Questions about sin

Mimidi said:

Yes, maybe that was my mistake to think evil is the same as sin.
God is our father and if we desobey him then this is sin, did I get it right?

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That is as good a summation as any.

Mimidi said:

The thing is that I don't see the point of some of his interdictions because they doesn't seem wrong according to my conception of right and wrong, therefor they only seem to get in the way of our liberty.

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You do not differ that much from the opinion of Paul in this. And in certain areas such as dietary laws and ritual sacrifice there is reason to believe that Paul would favor liberty as long as it did not cause a stumblingblock for others. Where things get troublesome is when behavioral habits are being discussed instead of laws that were established to set the Israelites apart form the gentiles. Each person may have the same general opinion about there being some behaviors that they do not find worthy of banning but there is no universal agreement upon which of those things described as sinful behaviors in the Bible belong in that category. One person might say gossip ought to be left out, another covetousness and yet another certain kinds of theft or certain kinds of lies or another that loving one's neighbor is only a suggestion and not a command or that it means a particular thing that either allows one to be an enabler of a neighbor's weaknesses or to verbally attack another neighbor for not doing the same. IMO it is much easier to just accept that all these and more are sinful rather than to try to argue about them with God or with myself or my fellow Christians. It isn't as if I could become completely free of sinful behavior or that God would refuse to forgive me if I ever engage in such behavior so why try to hold on to something that is causing a rift between myself and God? If I am wrong about them being sins and these things really are not sins my thinking that they are sins and asking God to forgive me has not done any harm. On the other hand, if I were inclined to say that these things were not sins and was wrong about that, my refusing to ask for forgiveness would cause harm to my relationship with God. I may not be able to completely resist a certain temptation no matter how much I try to, but why compound my offense by telling God he was wrong to say that behavior was something he did not condone and therefore say i have no reason to ask for forgiveness or say i have no reason to ask for forgiveness because I tell myself that I know best what He thinks and assume that those that recorded what are supposedly inspired words were mistaken as they did not understand what God meant as well as I do.

On another note. What all this boils down to is "God because of His great love towards us sinners, sacrificially gave His Perfect Son who knew no sin, to take our place in His Coming Judgement. Now in your love for God, what are you willing to sacrificially give-UP, for Him???

Mimidi said:

I still don't fully understand.
Here is an article that explain what's bothering me:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylightatheism/essays/divine-blackmail/
It's an atheist article but it does explain very well my concerns.
I can't find any objections to it, I hope you do because this concern is really affecting my faith.

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His argument insists upon the assumption that "hell" is a place made by God where people experience "torture" - that a person must, in cliche fashion, "turn or burn." This is a pop culture characterization, & though there are Christians who believe this, there are many who don't. In other words, he is treating the subject as if Christianity is a monolithic faith with only one stream of thought or view, which of course is not the case.

Two words are both sometimes translated as "hell" in the NT, which is somewhat confusing for the reader. They are "Gehenna" & "Hades." The former is a burning garbage dump - a literal place that once existed in Jesus' day - & the latter is akin to the Hebrew "Sheol," which is the grave.

This explanation of "Gehenna" closely mirrors my own views:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/formerlyfundie/what-jesus-talked-about-when-he-talked-about-hell/

Jesus does, IMO, talk about possible exclusion from the Kingdom of God, but it seems unclear about what that might look like, or how long it would last.

Hey
Your dilemma is popularly experienced.

Being effeminate is not a choice, but you should be honest with yourself if you're truly comfortable that way.

If you are it's fine, but if it makes you self conscious and uncomfortable when you're around people, you have to be brave enough to change certain characteristics.

The same way it's taken me almost a year to change the way I walk!

I once wanted to keep the girly traits, but the same way i enjoyed it, part of me hated it because I'm obviously a guy and I should act like one. I knew achieving this would make me truly content. That was me being honest with myself.

You can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it.

1 Corinthians 6:9 shows clearly that Homosexuality is a sin. The word 'effeminate' is used in certain translations tho, but it's used to mean 'those who practice homosexuality'.

However as you have understood, the sin is to be condemned and NOT the sinner.
Homosexuals themselves know how conflicted they are for a long time before they finally accept the lifestyle.

It is sin because it goes against God's natural order and they are aware of it, even if it's beyond their control to curb it.

That's where a higher power should come in, the Holy Spirit.

The truth is, these people are struggling heavily with something only they can understand.

However, they need to choose to fight sin, accept the only one who can give them true peace and love and help them in their struggle; Jesus Christ.

"there is now no condemnation for they that are in Christ Jesus"

He gives strength to the weak...He's our hope and when He becomes part of you He'll gradually change you and give you instant Peace and so much joy and hope.

Also please let us all always pray for strength to resist destabilisation by certain posts.

The truth is absolute but it's meant to save you not hurt you or make you condemn yourself.

You’ve asked two separate sets of questions, and I’ll try to answer them separately. First, the article about “divine blackmail.”

The article is a bit jumbled. It moves from topic to topic in a weird way. But the main argument seems to be that God can’t hold anyone accountable for anything because their behavior depends upon heredity and environment.

There’s nothing specific to Christianity in that criticism. He’s not basing it on the idea that God is responsible for everything (an attack which some people have made), but upon a purely secular concept that no one is free because their behavior is determined by heredity and environment. So it’s not just that God can’t hold anyone responsible. Neither can courts or anyone else.

Now there are some religious issues here.

* According to most versions of Christianity, you don’t go to hell because you’ve sinned, but because you’ve rejected Christ. However I’m not sure how much that changes things, because rejecting Christ is still a decision.

* The oldest Protestant traditions actually agree with the criticism. They agree that following Christ isn’t a free decision. There are lots of complexities here, but in my opinion we are still left with the ethical question of how it can be just to punish someone for something that was inevitable.

So I don’t think the purely religious answers really help. I think the real Christian responses are something else, which is more philosophical than theological. Thus they would apply just as much to sending people to jail as sending them to hell.

* The most common answer is that heredity and environment don’t actually determine someone’s character and decisions. They can affect it, but lots of people rise above challenging backgrounds.

* A minority answer, which I accept, is that the criticism involves a confusion about what free will means.

This is the most complex answer, so I’m going to take some time to explain it.

The web page compares our situation before God to someone that has a gun held on them. But there’s a critical difference. Someone who is coerced can end up doing something that is contrary to their character. We don’t consider someone who is coerced into doing evil to be evil themselves because their deed didn’t reflect their character, but rather the character of the one who coerced them.

But the normal situation in judgement is different. People who abuse others (those that Jesus typically shows as being rejected in the judgement) are actually evil. Their deeds reflect their characters.

Furthermore, because they aren’t being coerced, they could change their behavior. After all, one purpose of the threat of punishment is to give people reason to change. That doesn’t make sense to someone who is being coerced, but it does for someone whose character would lead them to do bad things, but who might change if they’re worried enough about the consequences. (Note by the way that according to most versions of Christianity, complete change of behavior isn’t necessary; just an acknowledgement of their responsibility and accepting forgiveness from God.)

It simply doesn’t make sense to say that in order to be responsible, people have to be free to choose even their own character. How could you choose your character? How would you make the decision? You’d make it based on your values, which are part of your character. So we have to treat people based on what they are. Evil people are really evil, no matter how they got that way.

The more difficult question isn’t the one asked on this web page, but the question of the purpose of punishment. In earthly situations it’s a deterrent or an incentive to change. But infinite torture seems overkill. Note however that there are lots of Christian ideas of the judgement, and infinite conscious punishment is by no means mandatory.