Yes, but what if we are not wrong?

[quatona]

Hello there guys. I am sure this have been discussed before in this forum, but I would like to know your point of view in my post here. What if, after all, the judeo-christian turns out to be the only one (as I believe He is), you die, but you realize you are perfectly conscious, you have your memories intact, but you are standing before Christ, before God, and it turns out that your entire life you have been denying Him. What now?

You tell me. It´s your theology, after all.
It all depends on which brand of judeo-christianity you subscribe to.

I don't want to debate the possibility of: yeah, but what if it's not true and you have been believing in a lie your whole life? I don't mind about that.

So, what if it turns out to be all true and you will most likely burn, not being able to assume God's love?

I don´t understand the question. What sort of answer are you looking for?

(In this case, note that I do not have the knowledge to know who is going or not going to be in the state of hell).

So then - considering the fact that it might be you who ends up burning - maybe you can go ahead and give your answer to your question "So what if you will burn?" - just so we know what kind of answer you are looking for.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

How would i know what I "suddenly knew" and "saw" was not just another fleeting illuision?

The proof would be transcendental, but as with other minds, and I only have access to the personal and filtered subjective experience of it or them.

Islamic theology says "there is nothing comparable unto Him" - and he hasnt a meterial aspect, he is transcendent.

This fits in with the view that God is ultimately hidden, is the player on the other side of the game of existence whom we can never be or know in a direct empirical fashion.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Hello there guys. I am sure this have been discussed before in this forum, but I would like to know your point of view in my post here. What if, after all, the judeo-christian turns out to be the only one (as I believe He is), you die, but you realize you are perfectly conscious, you have your memories intact, but you are standing before Christ, before God, and it turns out that your entire life you have been denying Him. What now?

I don't want to debate the possibility of: yeah, but what if it's not true and you have been believing in a lie your whole life? I don't mind about that.

So, what if it turns out to be all true and you will most likely burn, not being able to assume God's love? (In this case, note that I do not have the knowledge to know who is going or not going to be in the state of hell).

What if you find yourself standing before God, Jesus, and Joseph Smith?

 

[Eudaimonist]

What if, after all, the judeo-christian turns out to be the only one (as I believe He is), you die, but you realize you are perfectly conscious, you have your memories intact, but you are standing before Christ, before God, and it turns out that your entire life you have been denying Him. What now?

I take that as it comes, just as I would have to if I were to meet Odin, and he were to ask me if I had died with a sword in my hand.

So, what if it turns out to be all true and you will most likely burn, not being able to assume God's love? (In this case, note that I do not have the knowledge to know who is going or not going to be in the state of hell).

I would conclude that this God is evil, and not worth spending eternity with. It's no loss.

But I suspect that a real God would congratulate me on seeing through the flawed human doctrines of Hell and invite me to a friendly philosophical discussion.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Archaeopteryx]

But I suspect that a real God would congratulate me on seeing through the flawed human doctrines of Hell and invite me to a friendly philosophical discussion.

"And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that he would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt his existence." - Bertrand Russell

 

[Wryetui]

He is not offended by you not believing in it, you need it to fix our nature rotten and broken by sin, Christ is the great doctor of humanity as I said, please, stop looking at God like he is a dictator like Hitler that punishes you if you don't adhere to His ideals, for furthermore explaining: Theosis (Eastern Orthodox theology) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Archaeopteryx]

He is not offended by you not believing in it, you need it to fix our nature rotten and broken by sin, Christ is the great doctor of humanity as I said, please, stop looking at God like he is a dictator like Hitler that punishes you if you don't adhere to His ideals, for furthermore explaining: Theosis (Eastern Orthodox theology) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

If he were not offended by nonbelief, then why is nonbelief considered a sin worthy of eternal punishment?

 

[Wryetui]

If you understand me that way, you have a twisted mind, I guess. I repeat it again, God created man, man sinned and become twisted, wicked and rotten by pushing himself more and more away from God. God saw how man was suffering because of it, so He sent His only Son to the world, by Him incarnating, his divine nature helped our rotten human nature, so we can divinize ourselves too, God offered us the way we can be again in communion with our Creator, God offered us the "medication" against our disease, God offered us the healing for our decayed state and He chose to take us away from Hades, the state we would all go to because of the sin we chose from the beginning, because we have lost communion with out Heavenly Creator. God is not punishing you at all for not believing in Him, you are punishing yourself, you are sending yourself to Hell because God offered you the way to get out of it but you are refusing it, you are refusing the healing.

