Okay, this is one conversation I might be able to bear being involved with.
My chosen path in life is youth ministry, and I also really highly believe that a growth of faith can primarily come from a test of faith. I really love religious debates!
I'll love them a lot more once I go to a Christian college and figure out how to pull verses for every situation out of nowhere (I know there's a google Bible somewhere, though...) but for now I'll answer with how I believe.
First of all, I'd like to go ahead and say that one Christian's beliefs don't often express others'. The Bible is often "open to interpretation" (hence denominations), however, something I don't think is in debate amongst Christians is the existence of one undeniable truth. My belief is probably flawed, because it's based on mostly what I think and the best arguments presented to me. Present a good enough argument and I can change what I believe (somewhat).
Anyways, some of Felipe's statements just really made me want to respond, because I can come back to some of that stuff. Plus, I've always wanted to discuss religion with him, just to see what happens.
Yeah, I have to give it to God for the kick-off, and I believe in destiny (or a very close thing to it), so I also think there's at least a kind of... "force" that drives things around, steering the world in the right direction.
Well, I think God=Destiny, in the way you're thinking. The Bible says that God has a plan for the world, and every person in it (or at least that he knows what's going to happen to the world and every person in it). The world is going to end up where he says it's gonna end up. There's your destiny.
Surely, sometimes it swerves a bit, but hey, even omnipotent beings can't REALLY watch out EVERY SINGLE PERSON at all times, right?
See definition of omnipotent. God DOES see every singe person at all times. Because, well, he's different than a human. That's why you called him a "being," eh? He can (obviously) do stuff we can't.
Sometimes, one slips by unnoticed and takes a wrong path, but generically speaking, the world tens to drive them back to their right path.
Untrue. God is omnipotent, and as such, he knew that said person was going to make that specific wrong decision from the beginning.
The point is free will. People don't make wrong decisions because God "slips up" but because they do. God doesn't railroad us like a bad DM, but he still knows where things are going. God made humanity with the aptitude to choose right over wrong, or vice versa.
Which leads to the question, obviously, of why "evil" exists in the world. I could throw out the "Cold Doesn't Exist" argument to solve that one, but I also think that God allows evil to exist (although he could destroy it right now, if he wanted to) because of free will. I don't claim to know why God created humanity (I assume someone with a kid could make some comparisons), but it wasn't because he wanted little mind-slaves. He HAS to allow evil to exist (until judgment day) because that's just a result of free will.
C.S. Lewis had a chapter on that in Mere Christianity which, even if you don't agree, is an interesting theoretical look at how things would look from outside of time.
Ever read "The Bloodstone Chronicles"? An only okay series of books, but they do have some interesting thoughts on why God created people, and a God that exists outside of separate dimensions that people do.
I think it went something like this: people can observe a three-dimensional world, and exist in four dimensions (the fourth being time, eh?). So assume that you could create a world in only two dimensions. People in that world would consider it perfectly normal, but should you try to influence it, they couldn't understand the magnitude of your actions.
By their reasoning, God exists outside our field of understandable, observable dimensions, but he's still there.
Like I said, interesting thoughts, and probably not entirely untrue.
Also brings in some interesting connections between fate and free will (which, honestly, I don't believe are really mutually exclusive, but that would take forever to explain, and is part of that whole Dark Ages-era Anglo-Saxon/Old Norse influence in my worldview. If we're gonna argue about that one, we might need a whole new thread. Maybe I should write up an argument for that. Twisted! )
See above post. Enjoy.
I believe God gave us Jesus Christ to allow us to return to His presence if we do what he asks of us. Part of this is, as you state, accepting Christ. But I believe to fully accept Christ into your live you must make your life a reflection of His, or at least to the best of our ability, as we are not perfect, as He is. This is why I believe you must have works also.
My favorite argument of all.
What it boils down to is this: You MUST believe in God and Jesus Christ to go to heaven.
But what is belief? Lots of people believe in God the way they believe in a table. They know it's there, and they trust it to perform its function (for the most part), but they don't bother getting into any sort of personal relationship with it.
Obviously not the definition of belief.
Maybe, you think believing is just knowing God exists. Well, I LOVE this Bible passage. Read James 2:19. It says:
You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.
Demons go to heaven? Not likely. So that's not the answer either.
Even non-Christians can agree with me: there are some (a lot) of fake Christians in this world. People who say they believe in God but make wrong choices and do evil regardless, with the idea that either a) it doesn't really matter or b) because Jesus will forgive me anyway. Think those people will go to heaven? I don't either.
That's not to say if you make a mistake, you go to #$&*@!. Not at all. I'm just saying that people who take (consciously or unconsciously) spiritual "advantage" of being "saved" to do whatever they want don't believe. Agreed?
My old youth pastor told me this about baptism, although I think it applies to this situation also:
"It's not required. But if you really believe in God, and you have the opportunity, you'll do it."
Real belief in God, the kind that it takes to get to heaven, is trying to live a Godly life (a life following Jesus' and God's commands, in case that can be misinterpreted) not because it's required, but because you know it's right.
Topic: Deep Questions Seemingly Unanswerable (Read 9261 times)
