Did you really choose God…

St. Paul wrote of the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 decades before the Gospel of Mark was written down.

jayem said:

or did God choose you? I’ve read a lot of posts where believers say they became Christians after having a life-changing spiritual experience of some sort. If that’s true, then becoming a Christian wasn’t really your choice. It was an act of God. By logical extension, it raises the question does anyone make a free-will decision to be a Christian? If you were born into a Christian family, raised in the church, and have been a believer your entire life, then that was also an act of God. The same would be true if you were a Christian at one time, and now have a different faith, or have become an atheist. If a deity exists, who is the ultimate universal sovereign with a plan for everyone and everything, then logically, no one’s belief—or lack thereof—is her/his own decision. It’s all God’s will.

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Salvation can not occur unless God gives knowledge of Himself, but God gives this knowledge to all people. The free will bit is how we respond to that knowledge, are we willing and obedient.

The Bible shows that God becomes angry with those who suppress the truth He gives.


However, God reveals Himself to those who see Him, and obey.

jayem said:

What I recall learning in undergrad Bible class is that there are 66 books considered canonical by Protestants--39 OT, 27 NT. Another 7 deuterocanonical books are included in the Catholic Bible. All of these were written by at least 40 different authors over 1500-2000 or so years. Many of these authors are writing from somewhat different religious perspectives. Given this variation, you can find passages to support almost any Judeo-Christian doctrine you like.

Re. the NT—Jesus (like the Buddha) left nothing in writing himself. Mark, the earliest (and shortest) gospel account, was written about 30 years after Jesus's death. Its only mention of the resurrection states that some women found the rock had been moved from the tomb entrance. A man inside, dressed in white, told them Jesus had risen and they should notify the disciples. Which the women didn’t do because they were afraid. That’s all it says about Jesus’s supposedly most important and defining role. Which suggests to me that all the details in the other gospels (at least one of which is contradictory) were added later to make the narrative more compelling. Not to mention that the current Bible version considered to be canonical was compiled over the years by several church counsels and committees. Having served on committees myself, I’ve never known one to be holy and infallible.

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That's not what I was asking you though...?

And it almost sounds like your out to disprove Jesus resurrection and Christianity or whatever also, etc...?

But I was asking about how religion or certain religious beliefs, or belief in a God/god, or whatever, or lack thereof, affects (or changes) the psychology of and/or human behavior, which is what you said you really were here for...?

Want to discuss that maybe...?

God Bless!

jayem said:

What I recall learning in undergrad Bible class is that there are 66 books considered canonical by Protestants--39 OT, 27 NT. Another 7 deuterocanonical books are included in the Catholic Bible. All of these were written by at least 40 different authors over 1500-2000 or so years. Many of these authors are writing from somewhat different religious perspectives. Given this variation, you can find passages to support almost any Judeo-Christian doctrine you like.

Re. the NT—Jesus (like the Buddha) left nothing in writing himself. Mark, the earliest (and shortest) gospel account, was written about 30 years after Jesus's death. Its only mention of the resurrection states that some women found the rock had been moved from the tomb entrance. A man inside, dressed in white, told them Jesus had risen and they should notify the disciples. Which the women didn’t do because they were afraid. That’s all it says about Jesus’s supposedly most important and defining role. Which suggests to me that all the details in the other gospels (at least one of which is contradictory) were added later to make the narrative more compelling. Not to mention that the current Bible version considered to be canonical was compiled over the years by several church counsels and committees. Having served on committees myself, I’ve never known one to be holy and infallible.

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You left out some important facts. Jesus was seen alive after his death and the fact that His disciples were willing to endure torture and death rather than deny His resurrection. To Whom Did Jesus Appear after His Death?

jayem said:

What I recall learning in undergrad Bible class is that there are 66 books considered canonical by Protestants--39 OT, 27 NT. Another 7 deuterocanonical books are included in the Catholic Bible. All of these were written by at least 40 different authors over 1500-2000 or so years. Many of these authors are writing from somewhat different religious perspectives. Given this variation, you can find passages to support almost any Judeo-Christian doctrine you like.

Re. the NT—Jesus (like the Buddha) left nothing in writing himself. Mark, the earliest (and shortest) gospel account, was written about 30 years after Jesus's death. Its only mention of the resurrection states that some women found the rock had been moved from the tomb entrance. A man inside, dressed in white, told them Jesus had risen and they should notify the disciples. Which the women didn’t do because they were afraid. That’s all it says about Jesus’s supposedly most important and defining role. Which suggests to me that all the details in the other gospels (at least one of which is contradictory) were added later to make the narrative more compelling. Not to mention that the current Bible version considered to be canonical was compiled over the years by several church counsels and committees. Having served on committees myself, I’ve never known one to be holy and infallible.

