My sister believes that her son Arthur is in heaven. I do too. I believe Arthur is in heaven, and I cannot wait to see him again! I believe that all murdered babies are in heaven.
So, heaven will be crowded with disfigured fetuses? Remind me why I'd want to go there again?
If the Bible is correct about the non-believer hating God, then the fact that God is in heaven is all the reason you would need for not wanting to go there.
The Ninth Commandment is not to lie. To say you believe when you do not would be a sin. If you're wrong, at least you aren't sinning. If you're right, you may find another answer.
In simplist terms: Being non-Christian isn't the same as being anti-Christian.
How is this consistent with the belief that humans are born in sin and do not go to heaven unless they accept Christ as their savior?
That is a good question. My sister addresses the question on her blog. King David had a son who died as an infant, and King David remarked "I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). So that is where my hope is for my nephew. I will go to him and see him again one day in the courts of heaven.
I have no doubt that answer will be unsatisfactory to you...that babies and the mentally ill are the exception since they are not mentally able to grasp the concepts of the faith. At the end of the day all people are born in sin, and they need a savior. I have no doubt that Jesus could have died for the mentally ill and babies who die prematurely. Nowhere in scripture does it directly say this, but there is evidence that points to it. So that is what I hold onto in hope.
If the Bible makes this claim, it is incorrect. People don't hate things they don't even believe exist. Do you hate fairies? I don't think so.
I think your observation that people don't hate things they don't believe in is correct. And that is why I believe every agnostic/atheist believes in the Biblical God on some level. If people truly didn't believe in God there wouldn't be a whole sub-forum on MTGS that is mostly about bashing Christianity and the Bible. We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
Now I think that a lot of you think you don't hate God, but your attitude towards the subjects of Christianity, the Bible, and the Biblical God contradicts that profession. The nature of the non-believer's unbelief is that he has deceived himself about his own self-deception. The non-believer hates God, but has deceived himself into thinking that he simply does not believe in God. Romans 1 says that the non-believer suppresses the truth he knows about God in his own unrighteousness:
"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them" (Romans 1:18-32).
That is a good question. My sister addresses the question on her blog. King David had a son who died as an infant, and King David remarked "I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). So that is where my hope is for my nephew. I will go to him and see him again one day in the courts of heaven.
First and foremost, my condolences for your loss.
As for the citation, David isn't talking about heaven. That would be anachronistic. The text predates the idea of the dead going to heaven. Instead, there would have been a belief in Sheol, a land of the dead. The eschatological views of Heaven and Hell would not have been present in this tradition.
Which is not to say that babies don't go to heaven. I, for one, believe this. But that piece of Scripture does not justify your statement.
We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
To deny the existence of Allah is to deny the existence of God, for Allah means God.
That is a good question. My sister addresses the question on her blog. King David had a son who died as an infant, and King David remarked "I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). So that is where my hope is for my nephew. I will go to him and see him again one day in the courts of heaven.
Except, David isn't talking about heaven. That would be anachronistic. The text predates the idea of the dead going to heaven. Instead, there would have been a belief in Sheol, a land of the dead. The eschatological views of Heaven and Hell would not have been present in this tradition.
We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
Except Islam worships the same God that all Judeo-Christian religions do. To deny the existence of Allah is to deny the existence of God. Allah means God.
Highroller, we are going to have to disagree. I don't believe that religion evolves because God does not evolve. God does not change, and therefore whatever we know to be true about God in the New Testament it is true of God in the Old Testament. Not going to argue with you about, but I don't accept the premises involved with your perspective.
And we are going to have to disagree about Allah and Islam. Allah is not the same as the Biblical God. Allah is unitarian, and the Biblical God is trinitarian. And if we cannot agree on the Biblical God being trinitarian, then we cannot call one another brothers in Christ. I cannot call you a fellow believer if you do not know that the Biblical God is trinitarian.
We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
To deny the existence of Allah is to deny the existence of God, for Allah means God.
Allah means god, but it is very often used to specifically refer to the Islamic god, isn't it?
If babies and the mentally ill can go to heaven, then why can't Jesus also save the non-believers? What about the person who could have accepted Jesus in old age, but their mind was destroyed by dementia? What about the person who could have accepted Jesus in old age, but was hit by a bus? If we're going to send babies to heaven because it makes us feel good, we should just as well pretend that everyone else is going to heaven.
Well, to me the number one thing is simply the absence of evidence. Even if I can readily accept the existence of a historical Jesus around 2000 years ago, the whole story about that guy being supernatural is simply preposterous. On a more philosophical level, the whole idea of Hell and an omnipotent, omnipresent God punishing people for commiting the sins he knows they will seems absurdely cruel. The whole problem of evil too, if God is caring and loving and whatever, why doesn't he step in to do something about the idiots blowing themselves up in his name like today in Brussels.
By the way, those of you saying the Islamic God is not the Christian God should read the Koran,it..."borrows" extensively from the Old Testament, especially the book of Exodus. Muhammad made it extremely clear that his God (Allah in Arabic) was the god of Abraham (Ibrahim) and Moses (Musa) and of Jesus (Isa) whom he saw as a prophet, not as the Son of God.
Highroller, we are going to have to disagree. I don't believe that religion evolves because God does not evolve.
Since religion is not the same thing as God, that makes no sense.
Furthermore, that religion changed is part and parcel of both Jewish and Christian beliefs. It's in Scripture. So this belief of "religion doesn't change" is unfounded even in a Scriptural sense.
But then there's the most profoundly obvious problem with your beliefs, which can be demonstrated with a simple question: are we still waiting for Jesus to return?
If the answer is yes, as every modern Christian believes, then your worldview and your religion would be entirely foreign to Paul. Why? Because Jesus was supposed to return within the lifetime of the generation that was the early Christ movement. They weren't supposed to taste death. It was supposed to happen. The return of the Son of Man was supposed to be imminent.
