Not quite poetic but it has the upside of having a very specific meaning.
Touche!
(It's good to be able to laugh at myself)
No, infrequently. Condemnation is usual in my experience, not a claim of ignorance on the specifics of this subject.
That is, if I understand your take.
Well I was afraid you were saying that the majority of your contact with Christians has been of the 'turn or burn' variety. And I can refine my take away from sheer ignorance, but only a little. I know the path I took to God, and His own reception in the process. I know of His longing for that universally within our species. I can't know His specific will with any individual unless He specifically shows that to me, and that's just not how He usually does things. Instead, he wants me to be faithful, and yes that's a VERY loaded word that includes all sorts of things I often fall short of. Even more compound than faith or believe, which is perhaps the simplest of the 3.
I may suggest some tactical discussion differences when speaking with unbelievers though.
I bet!
I really was taking offense at what I saw to be dodging a question and semantical issues.
Honestly, can you not see how those semantical [sic] issues are substantive? Can you not see how attempting to 'nail down'
anything on this topic is incredibly difficult to begin with? I mean even among Christians, it usually only works if we just came out of the same Church service. How much harder it is with an unbeliever! When I pointed out you've not seen the Kingdom of heaven I was making a valid point, not being a wiseacre.
I am sensitive to people telling me I have faith when I spent a good part of my life trying and utterly failing for that to be true.
Ok so I set off a trigger, thank you for telling me that, but can you see I never said '
you have faith?' The difference between that and what I
said is not at all evasive nor minor; its HUGE!
And as a total aside, what if what
God means by 'lighting every man that comes into the world,' which I hold to be at least roughly synonymous to 'give each man a measure of faith,' what if in HIS view, you received that light and bear it currently? And just to be clear, even an established entity like the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) says explicitly that this
is possible. I mean I'm a mystic with the gift of faith, 2 things I never realized for most of my life and actually take for granted, but I'll tell you that the biggest factor in that was recognizing I had ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA what Jesus meant when He said things like "those that believe in Me." (Him) I wasn't content with that and saw that whatever He meant by it, it obviously changed everything. I wanted it, and asked God for it. This was a long and arduous process, over decades; and it still continues, and obviously I am anything
but perfect.
I am very sensitive to people who express the idea that they have had direct revelations and I just wouldn't understand.
But I never said 'you just wouldn't understand.' And if you're ever frustrated at the difficulty trying to communicate any of this verbally, you should try being ME! I do think that most anything God has revealed to me you actually COULD understand, but I hope you realize that if I were to use a word in a certain way you'd have to at least try to follow along, in order to be able to understand? And that by doing so you
in no way consent to anything I say as being correct? Gathering info is distinct from processing it.
Well thanks I suppose. I have always had a hard time imagining a being grand enough to create a universe that wouldn't like me much because I don't think it exists.
If that makes sense.
We all come from a different 'place,' or point, spiritually speaking. Obviously you and I have different backgrounds with this, but I think everybody does. If you were to explore what I mean by the word "God," you would find that to be a huge and difficult topic, but you might find a lot of common ground with stuff you don't even question the existence of.