oldiesman

On 6/28/2025 at 6:07 PM, Charity said:

My rhetorical question is why didn't God make himself and his true word known directly without any middlemen and then prevent it from being changed, suggesting in a fantastical way the threat of a lightning strike upon anyone who tried to do.  

 

I'd like to take a stab at answering this even though it's rhetorical.

In a word, experience.

God, Jesus and the Holy Ghost (each individual persons) desire people to love them each personally from the heart.       What do you do when you love someone?    You talk to them.   Ask them things.    Spend time with them, think about what they want and try to do what pleases them, because you love them and want to make them happy.   And they in turn love you back.

All of this takes time, energy, patience, persistence, and faith.   And at times, suffering and inconvenience.      I believe this is how a relationship is formed with these great persons without any middleman.  

6 hours ago, Raf said:

My apologies to you personally.

I thought I was clear that this was as a species, not a criticism directed at you personally. I thought I was as far from singling you out as I could possibly be.

But it is inherent in our opposing views that we will occasionally step on each other's toes.

So allow me to rephrase, please, in a way that does not insult anyone directly or indirectly:

 

Again with my apologies, is that better?

Generously sufficient, thank you!    

Can you explain further what you mean by "quantitative immeasurable"?    That brings back a memory of a blood test with my "quantitative covid antibody results" i.e. numerical antibody count.  LOL   

34 minutes ago, Raf said:

But in our arrogance as a species, we imagine ourselves to be an exception.

Hold on a minute...  I don't think (or hope) any of us in this discussion on either side is being arrogant about their beliefs.

47 minutes ago, Charity said:

If you go over to the doctrinal subforum, there is the thread "Salvation Universal or Not?" where I shared John Schoenheit's Appendix 4 from his REV bible.  It's basically the written form of the doctrine he teaches in the tape.  

His point #6 is called "The 'immortal soul' is not biblical; the Bible never says the soul is immortal," if you are interested in reading it.

I appreciate and have no dispute what John is teaching, only adding an opposite opinion above.    Put in legal terms, for me; let's say I'm still in the "discovery" phase of the argument...

12 hours ago, Charity said:

I need to correct the above post.  After listening to the tape again, John Schoenheit did not use the phrase "right" translation, he said a "good" translation.  

After watching the tape, I have to say his argument is a good one.   But I need to pray about and further study his teaching but must also include St. Thomas Aquinas' opposite take that the soul is immoral.   In sum, Aquinas has argued that the soul (a spiritual entity) cannot be destroyed by fire (a physical entity).    Here's some of what Aquinas argued:

AI Overview

I was thinking more along the lines of accurately defining the Old and New Covenants using objective/subjective standards which appears to be the topic of this thread.

6 minutes ago, waysider said:

It all boils down to being a geopolitical issue.

HERE

How does one talk about this issue only biblically then?   That's what I'm trying to do.   If you can develop some rules of the game that would satisfy everyone it would be terrific.  

7 hours ago, Stayed Too Long said:

How does one know, if something good happens in their life, that it was the result of another offering prayers for them? 
How do you know when you offer prayers for a neighbor that the prayer was actually answered? 
I used to offer perfect prayer, (SIT) for my family and those in my fellowship everyday, our countries leadership, and TWI leadership. They all got sick like anyone else in the world, two died in a car accident, and VPW somehow managed to get possessed my a devil spirit and died of cancer.
My prayer didn’t seem to make much difference at all.

It may not, if it's not God's will.   Jesus prayed in the garden "my Father, if this chalice may not pass away but I must drink it; Thy will be done". 

7 hours ago, Stayed Too Long said:

There are over 45,000 different Christian religions in the world, so if you accept that Christianity is the correct religion, how do you know you have picked the right version? How have you eliminated the other 44,999 as not being God’s accurate version of hell?

https://www.christianwebsite.com/how-many-denominations-of-christianity-2024/

 

How do I know?   I don't.    I picked a Catholic version (notice I say "a" because there's a schism in catholicism as well) because a friend thought I'd be wanting to return after decades of absence.    I took the RCIA course of her church, enjoyed it, and was confirmed.

Then I strayed from that and joined a staunch traditional, Latin version.    Both guns blazing.    It's what I'm doing right now but I'm not opposed to checking out other versions.   I've been to other versions and it's all interesting.    I'm even open to attending a Muslim meeting if a friend invited me to one.

This is not political... please follow...

With the U.S. bombing of Iran, I've gotten into a couple of debates with Jews who believe God gave them that land for eternity and American Christians are supposed to understand that and acquiesce.  (Old Covenant)

However some Christians (myself) believe that Jesus' crucifixion, burial, resurrection, ascension and glory began a New Covenant wherein Jews who believe in Christ are no more Jews but now members of the body of Christ along with the Gentiles who also believe.  

The Old has been supplanted by the New (according to my belief).   Here are the questions:

Would it be accurate to say that both of these beliefs are subjective?

Or, is the Jewish religion really the objective one, and the Christian religion the subjective (being an adaptation of the first)?

5 hours ago, waysider said:

Why would God need a witness?

Maybe it has to do with God giving specific officials in the church the power to forgive sins, but it's only an observation that maybe has some connection with that.  

Had to post this one... too funny...
 

