Excellent. Spoken like a true Thomist
.I congratulate both of you on the respectful 'tone' of your conversation.
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A Well-Defeated Muslim Apologist
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Excellent. Spoken like a true Thomist
.I congratulate both of you on the respectful 'tone' of your conversation.
Following!
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Excellent. Spoken like a true Thomist
Ouch, I will have to work on my elemental physics a bit more then.
I totally agree with what you said here.
Do you have any questions for me to answer at this level?
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I think we can move forward now. We are in agreement that there is in fact God and a legitimate case can be made for it in science.
If you agree, the next sequential step is establishing that His Son is Jesus. If you concur, lets start with your thoughts on that concept.
Yes, that's what I know about God. You mean scientific proof for god not God.
Mathematically speaking, provided that there is only one god and if we can prove that a god exists -- which can be done scientifically -- then god = God, is a unique solution.
My thoughts were inherited from the pure understanding of the concept of God in Islam, due to my Islamic background. As we have discussed in previous posts.
Additional questions:
How is the power of the son of God is compared to the power of God? Do we have two super powers?
Why the family tree stops at the son, why not have son of the son?
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Very well and thats very logical- we do need to establish "god" ( garden variety deity with the little g) is in fact "God" (YHWH) or it wouldn't matter if Jesus or George was his son or he was born in a brothel. I'll start a post on that for ease of read and following.
Scripture does not go into great detail on this but there are some references that give us "guidance" (best word I can come up with) leading to a conclusion on the "power" of the 2 and here are the references. Lets also define "power" as "force" to do anything above and beyond all the laws of physics as we know them in the universe.
God (YHWH) says in many places that He alone is Supreme in all ways and there is no other- The only way to read that is "God" is either full of crap with an unchecked ego or He is in fact "The Man". This would include Jesus, Allah, Angels, Zeus, Poseidon and all the rest.
(There is a "doctrine of the trinity" in Christianity with differing views[ such as Jesus is God YHWH which would make Him equal] but for the purpose of this discussion I am deliberately not discussing any Christian doctrine or belief/interpretations where there is a question of interpretation. None of them are germane to your salvation and they can all come later when you are learning/studying after your name is written in the book.)
So, God says He is- but there's more
Scripture says God raised Jesus so that implies ( but doesn't specifically state) that God has more power than Jesus. This also applies to God raising Lazarus (Jesus asked God to raise him)
Jesus also subordinates Himself to the Father (again, implies supremacy of the Father)
Jesus also makes a statement that "now all power has been given to me" ( after the resurrection) so that implies Jesus didn't have the "power" before and only God (YHWH) would be the one to give it to Him.
Scripture doesn't address that question so I don't know of any way to answer it other than that.
Let me know if you are comfortable with this part while i build the next post regarding God (YHWH) being GOD versus just a god.
Lets talk about "god" being "God" but as an Engineer we must establish the working definition of a "god" (any type) as it applies in context of this discussion to maintain a common baseline for discussion as :
A sentient being who is superior and can control at will everything (literally everything) in our universe and laws of physics on a scale from the "low" beings (specifically those who can manipulate time/energy/events/matter but lack the higher powers such as to create matter/life etc.) to the "top of the heap" (God of all gods and everything else who simply "is" while ALL OTHERS are not)
This is important for 2 reasons that we must agree to the above. (I've done some studies on deities and demons and there are over a thousand at least with varying degrees of followings throughout history so there is a preponderance of evidence that "gods" do exist so we need to "define" these gods in terms of being a "God" relative to the standards of a "god' rather than a man BECAUSE if they in fact "are" gods then they don't need our "belief" to establish themselves)
From our perspective (a mortal human) and especially as we regress back in time and technology- those "lower" beings (such as angels,demons and for the sake of discussion lets throw in space aliens and ghosts etc.) would have been unmistakable as "gods" to our ancestors and would have been worshiped as such. Lets call these the "lesser" gods.(for sake of a category)
Now, lets establish "GOD" (The ultimate and ONLY). There's a REASON for the only and here it is. There is a school of thought out there that "God" ( be it YHWH, Allah, Zeus or any of the rest) is either the "Head" ( as in smartest,strongest, toughest because he won the title in combat) god in the sense of a LEADER as opposed to an "absolute".
