:spew:

Epi, I sense that you have a problem with the bible. That makes me sad, but not mad. I hope you realize that your decision on who you think Jesus Christ is will have eternity consequences. I will not sling mud with you because I don't think God would have me do that. I will rather be polite and state my opinions without immature or mean remarks. I hope you have a great day! God bless! Dave

Pantheistic pagan here (and I am a nondualist too... I don't agree with polarities, they are a tool of oppression). I'm probably the most skeptical pagan in the world, too... LOL

Epi, I sense that you have a problem with the bible. That makes me sad, but not mad. I hope you realize that your decision on who you think Jesus Christ is will have eternity consequences. I will not sling mud with you because I don't think God would have me do that. I will rather be polite and state my opinions without immature or mean remarks. I hope you have a great day! God bless! Dave

no dave, i don't have a problem with the bible, i have a problem with you, and people like you who want to impose their beliefs on others when you have absolutely no right to.

:spew:

I could not have said it any better.

I hope you realize that your decision on who you think Jesus Christ is will have eternity consequences.

You read the bible? what about the part that the first will be the last ?

I could not have said it any better.
I second that thought. There is nothing that makes me dislike Christianity more than someone saying (or insinuating) that I will be damned for my beliefs. That is followed in a close second by the same person telling me that they are praying for me and/or my soul. In my mind it’s insulting and disrespectful. :brood:

Epi, I sense that you have a problem with the bible. That makes me sad, but not mad. I hope you realize that your decision on who you think Jesus Christ is will have eternity consequences. I will not sling mud with you because I don't think God would have me do that. I will rather be polite and state my opinions without immature or mean remarks. I hope you have a great day! God bless! DaveThe way I look at it is, if you or anyone else truely believes that I am going to hell or whatever for my beliefs, then I understand why you try to convert people. You're a re sincerely worried about them.

But this is the thing I don't like about many religions- intolerance is built in to the religion. Even if the followers are the most tolerant people, many religions state that the Mightiest of the Mighty, the Omniscient and all-loving (and/or whatever else attributed to the higher powers of given religion) is intolerant His/Her/Theirselves of people of the "wrong" beliefs.

I saw a PSA on NBC about teaching your children Love instead of Hate. They said that even if you do not outright teach your children to hate people who are different, they learn through example of the parents. What kind of example is being set by a higher power who gives eternal punishment to those with the wrong belief system, regardless of how good and loving they are in their lives?

If I had solid proof that a Judeo/Christian god existed, I would probably start kissing butt, but nothing could make me respect this aspect of God's decision to favor some after death and not others based on beliefs.

I'm moving this to the debate thread...and guys, lets keep this friendly.

For those you who feel that I am patronizing or pushy, I must say that I don't what in my original post caused those feelings. I did not throw hell into anyone's face. At the present time, my entire will be spending eternity in hell because they have rejected Jesus. That hurts me more than you will ever know, unless you are a Christian who also has non-believing family members. I have zero desire to act like a know-it-all or someone who takes pleasure in someone else's eternal destiny.

In my opinion, Jesus was one of only three possibilities: Lord, liar, or lunatic. He was either not telling the truth, or he was messed up in the head, or he was the Savior of the world. Many people have died in defense of Christ over the last two thousand years. Question: why would anyone die for a liar or a lunatic? When I said I am praying for people who don't know Jesus, that is not meant ina patronizing fashion. God tells us to pray for people whom do not know him. I think some people on this board are reading other motives into my words. I realize that happens a lot on internet message boards because nobody here has ever met me. I am not mad at anyone here. You can disagree with me. That is fine. We all have a free will to do what we want. However, each one of us will be held accountable on Judgment Day for how we answered this question: was Jesus a liar, a lunatic, or The Lord? Peace to you all and God bless! Dave

I said I wasn’t coming back in here to post... But I just had to.

This is meant with no disrespect to any religion, I don’t think it’ll offend anyone, but it’s not meant to.

Dave64, I believe the problem itself that others had with your post isn’t that you’re Christian, or your belief in Jesus. The problem I believe lies in the point that it’s a “God or higher power” i.e. “What’s your religious belief” type of thread.

In your post the first part was perfectly fine and non-offensive (to 99% of the people at least I’m sure). The problem was in:

“If you do not know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Personal Savior, it is my prayer that you will repend [sic] of your sins and ask Jesus into your heart. Christians are not perfect people; they are simply forgiven. May Jesus come into your heart today”

It can easily be taken that you don’t respect others choices to have any religious point other than Christianity, and they should cast away their evil ways and join the only true religion.

There are numerous religious beliefs in the world, Christianity when divided into categories are in the MINORITY. Muslims are the majority.
Of course I doubt you'll believe this, or the attachment from Encarta, but it's there, none the less.

Jl, I appreciate your post. In regards to the number of people in any particular "religion", I don't see how the quantity of people has anything to do with the truth. Every religious leader in the history of the world has one thing in common: they died and they stayed dead. That is except for the person of Jesus Christ. He rose again and he will come again. The other leaders may have been moral people who had followers, but only Jesus was able to escape the grips of death. Jesus was either a liar, a lunatic, or the Lord. There are no other choices. People would like to argue that he was just a good teacher. That is not possible. How could he be a good teacher if he was telling untruths? If he was lying, then his moral character has to be flawed. I am not trying to convince anyone of anything. The reason I posted my first post was that I felt that the Christian message of Jesus dying on the cross and being resurrected was not being presented as an option on this board. Am I in the minority? Yes! Does it bother me? No! I have no agenda here. I am just hoping that maybe one person will reconsider which option Jesus is: liar, lunatic, or Lord. I have no control over how anybody on this board responds. God knows and he will move in their hearts of some people and not in the hearts of others. I don't understand that, and in the case of my unsaved family members, I don't like it at all. However, this is about Jesus, it is about what people do with the question of who Jesus is, and it is not about me. I am but a sinner who for some reason God picked to have a saving relationship with Jesus. I don't mean to patronize anyone. I have not been disrespectful to anyone. All I ask is that other people treat me with respect and keep an open mind about what their answer is to the question of Jesus! Peace! Dave

I think people may just want to have it acknowledged that their confidence in their own beliefs might be just as strong as your confidence in your beliefs. People don't like to be told that you know the truth and they don't- especially in a matter such as religion. Perhaps it's a matter of humility. And since religion is based in faith, not reason, there really is no reason to argue about it, so it is good that you do not want to convince anyone.