Fast-forward to 2016 and we're getting close to the 2,000 year anniversary of the crucifixion, and we recognize that their beliefs were incorrect. Jesus didn't return within their lifetimes, as they so ardently believed he would. What does that mean? Well, interpret it however you want, but it's pretty clear that Christianity changed pretty considerably after that.
So throw away this "religion doesn't change" nonsense. Hell, do you believe in the existence of other gods besides God? Paul did.
God does not change, and therefore whatever we know to be true about God in the New Testament it is true of God in the Old Testament. Not going to argue with you about, but I don't accept the premises involved with your perspective.
You would deny the tradition of Sheol? It's in the Bible.
And we are going to have to disagree about Allah and Islam. Allah is not the same as the Biblical God.
The word Allah means God. That's what the word means. It was used by pre-Islamic Christians. If you're going to fault people for calling God "Allah" and saying that's not the same as God, then we have to fault you for calling God "God" because you're not using a Greek or Aramaic or Hebrew word.
Allah is unitarian,
So is the Jewish belief in God.
And if we cannot agree on the Biblical God being trinitarian
Actually a controversial topic in early Christianity, but that's besides the point.
Islam worships the same God that Christianity does. You might argue that they worship him wrong, or have the wrong understanding of him, but it's difficult for you to really argue that they're different entirely. If you do that, a Jewish person could argue the same about you.
What I oppose about Xianity is it's imputed power.
It's a bad idea that has caught on very well. This is why some look at faith in general as a virus. Xianity is not necessarily a virulent strain as much as it's the one that's managed in the West to have dominance. I'm sure if Hindus were the dominant culture and made so many instances on their way or no way...I'd despise them just as much.
Mostly, they don't matter; thus, they don't bother. (Even if their ideas are likely untrue as well).
In the early days of mankind we'd often tell stories to obtain influence. Those stories would develop and be passed down which would discuss stengths, powers and virtues like courage. Traits that hunters would have. Eventually people got smarter and realized they could farm. Stories increased from the hunters and many people who suggested farming/agriculture basically ingenuity were put down. Well people eventually became more agricultural and less nomadic. Then using transitive property the incumbents would use stories to attempt to gain control and influence over the next group with a good idea.
Religion is the story developed over time from myth and people trying to assert influence. Ingenuity using logic always trumps storytelling eventually. That's why you see people like Galileo defeating the previous views of church regarding the earth place in the universe and darwin defeating the creation story with the idea that life evolves (if you are educated in science)
Then you realize all religion is at first a story someone devised to gain influence over people. Not saying there's no God but all religious thought can be rooted back to a beginning of the stories. It's natural human trait to tell a story about why things should remain status quo when someone wants to take your role. More often than not in human history these stories have been religious in nature.
Kings --> divine rule
Politicians --> their virtues of character
Churches --> God said so based off so and so story
Then when someone wants to take them from their lofty perch aka church/galileo (how the church saw it at least) people get defensive and often violent. At the end of the day ingenuity wins out. Hooray for good ideas. We evolved to be wary of change because change involves risk. If the risk to change is less than the risk to not change people will change. You see times of most conflict have the greatest seeming development. i'm still trying to wrap my head around the middle east and the only explanation I have is the religion's influence on society is so backwards they'd kill the farmer in the initial example rather than hear him out. Or they'd kill galileo if he said something against the muslim church in a transitive example.
King David had a son who died as an infant, and King David remarked "I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). So that is where my hope is for my nephew. I will go to him and see him again one day in the courts of heaven.
For the record, I agree with Highroller that your interpretation of this passage is anachronistic. But let's assume for the sake of argument that you're right and that this is a reference to the afterlife system as you understand it. What makes you think David is going to Heaven? In addition to being born in sin he commits quite a few in his own right, and of course given his timing he can't accept Christ's grace any more than an infant can. Conventional Christian understanding puts him and all the other pre-Christian Biblical figures in Hell -- see Dante for an example.
I think your observation that people don't hate things they don't believe in is correct. And that is why I believe every agnostic/atheist believes in the Biblical God on some level.
Please understand that trying to dictate to other people what they truly believe is as insulting and unproductive when you do it as when somebody else does it to you. I have not and will not ever tell you that you do not believe in God. What would be the point?
If people truly didn't believe in God there wouldn't be a whole sub-forum on MTGS that is mostly about bashing Christianity and the Bible. We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
You're right: we don't have a Santa Claus/Easter Bunny/fairies forum because almost all adults agree that those characters are not real. But it does not follow from this that we have a religion forum because we all secretly agree that God is real. You will note that we also do not have forums for discussing the existence of the Sun or the Moon, which we all agree are real. This is because our forums for discussing things that are controversial: things for which there are people on both sides of the issue. So we have the Religion forum precisely because some people believe in God, and some don't. If everybody believed in God, or nobody did, then we wouldn't have this forum.
Now I think that a lot of you think you don't hate God, but your attitude towards the subjects of Christianity, the Bible, and the Biblical God contradicts that profession.
If somebody hates the Harry Potter books and the Harry Potter fandom, would you assume this implies they must secretly believe in Harry Potter? Because that's exactly the logic you're using here.
Romans 1 says that the non-believer suppresses the truth he knows about God in his own unrighteousness...
If Romans 1 is making a general statement about all nonbelievers (which I doubt), then it clearly incorrect. You are unlikely to convince me of the accuracy of the Bible when you quote verses which makes factual claims about me which I know to be untrue. I don't secretly believe in God and hate him, I don't worship idols, I'm not gay (not that there's anything wrong with that), and I'm not any more prone to immoral behavior than anyone else. The book might as well be saying "All nonbelievers have red hair." It's just wrong.
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Allah means god, but it is very often used to specifically refer to the Islamic god, isn't it?
Only in English. If we were having this conversation in Arabic, "Allah" is the word we would be using to talk about the Christian God. It's the word in all Arabic translations of the Bible, and the word used by Arabic-speaking Christians every day.
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If babies and the mentally ill can go to heaven, then why can't Jesus also save the non-believers? What about the person who could have accepted Jesus in old age, but their mind was destroyed by dementia? What about the person who could have accepted Jesus in old age, but was hit by a bus? If we're going to send babies to heaven because it makes us feel good, we should just as well pretend that everyone else is going to heaven.