This would imply that there is a higher civilization than the "god definition" we established above thats having god babies and we are just a fishbowl for "our' flavor of god.
That cannot be for this reason- if there were a "god factory" or civilization then at some point an even greater god could (and would) be born ( or however they are created) who would take over from YHWH or anyone else and with time being infinite past and future- theoretically this would have already happened many times. The fact we haven't heard about it is proof (to beyond a reasonable doubt) that it has never happened because nobody has challenged or beaten YHWH for the title.
So, if YHWH is the "God" then not only is he superior to all other "gods' in all ways- he actually CREATED them as well.
As we have agreed earlier, "God" (YHWH) is either the God of all or he is a waste of our time.
So, can we mutually agree with the above definition and continue? (or propose modifications)
A sentient being who is superior and can control at will everything (literally everything) in our universe and laws of physics on a scale from the "low" beings (specifically those who can manipulate time/energy/events/matter but lack the higher powers such as to create matter/life etc.) to the "top of the heap" (God of all gods and everything else who simply "is" while ALL OTHERS are not)
This is important for 2 reasons that we must agree to the above. (I've done some studies on deities and demons and there are over a thousand at least with varying degrees of followings throughout history so there is a preponderance of evidence that "gods" do exist so we need to "define" these gods in terms of being a "God" relative to the standards of a "god' rather than a man BECAUSE if they in fact "are" gods then they don't need our "belief" to establish themselves)
From our perspective (a mortal human) and especially as we regress back in time and technology- those "lower" beings (such as angels,demons and for the sake of discussion lets throw in space aliens and ghosts etc.) would have been unmistakable as "gods" to our ancestors and would have been worshiped as such. Lets call these the "lesser" gods.(for sake of a category)
Now, lets establish "GOD" (The ultimate and ONLY). There's a REASON for the only and here it is. There is a school of thought out there that "God" ( be it YHWH, Allah, Zeus or any of the rest) is either the "Head" ( as in smartest,strongest, toughest because he won the title in combat) god in the sense of a LEADER as opposed to an "absolute".
This would imply that there is a higher civilization than the "god definition" we established above thats having god babies and we are just a fishbowl for "our' flavor of god.
That cannot be for this reason- if there were a "god factory" or civilization then at some point an even greater god could (and would) be born ( or however they are created) who would take over from YHWH or anyone else and with time being infinite past and future- theoretically this would have already happened many times. The fact we haven't heard about it is proof (to beyond a reasonable doubt) that it has never happened because nobody has challenged or beaten YHWH for the title.
So, if YHWH is the "God" then not only is he superior to all other "gods' in all ways- he actually CREATED them as well.
As we have agreed earlier, "God" (YHWH) is either the God of all or he is a waste of our time.
So, can we mutually agree with the above definition and continue? (or propose modifications)
Certainly No, it is not. I have been busy with job workload. I will continue soon.Is this the end?
- Aug 10, 2012
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The power of God is in his divine essence, which is shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Can God's divine essence be shared with others? One must be born again to enter the Kingdom. Then his Spirit will live in you. But having God inside oneself doesn't make one God. Jesus is greater than any mere prophet.
Hello Jalal. I'm pleased to hear that you are investigating Christianity and I assume that this is from a sincere desire to know the truth. I must caution you that you may not have chosen the best place to learn as this particular site commonly has broad doctrinal disputes between various sects of Christianity and not even a full agreement upon the very gospel itself.
The largest Christian denomination in the world is the Roman Catholic Church, but there are literally thousands of sects that call themselves Christian, yet constantly argue over whose doctrine is correct. I was born into a Roman Catholic family and raised as one, but left that church at the age of 13 because of what I saw as hypocrisy in orthopraxy. Even so, the RCC has been the most influential church in the world and could be considered representative of what the world accepts as Christianity. They are worth examining for that reason, but after being born again of the Holy Spirit at the age of 39, and after spending 3 years of searching for Christ in the Old Testament (or Hebrew Tanaach), I came under conviction of the Holy Spirit to find a congregation where I could become a member and serve my Lord.
