It requires courage to be an Atheist.

Originally posted by rwingett
Googlefudge, you malodorous, pestilential cretin...everyone knows that babies are atheists. Furthermore, it is a wholly justifiable use of the term.

Wow!
How do you address people you don't agree with?
😀

Originally posted by Suzianne
I think maybe you didn't mean to give me that diatribe, since I've never actually disagreed with what you just said.

It appears then that I misunderstood your post. But I believe you misunderstood the discussion. Has anyone here claimed that no answer is the same as answering no, thus stacking the deck as you claim?

Originally posted by OdBod
I hear what you are saying sonship, but this is the important question, is the sin nature due to DNA or does it come with the soul? As you can guess the implications are very significant, I eagerly await your reply!

I hear what you are saying sonship, but this is the important question, is the sin nature due to DNA or does it come with the soul? As you can guess the implications are very significant, I eagerly await your reply!

That is a good question which of course I have contemplated myself.
I think it is something in the body of man.

Peter speaks of the lust of the flesh which war against the soul.
It sounds like something in the outer part of man which is warring against the inner part of man.

1 Peter 2:11

New American Standard Bible
Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul.

King James Bible
Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;

Yet there are some other passages which speak a little differently about this sin nature.

Whatever exactly it is, to me to find out about it was a relief .
Where as a lot of people I know would consider the revelation of a sin nature to be bothering thing, my reaction was more -

"Now that explains a lot! Though it is a bad thing I am relieved to finally have an accurate diagnosis."

Originally posted by rwingett
Googlefudge, you malodorous, pestilential cretin...everyone knows that babies are atheists. Furthermore, it is a wholly justifiable use of the term.

That's really senseless. Everyone knows babies are newborns, and nobody can remember being a baby, except me, that I know of, and I remember believing in God from the get go!

Originally posted by OdBod
It requires courage to be an Atheist. To accept that you will end, runs contrary to all your self preservation and survival instincts. To have to accept that you will not see your loved ones again is heartbreaking. Religious people are able to side step these hard truths, and that makes religion an easier option. I would also extend this thinking to martyrdom, ...[text shortened]... r his belief than anybody. How does this compare to a simple man or woman dying to save another?

no it dosent

Originally posted by sonship

I hear what you are saying sonship, but this is the important question, is the sin nature due to DNA or does it come with the soul? As you can guess the implications are very significant, I eagerly await your reply!

That is a good question which of course I have contemplated myself.
I think it is something in the body of man.

Peter ...[text shortened]... ] explains a lot! Though it is a bad thing I am relieved to finally have an accurate diagnosis."

Thankyou for your reply sonship, but some rather uncomfortable consequences follow from attributing the sin nature to the body (DNA) of man. I assume that god knew what he/she/it was doing when Adam was created. It therefore follows that god created the sin nature. It gets worse, didn't god create man in his own image?

Originally posted by OdBod

Thankyou for your reply sonship, but some rather uncomfortable consequences follow from attributing the sin nature to the body (DNA) of man. I assume that god knew what he/she/it was doing when Adam was created. It therefore follows that god created the sin nature. It gets worse, didn't god create man in his own image?

I have questions about the Bible as well as anyone. I have been studying it for many years.

Though I could raise some very good questions involving things I read, I do not go hunting for them with the goal of collecting reasons not to trust God. I have met Christ and enjoy immensely our friendship.

Whether I have graduated from that game of hunting out things to call "stupid" so I can live without Jesus Christ or just found it unprofitable sport, I don't know.

It is not a sport that I get into - IE. "Let me find something in the Bible to hold up to embarrass or stump these pesky Christians. I don't like this Jesus fellow anyway. The more reasons I find to make the whole thing look stupid the better."

I'm sorry OdBod. I am not a man without questions or paradoxes or even contradictions to contemplate. But the sport of seeking out problems as issues justifying the dismissal of God, is just somehow not my thing.

To me this is like sitting down to a turkey dinner just to hunt for bones to choke on.

So why I could pose lots of somewhat puzzling matters myself, I am not into helping you to collect "stupidities" to rationalize not believing in Christ for the joy and salvation I know He provides.

I think being made in God's image is the basis of human dignity.
And true human freedom apparently entailed Adam's choice to plunge his descendents into a fall from highest blessing.

The story does not END there. And I tend to stress the positive things God has done to reconcile us to Himself.

The fallen body thing, the transmuted flesh matter, I have much to learn there.

