You said..
""""""Yes, the devil is a liar and deceiver. Not sure what this has to do with folks on this thread controlling what other people posting on the thread believe...""""""
So, why do people fight on a Fourm like this one? a "christian" forum?
Its because some are not actually Christians......who are trying to teach the bible.........vs, some who are Christians, who dont understand their Salvation or correct NT theology....., vs the remaining few who are not those.
But I wasn't originally commenting on people
fighting on this thread (or on any other). I was addressing the idea that one person can
force another person to take up a belief they had no intention, or desire, to adopt. Fighting about ideas and forcing a belief upon another person aren't the same thing. In all your remarks about the deceiving power of the devil not once did you address my original point that one person cannot by raw, direct force compel another person to believe something they don't want to believe. And since your posts about the devil ignored this point, I felt little reason to engage with them. How this means I don't understand the deceiving nature of the devil, as you asserted, I don't know.
Why do people fight on forums?
The surface reasons are myriad. But the core problems, the Bible clearly describes:
James 4:1-2
1 What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members?
2 You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask.
Some conflicts - though, not all - arise from a carnal desire to have what others possess. Envy drives people into conflict with each other, the "have-nots" trying to wrest from the "haves" what the "haves" possess. While this happens on a material level, bloody conflicts sometimes waged over physical resources, I think there is also the envy of the fool who looks at the wisdom, confidence and clarity of the wise and, knowing he does not and cannot possess these things, resents them and picks fights with the wise. I've certainly observed this on the various forums I've posted to over the last twenty-plus years.
James 3:14-16
14 But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth.
15 This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic.
16 For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every evil thing.
The fool, as I said, is bitterly jealous of the wisdom of the wise (
vs. 14, 16) of their confidence and clarity of thought and reason. Sometimes this is so much the case that the fool will defy the wise person for no good reason ("lie against the truth" -
vs. 14), arrogantly attacking them, the fool projecting his/her own failings onto the wise person while carefully avoiding the actual substance of the wise person's remarks on a forum thread (with which they haven't the capacity to contend). They do this using nasty digs, patronizing remarks and outright abusive name-calling (stupid, agent of the devil, heretic, etc.). Strangely, though this behavior is clearly not in keeping with the fruit of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, gentleness, patience, etc.), or the meekness and grace of Christ, the fool behaves as though blind to this fact. As a result, when a fool posts to a thread, there is "disorder and every evil thing" (
vs. 16).
Galatians 5:19-20
19 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality,
20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions,
Some disputes and contentions arise from the flesh, from the self-centered Old Self (
Ro. 6:6; Phil. 3:18-19), that always seeks its own before and above anything else. When a person is posting to a forum thread while the Old Self is in control of them, very quickly they'll descend into name-calling, angry dismissiveness, off-point diatribes, etc.
1 Corinthians 3:1-3
1 And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ.
2 I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able,
3 for you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men?
Spiritual babes are carnal. And so, they act like babies, squalling and making messes wherever they go, complaining about spiritual meat they can't understand or digest, urging others to stay with the spiritual milk they so enjoy. As they do so, they engender jealousy and strife, deriding and deforming the wisdom and truth shared on a thread by the spiritually mature and in so doing, unwittingly aid the devil in his work.
Hebrews 5:11-13
11 Concerning him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.
12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food.
13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant.
Incredibly, the most ignorant of, and least prepared to teach, spiritual truth are the ones attempting to do so with the greatest fervor and volume on forum threads. They spew spiritual milk on everyone, thinking its meat they're giving out. And if anyone points this out, well, the rage and vicious retorts begin, demonstrating the very carnality and spiritual immaturity the "milk spewers" are trying to deny (or, at least, obscure).
Proverbs 13:10
10 Only by pride comes contention...
While this proverb offers a sweeping generality to which obvious exceptions exist, often it is spot-on, contention in forum threads amounting to little more than the manifestation of pride, such displays commonly marked by fallacious forms of reasoning like
ad hominem, Strawman arguing, Poisoning the Well, Moving the Goalposts, Tu Quoque, false dichotomies, Equivocation of Terms, etc.
Proverbs 29:22
22 An angry man stirs up strife, and a furious man abounds in transgression.
Sometimes, a poster to a forum is just angry. They have an unbridled temper over which the Holy Spirit is yet to be given control and so, they snarl and snap at others, migrating into name-calling constantly, attacking and abusing fellow posters in various ways, their temper overriding their reason and the commands of God to them to be peaceable, gentle, meek and patient (
2 Ti. 2:24-25; Ga. 5:22-23; Ja. 3:17-18).
Finally, arguments, debates and challenges occur because these are the means, sometimes, by which people arrive at the Truth of things. Just consider, say, a public prosecutor proving a man has committed a murder. There is much evidence and argument, much explanation of events, motives and opportunity, much cross-examination of testimony, that is required to reveal the truth about what the man did, or didn't, do.
Scientists regularly argue over empirical data and how best to interpret what it means. They go back-and-forth giving theories of explanation, testing them, adjusting them, and so on.
Christ himself regularly taught in synagogues, explaining God's truth while often in the presence of, and in the face of opposition from, the religious leaders of the time. He didn't shy away from contending with these pious hypocrites over the Truth, with wisdom and boldness showing them to be the "brood of vipers" that they were. (
Matthew 23)
The apostle Paul made a practice of reasoning from the Scriptures in synagogues, too, arguing with Jews and adherents to other religions about the Christian faith, working by reasoned argument to persuade them to trust in Christ as their Savior and Lord (
Acts 17:2-3; 18:19; 26).
This "negotiation process," by way of reasoned argument, proper biblical interpretation, and spiritual maturity, to an understanding of God's Truth is unavoidable - and increasingly necessary in view of the modern proliferation of online false teachers.
Jude 1:3-4
3 Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints.
4 For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
