It's the 9th of January and quite sunny and cool in London.
Printable View
It's the 9th of January and quite sunny and cool in London.
I do know you wouldnt picture God like this, I was just giving an example that God can be in form of anything as you said higher energy.Quote:
Originally Posted by limajean
I am happy for you. It's 10th of January and far too scorching and dry in New Zealand.Quote:
Originally Posted by kandaurov
You did read the reason for editing, right? Well what the hey, I'll just ask the question anyway: what do you mean when you say God is all that is 'clean'? And do you find the fact that God chose a people over all others righteous?
(Right, you have summer in New Zealand now, eh? Lucky!)
Actually I have no idea if there is a specific thread that discusses these kind of questions, but there are on going discussions between the religious and atheists and in betweens in this thread and other threads, so I dont think it matters.Quote:
Originally Posted by kandaurov
As you know I am a Christian, I will respond to your enquires with my thoughts as a Christian. First, in the Bible, first few chapters of Genesis indicates God did say 'There be Oceans! There be trees!'
9 And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so. 10 God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.
11 Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so. 12 The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. 13 And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day.
If you read the first page of the bible you would know that God definitely created trees and oceans:)
When I said God was clean and good, I was talking about clear of impurities, and evil. In other words, SOURCE of good and light. For example, in a light bulb, it cannot emit darkness, only pure light.
Now here comes my thoughts as I am so insignificant to explain the nature and intention of God, as we mankind cant ever understand God.
I will take reference that in Garden of Eden, there was evil, as one of the Trees in the middle was Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Evil was obviously existed before The Fall of Man. I am not God, so I do not know why evil existed. My thought, evil existed in Earth to serve God. As we all know good overpowers evil, therefore evil can serve good. I think that earth is like a test for all mankind, the weighing of the righteous and good decisions of their freewill, ie accepting and believing in Jesus. Evil serves God by tempting individuals and testing if these people will fall for them or resist to look upwards to God. I think God gives us a choice to choose good or evil by giving us freewill, and hopes for everyone of His creation to choose good, and rightfully take the title of God's Children.
People dying from genocides: God cannot be held responsible. It was human's choice and freewill that lead to these conflicts, not God, so it cant wrong the fact that God is truely all righteous.
Yep I did read the foot notes, I just wanted to express the diversity of the weather in different regions of the world:)Quote:
Originally Posted by kandaurov
Clean, by clear from impurities, simply pure and all truth. I should consider my choice of adjectives in the future as it is causing a bit of a confusion.
Choosing some people over others. The reason why it seems that He "chooses" people I think is because He knows the future. A person may have freewill and free choice of all the decision of His life however as God knows every future move of every man, He will know who responds to His call, therefore to Him, these people who respond to Him in the future are "chosen" ones. Choosing may seem that He picks out by hand, but I think its just that He already knows who will follow Him.
(Yep! Summer all right!:D pity where I live I cant see snow in winter thou)
Right, just wanted to know what a Christian though about these matters. Thanks!
(been often told NZ is amazing, will visit it whenever I can. Must be odd to have summer at Christmas though!)
Thats alright! Happy to share my views:)Quote:
Originally Posted by kandaurov
(Oh yes, please visit, you can have a tour of the Lord of The Rings set in Wellington, if you are fan that is.. Yeah, sun sand surf and barbie in Christmas all good:) Our Christmas cards have pot bellied half naked santa surfing with sunglasses on, not the traditional covered up sleighing big red santa.. Seems we are getting a bit off topic, maybe I should link with Christmas and Christ..
I believe in God because Jesus Christ was born in a food bowl for cows and horses on Christmas day, born as Son of God, all pure, perfect. He was born to teach us with wisdom, correcting the old laws for our own convenience, born as a healer to cure the sick and give hope to the one suffering from darkness. He was born to be spat on, mocked and sworn on, born to suffer and die with nails being hammered in his hands and feet, to be slung by an arrow, crowned nailed thorns and be laughed at while he cried for us mankind in a cross.
