Messages

31

Off-Topic / Re: daily Bible verse

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:21:08 pm »Message ID: 429225

"Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth." Colossians 3:2. [NKJV]

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Off-Topic / Re: Favorite flavor of jelly?

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:17:53 pm »Message ID: 429223

Apricot or blackberry.

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Off-Topic / Re: Have food prices risen as in your area lately?

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:17:23 pm »Message ID: 429221

Prices are definitely going up in my area. Things have probably doubled in the last couple years.

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Off-Topic / Re: Which one is your favorite Chicken, Beef or Fish?

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:16:23 pm »Message ID: 429219

I don't like eating anything that has a face or had a mother. (I'm vegetarian....)

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Off-Topic / Re: WHAT IS EVERYONE DOING FOR THE WEEKEND

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:15:18 pm »Message ID: 429218

I will be cutting and splitting wood for heating.

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Off-Topic / Re: Frequent Headaches

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:14:43 pm »Message ID: 429217

Try a good chiropractor. Sometimes headaches can be fixed by readjusting the back in the neck. Good chiropractors do exist!

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Off-Topic / Re: Do you like to be licked?

« on: October 08, 2011, 05:13:36 pm »Message ID: 429216

I don't like to be licked but I don't mind it terribly. I totally don't like being licked in the mouth--that is just gross. If you think about it, that is the only way the dog has to "pet" you!

38

Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 22, 2011, 12:18:48 pm »Message ID: 420883

A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still. (No offense, whatsoever, meant.)

An unsupported opinion is not equivalent to a substantiated opinion.



To whom is your opinion substantiated? Is it possible that your opinion is just as unsupported as you claim our opinions are?

This debate/discussion is going in an infinite loop!

Yep, you can accurately attribute that to Surveymack10's evading repeated requests for her to quote the claim she alleges I made and her tedious repetition of previously refuted evasions.  I'll take partial responsibility for fencing with an unarmed opponent.  That's terrible of me.

Surverymack10 has not been evading your requests. She has stated her opinion quite clearly and has repeated it at your request many times. Your assumption that she is an unarmed opponent is not a fair one. She has plenty of evidence on her side. Just because you do not see that the evidence a Christian can give is logical and realistic does not mean that that evidence is insufficient. There will always be people in this world that will do all they can to lead people to believe that there is no God. Belief in God takes faith. And that faith grows with experience.

Debate accomplishes nothing except stir up the ire of people. That attitude is not Christ-like nor becoming to a Christian. As a Christian, I believe that everything I post must be polite and respectful to the person I am writing to and I endeavor to do that. However, I cannot disguise what I believe to be true. If I do not share what I believe as a Christian, than I am responsible in a way for the people that I could have helped but didn't. Please stop attacking anyone who states that they believe differently then you do.

39

Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 22, 2011, 11:45:10 am »Message ID: 420877

A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still. (No offense, whatsoever, meant.)

This debate/discussion is going in an infinite loop!

40

Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 21, 2011, 06:43:37 pm »Message ID: 420514

I'm sorry, my last post didn't come out formatted quite right. I hope it is still clear enough as it is

41

Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 21, 2011, 06:41:17 pm »Message ID: 420512

Quote
I heard it said once that an argument does not have to be convincing in order to be compelling. There are some who will dispute any argument in favor of God, but others are willing to hear. The God I believe in is not a vindictive hateful God. Rather, He is a God of love who hates sin, but loves the sinner.

First off, there are no convincing arguments that favor your god. All of them are filled with humongous holes that only the naive and ignorant hover over when they're brought into the light of reality. This has been demonstrated countless times on this forum by the christian group. Secondly, have you ever read the OT? You believe your god is a god of love, and yet he has furiously slaughtered and commanded the slaughter of people for jealous, petty, and childish reasons. If that is love to you, I am very frightened to be typing to you right now.

Answer
I have read those stories in the Old Testament and there is no denying that from the surface it appears that God is cruel and vindictive. However, look more closely at the stories. I believe the Bible cannot contradict itself. All through the Bible, God is shown to be loving and compassionate. How can love and justice be combined? In every instance where someone was killed or a nation was destroyed, God was not acting out of anger. He was acting out of love for He knew that if those people were allowed to stay alive, they would not change. (It is similar in many ways to an honest judge today. If the judge allowed a murderer to go free, they would likely only go out and do it again and teach others to do it.) They would only spread their wickedness and disbelief of God and grow harder and harder in their sins. If God were to slaughter innocent people for no reason, that would not be love and I would not want to serve a God like that. But that is not the kind of God I serve. You are totally misunderstanding the big picture in the Bible.



Quote
All of the misery in the world today is not because God is angry. Instead, it shows that God is fair and that He gives everybody a choice. They can accept God or reject Him. God will not force anyone to obey Him; I can't force anyone to believe in God. But I can present compelling evidence so that those who have open minds might be convinced.

Okay, another point here- If he's fair and allows for choice, explain to me how either accepting him or being eternally damned to hell is a fair choice from a fair god. How is that any different from The Godfather giving you "An offer you can't refuse"? It is coercion. "Do what I say or BURN!" Not really a fair choice, is it? Seriously, try explaining it w/o spiralling away from the basic question I asked.