It is not because it makes us feel good. It is because the Bible seems to point to it. Romans 4:15 says, "For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression." Babies and the mentally ill do not have the capacity to understand God's law in the New and Old Testaments. That is why I believe babies and the mentally ill go to heaven.
For the person whose mind is destroyed by dementia, there was a point in their life where they could understand God's law. They knew right from wrong, and there is a very good chance that such a person heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, and hopefully they accepted it. If not then they drank judgment upon themselves when they rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ. When I say the gospel, that is the good news of Jesus Christ, which if summed up in a single verse, is probably best summed up as follows:
"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).
It is not because it makes us feel good. It is because the Bible seems to point to it. Romans 4:15 says, "For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression."
Which is not taking that quote into context.
Quote from Romans 4, via Oremus Bible Browser »
What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestor according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.’ Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due. But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness. So also David speaks of the blessedness of those to whom God reckons righteousness irrespective of works:
‘Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven,
and whose sins are covered;
blessed is the one against whom the Lord will not reckon sin.’
Is this blessedness, then, pronounced only on the circumcised, or also on the uncircumcised? We say, ‘Faith was reckoned to Abraham as righteousness.’ How then was it reckoned to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the ancestor of all who believe without being circumcised and who thus have righteousness reckoned to them, and likewise the ancestor of the circumcised who are not only circumcised but who also follow the example of the faith that our ancestor Abraham had before he was circumcised.
For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, ‘I have made you the father of many nations’)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become ‘the father of many nations’, according to what was said, ‘So numerous shall your descendants be.’ He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. Therefore his faith ‘was reckoned to him as righteousness.’ Now the words, ‘it was reckoned to him’, were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.
Except neither a baby nor a mentally ill person can be said to be justified by faith. Ergo, if indeed one is justified by faith, it cannot be said that a baby is justified, nor can it be said a mentally ill person is justified.
Therefore, if you believe that babies go to Heaven, it must follow, then, that justification requires neither faith nor works, in which case Paul is incorrect. Yes?
Babies and the mentally ill do not have the capacity to understand God's law in the New and Old Testaments.
Which doesn't matter. There's nothing in the Torah about an insanity defense. You are applying provisions found in the laws of countries to the law of the Torah.
I want you to think about the worst thing you ever experienced. Was it physical in nature or was it emotional or spiritual? I'd be willing to bet it was the latter.
How much are you willing to bet? Because I've been unemployed for a year, and I need money.
As for the fact that you would like Jesus to love you differently, I'm sure most kids wish their parents loved them differently and gave them whatever they wanted.
I'm not asking Jesus to love me differently. I'm saying that getting yourself tortured to death isn't love.
At the end of the day...you have a sin debt. You may not like it, and you might refuse to believe it, but you do.
If sin is a crime against god, then it's not an issue of "refusing" to believe it. I am incapable of believing that I have a "sin debt" as long as I do not believe in the existence of any god.
Actually "kill" is a bad translation. "Murder" is a much better translation.
The Hebrew word used can mean either "kill" or "murder", as well as a number of other things that could roughly be summed up as "destruction of property".
The Hebrew version of the Book of Numbers uses the same word to refer to any killing outside of warfare, with or without a weapon. It does distinguish between intentional and accidental killing, though, in that you're not supposed to leave the city if you accidentally kill someone, or else you'll be judged as intentionally killing them.
Israel was a theocracy, and so they had certain laws governing them as a theocracy. Many of those laws show us how holy God is, and how a holy God does not tolerate sin.
In what way to any of the laws show how holy god is? Some certainly assert it, but I can't think of any that show it.
Babies and the mentally ill do not have the capacity to understand God's law in the New and Old Testaments. That is why I believe babies and the mentally ill go to heaven.
Knowledge or understanding of a law is not required in order to be expected to follow it. That is why we lock up psychopaths and sociopaths who break the law, the mentally infirm and infants are looked after by others, etc.
On that note, what's your position on people that have never even gotten the message of Christ in the first place? For example, let's take the Pirahã people prior to 1978. They have no concept of deities (although they do have some supernatural beliefs). At this point in time, their only contact with believers has been shut down by a language barrier. It's not until 1978 that Daniel Everett manages to start communications with them. When he tells them about Jesus, they ask if he can bring Jesus to come meet them. When he admits that he can't, they move on with the conversation and ignore Jesus entirely.
In fact, the Pirahã were the starting point for Everett's deconversion, and he become a closeted atheist in 1985. When he finally came out of the closet over a decade later, his wife divorced him and most of his children refused to speak with him for another ten years.
Except neither a baby nor a mentally ill person can be said to be justified by faith. Ergo, if indeed one is justified by faith, it cannot be said that a baby is justified, nor can it be said a mentally ill person is justified.
Therefore, if you believe that babies go to Heaven, it must follow, then, that justification requires neither faith nor works, in which case Paul is incorrect. Yes?
You have an agenda, and that agenda is you want the Bible to be proven to contradict itself. Just because there is one exception does not mean that Paul is wrong. It is the exception that proves the rule. The rule for the normal person is that they must be justified by faith. So Paul is not wrong...even though you really really want it to be so.
Which doesn't matter. There's nothing in the Torah about an insanity defense. You are applying provisions found in the laws of countries to the law of the Torah.
No...that is not where I got it from. Go read the article on my sister's blog. It explains the position quite well.
You have an agenda, and that agenda is you want the Bible to be proven to contradict itself.
I don't want it to be proven to contradict itself, anymore than I want the sky to be blue, or I want 2+2 to equal 4.
But the Bible does contradict itself (and observable reality), and the sky is blue, and 2+2 does equal 4. Desire is irrelevant in these regards. What matters is facts.
What I do want is for you to acknowledge this.
Just because there is one exception does not mean that Paul is wrong.
Of course it does. If Paul says we are justified by faith, and we are not justified by faith, then we are not justified by faith, and Paul is wrong.
