Nothing much left to say

[I.O.U]

That is not the root cause at all. "The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked".

Can't you see it's what people believe that create the causes for our mental disease. But how can you see when all you see are the things you believe. If a person believed they could fix my TV but didn't care about the real know how, I'd be pretty stupid if I was convinced based on what they believed.

 

[I.O.U]

Yahzoo.

 

[I.O.U]

I bet it felt good to get that off your chest. We are indeed, both rat bags AND privileged.

Regarding us stepping on each other, please - by all means - show us how we may better reflects God’s glory.

Hey! No laughing out loud, or rolling on the floor laughing, or my favourite LIO laughing it off. I figured out why people laugh it off (Those ha ha ha types) Because they are uncomfortable and don't want to actually deal with how they feel. So they do the (ha ha ha) thing hoping the uncomfortable thing will go away.

 

[Brakelite]

I didn't, and I did factor that in when I was writing out that post. I was saying that a relationship with a internalized belief pretty much screws you up. You know what it's like to hang out with someone who is just focused on one thing. Day in day out one thing, one thing, one thing, you got to hear that one thing, over and over until you can't breathe anymore.

My relationship isn't with an internalized belief, but you refuse to accept my word. My relationship is with a risen glorified Savior, Jesus Christ, who is now representing us as High Priest before the throne of the Almighty Father. That's the truth. You don't have to reinvent what I'm saying to suit your preconceived faith in your own opinions.

 

[Brakelite]

I remember to well of a twelve year long friendship going down the toilet because the other party became absorbed into Mormonism. You can't do nothing, nothing about someone when they believe they know the truth. I know the culprit is believing itself, because it's the only constant. I remember wasting so much energy on trying to prove to my friend that Mormonism didn't add up logically, wasn't even consistent with biblical doctrine. Poor guy believed that the sabbath rest was on sunday not saturday, believing that the Jews were wrong.

So don't throw everything into the rubbish heap on account of error in some religious paradigms.

 

[Brakelite]

Forgive me but that's a total evasion of my question and a total diversion.

I ask again, do you think it would be a good reward to be granted eternal life but as my personal gardener, tending my plants, mowing my lawn, pruning my shrubs? It's a simple enough question.

Your question is irrelevant seeing you aren't the one offering me eternal life. The Christian hope of a future life of joy and peace and happiness, without fear, or death, pain or sorrow, is founded on the character of the one who has promised. Not on the promises of someone who can't deliver.

 

[Brakelite]

This is evasion. The OT clearly paints god as a vengeful tyrant whose anger and frustration results in him going on mass killing sprees to the extent that innocent babies and unborn babies get slaughtered in the process.

Now it's getting clearer. No wonder you don't believe in God. The God you describe above? I don't believe in him either.

 

[Brakelite]

I fairly spat my tea out reading that. You surely can not be serious. The USA is just about the most ****ed up society on the planet.
Crime is off the scale, police brutality is rife to the point of killing members of the public whilst being filmed doing it, millions are on food hand-out programmes, violence is everywhere, gun culture prevails . . . . I mean what have you been drinking?!!

And how is all that a reflection of biblical Christianity? Are not all those things affirmation that society is drawing further and further away from biblical Christianity?

 

[I.O.U]

My relationship isn't with an internalized belief, but you refuse to accept my word. My relationship is with a risen glorified Savior, Jesus Christ, who is now representing us as High Priest before the throne of the Almighty Father. That's the truth. You don't have to reinvent what I'm saying to suit your preconceived faith in your own opinions.

Excuse me. But I don't exist in your mind, so it's not as if I can actually experience what is happening to you. Jesus being very real to you isn't something you are able to cause to be real in my mind. If you could by some method cause someone to be awoken to that very real Jesus you experience, it wouldn't be the real Jesus now would it. Because only Jesus saves, not you, not me, not anyone.

 

[I.O.U]

So don't throw everything into the rubbish heap on account of error in some religious paradigms.