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They were not added to or changed or made up later to make it/them more "compelling", etc...

And I think the real reason it "says that to you", etc, is only because that is what you setting out to look for, etc, which is not an objective fact, but a very subjective, and extremely biased "opinion" of "yours", etc, and I think you should ask yourself maybe, why it is your setting out to do that, or believe that, etc, because in today's "misinformation age" almost anyone can set out to find whatever agrees with their own extremely biased subjective views, and find "something on it" always, etc, but that does not make it/them "fact", etc...

Just because Mark's gospel is shorter, and doesn't say as much about the resurrection for example, does not make all the other accounts about it false, or completely made up much later on, etc, and I don't see how you can even conclude that, etc, other than it maybe just only being what your looking for only, etc... which is way, way beyond "subjective" by the way, and maybe even approaches the realm of "absolute absurdity", etc...

And you claim to be an unbiased logical being, etc, yeah right, lol...

Anyway,

God Bless!

jayem said:

What I recall learning in undergrad Bible class is that there are 66 books considered canonical by Protestants--39 OT, 27 NT. Another 7 deuterocanonical books are included in the Catholic Bible. All of these were written by at least 40 different authors over 1500-2000 or so years. Many of these authors are writing from somewhat different religious perspectives. Given this variation, you can find passages to support almost any Judeo-Christian doctrine you like.

Re. the NT—Jesus (like the Buddha) left nothing in writing himself. Mark, the earliest (and shortest) gospel account, was written about 30 years after Jesus's death. Its only mention of the resurrection states that some women found the rock had been moved from the tomb entrance. A man inside, dressed in white, told them Jesus had risen and they should notify the disciples. Which the women didn’t do because they were afraid. That’s all it says about Jesus’s supposedly most important and defining role. Which suggests to me that all the details in the other gospels (at least one of which is contradictory) were added later to make the narrative more compelling. Not to mention that the current Bible version considered to be canonical was compiled over the years by several church counsels and committees. Having served on committees myself, I’ve never known one to be holy and infallible.

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I think this post, and the fact that you just seemed to completely miss what I was actually saying to you/asking you, proves why your really here, and that you just lied to me about it, so you should maybe ask yourself, and I mean really ask yourself, why you just did that, and the real reason as to why your really here, etc...

And why you maybe have to have a lot more "faith" to believe what you believe, than it does almost all other Christians, to believe what they believe, etc...

I think you have some serious "soul searching" to do, etc...

God Bless!

Ok, let's try and tackle this 100% neutrally and logically and objectively if we can, OK...

Most of the NT, if not all of it, is reported to have been written by the people we have reports of them having been written by, at around 20 to 30 to 40 years after Jesus was here, etc, and there is no evidence at all whatsoever of them having been changed or altered very much after that, by say, with the formation of the RCC after that or whatever, etc, or even after that even or whatever, etc, and certainly no good or logical reason to believe they were just 100% completely fabricated or were 100% totally false or were completely made up, etc, because that is just so very illogical and so very unreasonable that it is to the point of being "absurd", etc...

So, what follows then, is that we have some people, who think they saw, or at least heard from some others who saw (him), or a certain man named Jesus, who was alive and existed around that time, do and perform many miracles while he was alive, and then was crucified by the Romans, and then that some think they even saw him and interacted with him even after he was dead, but in a kind of "different" resurrected body, but still a physical form that they could see, and hear and touch and interact with, and that he came back after he was dead and interacted with them, etc...

But some people like you, not only don't believe it, and not only just don't want to believe it, but want to cast so much doubt on it however you can, to the point to where everybody will find a way to, not only just not believe it, but to where people will just simply flat out deny it all, in any way you or they can, or that you can convince them they can, etc...

You won't even acknowledge even the possibility of it being true, because of your deep down "hatred", or "whatever it is", etc, that wants people to just flat out deny it, and believe, like you, that it just simply cannot at all be true, and this is "just because", etc...

It does not at all matter to you if it's even possible or not, because you're so full of hatred, or malice, or bitterness, or jealousy/envy or "whatever", or some kind of "personal problem" or issue to be sure, or whatever, etc, that you just want people to deny it all in any way they can, or that you convince them they can, and this is again, "just because", etc...

