Word is preached faithfully as God speaks to you through his Word.  I'm going to get real specific and likely offend some or many, but what the heck, why would I want my friends to be eating hamburger when they could enjoy filet?  So, for some specificity, I highly suggest you find a Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (LC-MS) church, even if you have to drive a significant distance to attend.  The Pastor will probably preach the Scripture faithfully and (my humble opinion) stick to what Christianity really is, that is not corrupted by man as much as many other denominations.  Attend the church Divine Service regularly, join a Bible Study that is led by the Pastor, stick with it for at least several months and ask every conceivable question about things that bother you or want an explanation of.  As to knowing if the Word is preached faithfully, listen for 1. how many times Jesus is mentioned in a sermon, 2. is Jesus the subject or the object of the verb, and 3. what is the verb?  Make sure the message is about what Jesus has done for you and not what you do for Jesus to reap rewards on this side of heaven.  If the church you pick does not preach the Word faithfully, find another church QUICKLY.  It will be nice, but not essential, if you find a warm, inviting congregation.  The main thing is being able to hear the Word preached faithfully.

This website might help you find a church that meets the qualifications I mentioned:  http://issuesetc.org/findachurch/

If there is nothing close to you on that website, try this one:
http://locator.lcms.org/nchurches_frm/church.asp

If that does not work, I can refer you to some internet talk radio sites you can try out.


... Mountaineer

[MediumTex]

One item I would like to comment on relates to the idea that we hold the validation of the Jesus story to an unfairly high standard.

Here's the thing, though: If you ask me to believe that God impregnated a virgin, that the resulting son Jesus was actually God in mortal form, that Jesus performed all sorts of supernatural acts as a way of bolstering his ministry, that when the authorities executed him he suffered but then walked out of his grave three days later, that a bunch of other people popped out of their graves as well when Jesus came back to life, that Jesus travelled around for a bit after rising from the dead, that Jesus finally ascended into the heavens to sit at the right hand of God (or maybe re-commune with God), and that my fate through all of eternity rests on my correct understanding of all of these events, I'm going to subject it to more scrutiny that I would an account of what Abraham Lincoln had for breakfast on a given day.

I think that it's perfectly reasonable to subject more farfetched claims to greater scrutiny, with the starting assumption that claims involving the supernatural are false. 

[Kshartle]

If faith is a gift from God, why has He not seen fit to give it to me?

I used to just think he chose me because I was special for some reason. I, again, took it on faith. I didn't question his motives because who am I to question the motives of the creator of the universe?

It's when I started questioning those motives and looking at what I considered to be the complete immorality of the concept that I came to the conclusion it can't be true. Something can't be so contradictory and still be true. If I am truly loved regardless of what I do then why am I to be tortured for eternity? Why do I have to suffer every indignation here without opposing it? If someone strikes me on the right cheek I should offer my left? Who would give such advice to their children they loved? If you love me then why do you think I should be abused by others or by you dad?

It seemed to me like the morality of God or Jesus was not up to the standard of even some of the worst parents here and so how or why would they deserve my love? Why would I owe them? Do your kids owe you anything? You made them. You are responsible for them for a time. You owe them. Anything you get back in return is great but they don't owe you because you did your job. If humans, especially little ones are hurt and suffer horribly, what does that say about God as a parent? Tell me again why those people owe him?

The morality is so contradictory I just concluded it couldn't be real or true. It has to have been something for slaves to console themselves with (the meek shall inherit, the rich will be punished in the afterlife) or something to enhance the power of the rulers (render unto Ceasar, trust that God is in control and put your king/president in place....)

I hope no one takes offense. I'm just expressing the rationale for the conclusions I came to, just 3-4 years ago in fact. It actually started when I started studying philosophy and logic/morality. My "conversion" is not evidence that I'm right and anyone else is wrong.