I'm a born again Christian and I believe similar to Dave. So what? It annoys me that Christians are not allowed to say how they truely feel without comments like Epi's. I don't vomit on your beliefs; don't do it on mine.

This was a good, civilized thread for a while and it's too bad that everyone could not have more of the tolerance and respect towards people who believe completely differently then them.

whoa, hipocrisy with capital H here. apparently, you feel exactly the same way about me as i feel about you.

what? am i not allowed to feel disgust when someone tells me i'm going to burn in hell and they're going to pray for my soul just because i don't believe i am the slave sheep of some higher power? give me a break.

Calling all Christians, of which I am one. Let's try to remember that we will get better results with love not judgement. The world is full of judgement. At the risk of sounding too sweet, love is what we must show to be heard and listened to. It is not our job to judge others. What kind of Christians would we be if we have no real behaviors and true attitudes of compassion and love. If we don't show love, why on earth would someone want to be a Christian. We are selling what we feel is the most important product in history. Please, don't run off the customers. I feel God will hold US accountable for our sale's pitch.

whoa, hipocrisy with capital H here. apparently, you feel exactly the same way about me as i feel about you.

what? am i not allowed to feel disgust when someone tells me i'm going to burn in hell and they're going to pray for my soul just because i don't believe i am the slave sheep of some higher power? give me a break.

This is about what people believe. I didn't realize that sugar coating beliefs was required. I'm a discipline of Jesus Christ, just like Skylark, tear2song, etc. I believe in the same core beliefs as they've expressed at various times on this site.

You've shown many times your utter distain for Christianity and that's your issue. The only thing I feel for you is pity for being so full of anger.

Please, don't run off the customers. I feel God will hold US accountable for our sale's pitch.

Honestly? I'm not interested in selling. I have a hard enough time living my own life, let alone trying to help someone else live their's.

What is annoying me is that this thread was about people's beliefs, but when someone expressed their core beliefs, it was acceptable for them to get stomped on. Why? Because it's trendy right now.

If a muslim posted their fundamental beliefs and I said :spew:, there would be screams and cries of intolerance.

I agree withyou Kristadb. I'm not a Christian, but I didn't see anything wrong with that gentleman's post - and he stayed on topic, and answered the question asked. The topic starter specifically asked for others not to insult or attack.

Well, whatever.

I am still deciding what to believe.

Right now (this may change as I experience and learn more) I don't believe there is "a" God. Instead I believe that all souls together make-up what might be considerd "God". I have no clue what philosophy or religion embraces this theory - if anyone does, let me know :)

I follow Buddhist philosophy for the time being which seems to come closest to what I feel in my heart.

I'm not going to direct this post and any particular person, or religion. But the way I see it, no one has any room to judge another. Which sorta seems like it's going on here. Am I wrong to say that, in Christianity, judgement is to be left to God? or did I hear something wrong somewhere along the line?

Is religion really something that's open to debate when so many different people have so many different beliefs? You can use the bible to justify anything, which makes ME reluctant to believe in it. I've seen it used in many ways to justify racism, cruelty to animals, cruelty to women, vegetarianism, etc.. The list can go on and on. And i'm sure there are loopholes in any other religion. I am just using the bible as an example, so don't attack me for it.

Like I said, different people believe different things. If Epi doesn't want to believe in it, why should she have beliefs pushed on her? better yet, why should ANYONE have belief's pushed on them? I don't do it myself, so I refuse to let anyone do it to me.

Kristadb, I wasn't aiming that at you. Sorry if you took it that way. I agree, we Christians should not come under fire anymore than the next faith or non faith. It boils down to it being our personal opinion. And everyone has a right to speak their opinion without being puked on, right?

If a muslim posted their fundamental beliefs and I said :spew:, there would be screams and cries of intolerance.

no. if a muslim came here and said i should die because i don't believe in islam, i would say the exact same thing to him/her as i did to you. i see absolutely zero difference between you and them. thanks for bringing out that point. i want to be very clear on that.

This is about what people believe. I didn't realize that sugar coating beliefs was required. I'm a discipline of Jesus Christ, just like Skylark, tear2song, etc. I believe in the same core beliefs as they've expressed at various times on this site.

You've shown many times your utter distain for Christianity and that's your issue. The only thing I feel for you is pity for being so full of anger.


i don't have any disdain for christianity. i have disdain for people who think they are superior to all others because they believe in something that others don't- coincidentally, the majority of those people seem to fall in the category of "very religious". i guess that's just a given.

i don't need to respect anyone who thinks i'm going to burn in hell.

Everybody please - take a deep breath and count to 10 before continuing...

Promise? :)

Is Gandhi burning in Hell, by the way? He supported Christian ideals but wasn't Christian per se, but rather believed in all religions simultaneously or something. Anyway, according to some Christian interpretations, the answer is 'yes'. And this I find not only an abhorrent view but also contradictory (contradiction with the core thoughts in Christian thinking).