A Question for Creationists

[KWCrazy]

I was a Christian, just like you. You don't get to judge the sincerity of my former religious beliefs.

See post 80.

 

[AV1611VET]

Hitler was also mentally ill.

Show me official documentation to that effect, please.

Or are you just guessing?

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Hey, YOU'RE the one claiming a God with whom you once had a personal relationship doesn't exist. Don't blame me if that sounds foolish. I can understand how a person could loose their faith and even become bitter at God, but claiming He doesn't exist has only one of two explanations:
A. You never encountered God.
B. You're lying.

Or that they was mistaken in believing they encountered God.

 

[bhsmte]

Hey, YOU'RE the one claiming a God with whom you once had a personal relationship doesn't exist. Don't blame me if that sounds foolish. I can understand how a person could loose their faith and even become bitter at God, but claiming He doesn't exist has only one of two explanations:
A. You never encountered God.
B. You're lying.

It's kind of like me saying that I played football for four years but I never met a quarterback and now i don't believe there ever was one.

That, by the way, is NOT a judgement of you. It's an observation of the things you post. I don't make judgments about anyone on the internet; only about their posts. For all I know you could be my Aunt Edith.

Nice try, but horrible analogy. The QB on a football team is right there in the flesh, is it the same with your God?

Anyone who claims they have met God, has done so in their own mind. For various reasons, one can convince themselves they have done so and for other reasons, one can also come to the realization later, that they were only fooling themselves in believing they knew God.

This happens all the time and christians have difficulty accepting that the occurrence rate of the same, is accelerating.

 

[AV1611VET]

For all I know you could be my Aunt Edith.

 

[AV1611VET]

Or that they was mistaken in believing they encountered God.

Then why do they say, "I was a Christian ...", instead of "I thought I was a Christian ..."?

There's a difference.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Then why do they say, "I was a Christian ...", instead of "I thought I was a Chrstian ..."?

There's a difference.

No there's not, unless you want to spilt hairs. Why don't Christians say "Well, I think I am a Christian..."?

 

[bhsmte]

Show me official documentation to that effect, please.

Or are you just guessing?

The United States military hired a renowned psychiatrist around 1942, to examine all of Hitlers behaviors and to examine information acquired about him through spies and intelligence plants in Germany. There were also several other efforts to analyze Hitlers behaviors from a psychological standpoint. In the end, the assessment commissioned by the military, predicted Hitler would not surrender and he would likely shoot himself in his bunker.

http://www.psychologyandsociety.org/__assets/__original/2012/01/Hyland_et_al.pdf

 

[Naraoia]

Why did you conclude that you had no reason to believe any of these things?

I can't answer for Archaeopteryx, but for me it was realising how easily a mind can fool itself that nailed the coffin of supernatural beliefs. When I started to seriously think about it, I found that all the "evidence of things not seen" I'd experienced was inside my head. I had no outside verification for any of it. A "presence" I might feel can't be observed by any means beyond my feelings. So why should I conclude that something/someone is really there, when the much simpler explanation is that I'm just imagining things?

You didn't ask me this, but if you said that you said you experienced Gods...I would then have to say that you did not in fact experience God. If you are you know it.

I see this so often from believers. It's not only a classical No True Scotsman fallacy, it is also pretty insulting. That probably isn't your intention, you seem like a more decent person than that, but you are dismissing another person's assessment of their own experience. On what basis? Did you stick him into an MRI machine and compared the results to people who "really experienced God"? Or are you just assuming that your beliefs about his experiences trump his own?

You are assuming that I have never "come to God through faith". I have been a Christian for most of my life. I am familiar with all the feelings you describe; they're not alien to me. The question is whether they actually demonstrate what they purport to demonstrate; that is, knowledge of a deity.

I once used anxiety disorders as an analogy, since I can speak from, um, a fair amount of personal experience in that area.

I have some pretty strong feelings about the outside world. I often feel like people are secretly laughing at me. I'm often certain that something's going to go horribly wrong. Are either of those feelings evidence that that's really the case? Of course not. In fact, on a conscious level I'm reasonably certain that I'm not the constant subject of ridicule, and not many things have gone horribly wrong on me. These are irrational beliefs that stem from nothing more exotic than my own weird brain. What makes religious experiences different?

 

[KWCrazy]

Or that they was mistaken in believing they encountered God.

Refer to option A

 

[KWCrazy]

The QB on a football team is right there in the flesh, is it the same with your God?