I visited a number of congregations from different denominations including the Methodist church, the Presbyterian church, an episcopalian church, but was finally lead to a small local Baptist church which I attended for 3 years and where I was baptized as an adult, making the good confession before the congregation. I ended up moving to another "sister" church in the area because I wanted to serve in ministry and didn't find opportunity at the place where I was baptized.
Eventually the Lord lead me to a few more baptist congregations, a calvary Chapel, and back to a new church formed in part by a previous church that I attended. I don't recommend church hopping as a rule, but the Lord gave me a calling as a prophet in the church and sent me to congregations with serious issues that went unaddressed by the leadership of those congregations. The Lord doesn't like to see His churches fail through unrepentant or unrecognized sin.
It was my experience that there were major differences in orthopraxy among the various churches and I can't say that one was better than another or more representative of Christianity in general, but all held to the fundamental doctrines of the faith and the basic gospel of Jesus Christ.
However, to be entirely honest, the only places where I personally experienced works of power by the Holy Spirit were in independent Baptist congregations and that could be entirely coincidental. I certainly haven't come upon any perfect congregation, but some were clearly less spiritually mature than others.
The standard I use to measure a church congregation is scripture. Some churches engage in scripture reading with a pastor teaching through passages and books of the Bible, others barely mention it and have preachers that teach morality based upon worldly thinking, yet all call themselves Christian.
To complicate matters more, there are major "denominations " that reject the gospel but still identify themselves as Christian. Consequently some of us only recognize "biblical Christianity " as authentic, but misinterpretations of scripture even lead to more variations in belief.
I'm not very familiar with Islam, but the poet Omar Khayyam mentions the existence of many "sects" in his Rubaiyat so I assume Islam is plagued with a similar tendency to split over interpretation of the Koran. You may correct me if I'm wrong. I really have no way of knowing whether my English translation of the Koran is accurate, but that was never a concern in that it disagrees broadly with our bible on the character of God as revealed in Jesus Christ, though less so with the incomplete Revelation of the Hebrew scriptures (or Tanaach).
If you desire to understand biblical Christianity, which my mind considers authentic, then you should really just read the gospels, our primary source on the words and teaching of Jesus Christ, then the book " the acts of the apostles " which describes the early formation of the church and the spread of the gospel to the gentile nations through the man named Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul the Apostle and wrote most of the letters of the New Testament.
The letters or epistles as they're commonly called are written to believers, saints in the Lord Jesus Christ, and concern themselves with appropriate Christian behavior, sound biblical doctrine, sound church organization, proper leadership behavior, church discipline, and all those things we expect to see in a sound church of Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, if you had the time to examine the many sects of Christianity as well as the cults that identify as Christian, you will not find many that are entirely observant of biblical instructions.
I personally will not attend a church twice that ignores the biblical patterns of organization and worship, because they seem lifeless to me in the spiritual sense. They don't satisfy my hunger and longing for the truth, my desire for biblical fellowship with the brethren, or satisfy my longing for God's presence in His people.
I hope that you don't find this discouraging, but this is why I suggest you read through the New Testament carefully at least once and preferably several times (7 is the biblical number of completion, but I've found that the Lord teaches me new things with every reading and I've neglected most other books in favor of scripture for the last 26 years.)
The Bible will tell you what a Christian church should look like, but you may be disappointed when you start comparing the ideal to the real. As Christians we count on our heavenly Father to forgive our sins and make up for our shortcomings. We are only complete in Him and without hope without Him, so that tends to extend to all of our failings within the church.
I pray that the Lord grants you the grace to see Him in scripture and to know Him by faith. I also pray that He grants you grace to forgive the immature in Christ who sometimes see Muslims as irredeemable for reasons that will become apparent when you read through the epistle called 1 John and the last book of the New Testament, called the Revelation of Jesus Christ.