26 minutes ago, Charity said:

Danger, sin, egregious sin, ungodly lifestyle, commands of God, hardened hearts, salvation maintenance, suffering, hell, ... Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to believe.  (tangled web = a complex, difficult, and confusing situation or thing)  

Yeah, decided not to go down this rabbit hole again (rabbit hole = a bizarre, confusing, or nonsensical situation or environment, typically one from which it is difficult to extricate oneself)  

"What has been seen cannot be unseen, what has been learned cannot be unknown."  Cynthia Woolf.  

Entangle me once, shame on you...entangle me no more, shame be gone.  

I'll stop now.  

The antidote is quite simple: go to the confessional... make a thorough and honest confession, then the priest will absolve sins and you're back in the state of grace with God (in TWI terms... back "in fellowship with God").   As we know this differs from the TWI version.   But in Catholic and some other Christian traditions, a priest acts as a representative of Christ and is able to forgive sins.   This is not the priest's own power but a conferral of God's forgiveness through Christ.  The priest through the power given to the church acts as an instrument of God's mercy.      The practice stems from Jesus's giving authority to forgive sins to the Apostles, who passed this authority down through apostolic succession to priests.   In this manner, Catholics believe that when a priest absolves sins, it is ultimately God who forgives.   NOTE:  IMO, I consider this method more substantial and ultimately valid than simply asking God for forgiveness without a witness.

This 15 min. clip was sent to me and it's highly recommended.   Please note this is not about politics (not my intention) -- its all about answering the question "What is Israel".    Note that Atheists (I think Jimmy Dore is one too) know more about biblical truths than some Christians.     If we owe the modern state of Israel anything as Christians, it'd be converting them to Jesus Christ as it says in Romans Chapter 10.    
 

1 minute ago, Raf said:

2 billion Muslims say yes.

Willing to take that chance?

Yes.   I know nothing about it and I think the Christian hell is enough to keep me concerned.

6 hours ago, Charity said:

"Avoid it at all costs" 

AI Overview "The idiom "avoid it at all costs" means to make every effort to prevent something from happening, regardless of the difficulty or expense involved. It emphasizes the importance of preventing a particular outcome, action, or situation."

How confident can one be that their "every effort" is actually enough?  

The point of my earlier post was to question how the all-loving God of the Bible could 1) send people to eternal torment and now, 2) cause his people to live in fearful obedience their entire life to avoid said eternal torment not knowing if it was enough to ease his wrath towards them.   This is a rhetorical question.

A non-rhetorical question is whether a believer, such as yourself, sees living with this fear and uncertainty as a demonstration of being devoutly religious - something which God expects and honors?  I'll never forget when a priest (over five decades ago) told my mother she had to stay with her abusive husband as a show of her pious suffering which later would be rewarded in heaven.  

 

I don't know about that...   so I did a quick AI search:

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has clearly stated that no woman is expected to stay in an abusive marriage and encourages these women to seek an annulment. However, studies on the experiences of battered, Christian women indicate that this is not always enough to free women from abusive marriages.May 23, 2024

       

7 hours ago, Raf said:

How are you avoiding Islam's hell?

Wow now there's a question I was never asked in my 68 years.    Should I be concerned?

21 hours ago, Charity said:

"An eternity of torture"  

I think about the reality of this.  Since God is all knowing, he would always be aware of their suffering.  What would he be thinking?  Would he even make his presence known to them?  Would he talk to them?  What would he say?  

Day 1 - "This hurts me more than it hurts you." Or the opposite, "It sucks to be you."

Day 100 - "It's waaay too late to say you're sorry."

Day 1000 - "Stop complaining, a millennia of torture isn't even a drop in the bucket when it comes to all eternity."

Day 10000 - "If you can't handle the eternal time, you shouldn't have done the finite crime."

Day 100000 - "No, for the hundred thousandth time, I cannot parole you.  My righteous justice will not allow it."  

Any humour set aside, when you seriously consider the logistics of people actually being tortured for eternity, it is completely without reason or logic.  It's a man made concept simply designed to put "the fear of God" in people like it has in you.  
 

And if it's true, someone has done me a great service warning me to avoid it at all costs.    It's been said that in the beatific vision, "we'll understand it all by and by".      I certainly don't right now.  

12 hours ago, Raf said:

 

Mine are more geared toward addressing the presumption that god is a prerequisite for "objective moral values."

 

Raf I agree with what you're saying.    To me, it's simply logical that one doesn't necessarily have to believe in a god to believe in morality.    We all have brains.    It's simply a matter of logic not religion, to want to do unto others as you would have others do unto you.  (even though a religiously moral person said to do that too...)

11 hours ago, Raf said:

I don't mean to be snide, but it's not universal until everyone agrees, and I don't think we can get EVERYONE to agree on ANYTHING.

So we can get widespread agreement on, say, "murder is wrong." But rape? No, humanity grew into that one. For a long time, women were considered property, and so the rules against rape reflected the belief it was a crime against the property owner: her husband or father.

I think we would be hard pressed to find anyone who believes Jennifer Love Hewitt is less attractive than Sandra Bernhard. But that doesn't make her OBJECTIVELY more beautiful because no matter how you slice it, beauty is a matter of taste, opinion.

I'm saying morality is like that: even if one were to find a universally accepted moral tenet, that would not make it objective. 

Lemme know if I am saying this correct:

To the Christian, Christianity is objective

To the Jew, Judaism is objective

To the Atheist, Atheism is objective

But to everyone collectively, universally; there is no objective moral truth...

3 minutes ago, Raf said:

Define universal

Objective