[Pointedstick]

But mountaineer, don't believers of every denomination think that theirs is the only faithful preaching of the gospels? How am I to know that Lutherans have it right but Presbyterians or Catholics or Jews or Muslims don't? Is the rightness of the Lutheran version supposed to just radiate from the minister as though it was self-evident?

I have attended the religious services of many Christian denominations as well as those of various flavors of Judaism, the religious tradition I was brought up in. As an adult on a spiritual quest, I feel like I have been very open to receiving whatever truths revealed themselves to me, but none ever have. It's all just seemed like a bunch of nice, albeit self-referential stories paired with warm communities of friendly people.

I kept looking but nothing was revealed, and I kept asking and nobody could give me answers whose truth did not depend on my belief in other things I did not already believe.

[Kshartle]

One item I would like to comment on relates to the idea that we hold the validation of the Jesus story to an unfairly high standard.

Here's the thing, though: If you ask me to believe that God impregnated a virgin, that the resulting son Jesus was actually God in mortal form, that Jesus performed all sorts of supernatural acts as a way of bolstering his ministry, that when the authorities executed him he suffered but then walked out of his grave three days later, that a bunch of other people popped out of ther graves as well when Jesus came back to life, that Jesus travelled around for a bit after rising from the dead, that Jesus finally ascended into the heavens to sit at the right hand of God (or maybe re-commune with God), and that my fate through all of eternity rests on my correct understanding of all of these events, I'm going to ubject it to more scrutiny that I would an account of what Abraham Lincoln had for breakfast on a given day.

I think that it's perfectly reasonable to subject more farfetched claims to greater scrutiny, with the starting assumption that claims involving the supernatural are false.

So what happens when you make this argument MT, as far as I've seen, is it can be dismissed by saying God is all-powerful. It doesn't matter that they can't explain how something happend. They don't have to prove that something happened to make it true. And I actully agree with that argument. Nothing is false just because I can't or haven't proven it. It's irrelavent if I believe it or can't explain how it works. This is the ultimate argument for the supernatural acts and what not. While I don't think it's a very convincing argument....the premise is at least consistent (God is all-powerful).

That's why I take the moral inconsitency approach. We know that consistency is preferably to inconsistency. To argue the opposite is to say that it's preferable to consistently apply the rule that inconsistency is preferable....this is a FAIL. So if belief in God requires a lot of "faith" in inconsistant principles and actions, particularly from him.......can he really exist? Can he be God and be inconsistant, or would that just make him an all-powerful sadist?

[moda0306]

Xan,

I respect the heck out of you for coming to my rhetorical aid as a Communist Atheist Redistributionist Statist Fascist

You left out socialist puppy-killer.

J/K

There you go!

[Mountaineer]

If faith is a gift from God, why has He not seen fit to give it to me?

k.
I used to just think he chose me because I was special for some reason. I, again, took it on faith. I didn't question his motives because who am I to question the motives of the creator of the universe?

It's when I started questioning those motives and looking at what I considered to be the complete immorality of the concept that I came to the conclusion it can't be true. Something can't be so contradictory and still be true. If I am truly loved regardless of what I do then why am I to be tortured for eternity? Why do I have to suffer every indignation here without opposing it? If someone strikes me on the right cheek I should offer my left? Who would give such advice to their children they loved? If you love me then why do you think I should be abused by others or by you dad?

It seemed to me like the morality of God or Jesus was not up to the standard of even some of the worst parents here and so how or why would they deserve my love? Why would I owe them? Do your kids owe you anything? You made them. You are responsible for them for a time. You owe them. Anything you get back in return is great but they don't owe you because you did your job. If humans, especially little ones are hurt and suffer horribly, what does that say about God as a parent? Tell me again why those people owe him?

The morality is so contradictory I just concluded it couldn't be real or true. It has to have been something for slaves to console themselves with (the meek shall inherit, the rich will be punished in the afterlife) or something to enhance the power of the rulers (render unto Ceasar, trust that God is in control and put your king/president in place....)