It is the exception that proves the rule.
Exceptions don't prove rules. They disprove them. That statement comes from an older definition of the word "prove," which means "to put to the test." Exceptions test rules.
The rule for the normal person is that they must be justified by faith. So Paul is not wrong...even though you really really want it to be so.
First of all, cite the part where Paul mentions babies as being exempt from Paul's ruling on faith justifying people.
The fact is you can't. So it has nothing to do with what I want, it has to do with your refusal to accept what is right in front of you. Your beliefs are at odds with Paul's. It's fine, everyone's beliefs are at odds with Paul's. Physical reality is at odds with Paul's beliefs. It's fine. Everyone picks and chooses what they want from the Bible, because the Bible contradicts itself frequently. It's just a bound volume, a book composed of many scrolls, written by people who believed in God and wrote down what they believed was true, that were compiled together. None of these people were infallible, and neither are you. It's fine to disagree with them. It's fine to have your own interpretations. It's fine for you to be wrong. It's fine for them to be wrong.
But you, for whatever reason, can't deal with this. You refuse to acknowledge when you're wrong, or when your beliefs are at odds with Scripture, or when Scripture is wrong or internally contradictory.
No...that is not where I got it from. Go read the article on my sister's blog. It explains the position quite well.
I read it. It doesn't mention anything about ignorance of the Law giving one a free pass. For, indeed, there's nothing that tells of this. Meanwhile, there's Paul telling people NOT to practice circumcision on their children, for to do so would bind them to the Law and require them to follow it, circumcision being a ritual done to babies. It's quite clear that being ignorant of the Law does not in anyway absolve one from the Law. This is something you got from the laws of nations, the laws of men, which give provisions against children being tried like adults. But this does not exist in The Law as detailed in the Torah.
Now, let's talk about your sister's blog. While I have no desire to lecture a grieving mother, because frankly, she's got enough on her plate as is, she is interpreting Scripture as saying what she wants to hear. But it's not a correct interpretation.
The reading of David is, as I pointed out, incorrect. David is referring to Sheol, which is not Heaven, but closer to Hades, in the sense of a lightless land of the dead where all people go regardless of virtue.
The same is true of her misreading of Job. Job is not talking about Heaven. Job is talking about Sheol as well.
Quote from Job 14:13, Oremus Bible Browser »
Oh that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath is past, that you would appoint me a set time, and remember me!
I think your sister has suffered a terrible and traumatic experience, and she is trying to rationalize her beliefs with the terrible thing that has happened, and is recognizing that it is incompatible with any kind and loving God that her child would be sent to any layer of Hell as opposed to being taken up in God's embrace.
Now, you can believe whatever you believe. I, for one, believe the whole notion of Hell is garbage and doesn't exist. I believe it is completely incompatible with the character of God - whom I absolutely believe exists. So I agree that God redeeming babies is perfectly in keeping with God's character. But, and here's the issue, I freely acknowledge that my beliefs are at odds with Scripture.
And so are yours. And so are your sister's. And there's nothing wrong with that. Disagree with Paul! It's fine! But you seem to have this need that your beliefs MUST reconcile with Scripture, and Scripture MUST reconcile with itself and MUST reconcile with reality.
But they don't. And it doesn't. And that's ok. And you can rebel against it, just as you can rebel against the idea that 2+2=4, but it won't do you any good, because the truth is the truth, and is the truth regardless of whether or not you want it to be.
Therefore the pathway to heaven is not the works you do in life, and you've contradicted yourself.
Not quite. Saying that what we do affects eternity is not the same thing as saying that our works will get us to heaven. "The wages of sin is death" means that you reap what you sow. So what you do in this life you will reap the consequences of it. A baby doesn't do anything so it has nothing to reap. A baby cannot lie because it is not capable of doing so. A baby cannot lust because it is incapable of doing so. "The free gift of God is eternal life" means that people get to heaven on the basis of grace alone. That is just how we obtain eternal life. Once we have obtained eternal life there are many things we can do to affect eternity not just for ourselves but also for others. I don't particularly enjoy coming on here and arguing with some of you. The magic community in particular seems to have more than its fair share of rude arrogant atheists/agnostics/new-agers, especially in this forum. Make no mistake this forum is a hostile place for a Christian to post on. Another hobby of mine is Gator football, and the variety of atheist/agnostic/new-ager over on the Gator message boards is far less arrogant and more reasonable than what you will find here. I come on here and I try to reason with some of you because it appears to me that many of the Christians who are arguing for Christianity on this forum are not really Christians in any Biblical sense at all. So while my salvation does not hang in the balance because I am completely covered as a believer in Christ there are many of you here who need to hear the gospel message, and being a preacher of that message in a hostile environment is a way to affect eternity.
I'm not asking Jesus to love me differently. I'm saying that getting yourself tortured to death isn't love.
I find a creature arguing with the Almighty about the definition of the word "love" to be one of the vainest things I've ever heard of. If God says, "There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends" (John 15:13), then that is what love is. Your protesting of such is arbitrary because it is just your opinion.
If sin is a crime against god, then it's not an issue of "refusing" to believe it. I am incapable of believing that I have a "sin debt" as long as I do not believe in the existence of any god.
Sure...when Jesus describes the blindness and the deafness of the non-believer it is a very real thing. What a curse it is to be in such a condition, but you are blind and deaf because you have deceived yourself. It is of your own volition that you are imprisoned in such a state. I hope God gives you the ears to hear and the eyes to see.
I believe you do know God on a certain level. Romans 1:19-20 says, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."
You and many people here make a big deal about logical contradictions. How do you know logic exists? Can you account for immaterial laws (moral and logical) within your worldview? How do you know that the law of non-contradiction exists as a universal law? How do you know that logic itself isn't a culturally constructed idea?
On that note, what's your position on people that have never even gotten the message of Christ in the first place? For example, let's take the Pirahã people prior to 1978. They have no concept of deities (although they do have some supernatural beliefs). At this point in time, their only contact with believers has been shut down by a language barrier. It's not until 1978 that Daniel Everett manages to start communications with them. When he tells them about Jesus, they ask if he can bring Jesus to come meet them. When he admits that he can't, they move on with the conversation and ignore Jesus entirely.