May the Lord bless you, may the Lord keep you, may the Lord make His face to shine upon you and grant you peace. Amen.
The largest Christian denomination in the world is the Roman Catholic Church, but there are literally thousands of sects that call themselves Christian, yet constantly argue over whose doctrine is correct. I was born into a Roman Catholic family and raised as one, but left that church at the age of 13 because of what I saw as hypocrisy in orthopraxy. Even so, the RCC has been the most influential church in the world and could be considered representative of what the world accepts as Christianity. They are worth examining for that reason, but after being born again of the Holy Spirit at the age of 39, and after spending 3 years of searching for Christ in the Old Testament (or Hebrew Tanaach), I came under conviction of the Holy Spirit to find a congregation where I could become a member and serve my Lord.
I visited a number of congregations from different denominations including the Methodist church, the Presbyterian church, an episcopalian church, but was finally lead to a small local Baptist church which I attended for 3 years and where I was baptized as an adult, making the good confession before the congregation. I ended up moving to another "sister" church in the area because I wanted to serve in ministry and didn't find opportunity at the place where I was baptized.
Eventually the Lord lead me to a few more baptist congregations, a calvary Chapel, and back to a new church formed in part by a previous church that I attended. I don't recommend church hopping as a rule, but the Lord gave me a calling as a prophet in the church and sent me to congregations with serious issues that went unaddressed by the leadership of those congregations. The Lord doesn't like to see His churches fail through unrepentant or unrecognized sin.
It was my experience that there were major differences in orthopraxy among the various churches and I can't say that one was better than another or more representative of Christianity in general, but all held to the fundamental doctrines of the faith and the basic gospel of Jesus Christ.
However, to be entirely honest, the only places where I personally experienced works of power by the Holy Spirit were in independent Baptist congregations and that could be entirely coincidental. I certainly haven't come upon any perfect congregation, but some were clearly less spiritually mature than others.
The standard I use to measure a church congregation is scripture. Some churches engage in scripture reading with a pastor teaching through passages and books of the Bible, others barely mention it and have preachers that teach morality based upon worldly thinking, yet all call themselves Christian.
To complicate matters more, there are major "denominations " that reject the gospel but still identify themselves as Christian. Consequently some of us only recognize "biblical Christianity " as authentic, but misinterpretations of scripture even lead to more variations in belief.
I'm not very familiar with Islam, but the poet Omar Khayyam mentions the existence of many "sects" in his Rubaiyat so I assume Islam is plagued with a similar tendency to split over interpretation of the Koran. You may correct me if I'm wrong. I really have no way of knowing whether my English translation of the Koran is accurate, but that was never a concern in that it disagrees broadly with our bible on the character of God as revealed in Jesus Christ, though less so with the incomplete Revelation of the Hebrew scriptures (or Tanaach).
If you desire to understand biblical Christianity, which my mind considers authentic, then you should really just read the gospels, our primary source on the words and teaching of Jesus Christ, then the book " the acts of the apostles " which describes the early formation of the church and the spread of the gospel to the gentile nations through the man named Saul of Tarsus, who became Paul the Apostle and wrote most of the letters of the New Testament.
The letters or epistles as they're commonly called are written to believers, saints in the Lord Jesus Christ, and concern themselves with appropriate Christian behavior, sound biblical doctrine, sound church organization, proper leadership behavior, church discipline, and all those things we expect to see in a sound church of Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, if you had the time to examine the many sects of Christianity as well as the cults that identify as Christian, you will not find many that are entirely observant of biblical instructions.
I personally will not attend a church twice that ignores the biblical patterns of organization and worship, because they seem lifeless to me in the spiritual sense. They don't satisfy my hunger and longing for the truth, my desire for biblical fellowship with the brethren, or satisfy my longing for God's presence in His people.
I hope that you don't find this discouraging, but this is why I suggest you read through the New Testament carefully at least once and preferably several times (7 is the biblical number of completion, but I've found that the Lord teaches me new things with every reading and I've neglected most other books in favor of scripture for the last 26 years.)