I hope no one takes offense. I'm just expressing the rationale for the conclusions I came to, just 3-4 years ago in fact. It actually started when I started studying philosophy and logic/morality. My "conversion" is not evidence that I'm right and anyone else is wrong.

No offense taken.  I know you hate answering questions with questions, but consider this one.

If a parent tells his son or daughter not to run into the street without looking both ways but the child disobeys and runs into the street because his neighbor friend says "Did your dad REALLY say not to run into the street?  I've done it several times and nothing bad happened."  The child then gets hit by a passing car and is severely injured.  Are there consequences to disobeying the parent?  Did the parent really love the child in the first place?  Does the parent try to correct the situation?  Does the parent tell his other children what happened?, or just say, that whole scenario does not make sense ... I told him not to run into the street ... therefore, he can suffer on his own without me there to comfort him. 

 

[Mountaineer]

But mountaineer, don't believers of every denomination think that theirs is the only faithful preaching of the gospels? How am I to know that Lutherans have it right but Presbyterians or Catholics or Jews or Muslims don't? Is the rightness of the Lutheran version supposed to just radiate from the minister as though it was self-evident?

I have attended the religious services of many Christian denominations as well as those of various flavors of Judaism, the religious tradition I was brought up in. As an adult on a spiritual quest, I feel like I have been very open to receiving whatever truths revealed themselves to me, but none ever have. It's all just seemed like a bunch of nice, albeit self-referential stories paired with warm communities of friendly people.

I kept looking but nothing was revealed, and I kept asking and nobody could give me answers whose truth did not depend on my belief in other things I did not already believe.

If you have already tried my suggestion about LCMS churches and found them lacking, my appologies.  If not, give it a shot.  All you have to lose is some time, and it might even be useful.  Who knows, you might find some nice friends even if you do not end up believing as they do. 

In my experience prior to joining the LCMS (Methodist, long dry spell, Presbyterian, Baptist, Episcopalian, Methodist again, ELCA, Evangelical) I felt a lot like you are describing.  But then again, remember I said it is not about me or my journey:  it is only about Jesus coming, living, dying, raising again to redeem mankind and, God reveals himself as much as He wants us to know through his Word (Scripture and Sacraments).  He reveals all we need to know for salvation but not everything we would like to know.

[Kshartle]

No offense taken.  I know you hate answering questions with questions, but consider this one.

If a parent tells his son or daughter not to run into the street without looking both ways but the child disobeys and runs into the street because his neighbor friend says "Did your dad REALLY say not to run into the street?  I've done it several times and nothing bad happened."  The child then gets hit by a passing car and is severely injured.  Are there consequences to disobeying the parent?  Did the parent really love the child in the first place?  Does the parent try to correct the situation?  Does the parent tell his other children what happened?, or just say, that whole scenario does not make sense ... I told him not to run into the street ... therefore, he can suffer on his own without me there to comfort him. 

Questions are a perfectly fine way to formulate an argument when they lead somewhere. If you ask a question to understand where a person is coming from, to clarify, to get them to agree to a certain truth that you can show requires them to make contradictory statements to support their arguments etc, this is all good. The argument by question that I've alluded to is when a person never states their position, or point of disagreement, they just keep asking more and more questions endlessly requiring the other person to demonstrate knowledge of everything in some attempt to show they don't know everything so how can they know anything. I mean we've gotten to the point where people want to argue about atoms and biological differences of humans and gorillas. It's argument by endless question that's tiresome.

With regards to the street/car example.....The parent might very well love the child, it's not 100% clear. Why is the child in a position to run into the road? You see once the child is old enough to understand the consequences of being hit by the car, there is no need for them to take anything on faith. They have reason and free will. They don't need threats of spanking or other punishment. Until they are at this point they are not responsible...the parent is. If the parent is relying only on the fear of punishment or the hope that child won't run into the road....this is not a good parent. This is a parent who is not demostrating love.