Originally posted by rwingett
Googlefudge, you malodorous, pestilential cretin...everyone knows that babies are atheists. Furthermore, it is a wholly justifiable use of the term.

Rwingett! You Urbanophobic wannabe Hutterite, so good to see you again.

Everyone apparently didn't get the memo, and no matter how justified it is
there are those insufficiently informed persons that raise a right old stink
at the suggestion that babies might be considered atheists.

And as amusing as it is to antagonise these people it is not always helpful
to do so.

My point, as any half-blind dimwit could see, is that whether it is helpful
or not, is irrelevant to the truth of the claim. Truth doesn't have to be helpful,
it just has to be true.

Originally posted by sonship

Thankyou for your reply sonship, but some rather uncomfortable consequences follow from attributing the sin nature to the body (DNA) of man. I assume that god knew what he/she/it was doing when Adam was created. It therefore follows that god created the sin nature. It gets worse, didn't god create man in his own image?

I have questions a ...[text shortened]... o Himself.

The fallen body thing, the transmuted flesh matter, I have much to learn there.

At no time did I use the words stupid, stupidities, suggest hunting for problems or treating this discussion as sport. These statements and ideas are entirely yours. I happen to think that the questioning nature of man is one of the most important and defining qualities of mankind.From you post it would appear you wish limit this attribute in order to preserve your sense of wellbeing. As you know, the relationship between man and god has changed over time, as documented in the bible. Has it occurred to you that maybe, if there is a god, that relationship is changing again? Perhaps he/she/ it might want us to be independent and create in our own right. Now wouldn't that be something! But we need to be able question everything, because if we don't, to use your words, the story will END there.

Originally posted by OdBod

At no time did I use the words stupid, stupidities, suggest hunting for problems or treating this discussion as sport.

Okay. Sorry.

These statements and ideas are entirely yours. I happen to think that the questioning nature of man is one of the most important and defining qualities of mankind.

Okay.

From you post it would appear you wish limit this attribute in order to preserve your sense of wellbeing.

I am concerned about my spiritual wellbeing.
Should I not be ?

As you know, the relationship between man and god has changed over time, as documented in the bible.

I'm not absolutely certain what you mean. But I'm listening.
No telling how long this more amiable mood will last.

Give it your best shot.

Has it occurred to you that maybe, if there is a god, that relationship is changing again?

I think so in that those who DO have a fellowship with the living God are being called to sink deeper. Circumstances demand that we sink deeper. Rising tide of more and more pronounced forces against the relationship motivate many to go deeper.

No doubt, as I read of people's communion with God from the early Genesis to the latter Genesis there is a change in the sense of a deepening relationship.

Abraham expressed a level of fellowship with God.
Isaac expressed a slightly different aspect of this relationship.
Jacob expressed for certain a deepening experience.

When God says He is the God of Abraham the God of Issac and the God of Jacob He DOES indicate He is MOVING. He is MOVING ON. He is "traveling" and dispensing Himself deeper into the life of certain men.

Bringing man closer, yes, I could say is change.
Going deeper and spreading out into more and more of man's being, yes, I could say represents a change.

Good point if you mean you notice not a static relationship but a deepening one as the history of the Bible unfolds.

There is a consummation and a climax in Jesus Christ. There we have the ultimate in God / Man interaction. We see a total mingling. We see an interweaving to a degree that "the Word became flesh".

As you might notice this utter and most united union is fought strenuously by some religions. "This is TOO TOO much" would many argue. And this is "TOO TOO much" was uttered by those who hated the union and executed the Son of God.

Now this union, this incorporation God seeks to duplicate in all those who are "born again". Here is one little passage proving that Jesus Christ came to mass produce and duplicate what He was in millions of others.

"Truly, truly, I say to you, Unless the grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone; but if it dies it bears much fruit." (John 12:24)

What He was saying is that in order to duplicate that divine life within His human life He must DIE. The shell of His humanity must be cracked opened and the intrinsic divine life within released into "many grains". This is for a duplication. This is for a mass production. This is that the ONE unique Son of God might be duplicated through His death and resurrection to produce many sons of God.

I am one of those sons of God. And I can vouch that God is ever seeking to wrought and, if you will, change that union into a deeper and deeper incorporation of Christ living in me.

Perhaps he/she/ it might want us to be independent and create in our right. Now wouldn't that be something! But we need to be able question everything, because if we don't, to use your words, the story will END there.

I have to go now and come back latter.