Every time we do and say anything contrary to what is true, we are acting against the truth of God. All lairs are condemned, every false scale is an abomination to God. We live in a God-created universe; it all belongs to HIm, and every single person in it was made in His image and loved by Him, so much so that Jesus came and died so we could be redeemed, saved from our sins.
We would do well to remember that God inhabits all of time and space, meaning that each crime we have ever done against anyone, including God, is right before God’s face as if it were done to us in the now! They do not fall away over time; they accumulate, and since God is good, righteous, and holy, these will be answered for one way or another, but no doubt every sin will be paid for in full.
Since He set a time for judgment and made a way to be saved through Jesus Christ, we either come to Him or not; that choice is ours today, while it is today. Once we are not able to make it in this life, the consequences follow.
@KellyJay saidCheers KellyJay
Every time we do and say anything contrary to what is true, we are acting against the truth of God. All lairs are condemned, every false scale is an abomination to God. We live in a God-created universe; it all belongs to HIm, and every single person in it was made in His image and loved by Him, so much so that Jesus came and died so we could be redeemed, saved from our si ...[text shortened]... rs today, while it is today. Once we are not able to make it in this life, the consequences follow.
The last paragraph is compelling
"Since He set a time for judgment and made a way to be saved through Jesus Christ, we either come to Him or not; that choice is ours today, while it is today. Once we are not able to make it in this life, the consequences follow."
As the Lord already knows what choices we are going to make - today and every day moving forward - what consequences will follow in your thinking?
What is the cost of the wrong choice in 2026 America? I assume you are talking about America - as many people around the world don't have access to the same stories you and I do - so don't have the same choices we are afforded.
@KellyJay saidWhat a load of utter codswallop!
Every time we do and say anything contrary to what is true, we are acting against the truth of God. All lairs are condemned, every false scale is an abomination to God. We live in a God-created universe; it all belongs to HIm, and every single person in it was made in His image and loved by Him, so much so that Jesus came and died so we could be redeemed, saved from our si ...[text shortened]... rs today, while it is today. Once we are not able to make it in this life, the consequences follow.
You are, of course, completely welcome to inhabit a rather insecure mental framework where the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ only apply only to a fictional being of whose existence there is no proof; a cruel and tyrannical dictator who chooses to inflict torture, hunger, deprivation, suffering, and untold disasters among his loving creations; a bombastic megalomaniac who says if you don’t worship me you will endure an eternity of suffering in Hell.
It is a fiction!
Your ‘truth’ in the fifteenth century stated that the Earth was the centre of the Universe!
Your ‘truth’ in the thirteenth century stated that airborne diseases were punishments from God!
Etc.
You should think very carefully about using the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ or you will find yourself hung by your own petard.
@Pianoman1 saidTruth and reality, they go hand in hand. Opinions like the one you just expressed totally reside in you.
What a load of utter codswallop!
You are, of course, completely welcome to inhabit a rather insecure mental framework where the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ only apply only to a fictional being of whose existence there is no proof; a cruel and tyrannical dictator who chooses to inflict torture, hunger, deprivation, suffering, and untold disasters among his loving creations; ...[text shortened]... arefully about using the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ or you will find yourself hung by your own petard.
@Pianoman1 saidThe mental framework might be more secure than it logically should be. How else would an obviously fictitious tome still be revered two thousands years later.
What a load of utter codswallop!
You are, of course, completely welcome to inhabit a rather insecure mental framework where the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ only apply only to a fictional being of whose existence there is no proof; a cruel and tyrannical dictator who chooses to inflict torture, hunger, deprivation, suffering, and untold disasters among his loving creations; ...[text shortened]... arefully about using the words ‘true’ and ‘truth’ or you will find yourself hung by your own petard.
Believing Moses received the Ten Commandments directly from God at Mount Sinai is an act of faith, and I think most of us can agree a little faith in these dark times is not the worst thing in the world to help us keep going.
However believing someone built a boat that held animals from Africa and North America - or not acknowledging that the authors didn't understand how bee colonies work or that there were over 400,000 described species of beetles - that is just not trying to be part of a wider intelligent theological discussion.
People don't come from other peoples ribs while they are sleeping. We know that now.