If God gives us the free will to choose whether or not to believe in him.....but then says if we choose to not he will torture us for all eternity....this is sadistic. Why would a being do such a thing and how is this demonstrating love? This is the moral equivalent of telling your kid to not run out into the street but when they do you want or cause a car to come along and hit them. Where is the love?

[Libertarian666]

One item I would like to comment on relates to the idea that we hold the validation of the Jesus story to an unfairly high standard.

Here's the thing, though: If you ask me to believe that God impregnated a virgin, that the resulting son Jesus was actually God in mortal form, that Jesus performed all sorts of supernatural acts as a way of bolstering his ministry, that when the authorities executed him he suffered but then walked out of his grave three days later, that a bunch of other people popped out of ther graves as well when Jesus came back to life, that Jesus travelled around for a bit after rising from the dead, that Jesus finally ascended into the heavens to sit at the right hand of God (or maybe re-commune with God), and that my fate through all of eternity rests on my correct understanding of all of these events, I'm going to ubject it to more scrutiny that I would an account of what Abraham Lincoln had for breakfast on a given day.

I think that it's perfectly reasonable to subject more farfetched claims to greater scrutiny, with the starting assumption that claims involving the supernatural are false.

So what happens when you make this argument MT, as far as I've seen, is it can be dismissed by saying God is all-powerful. It doesn't matter that they can't explain how something happend. They don't have to prove that something happened to make it true. And I actully agree with that argument. Nothing is false just because I can't or haven't proven it. It's irrelavent if I believe it or can't explain how it works. This is the ultimate argument for the supernatural acts and what not. While I don't think it's a very convincing argument....the premise is at least consistent (God is all-powerful).

That's why I take the moral inconsitency approach. We know that consistency is preferably to inconsistency. To argue the opposite is to say that it's preferable to consistently apply the rule that inconsistency is preferable....this is a FAIL. So if belief in God requires a lot of "faith" in inconsistant principles and actions, particularly from him.......can he really exist? Can he be God and be inconsistant, or would that just make him an all-powerful sadist?

If God is all-powerful, can he make a stone so large he can't lift it?

[Kshartle]

One item I would like to comment on relates to the idea that we hold the validation of the Jesus story to an unfairly high standard.

Here's the thing, though: If you ask me to believe that God impregnated a virgin, that the resulting son Jesus was actually God in mortal form, that Jesus performed all sorts of supernatural acts as a way of bolstering his ministry, that when the authorities executed him he suffered but then walked out of his grave three days later, that a bunch of other people popped out of ther graves as well when Jesus came back to life, that Jesus travelled around for a bit after rising from the dead, that Jesus finally ascended into the heavens to sit at the right hand of God (or maybe re-commune with God), and that my fate through all of eternity rests on my correct understanding of all of these events, I'm going to ubject it to more scrutiny that I would an account of what Abraham Lincoln had for breakfast on a given day.

I think that it's perfectly reasonable to subject more farfetched claims to greater scrutiny, with the starting assumption that claims involving the supernatural are false.

So what happens when you make this argument MT, as far as I've seen, is it can be dismissed by saying God is all-powerful. It doesn't matter that they can't explain how something happend. They don't have to prove that something happened to make it true. And I actully agree with that argument. Nothing is false just because I can't or haven't proven it. It's irrelavent if I believe it or can't explain how it works. This is the ultimate argument for the supernatural acts and what not. While I don't think it's a very convincing argument....the premise is at least consistent (God is all-powerful).

That's why I take the moral inconsitency approach. We know that consistency is preferably to inconsistency. To argue the opposite is to say that it's preferable to consistently apply the rule that inconsistency is preferable....this is a FAIL. So if belief in God requires a lot of "faith" in inconsistant principles and actions, particularly from him.......can he really exist? Can he be God and be inconsistant, or would that just make him an all-powerful sadist?

If God is all-powerful, can he make a stone so large he can't lift it?

So that settles that. The inconsistency of the argument proves it's false.