There, yes. In the flesh? No. There's only one God. I do NOT claim ownership or exclusivity.

Anyone who claims they have met God, has done so in their own mind.

Nobody has ever physically met the Father. I've heard it explained the when Adam talked with God it was through the Son- which makes quite a bit of sense when you look at the interactions between man and God in their entirety. However, with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit we can feel a direct connection with God.

For various reasons, one can convince themselves they have done so and for other reasons, one can also come to the realization later, that they were only fooling themselves in believing they knew God.

Many are called, few are chosen.

The fact is, either they WERE deceiving themselves then or they ARE deceiving themselves. Either way, self deception is a mainstay with atheism.

 

[frogman2x]

They believe that divine revelation (the bible) trumps anything we find as far as physical evidence is concerned.

What p;hysical evidence have you found that can be verified b iologically.

]Man is fallible; God is not. The problem is that even if the bible is divine revelation, it must still be interpreted by fallible men, such as themselves.

The same is true about the so called evolution that you think validates evolution. Fallible men interpreted the fossil record as reinforcing gradualism, but 2 of your popes, Gould and Mayr said that is not a valid way to use the fossil record.

Fallible men, Darwin, said the intermediate fossils would be found and all the evos said AMEN. Yete in over 100 years none have been found.

Fallible men found the bones of a whale and said the creature was once a dog-like land animal. They even had pictues drawn up to hsow the intgermediatge steps, but they for got one thing. The actual fossils that matched their claim.

They, made up a stgory we can call the tale of the whale.

The never eplain how a dog can geneticfally lose it legs for a million years and survive.

Whale evolution is a necessary ploy to give the faithful hope that what they have put their faith in had not been given by a false prophet.

 

[frogman2x]

No there's not, unless you want to spilt hairs. Why don't Christians say "Well, I think I am a Christian..."?

There is a big difference and if you were ever a Christisn, you still are. Yoou may be a prodigal but you are still a Christiasn. Once you are born physically, y ou cant be unborn. ONce y ou are born again, spiritually, the same is true. God gave u s that analogy for our assurnce.

Also remember what the prodigal son did. He figured out that being a hired hand for his father was better than living free without him


The father watched for his son ever day and God is doing the same for you.

Some Christians do say, "I think I am a Christian." Especially, new converts who have been taught that our conduct determines if we really are a Christian.

 

[mzungu]

There is a big difference and if you were ever a Christisn, you still are. Yoou may be a prodigal but you are still a Christiasn. Once you are born physically, y ou cant be unborn. ONce y ou are born again, spiritually, the same is true. God gave u s that analogy for our assurnce.

Also remember what the prodigal son did. He figured out that being a hired hand for his father was better than living free without him


The father watched for his son ever day and God is doing the same for you.

Some Christians do say, "I think I am a Christian." Especially, new converts who have been taught that our conduct determines if we really are a Christian.

There is a Christians only section that I think is more appropriate for your preaching. We are here to discuss and debate not proselytise.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Then why do they say, "I was a Christian ...", instead of "I thought I was a Christian ..."?

There's a difference.

Right! There is a difference. It is like they are trying to say that just because their experience was without revelation of God that no one has it.

 

[lasthero]

Fallible men found the bones of a whale and said the creature was once a dog-like land animal. They even had pictues drawn up to hsow the intgermediatge steps, but they for got one thing. The actual fossils that matched their claim.

Did they? Did they, really?

-Indohyus

-Pakicetus and ambolocetus

-Kutchicetus

-Rodhocetus

-Dorudon

 

[AV1611VET]

There is a big difference and if you were ever a Christisn, you still are.

Eternal security = once saved, always saved.

John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.

 

[AV1611VET]

We are here to discuss and debate not proselytise.

Did someone post the Ten Commandments on your courthouse lawn?

Now everyone in town is a born-again, Bible believing, blood-bought, God fearing Christian?

 

[AV1611VET]

Right! There is a difference. It is like they are trying to say that just because their experience was without revelation of God that no one has it.

I can understand someone thinking he's a Christian, when in fact, he isn't.

I can also understand that same person later denouncing his membership in the family of God.

But I can't understand that person saying, "I was a Christian once."

That doesn't make sense.

 

[selfinflikted]

I can understand someone thinking he's a Christian, when in fact, he isn't.

I can also understand that same person later denouncing his membership in the family of God.

But I can't understand that person saying, "I was a Christian once."

That doesn't make sense.

Of course it does. It's like saying I used to be Muslim, or Buddhist, or... See? Works just like that.