And your so directly tunnel vision focused on just only that being your primary motivation or reason or focus or whatever, that the real truth of it does not matter at all to you, and probably never has, etc...

And you probably hate people who believe in anything at all so very much, only because you do not at all believe in anything at all, and you just simply don't like the way that makes you feel deep down on the inside, because it makes you feel "inadequate" or "less" or "whatever", etc, because secretly you want to believe in something, anything at all really, but just cannot bring yourself to, and you hate that so very much that it's at the point of "despising", etc, and so it makes you so very desperate to do whatever you feel you can or must to destroy all those others just simply so you won't have to feel the way you do about yourself anymore, or "despise yourself despising them" anymore, etc, or have it turn inward, etc, because you just couldn't face that, etc, and that's your true motivation and/or reason for being on here and doing what you are doing, or are trying to be doing, etc, and it isn't about "truth" at all, and is the "furtherest thing from it", etc...

Anyway, don't lie to me, etc, because I can so very easily see through all that "garbage/poop/excrement", and it makes me "very very angry", etc...

If you didn't feel the way I just said, you just simply wouldn't be here doing what your trying to be doing, so don't be lying to me about it...

Like I said, I can see through it...

And it makes me "angry", etc...

You feeling the way you do about yourself in nobody else's problem but your own, so go solve it on your own, and leave other people alone until you do, OK...

And "don't lie to me", because I don't like being lied to, etc...

God Bless!

jayem said:

So if we add up all of Christianity's Assets, and subtract all the Liabilities, what will be the bottom line--black ink or red?

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I think that will depend on how it all ends because of it's influence, don't you...?

And my religion teaches me that the end most certainly will justify the means in the end to a very much exceeding degree, etc...

Also, I think much of what you are saying is just the evolution of humans as they are, both good and bad right now as well, and there is both in "all groups", and religious organizations or groups are not immune, etc...

OK, I want to ask you this then: How do you think mankind would have evolved or got along this far without the influence of any kinds of religious beliefs at all, and I most especially want to ask you how you think they would have without Jesus, or the influence of Christianity on the world from his point in time onward into today, etc...?

Better, or worse, etc...?

Because it is specifically Jesus teachings and influence that basically shaped the western world, and is responsible for it's advancements I think, which came to influence and advance the rest of the world into what it is now today, etc, and I think without religion at all, at any point in time, we still might be cavemen still, and still using stone tools and rocks and wooden clubs, and living in caves, and will have been lucky to have even discovered fire by now, and be basically no different than animals, etc, but, what do you think, etc...?

God Bless!

jayem said:

And I have absolutely no intention of changing anyone else's opinion. That's beyond my pay grade.

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I don't really believe you, and that's what I am getting so upset about, because you seem to be trying to present information that you found, that you went looking for, to present here that is specifically designed to "change other people's opinions", or be getting them to doubt, etc...?

And my question is, what happened to you, or what is wrong with you, that makes you want to do that, etc...?

And I'm not afraid of the information, or of you being successful, it's not a threat to me or my religious beliefs, etc, but am going to be very upset if you are only going to be continuing to lie to me through the rest of this conversation, etc...

99.9% of people who are like you, and who are on here trying to do the kinds of things you are trying to be doing, are going through or are experiencing the kinds of things that I have been kind of mean about (sorry) in some of my more recent posts, or some of the ones I said to you earlier, etc...

Now you can tell me your an/the "exception to the rule" if you want to, but just please don't be lying to me, OK...

And if you don't lie to me, then I'll be nice, OK...

God Bless!

I think most of the innovations/advancements, etc, originally came the race or class of the Sons of God in the Mesopotamian area after Adam and Eve before the flood in that area when they began intermixing and cross-breeding with the sons and daughters of man or men and their race or kind was all but wiped out, and that some advancements were lost, but that some remained but with mostly the sons and daughters of man or men after that, etc...

But enough of the knowledge remained to catapult and push the sons and daughters of men very much toward a lot more, kind of exponential at that point, much more forward advancements and progress after that, both technologically and socially, and that, without that, the sons and daughters of men (us) would still be using sticks, and rocks and stones and things like that, etc, and maybe still living in caves, etc...

And would be having no spoken or written language, but would still be grunting to one another, etc...

And that "that's" your world without "religion", etc...

What say you to or about this, or these things, etc...?