The Bible will tell you what a Christian church should look like, but you may be disappointed when you start comparing the ideal to the real. As Christians we count on our heavenly Father to forgive our sins and make up for our shortcomings. We are only complete in Him and without hope without Him, so that tends to extend to all of our failings within the church.
I pray that the Lord grants you the grace to see Him in scripture and to know Him by faith. I also pray that He grants you grace to forgive the immature in Christ who sometimes see Muslims as irredeemable for reasons that will become apparent when you read through the epistle called 1 John and the last book of the New Testament, called the Revelation of Jesus Christ.
May the Lord bless you, may the Lord keep you, may the Lord make His face to shine upon you and grant you peace. Amen.
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Hello, Jalal, and Welcome!
You simply need to start with the basics of the Gospel. And the best place to start would be in the Gospel of John, chapter 3. Following that, kindly read and study the entire Gospel, and ask God to show you that Christ is the only Savior of the world. That is the purpose of this Gospel.
When the apostle Thomas saw the wounds in the hands, feet and side of Christ (as revealed in John's Gospel), he cried out "My Lord and my God!". So Jesus is (and was) God who became Man to die for our sins, and rise again for our justification (that we might be saved by God's grace through faith in Christ and His finished work of redemption).
Permit me to tell you a little of my paternal grandfather:
Born and raised in the Rhondda Valley, South Wales, he was taken out of school at the age of ten, and set to work in the coal-mines (unlawful by that time, but who cared?).
Using the local Miners’ Institute – centres of learning at that time (and being a book-worm) – he learned (among many other things) both Hebrew and Greek. His second great passion – Faith and Family together being his first – was music. Able to play both violin and piano – and to transpose written music into tonic-solfa for those who could not read a score – he was appointed Musical Director of the Glanselsig Amateur Operatic Society. His favourite work was Handel’s Messiah. I can see him now, dressed in his black evening suit, white shirt, black dickie-bow, conducting a full chorus and orchestra, with his white baton; with every word, every note engraved in his heart. I have his baton, but none of his talent!
In the 1920’s, a number of Italian families moved into Glamorgan and set up shops and cafes. One of these families (the Bassini’s) settled in Tynewydd (my home town).
When Italy declared war, and joined with Germany, the UK government issued an internment order against those it deemed to be ‘enemy civilians’. This included the Bassini’s. The husband (I knew him as Jack) was taken away, but his wife and children were allowed to remain in their home (they had a café and a fish and chip shop, located side-by-side).
One day, my grandfather was returning from work, only to discover a mob hurling abuse (and stones) at the Bassini’s and their home; at people they had once called friends. My grandfather stood before the mob, and told them to stop, and to leave. This they did.
Many years later the family’s eldest daughter (Maria) was accepted as a Carmelite nun; and my grandfather and grandmother were invited to attend the ceremony. A great honour.
My grandfather was an Elder at Blaencwm Chapel (Welsh Baptist). The Elders employed the Minister.
When I was a teenager, one Minister visited my grandfather’s house, and was treated like royalty. My grandfather called him ‘Sir’. Later, I asked my grandfather why he had called this man ‘Sir’ after all, he was the Minister’s boss!
My grandfather smiled, and said: ‘I’m just an Elder. The Minister speaks the Word!’
When my grandfather died, several hundred men – of all ages – attended his funeral (women did not do so in those days). They filled the cemetery chapel, and many were weeping openly.
My grandfather was able to calm an angry mob – and move the hearts of many – not because of any legal authority (he had none), but because of his character; because of the person he was. He lived his Faith as it was meant to be lived. A Christian would say that he reflected the love of Jesus; and that it was this that made him a shining beacon to others. I would say that he reflected the love of God. He led by example rather than by argument.
He is, by far, the finest man I ever knew.