"God is all-powerful so he can make a stone so large he can't lift it".

- but you said he was all powerful.

"Well his own power nullifies himself".

Wow. Perfecto logic. Gracias. Can't be all-powerful. It's like me arguing that I don't exist. The form of the argument destroys itself.

[Mountaineer]

If God gives us the free will to choose whether or not to believe in him.....but then says if we choose to not he will torture us for all eternity....this is sadistic. Why would a being do such a thing and how is this demonstrating love? This is the moral equivalent of telling your kid to not run out into the street but when they do you want or cause a car to come along and hit them. Where is the love?

Maybe I'm off base here, but the way I see it (remember my two kingdoms discussion - vertical that deals with God and horizontal that deals with life here on earth):  we have free will only in the earthly kingdom because God loves you enough to not make you a puppet.  Your statement above, in my opinion, is dealing with the horizontal.  So, if you choose not to believe what God is saying via his Word, I believe you, living here on earth, have made the choice for eternal punishment of yourself.  God does not choose that for you, he offers you eternal life (vertical kingdom), you made the choice and thus your punishment is a consequence of your rejecting the gift.  As with many bad things that happen to us (certainly not all by a long shot) "we do it to ourselves".  So, God indeed does love us, we just choose not to love God.

[MediumTex]

In my experience prior to joining the LCMS (Methodist, long dry spell, Presbyterian, Baptist, Episcopalian, Methodist again, ELCA, Evangelical) I felt a lot like you are describing.  But then again, remember I said it is not about me or my journey:  it is only about Jesus coming, living, dying, raising again to redeem mankind and, God reveals himself as much as He wants us to know through his Word (Scripture and Sacraments).  He reveals all we need to know for salvation but not everything we would like to know.

If you know that there is an all-powerful immortal being that created you and everything else in the universe and that this being has certain hopes and expectations for you, how could you possibly have a "long dry spell" when it came to your relationship with this being?  That is incomprehensible to me.

If I were certain that God existed and that the Bible was basically an accurate guide to understanding his nature and expectations of me, I would do nothing but study my Bible and hang out at church.  It would be impossible to think about anything else.

This is one matter that troubles me about many Christians.  They often don't really act like what they believe is true.  Contrast the casual nature of many Christians' religion to the way Muslims approach their faith, which seems to involve far more discipline and commitment and frequently even provides a rationalization for suicide and murder under the pretext of simply following God's will for their lives.

***

It would be kind of amusing to have a Muslim join this discussion at some point and basically say: "Well, folks, I've got some bad news--you're both wrong, and worse, if you persist in your infidelity you're going to be punished severely both in this life AND in the afterlife for your failure to see that Islam is the one true religion."

[Pointedstick]

Maybe I'm off base here, but the way I see it (remember my two kingdoms discussion - vertical that deals with God and horizontal that deals with life here on earth):  we have free will only in the earthly kingdom because God loves you enough to not make you a puppet.  Your statement above, in my opinion, is dealing with the horizontal.  So, if you choose not to believe what God is saying via his Word, I believe you, living here on earth, have made the choice for eternal punishment of yourself.  God does not choose that for you, he offers you eternal life (vertical kingdom), you made the choice and thus your punishment is a consequence of your rejecting the gift.  As with many bad things that happen to us (certainly not all by a long shot) "we do it to ourselves".  So, God indeed does love us, we just choose not to love God.

This makes sense from the perspective of God being the master and basically offering us two choices, and then cosmically saying, "Welp, it's not my fault if you chose eternal torture."

However, I hope you can see how this does not make for an especially appealing version of God that I am very inclined to believe in. Things that spring to mind include questions about how exactly we make the choice to go to heaven. Do all Christians avoid hell, or only Lutherans? Do Evangelicals go there? What about non-Christians? Are all the Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists all going to hell? Don't nearly all religious people make this same claim about their own religion and afterlife? Are they all just wrong?