In fact, the Pirahã were the starting point for Everett's deconversion, and he become a closeted atheist in 1985. When he finally came out of the closet over a decade later, his wife divorced him and most of his children refused to speak with him for another ten years.
To answer your question, I'd respond back with Romans 1 again. All non-believers are without excuse because God's attributes are clearly perceived by the things that have been made. So they will be held accountable before God. That is my position, and I believe it is Paul's position too.
It is not because it makes us feel good. It is because the Bible seems to point to it. Romans 4:15 says, "For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression." Babies and the mentally ill do not have the capacity to understand God's law in the New and Old Testaments. That is why I believe babies and the mentally ill go to heaven.
For the person whose mind is destroyed by dementia, there was a point in their life where they could understand God's law. They knew right from wrong, and there is a very good chance that such a person heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, and hopefully they accepted it. If not then they drank judgment upon themselves when they rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ. When I say the gospel, that is the good news of Jesus Christ, which if summed up in a single verse, is probably best summed up as follows:
"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).
If we're going to start carving out exceptions, there are a lot more we can make than just babies and the mentally ill. What about someone who grew up in Saudi Arabia, and had it drilled into them from childhood that Christianity is the religion of infidels. Even if they at some point hear a brief description of the story of Jesus, can they really be blamed for rejecting it? Is the test that no matter your condition in life, as long as you possess the mental capacity to understand the gospel, you must accept it?
Seems easy enough to say for someone who in a country with a church on every block, but does sending the Saudi to hell sound any more just to you than sending the baby?
I believe you do know God on a certain level. Romans 1:19-20 says, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."
And Romans 1:27 says, "In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error." Do you believe that I have had sex with another man? Are you prepared to tell me that I have had sex with another man?
Again, the things Paul says in Romans, if taken to be general claims about nonbelievers, are clearly not true.
Logic is the notion that when we talk about stuff, we should have clear definitions for our terms and use the same definition for the same term every time. It is an idea. As with any idea, simply expressing it is both proof of its existence and instantiation of it.
How do you know that the law of non-contradiction exists as a universal law?
Because it's really just the definition of the term "not". When we use "not" to describe any possible situation, in this universe or any other, it will mean the same thing.
A baby doesn't do anything so it has nothing to reap.
But the baby is born in sin. The whole point of accepting Jesus is to get around original sin, not (necessarily) anything you've done in your life up to that point. If what you do in life affects your position in the afterlife and accepting Jesus pays off your "sin debt", then babies should all be roasting in hell for eternity. You can go and have some special pleading for babies and the mentally ill if you want, it's your religion, but at least admit that's what you're doing.
Jesus describes the blindness and the deafness of the non-believer it is a very real thing. What a curse it is to be in such a condition, but you are blind and deaf because you have deceived yourself. It is of your own volition that you are imprisoned in such a state. I hope God gives you the ears to hear and the eyes to see.
I can guarantee you that it's not a curse to live with, I am not imprisoned, and it is only of my own "volition" by virtue of the fact that I refuse to delude myself into believing unsupportable claims.
You and many people here make a big deal about logical contradictions. How do you know logic exists? Can you account for immaterial laws (moral and logical) within your worldview? How do you know that the law of non-contradiction exists as a universal law? How do you know that logic itself isn't a culturally constructed idea?
It's really a matter of definitions, as B_S has pointed out. What about you? How do you know god exists? How do you know that god isn't a culturally constructed idea?
If I look upon another man's wife with lustful thoughts, that deserves death? It's a sin.
That would be correct.
Well, at least you're being consistent in this case, so I'll give you props for that. I think this particular belief of yours is abhorrent, but at least you're consistent.
Trying to police thoughtcrime is doubleplus ungood.
On that note, what's your position on people that have never even gotten the message of Christ in the first place? For example, let's take the Pirahã people prior to 1978. They have no concept of deities (although they do have some supernatural beliefs). At this point in time, their only contact with believers has been shut down by a language barrier. It's not until 1978 that Daniel Everett manages to start communications with them. When he tells them about Jesus, they ask if he can bring Jesus to come meet them. When he admits that he can't, they move on with the conversation and ignore Jesus entirely.
In fact, the Pirahã were the starting point for Everett's deconversion, and he become a closeted atheist in 1985. When he finally came out of the closet over a decade later, his wife divorced him and most of his children refused to speak with him for another ten years.
To answer your question, I'd respond back with Romans 1 again. All non-believers are without excuse because God's attributes are clearly perceived by the things that have been made. So they will be held accountable before God. That is my position, and I believe it is Paul's position too.
Paul is justified in his beliefs: he believes that god literally appeared before him and talked to him. I have no such justification for doing the same. Why does Saul warrant a personal revelation while the rest of us don't? If god is omnipotent, he's clearly capable of appearing before every single person on the planet. If god did that, it would make sense to call anyone continuing to disbelieve "fools".
And yet, god doesn't reveal himself. Why not? Is he playing hide & seek?
It's not an issue of free will, obviously. The satan not only believes that god exists, but knows that god exists. And yet the satan had the free will to reject god, so knowledge of god's existence does not remove free will.
Therefore, if god exists, he must not want people to know he exists for some reason. Does he only reward those gullible enough to believe in him without any evidence with eternal pleasure in heaven?
If the Bible is correct about the non-believer hating God, then the fact that God is in heaven is all the reason you would need for not wanting to go there.
If the Bible makes this claim, it is incorrect. People don't hate things they don't even believe exist. Do you hate fairies? I don't think so.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
In simplist terms: Being non-Christian isn't the same as being anti-Christian.
That is a good question. My sister addresses the question on her blog. King David had a son who died as an infant, and King David remarked "I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). So that is where my hope is for my nephew. I will go to him and see him again one day in the courts of heaven.
