@ghost-of-a-duke saidYou talk about God as if He were a fairy tale, unreal, a simple projection of your imagination making that the only possible interpretation of God there is for you, is the one you make up. I'm not interested in your fairy tale.
Not sure how that post advances the conversation.
@moonbus saidYour tooth fairy has no evidence, but we are not talking about a fairy tale, at least I am not, for you nothing matters. You have managed to keep God out of your thinking, proving what Jesus said, you must be born again even to see the Kingdom of God.
The Bible is no more evidence that someone rose from the dead than Homer’s Illiad is evidence of a battle on the shore of present-day Turkey.
@ghost-of-a-duke saidSo you say as you project your imaginary god everywhere else on everyone else.
Not my imagination Kelly, yours.
@kellyjay saidI'm sure moonbus, in his tooth fairy analogy ~ and I understand why it rubs you up the wrong way given the very real impact that the account of Jesus's life has had on history ~ would point to the many writings about the tooth fairy [i.e. what you would call evidence] that there have been down through history : THAT is the point that moonbus is making with the analogy.
Your tooth fairy has no evidence, but we are not talking about a fairy tale, at least I am not, for you nothing matters.
@ghost-of-a-duke saidComing to God, based on proof of God, smacks of coercion.
Why does an omniscient God want people to believe without evidence and reward them for doing so? Why wouldn't such a God want people to come to him because they are convinced intellectually, based on evidence?
Belief is from the heart. That's what God wants.
@suzianne saidBy providing knowledge of its existence and its express will, a deity would still be allowing the exercise of free will in so far as people would still have the free will to be obedient or disobedient, free will to heed or ignore warnings, etc. There is no "coercion". People continue to be free moral agents. What moral purpose could credibly be attached to a deity "rewarding" faith?
Coming to God, based on proof of God, smacks of coercion.
Belief is from the heart. That's what God wants.
@kellyjay saidThe tooth fairy analogy is a placeholder for all the imaginary things people have ever believed in. Marduk was the god of the Babylonians, Ahura Mazda was the god of the Persians, Shiva that of the Hindus, Jupiter that of the Romans, and there are literally tens of thousands of others. There is no reason to believe that the one you believe in really exists and all the others don’t.
Your tooth fairy has no evidence, but we are not talking about a fairy tale, at least I am not, for you nothing matters. You have managed to keep God out of your thinking, proving what Jesus said, you must be born again even to see the Kingdom of God.
@kellyjay saidThere is no reason to believe that the stories in the Bible are accurate reports of events which really happened, whereas the stories of the other religions, Gilgamesh, The Bagavad Gita, and ten thousand other holy texts, are all fictional.
Your tooth fairy has no evidence, but we are not talking about a fairy tale, at least I am not, for you nothing matters. You have managed to keep God out of your thinking, proving what Jesus said, you must be born again even to see the Kingdom of God.
@suzianne saidBut I believe in evolution, for example, because I have been convinced by the evidence, the proof. I don't think being convinced by something necessitates coercion. If God did indeed create mankind then he gave us intelligence and the ability to reason,...for a reason. I don't think intelligence and emotion/feelings are mutually exclusive.
Coming to God, based on proof of God, smacks of coercion.
Belief is from the heart. That's what God wants.
@moonbus saidEvery object of conversation here stands or falls for the evidence and the narrative surrounding it. If you compare all of the gods of this world that had their beginning inside this universe to the one who didn't, the narrative alone shows you are not talking about the same type of god, because the God of scripture transcends the universe as the creator of time, space, energy, and life who also holds it all together by the power of His Word.
The tooth fairy analogy is a placeholder for all the imaginary things people have ever believed in. Marduk was the god of the Babylonians, Ahura Mazda was the god of the Persians, Shiva that of the Hindus, Jupiter that of the Romans, and there are literally tens of thousands of others. There is no reason to believe that the one you believe in really exists and all the others don’t.
We have writings spanning 1500 years compiled into a single book, the Bible, with the Old and New Testaments that book stands alone in its authorship and time, a far cry from the single source of Mormonism, even the Koran. Coupled with the information and order within the universe that led to science by men who believed in a lawgiver, the God of scriptures stands alone.
I'd say there are several reasons to accept God in addition to what He has done with my life and the lives of millions of others. His denial leaves great gaping holes of explanation for everything from the universe itself to life. From the micro to the cosmic, morals, life, order, and entropy, the list is so large it isn't funny. All deniers will have no excuse due to the evidence.
@ghost-of-a-duke saidYou believe in evolution and evolution is not a comparison for anything concerning life and the universe, you cannot get evolution until you get biology as evolution is a change of biology and there is nothing that shows how a mindless process could create living systems that have built-in error checking, maintains temperatures, has cellularly division done in such a way life progresses through time.
But I believe in evolution, for example, because I have been convinced by the evidence, the proof. I don't think being convinced by something necessitates coercion. If God did indeed create mankind then he gave us intelligence and the ability to reason,...for a reason. I don't think intelligence and emotion/feelings are mutually exclusive.
Neither can you account for the start of the universe without suggesting the logical impossible as everything coming from nothing or an eternal universe that has been winding down forever and has not yet hit heat death. You cannot use evidence for any theory any more than I can say God did it, but logically we know from X we can get Y, but we cannot say from X we get X, or that something that is moving toward entropy eternally can exist without being completely laid out without order, let alone having systems in it that supposedly are becoming more advanced in complexity over time without breaking laws. The multiverse theory and life coming here from other planets only move questions away from here, it doesn't answer first life or the beginning of everything.
Imagination supports so many things, that it isn't funny.
@kellyjay saidSorry Kelly. I appreciate evolution is something you struggle to understand. This is the reason I directed my post towards Suzianne and not yourself.
You believe in evolution and evolution is not a comparison for anything concerning life and the universe, you cannot get evolution until you get biology as evolution is a change of biology and there is nothing that shows how a mindless process could create living systems that have built-in error checking, maintains temperatures, has cellularly division done in such a way lif ...[text shortened]... st life or the beginning of everything.
Imagination supports so many things, that it isn't funny.