Truth can never be divided into multiple truths. Christianity or any religion that makes claims of one absolute truth, can not have multiple foundations leading to the one truth. But if we consider belief to be the flaw, then we can understand where and why the splinters form in all faith based institutions.

 

[I.O.U]

Human beings are naturally needing to acquire knowledge over belief. It is hardwired into our nature. But if we suspend this natural function in favour of a subjective understanding of our reality, we become knowledge starved, suffering in likeness to being not feed.

 

[I.O.U]

Knowledge is food for our mind's no less than a healthy meal is for our bodies.

 

[Wrangler]

Hey! No laughing out loud, or rolling on the floor laughing, or my favourite LIO laughing it off. I figured out why people laugh it off (Those ha ha ha types) Because they are uncomfortable and don't want to actually deal with how they feel. So they do the (ha ha ha) thing hoping the uncomfortable thing will go away.

No. Humor is an effective way to smooth over conflict.

Just last night I went to the theater where an exchange between Churchill and a female political opponent. It was in the evening after Churchill had a few drinks. She said loudly to embarrass him that he was drunk. The statement was mean-spirited even if true. They guy is fighting the Nazi's and trying to prevent the kingdom from annihilation and probably needed to mitigate above average stress.

The great leader replied with a joke, which left his opponent speechless.

Reagan did a similar thing in 1984 when running for re-election. He was criticized for being too old. His reply was humorous, turning it around defending his opponent to not be criticized for youth and inexperience.

 

[Ziggy]

JFK gave a great speech to the press. But today they are failing miserably.
They use the media to keep the people divided. They use the media as a weapon against political opponants and ideologies.
It doesn't matter what side the aisle your on.
Our government has been infiltrated by enemies foreign and domestic. And the media (spiritual wickedness in high places)
is what controls and persuades the minds of the masses.
Eph 2:2
Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
Eph 2:3
Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

America is a great country with great promise but somehow we lost our way. We let our guard down. And we made deals with our enemies for the sake of money and power.
Americans are proud of the path we started out on. Our constitution of the promise of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness was grand.
We've had a lot of bumps and hurdles to overcome. Civil rights, women's rights, now we have parents rights and childrens rights.
But some of these have become warped and twisted and not in the peoples best interest, but as a means to overthrow and destroy our traditions and way of life.

The policies being passed today which should be for all, are for a select few. Special interests and big money pull the strings to accomplish their agenda.
And that agenda is not in the interest of the American people or it's Constitutional freedoms.

What we are seeng today is a twisted mockery of what we had hoped we would become. Free and Fair for everyone.
I can understand the disdain of other countries looking at America today. It is not what it was intended to be.
But there is still hope. There are still a lot of people holding on to that American dream.
Patriotism is almost forgotten among many. And selfishness and greed are quickly taking over.

From Eisenhower with his warnings of the military industrial complex, to JFK with his warnings of secrecy and secret societies, we haven't taken those warning seriously enough. And what we see today are the fruits of their labors taking over the freedom and independence of the American way of life.
There is more China in our government than America. There is more Russia in our media than America.
Our land and manufacturing have been sold out from under our feet.
And our children are being brought up in society by communists and marxists.
Where disfiguring a child's body to fit their ideology is becoming more acceptable everyday.

We have drugs, guns, and human trafficking running freely across our borders. And there isn't much push to fix it, because it pays to look the other way.
And it's not just here, it's around the world. But America was supposed to be the one place that would set an example of how to be Better.
We are failing.
The spirit is dying.
The very rich and very greedy and very powerful are exercising their power around the world. It's coming from places some have never even heard of.
These people want to reshape the world to their own liking and use whatever means necessary to do it. Even turning neighbor against neighbor and brother against brother in the name of social justice.

We are at the point where half the country have oil in their lamps and the other half has run dry.
But even those with the oil are being beaten down and exhausted. This war is unlike any war the world has ever known.