I have no doubt that answer will be unsatisfactory to you...that babies and the mentally ill are the exception since they are not mentally able to grasp the concepts of the faith. At the end of the day all people are born in sin, and they need a savior. I have no doubt that Jesus could have died for the mentally ill and babies who die prematurely. Nowhere in scripture does it directly say this, but there is evidence that points to it. So that is what I hold onto in hope.
I think your observation that people don't hate things they don't believe in is correct. And that is why I believe every agnostic/atheist believes in the Biblical God on some level. If people truly didn't believe in God there wouldn't be a whole sub-forum on MTGS that is mostly about bashing Christianity and the Bible. We don't have forums solely devoted to bashing Islam, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or Fairies. That is because we all know that Allah, Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and Fairies are not real, and therefore we don't hate them and obsess over them like we do Christianity.
Now I think that a lot of you think you don't hate God, but your attitude towards the subjects of Christianity, the Bible, and the Biblical God contradicts that profession. The nature of the non-believer's unbelief is that he has deceived himself about his own self-deception. The non-believer hates God, but has deceived himself into thinking that he simply does not believe in God. Romans 1 says that the non-believer suppresses the truth he knows about God in his own unrighteousness:
"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them" (Romans 1:18-32).
As for the citation, David isn't talking about heaven. That would be anachronistic. The text predates the idea of the dead going to heaven. Instead, there would have been a belief in Sheol, a land of the dead. The eschatological views of Heaven and Hell would not have been present in this tradition.
Which is not to say that babies don't go to heaven. I, for one, believe this. But that piece of Scripture does not justify your statement.
To deny the existence of Allah is to deny the existence of God, for Allah means God.
Highroller, we are going to have to disagree. I don't believe that religion evolves because God does not evolve. God does not change, and therefore whatever we know to be true about God in the New Testament it is true of God in the Old Testament. Not going to argue with you about, but I don't accept the premises involved with your perspective.
And we are going to have to disagree about Allah and Islam. Allah is not the same as the Biblical God. Allah is unitarian, and the Biblical God is trinitarian. And if we cannot agree on the Biblical God being trinitarian, then we cannot call one another brothers in Christ. I cannot call you a fellow believer if you do not know that the Biblical God is trinitarian.
Allah means god, but it is very often used to specifically refer to the Islamic god, isn't it?
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By the way, those of you saying the Islamic God is not the Christian God should read the Koran,it..."borrows" extensively from the Old Testament, especially the book of Exodus. Muhammad made it extremely clear that his God (Allah in Arabic) was the god of Abraham (Ibrahim) and Moses (Musa) and of Jesus (Isa) whom he saw as a prophet, not as the Son of God.
Furthermore, that religion changed is part and parcel of both Jewish and Christian beliefs. It's in Scripture. So this belief of "religion doesn't change" is unfounded even in a Scriptural sense.
But then there's the most profoundly obvious problem with your beliefs, which can be demonstrated with a simple question: are we still waiting for Jesus to return?
If the answer is yes, as every modern Christian believes, then your worldview and your religion would be entirely foreign to Paul. Why? Because Jesus was supposed to return within the lifetime of the generation that was the early Christ movement. They weren't supposed to taste death. It was supposed to happen. The return of the Son of Man was supposed to be imminent.
Fast-forward to 2016 and we're getting close to the 2,000 year anniversary of the crucifixion, and we recognize that their beliefs were incorrect. Jesus didn't return within their lifetimes, as they so ardently believed he would. What does that mean? Well, interpret it however you want, but it's pretty clear that Christianity changed pretty considerably after that.
So throw away this "religion doesn't change" nonsense. Hell, do you believe in the existence of other gods besides God? Paul did.
You would deny the tradition of Sheol? It's in the Bible.
The word Allah means God. That's what the word means. It was used by pre-Islamic Christians. If you're going to fault people for calling God "Allah" and saying that's not the same as God, then we have to fault you for calling God "God" because you're not using a Greek or Aramaic or Hebrew word.
So is the Jewish belief in God.
Actually a controversial topic in early Christianity, but that's besides the point.
Islam worships the same God that Christianity does. You might argue that they worship him wrong, or have the wrong understanding of him, but it's difficult for you to really argue that they're different entirely. If you do that, a Jewish person could argue the same about you.
It's a bad idea that has caught on very well. This is why some look at faith in general as a virus. Xianity is not necessarily a virulent strain as much as it's the one that's managed in the West to have dominance. I'm sure if Hindus were the dominant culture and made so many instances on their way or no way...I'd despise them just as much.
Mostly, they don't matter; thus, they don't bother. (Even if their ideas are likely untrue as well).
Religion is the story developed over time from myth and people trying to assert influence. Ingenuity using logic always trumps storytelling eventually. That's why you see people like Galileo defeating the previous views of church regarding the earth place in the universe and darwin defeating the creation story with the idea that life evolves (if you are educated in science)
Then you realize all religion is at first a story someone devised to gain influence over people. Not saying there's no God but all religious thought can be rooted back to a beginning of the stories. It's natural human trait to tell a story about why things should remain status quo when someone wants to take your role. More often than not in human history these stories have been religious in nature.
Kings --> divine rule
Politicians --> their virtues of character
Churches --> God said so based off so and so story
Then when someone wants to take them from their lofty perch aka church/galileo (how the church saw it at least) people get defensive and often violent. At the end of the day ingenuity wins out. Hooray for good ideas. We evolved to be wary of change because change involves risk. If the risk to change is less than the risk to not change people will change. You see times of most conflict have the greatest seeming development. i'm still trying to wrap my head around the middle east and the only explanation I have is the religion's influence on society is so backwards they'd kill the farmer in the initial example rather than hear him out. Or they'd kill galileo if he said something against the muslim church in a transitive example.
He is supposed to have died for everybody. So why does anybody go to Hell?
Please understand that trying to dictate to other people what they truly believe is as insulting and unproductive when you do it as when somebody else does it to you. I have not and will not ever tell you that you do not believe in God. What would be the point?