Discussions of how the most amazing book ever written still fits into our current understanding of the earth's and human origin stories are happening in seminaries and rabbinical schools and dinner tables all over the world. Smart people differ and debate and grow and learn. The growing and learning is what moves the discussion and our spiritual society forward.
This isn't that. In fact this just gets in the way of that. There is no capacity or capability to teach and learn when you think you already have all the answers, and as it turns out all the answers are just platitudes.
Like the rest of us, the OP is doing the best they can. Walk a mile in their shoes. Perhaps compassion is more appropriate than scorn.
@Bish saidBish
The mental framework might be more secure than it logically should be. How else would an obviously fictitious tome still be revered two thousands years later.
Believing Moses received the Ten Commandments directly from God at Mount Sinai is an act of faith, and I think most of us can agree a little faith in these dark times is not the worst thing in the world to help us keep ...[text shortened]... ng the best they can. Walk a mile in their shoes. Perhaps compassion is more appropriate than scorn.
Believing Moses received the Ten Commandments directly from God at Mount Sinai is an act of faith, and I think most of us can agree a little faith in these dark times is not the worst thing in the world to help us keep going.
I have faith in the basic goodness of humanity. I have faith that evil is wrong. I have faith in peace, compassion, humility, altruism, music, poetry, service to others. What I don’t need, and I certainly won’t have anyone telling me that I need, is a supernatural woo woo being who is all loving, all caring, all knowing, and who, if I don’t worship him, will sentence me to eternal damnation.
Religion does not entitle its followers to take the moral high ground.
There is no scorn in me, but yes, I do have compassion. Compassion for the poor misguided souls who are suffering the illusion that God loves them and will save them in the next life.
Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu,
Buddhist, sufi, or zen. Not any religion or cultural system. I am not from the East or the West, not out of the ocean or up from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not composed of elements at all. I do not exist, am not an entity in this world or in the next, did not descend from Adam and Eve or any
origin story. My place is placeless, a trace of the traceless. Neither body or soul.
I belong to the beloved, have seen the two worlds as one and that one call to and know, first, last, outer, inner, only that breath breathing hu-man being.
the only "truth" is what is true.
belief and opinion or objective analysis may or may not be true.
since there is no rule that can demonstrate which of the three above can lead to truth all must be put aside as leading to what is truth as each has their own method of proof to show one how each is actually true.
truth is an ocean which is comprise of the water of many streams ( an old Chinese saying ).
but even this chinese saying is an avoidance of the issue, is it not ?
@KellyJay saidYou sound like someone desperately trying to talk himself into something he doesn't really believe.
Every time we do and say anything contrary to what is true, we are acting against the truth of God. All lairs are condemned, every false scale is an abomination to God. We live in a God-created universe; it all belongs to HIm, and every single person in it was made in His image and loved by Him, so much so that Jesus came and died so we could be redeemed, saved from our si ...[text shortened]... rs today, while it is today. Once we are not able to make it in this life, the consequences follow.
I have known people of deep, abiding faith; they don't talk like you do.
@moonbus saidHave you ever wondered why this is in the Bible, in James 4?
You sound like someone desperately trying to talk himself into something he doesn't really believe.
I have known people of deep, abiding faith; they don't talk like you do.
What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.
@Suzianne saidI have said that truth and reality do not depend on human opinions, including mine. It seems you have to keep it all about human opinion, then you can keep framing the discussion about people instead of reality and truth independent of human opinion. An independent truth and reality we would share and live under, whether we like it or not. There we can be corrected; there we can find where we are wrong about things and about other people, but if it is only what we think? Then we would all have no hope of ever being corrected, since everything we think we accept as true is simply because we think it.
As long as they are YOUR "truth and reality", no?
@KellyJay saidNonsense. Pure nonsense.
I have said that truth and reality do not depend on human opinions, including mine. It seems you have to keep it all about human opinion, then you can keep framing the discussion about people instead of reality and truth independent of human opinion. An independent truth and reality we would share and live under, whether we like it or not. There we can be corrected; there ...[text shortened]... of ever being corrected, since everything we think we accept as true is simply because we think it.
The scary part is that this is how you propose others to bend to your will, ignoring that it is not God's. This is how authoritarians think.