In the Orthodox view, Heaven and Hell are not places, are states of the soul. In "Hell" you will suffer from God's light and love because it will burn you, it will make you suffer because you refused His healing and chose to be away from God, so His light will cause you pain. But in "Heaven" God's light will make for you you eternal happiness and delight in Him. Let's consider it this way, God is the Holy Fire. That fire, makes the wood (sinners) to burn and become ash, it's not fire's fault, fire is that way, you can't blame fire for burning dry wood, it's just the way fire is. But if you throw to that fire a piece of gold (people who chose God) that gold will become brilliant and will purify itself and become better and better and purer and purer until it shines like the sun.

 

[KCfromNC]

I still disagree Yahweh is felt in the heart yes, but also experienced with the mind/intellect as per Hebrews 11 and my personal experiences.

It's ok that we disgree though, I disagree with most christian I know on this matter.

It is interesting that non-believers get the blame for not figuring out what god wants when the people who believe it in can't seem to agree on it either.

 

[KCfromNC]

The day you will understand that God doesn't send you to hell punishing you for not believing in Him, that hell is not a place and that we need Him, that day you will be healed.

I think non-believers are well aware that god doesn't do anything of the sort, mainly because they wouldn't believe an imaginary being would do anything in the first place.

I find it quite amazing how you live your entire life without God and even insulting or criticizing Him, but when you die you expect that He is "fair"

Hey, if you want to worship an unfair god that's your choice. Seems like that would create some interesting theological challenges, though, what with it being the ultimate moral lawgiver and all that.

with the rotten nature you have and you did nothing about it your entire life.

Calm down with the name calling. If you don't have anything substantive to present, insults are not going to make things better for you.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

If you understand me that way, you have a twisted mind, I guess. I repeat it again, God created man, man sinned and become twisted, wicked and rotten by pushing himself more and more away from God. God saw how man was suffering because of it, so He sent His only Son to the world, by Him incarnating, his divine nature helped our rotten human nature, so we can divinize ourselves too, God offered us the way we can be again in communion with our Creator, God offered us the "medication" against our disease,God offered us the healing for our decayed state and He chose to take us away from Hades, the state we would all go to because of the sin we chose from the beginning, because we have lost communion with out Heavenly Creator. God is not punishing you at all for not believing in Him, you are punishing yourself, you are sending yourself to Hell because God offered you the way to get out of it but you are refusing it, you are refusing the healing.

If God doesn't want to send people to Hell for not believing, then he wouldn't. If he wants to heal people, he can heal them without setting preconditions. If he wants to communicate a message, he doesn't need to rely on ancient texts written by fallible human beings.

 

[KCfromNC]

If you understand me that way, you have a twisted mind, I guess. I repeat it again, God created man, man sinned and become twisted, wicked and rotten by pushing himself more and more away from God.

By acting just as god had created them to act. Or maybe god screwed up and made some mistakes in creating humans. Or didn't have the foreknowledge to know what its creations would do.
Seems like you'd have to deny god's omnipotence to believe these sorts of things.

 

[Wryetui]

Calm down with the name calling. If you don't have anything substantive to present, insults are not going to make things better for you.

I wasn't insulting anyone. That rotten nature we share because of sin, it's not just you or him, it's all of us, I am too into that rotten nature.

 

[RDKirk]

Really, you go too far. Who said anything about "forcing". Your correspondent spoke of simply revealing himself effectively. Is that too much to expect of an omnipotent being, that he could honour his own call for people to worship him by at least letting them know he was there!?

I live in Australia. Please explain how the aboriginal people of my country could have avoided hell for the last several thousand years, since your God supposedly revealed himself to mankind? Or the Inuit? Or the Aztecs? Or the Japanese? Or Mongolians? Countless millions have gone to their deaths, never having known about this deity of yours, simply because their births were geographically inconvenient. And now, you would have us believe, they reside in hell through no fault of their own.

"For God so loved the world".......that he couldn't be bothered telling most of it about himself!

Scripture indicates that God takes the degree of knowledge into account in His judgments.

 

[RDKirk]

Scripture says man was "good." Hebrew has its words that mean "perfect" and it's words that mean "good," and the difference is about the same as the difference between those two English words.

