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One receives Gods saving grace because they are unworthy of saving.

if you deserved saving , then it would not be under the GRACE of God.

Didn't say we deserved saving, I said He thought we were worth saving. And He did it. And in a most spectacular way.

It is by grace alone. No worth whatsoever. Read and understand the depavity of man.
God does not save anyone because of what he deems as worthy.

And now we're arguing semantics. But to say God sees us as not worth saving but in his mercy he does save us would make God irrational. Better to say we cannot achieve salvation through our own merit. When we follow the laws there is no gain as that is what is required, what we should be doing. But when we sin there is loss. We need forgiveness an mercy to get us back to even.

DBT ……… you posted:

“Not that any of this matters to the contradiction between descriptions of a God of Love and the vindictive Tyrant of the old testament. If one is true, the other must be false, hence a contradiction between the two sets of descriptions.”

You are wrong in your statement. You are not simply pointing out a contradiction. You are clearly making an interpretation of Scripture and are indeed therefore concluding there is a contradiction. If you were not interpreting scripture …...(wrongly) … you would not even note a supposed contradiction. You have concluded that God is “a tyrant” and you have concluded that the description of a “God of Love” is incongruent.

You have come to these conclusions based on…. your own opinion….. and then insert your opinion in a terribly skewed interpretation of the Bible.

Yep, not a bible scholar…..

btw…. what you have done here is called “eisegesis.”




DBT, you also posted this:

“You yourself happen to be assuming the vindictive tyrant over the God of Love, who does not keep a record of wrongs and is 'good to all' unconditionally.”

Here you go again…. you make a statement and this statement is indeed your “interpretation” of verses that you do not quote but make clear reference to.

You make the statement that God does “not keep a record of wrongs” and is “good to all” unconditionally.

When challenged on this, you retreated to bafflegab and obfuscation.

You have indeed interpreted and have posted that God does “not keep a record of wrongs.”
You have indeed interpreted and have posted that God is “good to all” unconditionally.

Both of your interpretations are inconsistent with even a basic level of scholarship. You seemingly have no idea of the context or application.


When challenged, you retreat to “cut and paste” ….. that is all you can do …. you cannot support nor explain what you said.


The point is this: You have little knowledge of the Bible and little knowledge of biblical interpretation. But, you plunge ahead anyway in your zeal to …..what?
.........influence folks with even less knowledge than you….. Is that it?


Anyway, gotta go, have another road trip.

god in his omneity has a lot of options.

humans are in truth, probably not worth saving.

a poor design, or poorly implemented, or unbalanced.

maybe he was doing his best with the materials available?

anyways, he'll let people give up, give in to the mighty god.

but he is still omnipotent. he can save whether you like it or not.

a lot of folks will probably not like god's decisions. but what ever.

The Greeks were far ahead of their time, but that does not mean that the things they believed about the world or the nature of self and the soul are true. If you want to propose a transcendent soul as the decision maker, it needs to shown that an apparently an immaterial, non detectable entity is interacting with the brain as the Master of the system.

As it is, any significant condition within the brain, lesions, connectivity failure, chemical imbalances, etc, does in fact effect perception and decision making in very specific ways regardless of the presence of this proposed non material entity, the soul.


On the neurology of morals
Patients with medial prefrontal lesions often display irresponsible behavior, despite being intellectually unimpaired. But similar lesions occurring in early childhood can also prevent the acquisition of factual knowledge about accepted standards of moral behavior.

the ego, a bit of self-awareness does not want to die.

if it does die, it wants to know that it's going to be in a better place.

that's not a bad desire to have, to leave the urth and then move on up.

but, it's not necessarily that way at all? we're here, we're physical humans.

ego is a imagined self that doesn't want to die. that would be the end. is that true?

You offer nothing more than your opinion while venting your frustration at your own inability to deal with the issue of contradictions in the bible.

By focusing your attention and your ire onto your opponent you fail to address the argument and the issues being raised.

It is not my 'scholarship' that is in question. Why you probably wonder....well, because the cruel vindictive nature of the old testament god was noted centuries ago. It is neither my idea or my interpretation of the bible.

I am not making up verses. I quote the relevant verses and it is the verses that speak for themselves.

The verses say what they say without alteration or input from me.

There is a clear and undeniable divide between the nature of the OT god in comparison to the Gospel version. One describes the willingness to kill and condemn generations, the other to forgive and keep no record of wrongs. Which is an undeniable contradiction.


It is not me saying these words, or making these claims. It is right there for anyone to see and read.

It is the apologist who seeks to alter what the words and verses say and mean and transform their undeniable meaning into something more suitable for the believer, more palatable version of the bible an its history at the expense of truth

Yeah, nobody wants to die.

Even Marion, the first person to assemble a NT (and who Dr. Robert Price believe was the actual author of many of "Pauls" works) cannon could see that. It's exactly why he rejected the OT as relating to a god completely different and distinct from Jesus.

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Yeah, nobody wants to die.
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yes, this is the dilemma i always face whether dealing with christians, other worshippers or even atheists.

if the something better is just beyond the veil, the cross-over, the passing,

then why aren't folks "dying" to get a chance at the outcome?

but no, folks will do most anything not to die.

there's a dilemma here. a contradiction even.

First of all since we are discussing the Founders we can dismiss the comments of Carl Sagan and Sandra as irrelevant to this discussion.

Secondly, what I called the "rantings of Jefferson" were his private views on supernatural events in the Bible and not his views on good government. Most of the other founders would not have accepted his ravings on the Bible either; but they did agree with him on good moral government; so I stand in good company on that point.

