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Spikey

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Hi there.

I'm a 47 year old married man from Manchester England. I never really bought into religion at any stage of my life, but as I've got older the subject has started to really interest me.

I have four children, three boys and a girl.

I'm here to learn more about belief systems and hopefully have some interesting debates.

Nice to be here :)
 

SeraTaru

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Welcome Spikey!

I joined yesterday and I'm about 300 miles west of you in Belfast. You know....that place that's holding up Brexit at the moment? ^_^

Have a good time here and I hope you're enriched and encouraged,

Serataru a.k.a. David
 
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Spikey

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Welcome Spikey!

I joined yesterday and I'm about 300 miles west of you in Belfast. You know....that place that's holding up Brexit at the moment? ^_^

Have a good time here and I hope you're enriched and encouraged,

Serataru a.k.a. David

Nice to meet you :)

Thank's for the welcome.
 
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Purity Clarity Parkes

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Hi there.

I'm a 47 year old married man from Manchester England. I never really bought into religion at any stage of my life, but as I've got older the subject has started to really interest me.

I have four children, three boys and a girl.

I'm here to learn more about belief systems and hopefully have some interesting debates.

Nice to be here :)
Hello, Mr Spikey.
I am very pleased to meet you. I suggest you have a look in the Theology section of the Forums if you want to find some good topics to debate. You can also talk with other members in the ‘Chat’ section. God Bless Thee.
Yours Sincerely~
~Purity Clarity Parkes
 
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Spikey

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Hello, Mr Spikey.
I am very pleased to meet you. I suggest you have a look in the Theology section of the Forums if you want to find some good topics to debate. You can also talk with other members in the ‘Chat’ section. God Bless Thee.
Yours Sincerely~
~Purity Clarity Parkes

Thank's for the advice, and the welcome :)
 
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SeraTaru

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Hello, Mr Spikey.
I am very pleased to meet you. I suggest you have a look in the Theology section of the Forums if you want to find some good topics to debate. You can also talk with other members in the ‘Chat’ section. God Bless Thee.
Yours Sincerely~
~Purity Clarity Parkes

Aye we need to get a debate going! We could start with :

Is there any proof that God exists?
How can a loving God send anyone to hell?
How come Christians can lead such bad lives?
What about suffering? Is it fair?
How come Christians claim theirs is the only right way when there are so many other good religions?
What about all the contradictions in the Bible?
Where did Adam get his wife?

....or we could skip all that and just go with the "Ok it's all true how can I become a Christian today?"

^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^^_^
 
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Little Lantern

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Greetings, and welcome to CF, @Spikey. Well, I don't live anywhere near you, and I don't have any ancestors from your area either; however, I did watch a "House Hunters" episode filmed in Manchester and loved it-- Would that count? :D

Seriously though, I'm glad you joined us, and I hope you find good encouragement, warm fellowship, and engaging discussion here. God bless you in your search for truth.
 
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Spikey

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Greetings, and welcome to CF, @Spikey. Well, I don't live anywhere near you, and I don't have any ancestors from your area either; however, I did watch a "House Hunters" episode filmed in Manchester and loved it-- Would that count? :D

Seriously though, I'm glad you joined us, and I hope you find good encouragement, warm fellowship, and engaging discussion here. God bless you in your search for truth.

Thank's for the welcome.

No that doesn't count. :D
 
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SeraTaru

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Hi Spikey - there was a thread on another forum about the proof of God existing.

Let me post my view here and see what you make of it :

As a background here's Romans Chapter 1 (forgive the formatting it's a cut paste thing) :

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Here Paul is saying (and it's my position) that there is no such thing as an atheist - only someone who deceives themselves. Deep in the heart of every person is a knowledge that God has planted there that this incredible universe comes from the ordered mind of a designer.

There's also a passage (can't remember where atm) that also says that the "Law of God is written on every man's heart". I'm sure you experienced this yourself - let me give you an example :

If you've ever smoked then you probably felt a little pang of guilt first time you did it? If you don't smoke then think of something you've done that you just "knew" was a little naughty....I will say that the pang of guilt you felt was because you were violating the law of God that's written on your heart. However if you do the thing enough the guilt goes away....why? Because scripture also teaches that you can burn or sear your conscience (again the scripture escapes me) so that it becomes like dead scar tissue....you feel no guilt.

The Bible also makes it clear that God is a fair and just judge - He will judge you "according to the amount of light you've received". If your Creator God gives you no light...then He has no right to judge you...because you broke His laws in ignorance. For God to be fair, and just then He must judge you according to a revealed standard and these two things - conscience within and creation without are - according to scripture - enough of a witness to you to realise there's a Creator and search after Him.