So first the notion that Adam was "perfect" is not supported by scripture. Adam was "good."



As I've said before, "This is God's Plan A." Scripture says over and over again that God had all of this planned before He even created the universe.

That may be so, scripture saying that but it just proves how dismal
the early philosophers and mystics were about cosmology
(or ultimately how smart) since it really caught on.

Probably because it seems like one of the few something for nothing bargains
to come along. Tto the fearful ego needing a port in a storm. Christians love to sin, as their sin does not effect their afterlife in heaven, only their belief does. The sin becomes blessed, the adherent immune to its' effect on other sinners.

Christians continue to sin, they love it, it is part of the addiction.
Where then is the personal transformation? - There is none.

In actuality there is no good and bad. All information is neutral.
Any slant on it is manufactured by the minds of humans.

The same creator that made love also made rape, torture and every form of wickedness one can think of/ What is ... is best. Is perfect otherwise it could not be part of the quantum world we build our world on.

As far as I can tell from all that, your complaint is that God did not create Stepford.

 

[RDKirk]

To be blunt, if a God exists and he planned all of this, I am not impressed.

So your complaint is that God did not create Stepford. You seem to think that God's plan should not be any more complex than the plot of a Lone Ranger episode.

You claim (correctly) that modern fundamentalists (as distinct from classical Fundamentalists) don't see shades of grey, but can't you see that God could have a plan with more complexity than the plot of a Lone Ranger episode?

 

[FireDragon76]

So your complaint is that God did not create Stepford. You seem to think that God's plan should not be any more complex than the plot of a Lone Ranger episode.

People see suffering in the world and they conclude the world is ugly, this is understandable. Sin has that power on people: to cause despair and a darkening of the mind. It is not until they come to the Great Physician and follow his Perscription that they will be able to appreciate the goodness. That means entering into the life of faith. Anselm, one of the greatest theologians of the West, said that he had "faith seeking understanding". Understanding does not precede faith, how could it? Sin is a sickness and unless you are wiling to undergo treatment for it, there is no cure.

 

[True Scotsman]

The day you will understand that God doesn't send you to hell punishing you for not believing in Him, that hell is not a place and that we need Him, that day you will be healed. I find it quite amazing how you live your entire life without God and even insulting or criticizing Him, but when you die you expect that He is "fair" and He will accept you into heaven even with the rotten nature you have and you did nothing about it your entire life.

This is your irrational, faith based belief. If you want to accept that you are rotten by nature then that is your right, but don't project your filthy beliefs onto me.

I don't expect anything from an imaginary being when I die.

I am not rotten by nature. My nature is metaphysically given and thus is not open to change. It is not nature that is rotten. Actions can be rotten or good depending on what they are. A man or woman does not have to be rotten, but as long as he is, he is. And a man has choices about the actions he takes, and if those actions are good then they are good. How could you possibly know that I have done nothing all of my life, to improve my character. You know nothing about me. You are quite silly, frivolous and presumptuous to think these things.

If this is what religion does to a person, I will pass. As to your opening post, I think Pascals wager is absurd and anyone who is willing to take it is a despicable coward. I will gladly burn if it means I get to live free, by my own judgement in this world. I think anyone who takes that wager is the rotten one who deserves punishment. I think that if there were a god, when I stood before it, it would say congratulations, you passed the test. You used your mind the way I intended. You did not cower and abdicate it at the first tough question. You were not afraid to accept the responsibility to think and act on your own judgement. Come on in.

 

[True Scotsman]

People see suffering in the world and they conclude the world is ugly, this is understandable. Sin has that power on people: to cause despair and a darkening of the mind. It is not until they come to the Great Physician and follow his Perscription that they will be able to appreciate the goodness. That means entering into the life of faith. Anselm, one of the greatest theologians of the West, said that he had "faith seeking understanding". Understanding does not precede faith, how could it? Sin is a sickness and unless you are wiling to undergo treatment for it, there is no cure.

Faith is imagining something and then pretending that what is imaginary is real.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

People see suffering in the world and they conclude the world is ugly, this is understandable. Sin has that power on people: to cause despair and a darkening of the mind. It is not until they come to the Great Physician and follow his Perscription that they will be able to appreciate the goodness. That means entering into the life of faith.

That doesn't appear to be a requirement for appreciating goodness at all. One need not view the world through a Christian lens to appreciate or aspire toward goodness.