My grandfather and his only son were both coal miners in western Pennsylvania back when men used picks and shovels to dig out the coal by hand and the only safety gear they used was a helmet with a candle lamp. My uncle Bucky lived into his sixties but eventually died of black lung disease. My grandfather, my dzedo as we called this old Slovak immigrant, lived to the age of 92 and was a devout Catholic, but from humble origins and with no more than a sixth grade education at best. Yet, he was an amazing man to me. He would sit smoking his pipe in the shade of an old tree by his house and I saw sparrows sometimes hopping about on his shoulder (he kept some bird seed in his pocket and as a child he'd caught and ate birds for a meal while tending the flocks in Stada Lubovna, Slovakia.)
He and my grandmother, baba, raised their son and a household of daughters on his wages as a miner and the produce of his garden, the chickens and bees that he kept, yet he didn't withhold his means from his neighbors in want, nor from his church.
None of these things of themselves are guarantors of his eternal salvation and though I only knew him as an old man, I knew that he was still guilty of sin. He wasn't a perfect man, only one such man was ever born, Yahshua of Nazareth.
Scripture teaches us that God alone is good and that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, but with one exception, God Himself in the person of His Son.
My English translation of the Koran informs me that the prophet of Allah took exception to this, believing that this involved some kind of carnality. He was mistaken, neither knowing the scriptures, nor understanding the power of God who spoke all things into creation through His Son.
The Bible teaches that Jesus was God before He was born into a tabernacle (tent) of flesh and that the man, Jesus, was born of a virgin and not of the seed of man.
While within the churches of Christianity there remains disputes over the gospel, the dispensation of God's grace, the return of Christ, and the coming of God's kingdom upon the Earth, scripture speaks plainly to all these things and recieving them is an act of faith.
Scripture says plainly that without holiness no one will see God, but it also says that man is incapable of such holiness for God will not share His glory with men. Yet scripture also teaches that men can receive the Holy Spirit of God through faith in His Son and it is God's presence that makes anything holy, even the ground where He appears.
All this is to say that the works of men, whether good or evil, can not restore them to a state of innocence before God.
The cross of Jesus represents the sacrifice of truly innocent blood in payment for sin, not for Jesus who was without sin, but for humanity. This doesn't cleanse humanity of all sin, but allows God to forgive us and indwell us based upon the sacrifice of His Son and not upon our deeds.
Jesus called this being born again of the Spirit of God. He didn't mean a physical birth, but a spiritual one, a new creation with new life in His Spirit. When you receive Him, His Spirit teaches your spirit how to live righteously according to His standard rather than your own.
I do not comprehend the concept of crusade, holy war, or jihad. Such things were never approved by Jesus and the one time that he told His disciples to pick up a sword was just prior to His arrest so that the scripture would be fulfilled that He would be counted with the transgressors.
His apostle Simon, whom He renamed Cephas (or Peter) was the one who obtained a sword and used it to lop off a soldiers ear at Jesus' arrest, and Jesus Himself restrained Peter by commandment and restored the soldier's ear.
Our Lord's professed purpose was to bring a sword upon the Earth and to reveal His Father in His own person, to deliver the words of God that would either justify or condemn men according to their acceptance or rejection of them and Him.
Christians do not believe that Allah is God, though the Hebrews before Christ believed that Yah havah was much like the Allah of the Koran. I'm convinced that Mohammed believed as much, but I can only see the prophet of Islam as a thief, a liar, and a murderer for his rejection of the Son of God because such rejection of the Son of God is defined by scripture as antichrist, the work of Satan.
Men did not create the division between Christianity and Islam. God did that prophetically through His word delivered to the saints. This doesn't justify war, but it was Mohammed that brought war against the "infidels" and it was Turks and Moors that brought war to Europe, wars that are still being fought.
Do you wonder why young Christian Arabs and Persians yield their necks to the cruel blades of radical Islam rather than taking up weapons against it? They did not love their lives to the death, but clung to Jesus our God. These all will receive a martyr's crown from God for their faithfulness and they didn't have to murder a single soul.
I don't doubt your story at all, but there is only one name under heaven through which men may be saved as declared by scripture and that is the name of our Lord and the Savior of our souls from eternal damnation, Jesus (Yahshua) the Christ (anointed or holy one.)
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