Answer
That is not representative of the God I have learned to love. He does not hang threats of death over them. Rather, He gives everyone a choice. One misunderstanding here is that God does not have an eternally burning hell. The Bible teaches that everyone who dies sleeps in the grave until Jesus comes. Then, those who have chosen to not follow God will be destroyed by fire. That fire will burn forever--until it goes out and sin is totally destroyed. My evidence stated here is perhaps not conclusive, but there is plenty to back my belief in the Bible. Would it be fair for Cain to suffer 4000 years longer for murder than someone who commits the same crime? Back to the question at hand, God does not coerce people; rather He gives them the choice of life or death. It is their choice. If God were to force anybody to do anything, God would not be the loving God He says He is.



Quote
Those who don't believe there is a God will find out that they are wrong, but I really hope that you will realize that before God destroys sin and, with it, those who would not listen to His pleadings to repent.What is it that brings out such bitterness and hatred toward the thought of the existence of God

I assure you it has nothing to do with the god because freethinkers do not wholeheartedly believe or put faith in gods. It has to do with the believers spreading this cursing filth around to everyone because "they're commanded to do so". How ignorant does one have to be to realize that people DON'T want to be cursed to rot in a fiery afterlife just because they don't think the same way you do? From an aerial POV it is nothing more than rudeness and bitterness disguised as a 'loving' warning.


Answer
It is not that people will be lost because they don't believe the same way I do. People will be lost, though, if they understand the truths in the Bible and refuse to obey them. If you kill someone on purpose, the courts will give you a serious sentence. In a similar way, God's law cannot be disobeyed or else the person who disobeys and refuses to repent will receive a serious sentence. This is by no means a threat, it is a plea to change your ways and choose to believe in a God who loves you.

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Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 21, 2011, 05:16:58 pm »Message ID: 420473

plenty of people BELIEVE in things that are not considered proven facts--- i am not CLAIMING my God's existence is a FACT, I am simply claiming that I BELEIVE IN HIM, hope this makes more sense to ya as I am running out ways to word the same thing.

To summarize your claim then; you are asserting that you "believe" in something which lacks a factual basis for existance.  In other words, you aren't claiming such an existance as a fact but, are claiming to "believe" in a hypothetical existance.  This is a curious state of affairs.

Can you prove that God does not exist? Or is it possible that you only believe that He does not exist?

43

Debate & Discuss / Re: God is a Fake

« on: September 21, 2011, 04:28:05 pm »Message ID: 420445

answers below by number.

I am not trying to avoid the questions you asked and will reply to them later.

Okay, which questions were those again that you'll be getting around to answering later?

1.

What is it that has made you so bitter to the thought of God?

Why do you presume 'bitterness' must be the reason before asking?  Should I also engage in speculation and hypothesize that your assumption rests solely upon the nature of this particular debate & discussion, which you've determined stems from being "bitter" about something?  It just doesn't occur to you that there could be some other basis, does it?

2

This probably means very little to you based on your attitude throughout this post and many of your other posts, but I just want you to know that I will be praying for you.

Whatever helps you sleep at night.  The irony of that is your threats on "god's" behalf on the one hand, ("Those who don't believe there is a God will find out that they are wrong, but I really hope that you will realize that before God destroys sin and, with it, those who would not listen to His pleadings to repent." - jsuderc & supposedly, 'god'), while alternatively "praying" for the ones you've threatened on the other.  That's sublime.

3

1. There were some questions in earlier posts that you asked. I will do my best to answer them later on when I have more time.

2. Perhaps bitterness was not the right word. I do realize that there could be some other basis, but would you be willing to share where you are coming from. All I was saying is that there seems to be something at the root of these feelings against the thought of a God. I am not seeking to offend in any way.

3. I am not trying to threaten you and I am sorry if I came across that way. However, I do not know how else to say what I said. My conviction is that you are making a critical mistake and you feel that you are right. One of us is wrong because we can't both be right. I am not trying to force you to change the way you believe--all I am doing is trying to share my understanding of things in this discussion.

Just a thought: I believe that you are quite intelligent and are making the best decision for yourself based on what you understand and know. Please humor me for a minute--Do you know everything there is to know in the entire universe? If we even knew 1% of what there is to know about everything in the universe, there is still 99% that we don't know about. Could it be that somewhere in the universe, in the part you don't know about, is a God like the one I believe exists? (I am not at all trying to say that I have reached a higher level and know more than you for that would be obnoxious! We are all at different points in our understanding of different things.)

44

Off-Topic / Re: What do you drink with dinner?

« on: September 21, 2011, 02:58:22 pm »Message ID: 420420

I don't usually drink anything with my meal. I don't believe it is healthy to mix lots of fluid with food in your stomach. Then again...what is soup?

45

Word Chains & Countdowns / Re: OFFICIAL COUNT TO 1,000,000

« on: September 21, 2011, 02:56:27 pm »Message ID: 420418

2711