It is important to understand that the very media we trust for information, is the very media being used against us to keep us all divided.
The devil with his agenda to kill, steal, and destroy is very much active in America today and around the world.
From killing babies to destroying nations, there is no mercy.
It's not just here. The problem is, we are confederate with it. We/our government has lost it's will to fight for good instead of evil.

On the other hand there are still some glimmers of hope. Some compassion, some empathy still resides in the hearts and minds of mankind.
Those who are powerful (the mountains) need to be brought low. And those who are weak and poor (the valleys) need to be lifted up.
The tides are always turning and right now the tide is out and it's low and it's stinky. But we, those who still have some oil in their lamps are waiting for thr tide to turn, and when it comes in it will wash the stink away.

Have hope. Stay strong. Never give up.
Hugs

 

[marksman]

Like so many Christians you compartmentalise and blot out the nature of god described in the OT. That's denial and religious conditioning at work. Do you believe the Bible? Do you choose to ignore the OT? Do you believe the OT is wrong, fallible a lie?

And do you have a hard time comprehending the truth?

 

[Lapidem]

Your question is irrelevant seeing you aren't the one offering me eternal life. The Christian hope of a future life of joy and peace and happiness, without fear, or death, pain or sorrow, is founded on the character of the one who has promised. Not on the promises of someone who can't deliver.

This again is evasion. The question being put to you is obviously sensitive. It's difficult to be honest and humble when things challenge your belief systems but it should be plain to most people that if you can't face such questions there's something badly wrong somewhere.

The salient point which you don't want to hear is that a life spent in eternity in subservience to someone else really isn't the idyllic dream imo. According to Genesis god made man so that he had someone to till the land, maintain the garden, though anyone with 2 brain cells should of course be asking why an entity who can create an entire universe would need anyone to tend a garden!

Imagine if Adam and Eve had stayed as ignorant naïve chumps being used by god to look after the garden. That's pretty awful really when you think about it. Deliberately kept from knowledge and wisdom so they accept their live of servitude / slavery. Then when they reached out to better themselves, to gain knowledge, to learn new things, they get punished and banished. Is this really an entity to be spending eternity with??? Something is badly off there.

 

[Lapidem]

Now it's getting clearer. No wonder you don't believe in God. The God you describe above? I don't believe in him either.

Then you don't believe the OT accounts are true. You don't believe the Bible is true. Fair enough.

 

[Lapidem]

And how is all that a reflection of biblical Christianity? Are not all those things affirmation that society is drawing further and further away from biblical Christianity?

Estimates from 2021 suggest that of the entire U.S. population (332 million) about 63% is Christian (210 million). I presume you're not going to be so gullible as to suggest that all the messed up Americans are the non-Christians . . . .

 

[Lapidem]

Human beings are naturally needing to acquire knowledge over belief. It is hardwired into our nature. But if we suspend this natural function in favour of a subjective understanding of our reality, we become knowledge starved, suffering in likeness to being not feed.

Totally correct. Which is why the (allegorical) story of Adam and Eve is so eye-opening. God tried to keep knowledge from them, denied them access to knowledge. He wanted them ignorant and effectively kept as goldfish in a bowl. When they succumbed to their natural desire to learn and get more knowledge and ate from the tree, god punished them severely. That's a pretty poor situation. People should really think through what really happened in that story.

 

[I.O.U]

No. Humor is an effective way to smooth over conflict.

Just last night I went to the theater where an exchange between Churchill and a female political opponent. It was in the evening after Churchill had a few drinks. She said loudly to embarrass him that he was drunk. The statement was mean-spirited even if true. They guy is fighting the Nazi's and trying to prevent the kingdom from annihilation and probably needed to mitigate above average stress.

The great leader replied with a joke, which left his opponent speechless.

Reagan did a similar thing in 1984 when running for re-election. He was criticized for being too old. His reply was humorous, turning it around defending his opponent to not be criticized for youth and inexperience.

Have you heard the joke about the joke?
It was no laughing matter.