One Question

Originally posted by Proper Knob
Prosletyze away, I'm not telling you to stop, merely letting you know you're wasting your time. 🙂

I don't want any proselytes. I may want you to be saved.
But that is your sacred choice which neither God nor I will violate.

Feel the sheer power of your own free will to decide.

Originally posted by sonship
I don't want any proselytes. I may want you to be saved.
But that is your sacred choice which neither God nor I will violate.

Feel the sheer power of your own free will to decide.

Free will doesn't exist. It's an illusion.

And this is your mistake, free will is not required for a decision to be taken.
Thus decisions are not, in and of themselves, evidence for free will.

Certain people are, as ever, conflating sin with morality.

Sin's are 'crimes against god' and/or failing to follow gods laws/rules.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with morality, and whether something is right or wrong.

Morality does not and cannot come from divine command. It cannot come from any god.


Now an action deemed a sin may also be immoral, and a virtue can be moral... However
the inverse can, and often is, true as well.

In fact following all the commandments in the bible will get you imprisoned.

Originally posted by sonship

Personally I think 'free' is implicit in the word 'gift' ... as it's not a gift if you
have to earn it/pay for it... It would then be a reward, and not a gift.

As your religion emphatically requires you to earn this 'gift' it is neither
free, nor a gift, it's a reward.

Grampy,

This opinion above is as stupid as saying that you ...[text shortened]... impenetrable Rakj999 what Christian brother or sister here could say this was their experience ?

I am in a castle, you are in a glass house... I recommend not throwing stones at me.


It would indeed be stupid to say "that you had to do a favor [sic] for your mother in order
for her to give you birth." ... it would also be grammatically incorrect and incorrectly spelt.

However that is nothing like what I actually said.

In your religion, as spelled out in the OP... your god is offering a supposedly pleasant eternal
life.
However this is conditional upon doing/saying/thinking/believing certain things [which I will
term 'actions' for the rest of the post].

BECAUSE it is conditional on those REQUIRED actions it is a reward for those actions and is
thus not given freely.

Additional coercion is applied when your religion posits punishment for failing to do the required
actions.

There is nothing free about this. It is a reward, it is payment, it is not a gift.


This is true utterly independent of the nature of the reward. It is tied up in the meaning of the
words 'free' and 'gift' and 'reward'.


If you think this is wrong, feel free to present an actual argument...

But think twice before you include stones...

R C Sproul's good message which I am hearing for the second time.

"This is what the Lord has said, Among those who come near Me I will be regarded as holy."

The Wrath of God in Preaching

YouTube

You didn't listen to the whole thing. Now go back and hear the entire message, why don't you?

" .... I will be regarded as HOLY"

YouTube

Originally posted by Grampy Bobby
God; His plan; the grace gift; eternal life; eternity; other?

"eternity" is something to ponder, the other terms mean vastly different things to say... me and you.

Originally posted by karoly aczel
"eternity" is something to ponder, the other terms mean vastly different things to say... me and you.

appreciate your honesty, karoly. thanks for your reply.

Originally posted by Grampy Bobby
appreciate your honesty, karoly. thanks for your reply.

I remember telling a young man that many years ago.

Essentially, what did he mean by God.

Originally posted by sonship
Oh. So if it is truth, your not believing will make the truth go away?

I can jump out the window of a six story building and wish that there were no law of gravity. But my wishing cannot control the real laws of the universe to that extent. It is better to heed the advice not to jump out of the window expecting that my preference will change the way things are designed to work.

So what you're saying here is that the things you believe apply to me in the same way as the law of gravity does?

Saying this is dodging my question. Once again:

Do you think that threats of eternal torture can somehow force me to believe something that I don't believe?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH

The question has nothing whatsoever to do with anyone's belief in God.

The question has everything to do with the final analysis.

In the final analysis, do you stand before God and account for your life on the basis of your own works, your own good?

Or, in the final analysis, do you stand before God with the covering of the work done on the cross on your behalf by the Lord Jesus Christ?

Neither.

You say "The question has nothing whatsoever to do with anyone's belief in God". And then you offer only two options for the "final analysis" which begin with [1] "do you stand before God [and blah blah]...? and [2] "or do you stand before God [and blah blah]...?" The clumsy way you frame this has everything to do with your belief in your God figure.

Originally posted by Proper Knob
I have no idea what Stalin or Pol Pot thought, why would I? What do they have to do with anything?

They were atheists and therefore think exactly as you do. 🙄

Originally posted by sonship
So if I bonked you on the head in the alley and stole your wallet, I think you would have no problem in holding that I have "sinned" against you.

I would rush to the nearest police station and report that I
had been sinned against!

Given that half the programs on tv are cop shows - how often
do you hear the victims talk about being sinned against?

What a ridiculous redefining of a word!

Originally posted by googlefudge
Free will doesn't exist. It's an illusion.

And this is your mistake, free will is not required for a decision to be taken.
Thus decisions are not, in and of themselves, evidence for free will.

An illusion?
Of what?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
An illusion?
Of what?

The sensation of 'freely' making decisions is an illusion.