God Bless!

jayem said:

As I stated earlier, I'm here for intellectual discussion. Which is not limited solely to religion. I'll express an opinion on any topic that piques my interest. And I have absolutely no intention of changing anyone else's opinion. That's beyond my pay grade.

But the religious study I did tells me that religion is a mixed bag. There's both good and bad. Let's imagine a religious balance sheet. Which would apply to all religions--not just Christianity. In the Assets column is psychological comfort. Religion provides many, many people with peace of mind and relief of stress during difficult times. Belief in a loving god gives a sense that you're not alone. You have a higher power that cares about you and is looking out for you. Of course, religion helps deal with death, both of friends and family, and your own. There's great comfort in believing a blissful eternal life awaits you when your earthly life ends. Having a common religious belief unites a society. Churches promote social interaction which counteracts loneliness. And there's no doubt that religion has established schools, hospitals, and many charitable organizations doing good works. Religion kept learning and knowledge alive during the Dark Ages. Not to mention masterpieces of art, music, literature, and architecture have been supported by churches.

But there's also a Liabilities column. Religion is tribalistic. Which is the downside of social cohesion, Members of different, and usually minority religions have suffered imprisonment, forced conversions, expulsion, seizure of assets, restrictions on employment, and all manner of persecution for observing a religion different than that of the majority. Religion has provided a convenient veneer of godliness for wars. Violent conflicts have occurred between different denominations of the same religion. There was a time when Christians fought over such triviality as whether babies or adults should be baptized. And how many millions of Christians died in the Catholic/Protestant wars of the 16th-17th centuries? Prejudice against Jews still exists. I doubt that the Holocaust could have occurred to the monstrous degree that it did if both the Catholic and Protestant churches in Europe had not taught for centuries that Jews were responsible for Jesus's death. Religion is supposed to promote good morals. The truest test of any religion's morality is how it treats non-believers.

So if we add up all of Christianity's Assets, and subtract all the Liabilities, what will be the bottom line--black ink or red?

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...if this was the now closed Christian Apologetics section rather than the Exploring Christianity section, I'd have a philosophical field day with your response. But since it isn't, I guess I won't.

jayem said:

As my avatar notes, I’m a naturalist. I believe everything in this universe is purely a function of matter/energy and the fundamental forces of nature. Anything claimed to be supernatural is a product of the human imagination.

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I am a physicist and I can prove that naturalism is certainly wrong because it contains logical contradictions and is disproved by our scientific knowledge. In fact, the cause of the existence of consciousness and all our mental experiences cannot be physical. This implies the existence in us of an unphysical element, which is usually called soul or spirit. Many argue that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain, but it can be proved that this hypothesis is inconsistent with our scientific knowledge and implies logical contradictions. In fact, all the alleged emergent properties are just simplified and approximate descriptions of underlying processes and arbitrary abstractions of the actual physical processes. An approximate description is a wrong description, and no entity exists per se corresponding to that wrong description, simply because it is a wrong description and, as such, can only exist as an idea in a conscious mind.
Therefore, every emergent property requires a consciousness from which to be conceived. Therefore, that conceiving consciousness cannot be the emergent property itself.
Conclusion: consciousness cannot be an emergent property.
In other words, emergence is a purely conceptual idea that is applied onto matter for taxonomy purposes. On a fundamental material level, there is no brain, or heart, or any higher level groups or sets, but just fundamental particles interacting. Emergence itself is just a category imposed by a mind, so the mind can't itself be explained as an emergent phenomenon. Furthermore, the hypothesis that the brain can generate consciousness also implies an intrinsic logical contradiction; in fact, considering a particle as part of the arrangement that would generate consciousness is an arbitrary choice, and consciousness is the necessary precondition for the existence of arbitrariness. In other words, any set of particles is inherently an arbitrary abstraction, and such an abstraction can only exist in a conscious mind that conceives it. The "brain" doesn't objectively exist as a single entity. We create the concept of the brain by arbitrarily "separating" it from everything else; however, there is no objective criterion that allows us to identify what separates brain and non-brain. Obviously, consciousness cannot be a property of an abstraction, because an abstraction cannot conceive of itself
Any set of elements is an arbitrary abstraction because it implies the arbitrary choice to include some elements in the set and exclude other elements. Physically the brain is not a single entity and therefore every alleged property of the brain is an arbitrary concept, a subjective abstraction. This is sufficient to prove that the hypothesis that consciousness is a property of the brain is nonsensical because it contains an intrinsic logical contradiction; consciousness is a necessary precondition for the existence of arbitrariness, and therefore the existence of consciousness cannot be a consequence of anything that implies arbitrariness.