Jesus Christ was born on Christmas day to be sent to earth to sacrifice Himself and be punished by us when He did nothing wrong. But we forget that on Christmas day, Christ was born to suffer for us, for our sins and for giving us the opportunity to live with God forever. Yet on Christmas day we rather focus on spending money for self indulgence and self satisfaction. On Christmas day, we forget that Christ sacrificed Himself simply because He loved us. Lest we forget His love. Lest we forget to love Him back and thank Him for being born on Christmas day.
I believe in God because He rose from death in three days, giving us a mission to spread the Word about God, and His works and words while in earth. I believe in God because He gives us hope and light in the darkest times in our world. I believe in God because He gave us meaning in the world, giving us the choice to thank Him for His time in earth, and spread the Word about Him. I believe in God because He is with us all the time. I believe in God because as He had done His painful work in earth, I want to repay His love for us by following His Words, and serving Him and His people.
So a big bang made this wonderful earth? Formed all those lovely planets and the skies and lined them up just so? Made them lovely? I don't think so. That was planned and done by God.
Cat
feel free to believe irrational notions. but leave em at that. no need to defend your creationist view with an appeal to beauty argumentQuote:
Originally Posted by Cat_Brenners
I think I jumped in too late here but to answer the original question isn't more reasonable to say you believe in God due to an environment that promotes the idea? Anyone can be indoctrinated into any religion. Cultures have a wide variety of how they view God. Since we live in the west I guess its more likely the conception of God is along the lines of the Abrahamic religions.
What makes this conception more superior? Doesn't the fact that religions and conceptions of god(s) are not uniform make you ponder at least a little on whether you could be incorrect?
Sounds like I might have hit a nerve. lol. I believe in what I know in my heart to be true. No one will convince me that it's irrational notions. Beauty and the formation of our earth and universe is as much an argument as anything I have heard here.
Hugs, Cat
Cat, good on you to link God with beauty. I believe that God is beauty because as He is immaculate, clear from any flaws, He is beautiful. The universe and everything in it is beautiful and that is becuase God has created them. Everything in the world are created by purpose with His intricate care and love.
Try and study the most insignificant feature you can find in nature, and there is no doubt that you will appreciate its complex beauty. Reason is that they are footprints of God, and every footprints made by God are inexplicably beautiful.
I agree with you whole-heartedly Cat and skasian. I also believe that all comes from the divine. Within everyone is that divine. This world only looks to be material because we cannot see beyond that. But actually everything is beautiful, everything is spiritual - not because it is all divine but because it all belongs to the divine. In fact you can see that the divine is within everything only if you really focus on it, even as you walk down the street or sidewalk. Life is eternal, and as William Blake said, if the doors of perception were cleansed, then we would see all as it is, infinite. Saints and rishis all supported this, they said that all is a play of the infinite, or in other words divine. I follow Hinduism more than anything else, but Christ taught the same thing, that there is life within you, the Kingdom of God... it is difficult to explain but it is the destination of the self.
Well, nature has its flaws. Humanity itself is a flawed species -- while other animals obtain satisfaction just by eating, sleeping and breeding, our intellect gives us the inspiration to achieve much more. It's why we have art, literature, science, and civilization in general. While that all sounds like a good thing, it just makes us self-serving wastes of space in the context of the natural world. We contribute basically nothing to it. We try and give back to nature by planting trees and constructing animal shelters, but that's really just an act of cleaning up our huge mess. Humans are just a scab on Earth's backside. I don't see any divinity in that.Quote:
Originally Posted by skasian
Humanity tends to personify what they are not aware of or what they fear. I say that because you mentioned the "footprints" of God on everything he created. If a god or gods did in fact exist, we could not possibly fathom their existence. We can try to by creating Bibles and religions, and painting pictures of saints and prophets, but in the end it really wouldn't make a difference.
I kind of stumbled into this thread at a late time so if I am intruding on some other discussion then ignore me. But, still, I don't see how anyone can believe anything based on faith, even if it's a question that science hasn't completely answered yet.