Let's look again at the Declaration:
All the founders signed their names to a firm persuasion of the following:
Belief in a Creator, His laws of nature, that all men were created equal, self-evident truth that is beyond reasonable debate, a Supreme Judge, and that the success of the nation depended on divine providence. There's no wiggle room on these points--they all signed that document. This is the moral basis of the country and that moral basis is Biblical morality, not any other morality. The founders were abundantly clear in their writings that they believed in the morals of Jesus.

The skeptics on this thread are not coming out and saying they subscribe to each of those points declared in the Declaration, they are only agreeing to parts of it. This tells me the skepticism expressed here is incompatible with the beliefs of the Founders and that they could not have honestly signed the document which began the formation of America. If you discard the Declaration as not being a legal document in force, well then you have no historical argument either for the equality of all men. This specific portion of the document was used to abolish slavery. It was argued that every document that followed was founded upon the premise of that which gave birth to the nation which included the equality of all men. I agree with that line of reasoning.

Everything since that Declaration that they wrote also needs to be interpreted in light of that document which they signed. No one ever said later (to my knowledge) that they did not believe in what they signed.

Everything written or enacted after that point were intended to uphold "belief in a Creator, His laws of nature, that all men were created equal, self-evident truth that is beyond reasonable debate, a Supreme Judge, and that the success of the nation depended on divine providence."

When John Adams says--“The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.” He is not saying it was not founded on Biblical morals or the general principles of Christianity.

John Adams also says, the general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.

The Christian religion is, above all the religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern times, the religion of wisdom, virtue, equity and humanity.

Suppose a nation in some distant region should take the Bible for their only law book and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited. . . . What a Eutopia – what a Paradise would this region be!

I have examined all religions, and the result is that the Bible is the best book in the world.

What Adams is saying is that we founded this nation on the principles and morals of Christianity but we did not declare it a Christian nation or a Christian government because that would require a union of Church and State and that is what they wanted to avoid. However neither did they wish to establish an amoral or irreligious government either. They founded the nation on the general moral principles of the Christianity but the religion or faith of Christianity was kept outside the sphere of the government. No one had done this before in history.

James Madison also professed his personal beliefs as follows:
A watchful eye must be kept on ourselves lest, while we are building ideal monuments of renown and bliss here, we neglect to have our names enrolled in the Annals of Heaven.

I have sometimes thought there could not be a stronger testimony in favor of religion or against temporal enjoyments, even the most rational and manly, than for men who occupy the most honorable and gainful departments and [who] are rising in reputation and wealth, publicly to declare their unsatisfactoriness by becoming fervent advocates in the cause of Christ; and I wish you may give in your evidence in this way.

Madison is supporting the Christian cause and influence in this country but yet he is still opposed to making Christianity a state religion or a test of office. There is no conflict to in being a strong Christian and also holding to the separation of Church and state.

In his memorial and remonstrance he says,
The Religion then of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate. This right is in its nature an unalienable right. It is unalienable, because the opinions of men, depending only on the evidence contemplated by their own minds cannot follow the dictates of other men: It is unalienable also, because what is here a right towards men, is a duty towards the Creator.

Jefferson
He supported the morals of Jesus:
The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man.
The practice of morality being necessary for the well being of society, He [God] has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral principles of Jesus and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in His discourses.

I am a Christian in the only sense in which He wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to His doctrines in preference to all others.

I am a real Christian – that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus Christ.

So while Jefferson was strident about the separation of church and state he was also equally adamant about building a moral society on the principles that Jesus taught.

All of this goes again to prove--the skepticism expressed on this thread does not embody the founding ideals of America. However at the same we are not a Christian nation in the religious sense of requiring the Christian faith as a test of office. The separation of the Church and State was always intended. But think about that phrase--they did not say the separation of paganism and the state, or the separation of Islam and the state. It is very clear by this phrase that they expected most of the nation would be Christian. But they also intended for there to be freedom of religion of any kind, providing it would not be allowed to overthrow our moral basis of government.

Gus,

You are presuming any gods exist, a claim which has not been supported by sufficient evidence within this thread.

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Even Marion, the first person to assemble a NT (and who Dr. Robert Price believe was the actual author of many of "Pauls" works) cannon could see that. It's exactly why he rejected the OT as relating to a god completely different and distinct from Jesus.
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i just hate it when people of the urth attack the mighty YHWH over and over!

of course his son was different from him. ever considered 23&me, or ancestry?

the female and male have their own dna. and it gets passed on.

so, jesus was half yhwh and half human: a fusion of god/alien and mary the virgin.

there's things going on here that a lot of the elites don't really want to talk about?

A statement which all the founders would dispute as ludicrous as they held the belief in a Creator to be a self-evident truth. And they were right as no mathematical equation can ever be done to illustrate how biological life can start without there being an eternal uncaused first cause or how life can exist without all the anthropic principles in place.

I have concluded you cannot have a reasonable discussion with DBT.

LOL this is humorous. The epistles of Paul were being quoted by Ignatius before the times of Marcion. Where do these people come up with this drivel?

I guess if you put information out to people who don't test it from history it can become believable.

Not true as was established earlier. And even if it was, at best it's an appeal to authority, in an area where they are not a knowledgeable authority, especially not by today's standards. Science is not determined by politicians.



This is a straw-man argument. The realm of science is not limited to just math. I especially like how you mixed math and biology for your "mathamatical biological equation", to form a straw-red herring leading into your Argument from Ignorance.