Consciousness can exist only as the property of an indivisible entity, because only an indivisible entity does not imply any kind of arbitrariness; moreover, this indivisible entity must interact with brain processes because we know that a correlation exists between brain processes and consciousness. This indivisible entity cannot be physical, since there is no physical entity with such properties; therefore this indivisible entity corresponds to what is traditionally called soul or spirit.

jayem said:

or did God choose you? I’ve read a lot of posts where believers say they became Christians after having a life-changing spiritual experience of some sort. If that’s true, then becoming a Christian wasn’t really your choice. It was an act of God. By logical extension, it raises the question does anyone make a free-will decision to be a Christian? If you were born into a Christian family, raised in the church, and have been a believer your entire life, then that was also an act of God. The same would be true if you were a Christian at one time, and now have a different faith, or have become an atheist. If a deity exists, who is the ultimate universal sovereign with a plan for everyone and everything, then logically, no one’s belief—or lack thereof—is her/his own decision. It’s all God’s will.

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So then... the people who don't believe in God... that's God's fault, in your opinion? And it will be God's fault that people end-up... some place... away from God? So that man has no responsibility... at all? Seriously?

Some people just know from birth that the world was created by some being outside of the world. They see the order of the insects and the plants they live upon. They see the sky and the birds that fly in it. And the fish that swim in the waters. They see that man is given by this creator all that he needs to thrive. And so they begin to think about the nature of their Creator.

jayem said:

Wrong. If God is truly sovereign, and has a plan for the universe, then everything that happens must be in accordance with his sovereign plan. So if I never believe in God, that would logically mean that God never intended for me to be a believer. And if you do believe in God, how can you know that it was really your choice? Why isn't it possible that God--in one manner or another-led you to belief?

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That assumes that God is a micromanager. God does not need to remove free will in order to accomplish His goals. God allows free will because if He did not we would be robots and our love of God would mean nothing because it was programed into us rather than being freely given.

@jayem

Because of what we don't know, there is still always the possibility to choose and/or choice/chance, or free will, or of changing it right now, etc, or is still the possibility of apparent randomness, etc, when that might not actually be so, etc...

But, that being said, I hope you enjoy living your same exact life over and over again and having no conscious memory of it at all each time for all eternity without any hope or possibility of it, or that, or you, ever changing ever at all ever for you ever at all ever for all eternity, etc...

Because that sounds like somebody's kind of idea of "hell" to me...

Like forever living in a "twilight zone" episode forever, with absolutely no possibility of it ever changing, etc...

You don't know right now, so you still have a chance to change it right now, etc, but there will come a day when that will no longer be so, etc, so best to try and exercise it now for the better, etc, for "now" may be the only time you/me/we have, etc.

God Bless!

Ligurian said:

So then... the people who don't believe in God... that's God's fault, in your opinion? And it will be God's fault that people end-up... some place... away from God? So that man has no responsibility... at all? Seriously?

Some people just know from birth that the world was created by some being outside of the world. They see the order of the insects and the plants they live upon. They see the sky and the birds that fly in it. And the fish that swim in the waters. They see that man is given by this creator all that he needs to thrive. And so they begin to think about the nature of their Creator.

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jayem said:

Wrong. If God is truly sovereign, and has a plan for the universe, then everything that happens must be in accordance with his sovereign plan. So if I never believe in God, that would logically mean that God never intended for me to be a believer. And if you do believe in God, how can you know that it was really your choice? Why isn't it possible that God--in one manner or another-led you to belief?

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Soveriegnty is defined as authority.

Matthew 7:29 For He taught them as having authority, and not as the scribes.
exousia = exesti (in the sense of ability); privilege, i.e. (subjectively) force, capacity, competency, freedom, or (objectively) mastery (concretely, magistrate, superhuman, potentate, token of control), delegated influence:--authority, jurisdiction, liberty, power, right, strength.

Deuteronomy 30:19-20 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life...

Isaiah 7:16 Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good.

Revelation 22:17 And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.

disciple Clint said:

That assumes that God is a micromanager. God does not need to remove free will in order to accomplish His goals. God allows free will because if He did not we would be robots and our love of God would mean nothing because it was programed into us rather than being freely given.

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Exactly. And we all will be held responsible for our own choices.

Jeremiah 31:29-30 In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge. But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.