You're right: we don't have a Santa Claus/Easter Bunny/fairies forum because almost all adults agree that those characters are not real. But it does not follow from this that we have a religion forum because we all secretly agree that God is real. You will note that we also do not have forums for discussing the existence of the Sun or the Moon, which we all agree are real. This is because our forums for discussing things that are controversial: things for which there are people on both sides of the issue. So we have the Religion forum precisely because some people believe in God, and some don't. If everybody believed in God, or nobody did, then we wouldn't have this forum.
If somebody hates the Harry Potter books and the Harry Potter fandom, would you assume this implies they must secretly believe in Harry Potter? Because that's exactly the logic you're using here.
If Romans 1 is making a general statement about all nonbelievers (which I doubt), then it clearly incorrect. You are unlikely to convince me of the accuracy of the Bible when you quote verses which makes factual claims about me which I know to be untrue. I don't secretly believe in God and hate him, I don't worship idols, I'm not gay (not that there's anything wrong with that), and I'm not any more prone to immoral behavior than anyone else. The book might as well be saying "All nonbelievers have red hair." It's just wrong.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
...which is what we are speaking in, no?
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It is not because it makes us feel good. It is because the Bible seems to point to it. Romans 4:15 says, "For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression." Babies and the mentally ill do not have the capacity to understand God's law in the New and Old Testaments. That is why I believe babies and the mentally ill go to heaven.
For the person whose mind is destroyed by dementia, there was a point in their life where they could understand God's law. They knew right from wrong, and there is a very good chance that such a person heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, and hopefully they accepted it. If not then they drank judgment upon themselves when they rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ. When I say the gospel, that is the good news of Jesus Christ, which if summed up in a single verse, is probably best summed up as follows:
"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).
Except neither a baby nor a mentally ill person can be said to be justified by faith. Ergo, if indeed one is justified by faith, it cannot be said that a baby is justified, nor can it be said a mentally ill person is justified.
Therefore, if you believe that babies go to Heaven, it must follow, then, that justification requires neither faith nor works, in which case Paul is incorrect. Yes?
Which doesn't matter. There's nothing in the Torah about an insanity defense. You are applying provisions found in the laws of countries to the law of the Torah.
How much are you willing to bet? Because I've been unemployed for a year, and I need money.
I'm not asking Jesus to love me differently. I'm saying that getting yourself tortured to death isn't love.
If sin is a crime against god, then it's not an issue of "refusing" to believe it. I am incapable of believing that I have a "sin debt" as long as I do not believe in the existence of any god.
The Hebrew word used can mean either "kill" or "murder", as well as a number of other things that could roughly be summed up as "destruction of property".
The Hebrew version of the Book of Numbers uses the same word to refer to any killing outside of warfare, with or without a weapon. It does distinguish between intentional and accidental killing, though, in that you're not supposed to leave the city if you accidentally kill someone, or else you'll be judged as intentionally killing them.
If I look upon another man's wife with lustful thoughts, that deserves death? It's a sin.
In what way to any of the laws show how holy god is? Some certainly assert it, but I can't think of any that show it.
Knowledge or understanding of a law is not required in order to be expected to follow it. That is why we lock up psychopaths and sociopaths who break the law, the mentally infirm and infants are looked after by others, etc.
On that note, what's your position on people that have never even gotten the message of Christ in the first place? For example, let's take the Pirahã people prior to 1978. They have no concept of deities (although they do have some supernatural beliefs). At this point in time, their only contact with believers has been shut down by a language barrier. It's not until 1978 that Daniel Everett manages to start communications with them. When he tells them about Jesus, they ask if he can bring Jesus to come meet them. When he admits that he can't, they move on with the conversation and ignore Jesus entirely.
In fact, the Pirahã were the starting point for Everett's deconversion, and he become a closeted atheist in 1985. When he finally came out of the closet over a decade later, his wife divorced him and most of his children refused to speak with him for another ten years.
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You have an agenda, and that agenda is you want the Bible to be proven to contradict itself. Just because there is one exception does not mean that Paul is wrong. It is the exception that proves the rule. The rule for the normal person is that they must be justified by faith. So Paul is not wrong...even though you really really want it to be so.
No...that is not where I got it from. Go read the article on my sister's blog. It explains the position quite well.
But the Bible does contradict itself (and observable reality), and the sky is blue, and 2+2 does equal 4. Desire is irrelevant in these regards. What matters is facts.
What I do want is for you to acknowledge this.
Of course it does. If Paul says we are justified by faith, and we are not justified by faith, then we are not justified by faith, and Paul is wrong.
Exceptions don't prove rules. They disprove them. That statement comes from an older definition of the word "prove," which means "to put to the test." Exceptions test rules.
First of all, cite the part where Paul mentions babies as being exempt from Paul's ruling on faith justifying people.
The fact is you can't. So it has nothing to do with what I want, it has to do with your refusal to accept what is right in front of you. Your beliefs are at odds with Paul's. It's fine, everyone's beliefs are at odds with Paul's. Physical reality is at odds with Paul's beliefs. It's fine. Everyone picks and chooses what they want from the Bible, because the Bible contradicts itself frequently. It's just a bound volume, a book composed of many scrolls, written by people who believed in God and wrote down what they believed was true, that were compiled together. None of these people were infallible, and neither are you. It's fine to disagree with them. It's fine to have your own interpretations. It's fine for you to be wrong. It's fine for them to be wrong.
But you, for whatever reason, can't deal with this. You refuse to acknowledge when you're wrong, or when your beliefs are at odds with Scripture, or when Scripture is wrong or internally contradictory.
I read it. It doesn't mention anything about ignorance of the Law giving one a free pass. For, indeed, there's nothing that tells of this. Meanwhile, there's Paul telling people NOT to practice circumcision on their children, for to do so would bind them to the Law and require them to follow it, circumcision being a ritual done to babies. It's quite clear that being ignorant of the Law does not in anyway absolve one from the Law. This is something you got from the laws of nations, the laws of men, which give provisions against children being tried like adults. But this does not exist in The Law as detailed in the Torah.
