Where does religion fit in?

[Confused-by-Christianity]

Assume true:
A society cannot survive if it isn't great at getting the best out of it's people.
A society that spends all it's time watching reality TV / building prisons / paying for police to fight gangs / consuming drugs / eating junk and having poor quality thought and education is eventually going to fail.

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

How do you get the very best out of everyone?? You can't force people.
Is it safe to assume a well balanced person will produce good things for their society.
Is religion supposed to produce well balanced people - that then go out and benefit everyone?

 

[prism]

Assume true:
A society cannot survive if it isn't great at getting the best out of it's people.
A society that spends all it's time watching reality TV / building prisons / paying for police to fight gangs / consuming drugs / eating junk and having poor quality thought and education is eventually going to fail.

Religion doesn’t fit in, only changed hearts make a societal difference.
One must be born again.

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

Religion doesn’t fit in, only changed hearts make a societal difference.
One must be born again.

how do you do that without religion then?

 

[theophilus]

Assume true:
A society cannot survive if it isn't great at getting the best out of it's people.
A society that spends all it's time watching reality TV / building prisons / paying for police to fight gangs / consuming drugs / eating junk and having poor quality thought and education is eventually going to fail.

I believe that what you say is correct and if so modern American society is about to fall. Sometimes when a society is on the verge of collapse God intervenes by giving the people the opportunity to repent of their sins and return to him. I am praying that this will happen to America. Even a person who lives in a collapsing society can still survive by trusting and obeying God. The prophet Jeremiah was such a person. He lived during the time Judah was conquered by Babylon but God protected him and enabled him to continue serving as a prophet.

The most important thing isn't the state of the society in which you live but your relationship with God. Your profile indicates that you are not a Christian. You need to become one in order to establish the right relationship with God. Here is a place where you can learn more about how to do this: Jesus Saves | CARM.org

 

[bbyrd009]

wow, Christians are a mess, huh

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

wow, Christians are a mess, huh

Do tell??

 

[theophilus]

wow, Christians are a mess, huh

Everyone is a mess! Christians have admitted they are a mess and turned to Christ to clean up their messes and transform them into the kind of person God wants us to be.

 

[bbyrd009]

A society cannot survive if it isn't great at getting the best out of it's people.

ha well a society cant maybe but another society could--esp if they were left to their own devices--enslave the first one, in a parody of "getting the best out of its ppl"

the point being we live in a divided "society," right, and most ppl seek to "move up" into a "higher" society

 

[bbyrd009]

Do tell??

ah well he means well i'm sure, but fwiw imo you dont need to do any of those things necessarily, and imo what would most likely happen if you did would be ezackly what Scripture says anyway, you traverse land and sea to make a single convert, and then turn them into twice the sons of hell you are

Codependence is not a pretty thing imo

 

[amadeus]

Assume true:
A society cannot survive if it isn't great at getting the best out of it's people.
A society that spends all it's time watching reality TV / building prisons / paying for police to fight gangs / consuming drugs / eating junk and having poor quality thought and education is eventually going to fail.

Sounds a bit like a more modern but not less decadent Rome!

 

[bbyrd009]

Where does religion fit in?

For the heir is under servants and no better than a slave until he inherits, even though he is lord of all

so imo religion is a great way to find ppl who might one day set a toe on the path, they get to learn in a nice, safe camp and keep their allegiance divided between the state and Yah, and imagine that they might go somewhere after they have literally died, Death, More Abundantly, "When we ALL get to heaven," Apollos waters

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

Sounds a bit like a more modern but not less decadent Rome!

haha you said it not me ;-)

 

[bbyrd009]

Sounds a bit like a more modern but not less decadent Rome!

tell you what i would sure be out developing black market contacts instead of sitting at home right now
and i would be converting most of that $ into commodities, being as how they just printed like $3TRILLION more
just sayin

and, they arent even limited by the speed of the press now, it's just a computer entry, right

 

[amadeus]

haha you said it not me ;-)

Oh I meant exactly what I said. Man has developed a religious system which too often teaches people that for them all is well to the point where many of them do little or nothing "good". Individuals too often are found...

"Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away." II Tim 3:5

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

tell you what i would sure be out developing black market contacts instead of sitting at home right now
and i would be converting most of that $ into commodities, being as how they just printed like $3TRILLION more
just sayin

and, they arent even limited by the speed of the press now, it's just a computer entry, right

yeah - maybe there is wisdom in going for commodities. If things are really really bad - everything will collapse and the contracts won't be worth anything.

 

[bbyrd009]

Everyone is a mess! Christians have admitted they are a mess and turned to Christ to clean up their messes and transform them into the kind of person God wants us to be.

i agree, that is the stated purpose, however there are some other implied or even explicit "rewards" that most Christians expect to get, right? And you say "everyone is a mess" which i have always parrotted myself, but now i'm thinking that that is just a way for us to justify ourselves, JEsus did say I came for the lost sheep right

 

[bbyrd009]

yeah - maybe there is wisdom in going for commodities. If things are really really bad - everything will collapse and the contracts won't be worth anything.

manure has been very good to me

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

Oh I meant exactly what I said. Man has developed a religious system which too often teaches people that for them all is well to the point where many of them do little or nothing "good". Individuals too often are found...

"Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away." II Tim 3:5

A friend told me a story about people who died and got the heaven they all believed in. Some thought you worshipped all the time, others thought heaven was dancing on a hill day and night. others thought it was church always.
Story basically says in the end each group had their heaven turn into hell.
Angels came and saved them. I forget the moral of the story - make your own haha

 

[Confused-by-Christianity]

manure has been very good to me

Who'd have thunk it?? haha
Seems God thought of it and put little cycles here for us where stuff just reproduces itself over and over.