That's my basic scriptural position.

But then speaking as a Father to another Father here's a challenge :

Look at your children...the sparkle in their eyes. The sound of their laughter - all different. Their personalities...again unique. Their gifts and talents. I remember when my daughter started drawing at age three thinking "where on earth does that come from?". Neither I nor her mother can draw a straight line but here's a person we produced that's incredibly talented at art.

Remember that feeling when your first child was born and the first time you looked at them?

Now - if there's no God then those things are chance. It doesn't matter if they live or die, because they were just random products of biological soup. No different from dust on the wind or sand on the shore. Anything special or precious about them comes from a random number generator. Play the game enough and you might get a monkey or you might get a Mozart.

If it was proven, really proven that God - Jesus - the "Christian" god was a fake I would HAVE to look for another Creator because the order, the majesty, the complexity that I see is too incredible to come from what Dawkins calls a "series of happy accidents".

Back to scripture in closing :

This is why the verse in Psalm 14 v 1 says "The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”".

It's because it takes effort to be that idiotic to want to believe this was all chance. You literally are lying to yourself and then agreeing that you believe it.

Let me share a little story.

A few years ago my first marriage broke up and I became a terrible drinker. I was alone, lost, drunk 5 days a week, suicidal, self-harming....the works basically. I made a conscious decision to reject Christ because of what my first wife (A Christian) and others had done to me.

I became so anti-God that one day a girl tried to give me a bible tract on a Saturday morning. I grabbed her and told her if she ever did that again that I would kill her where she stood.

You know the most annoying thing? I couldn't escape that small, inner voice that I alluded to. Every time I told someone that I was an atheist....right inside....there was an answer that said "you don't really believe that Dave".

I thought it was my mind...now I realise what or more specifically who it was. That inner voice of conscience that came from my Designer simply would not let me rest.

Anyways....hope these thoughts are interesting to you. Feel free to disagree and we can get a good chat going :)

Be blessed

~David

(PS - we can work out if there's a God and then worry about which one it / he / she / they is later ^_^^_^^_^ )
 
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Spikey

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Hi again.

What you describe as an inner voice to me is just an evolved sense of 'morality'.
I certainly can't read the OT and claim my moral standards came from there.
Although the NT has some messages that are helpful, it also has some that are not so, I'm thinking of the doctrine that a sacrifice was required to enable forgiveness. And forgiveness for what exactly? I don't believe Adam was the first man so original sin means nothing to me.

I don't believe mankind to be intrinsically bad or sinful, we are land mammals at the end of the day just like anything else alive that managed to avoid extinction.

This is the harsh reality, but because it's harsh it doesn't make it any less true.
 
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SeraTaru

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Hi again.

What you describe as an inner voice to me is just an evolved sense of 'morality'.
I certainly can't read the OT and claim my moral standards came from there.
Although the NT has some messages that are helpful, it also has some that are not so, I'm thinking of the doctrine that a sacrifice was required to enable forgiveness. And forgiveness for what exactly? I don't believe Adam was the first man so original sin means nothing to me.

I don't believe mankind to be intrinsically bad or sinful, we are land mammals at the end of the day just like anything else alive that managed to avoid extinction.

This is the harsh reality, but because it's harsh it doesn't make it any less true.

Thanks for your reply Spikey,

Out of interest where is your head just at the moment? By that I mean are you open to the idea of a God / Creator? Would you say you're searching for spiritual truth? Or would you say that you're a 100% committed and firm atheist and very happy with your position?

At the end of the day if you're totally firm on your position then all the convincing and debating in the world won't really be of much help to anyone

Thanks & Blessings

David
 
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Spikey

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Thanks for your reply Spikey,

Out of interest where is your head just at the moment? By that I mean are you open to the idea of a God / Creator? Would you say you're searching for spiritual truth? Or would you say that you're a 100% committed and firm atheist and very happy with your position?

At the end of the day if you're totally firm on your position then all the convincing and debating in the world won't really be of much help to anyone

Thanks & Blessings

David

I'm open to any ideas as long as they make sense. As I have said to other people here, there are mysteries and unanswered questions.
I'm 100% atheist because I have yet to see a reasonable argument for the existence of God, all I seem to come across is bible verses and look around you. These arguments are not convincing to me as I need solid evidence before accepting anything.

Something is nagging at me about how everything came to be, but I can't put it down to a God unless provided with better evidence.
I would rather say "I don't know." rather than pretend I do know.
 
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