Now, let's talk about your sister's blog. While I have no desire to lecture a grieving mother, because frankly, she's got enough on her plate as is, she is interpreting Scripture as saying what she wants to hear. But it's not a correct interpretation.
The reading of David is, as I pointed out, incorrect. David is referring to Sheol, which is not Heaven, but closer to Hades, in the sense of a lightless land of the dead where all people go regardless of virtue.
The same is true of her misreading of Job. Job is not talking about Heaven. Job is talking about Sheol as well.
I think your sister has suffered a terrible and traumatic experience, and she is trying to rationalize her beliefs with the terrible thing that has happened, and is recognizing that it is incompatible with any kind and loving God that her child would be sent to any layer of Hell as opposed to being taken up in God's embrace.
Now, you can believe whatever you believe. I, for one, believe the whole notion of Hell is garbage and doesn't exist. I believe it is completely incompatible with the character of God - whom I absolutely believe exists. So I agree that God redeeming babies is perfectly in keeping with God's character. But, and here's the issue, I freely acknowledge that my beliefs are at odds with Scripture.
And so are yours. And so are your sister's. And there's nothing wrong with that. Disagree with Paul! It's fine! But you seem to have this need that your beliefs MUST reconcile with Scripture, and Scripture MUST reconcile with itself and MUST reconcile with reality.
But they don't. And it doesn't. And that's ok. And you can rebel against it, just as you can rebel against the idea that 2+2=4, but it won't do you any good, because the truth is the truth, and is the truth regardless of whether or not you want it to be.
Not quite. Saying that what we do affects eternity is not the same thing as saying that our works will get us to heaven. "The wages of sin is death" means that you reap what you sow. So what you do in this life you will reap the consequences of it. A baby doesn't do anything so it has nothing to reap. A baby cannot lie because it is not capable of doing so. A baby cannot lust because it is incapable of doing so. "The free gift of God is eternal life" means that people get to heaven on the basis of grace alone. That is just how we obtain eternal life. Once we have obtained eternal life there are many things we can do to affect eternity not just for ourselves but also for others. I don't particularly enjoy coming on here and arguing with some of you. The magic community in particular seems to have more than its fair share of rude arrogant atheists/agnostics/new-agers, especially in this forum. Make no mistake this forum is a hostile place for a Christian to post on. Another hobby of mine is Gator football, and the variety of atheist/agnostic/new-ager over on the Gator message boards is far less arrogant and more reasonable than what you will find here. I come on here and I try to reason with some of you because it appears to me that many of the Christians who are arguing for Christianity on this forum are not really Christians in any Biblical sense at all. So while my salvation does not hang in the balance because I am completely covered as a believer in Christ there are many of you here who need to hear the gospel message, and being a preacher of that message in a hostile environment is a way to affect eternity.
I find a creature arguing with the Almighty about the definition of the word "love" to be one of the vainest things I've ever heard of. If God says, "There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends" (John 15:13), then that is what love is. Your protesting of such is arbitrary because it is just your opinion.
Sure...when Jesus describes the blindness and the deafness of the non-believer it is a very real thing. What a curse it is to be in such a condition, but you are blind and deaf because you have deceived yourself. It is of your own volition that you are imprisoned in such a state. I hope God gives you the ears to hear and the eyes to see.
I believe you do know God on a certain level. Romans 1:19-20 says, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse."
You and many people here make a big deal about logical contradictions. How do you know logic exists? Can you account for immaterial laws (moral and logical) within your worldview? How do you know that the law of non-contradiction exists as a universal law? How do you know that logic itself isn't a culturally constructed idea?
That would be correct.
To answer your question, I'd respond back with Romans 1 again. All non-believers are without excuse because God's attributes are clearly perceived by the things that have been made. So they will be held accountable before God. That is my position, and I believe it is Paul's position too.
If we're going to start carving out exceptions, there are a lot more we can make than just babies and the mentally ill. What about someone who grew up in Saudi Arabia, and had it drilled into them from childhood that Christianity is the religion of infidels. Even if they at some point hear a brief description of the story of Jesus, can they really be blamed for rejecting it? Is the test that no matter your condition in life, as long as you possess the mental capacity to understand the gospel, you must accept it?
Seems easy enough to say for someone who in a country with a church on every block, but does sending the Saudi to hell sound any more just to you than sending the baby?
Again, the things Paul says in Romans, if taken to be general claims about nonbelievers, are clearly not true.
You really should too. Otherwise, when someone said, "There is no God", you would not be able to contradict it.
Logic is the notion that when we talk about stuff, we should have clear definitions for our terms and use the same definition for the same term every time. It is an idea. As with any idea, simply expressing it is both proof of its existence and instantiation of it.
Yes.
Because it's really just the definition of the term "not". When we use "not" to describe any possible situation, in this universe or any other, it will mean the same thing.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
I can guarantee you that it's not a curse to live with, I am not imprisoned, and it is only of my own "volition" by virtue of the fact that I refuse to delude myself into believing unsupportable claims.
It's really a matter of definitions, as B_S has pointed out. What about you? How do you know god exists? How do you know that god isn't a culturally constructed idea?
Well, at least you're being consistent in this case, so I'll give you props for that. I think this particular belief of yours is abhorrent, but at least you're consistent.
Trying to police thoughtcrime is doubleplus ungood.
Paul is justified in his beliefs: he believes that god literally appeared before him and talked to him. I have no such justification for doing the same. Why does Saul warrant a personal revelation while the rest of us don't? If god is omnipotent, he's clearly capable of appearing before every single person on the planet. If god did that, it would make sense to call anyone continuing to disbelieve "fools".
And yet, god doesn't reveal himself. Why not? Is he playing hide & seek?
It's not an issue of free will, obviously. The satan not only believes that god exists, but knows that god exists. And yet the satan had the free will to reject god, so knowledge of god's existence does not remove free will.
Therefore, if god exists, he must not want people to know he exists for some reason. Does he only reward those gullible enough to believe in him without any evidence with eternal pleasure in heaven?
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)