Author Topic: Searching for GOD...  (Read 3757184 times)

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10475 on: March 02, 2016, 02:12:21 PM »
I'm curious as to how you know when it's the devil at work.   For example, which posters here strike you as demonically affected?  All of them?
Nobody is immune - including myself!
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10476 on: March 02, 2016, 02:14:15 PM »
So when do you know that somebody is being affected, then? What are the signs and symptoms?
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10477 on: March 02, 2016, 02:17:55 PM »
You are virtually saying that your "God" isn't strong enough to make his truth "Devil" proof. How very odd!
God can save us - that is the message of the NT.  It may not be the way we would like to be saved, but it is our only choice.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10478 on: March 02, 2016, 02:19:48 PM »
If it's not the way you would wish to be saved, how is it being saved at  all? And from what?
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Khatru

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10479 on: March 02, 2016, 02:23:22 PM »
Dawkins and Hitchens are two very clever, talented people, but the devil is far more clever than any of us, which is why we need the help of our Saviour.

No, the devil is dumb.

I explained this in another thread.
"I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy"

Dorothy Parker

Khatru

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10480 on: March 02, 2016, 02:24:43 PM »
God can save us - that is the message of the NT.  It may not be the way we would like to be saved, but it is our only choice.

Save us?

Save us from what?

Please share your answer with us.
« Last Edit: March 02, 2016, 02:42:27 PM by Khatru »
"I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy"

Dorothy Parker

Khatru

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10481 on: March 02, 2016, 02:31:57 PM »
Jesus to Alan:  "Let me in"

Alan:  "Why?"

Jesus:  "So that I can save you"

Alan:  "Save me from what?"

Jesus:  "From what I'm going to do to you if you don't let me in."
"I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy"

Dorothy Parker

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10482 on: March 02, 2016, 02:34:34 PM »
Jesus to Alan:  "Let me in"

Alan:  "Why?"

Jesus:  "So that I can save you"

Alan:  "Save me from what?"

Jesus:  "From what I'm going to do to you if you don't let me in."
Sounds more like Charlie Richardson than the Prince of Peace  :o
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Khatru

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10483 on: March 02, 2016, 02:39:48 PM »
Sounds more like Charlie Richardson than the Prince of Peace  :o

Yup!  It's one big protection racket.
"I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy"

Dorothy Parker

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10484 on: March 02, 2016, 02:43:25 PM »
How do you tell the difference between truth being hidden by the devil, and the absence of any such truth? If you claim that there's a truth which is being concealed, how do you know of its existence (know, not believe) as opposed to it simply not existing in the first place?

Divine revelation through prayer and the scriptures.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10485 on: March 02, 2016, 02:47:14 PM »
Divine revelation through prayer and the scriptures.
That's merely a dodge, though.

How do you know that they are supposed to be correct? Divine revelation and the scriptures sound like things that can be regarded as true if and only if you have a pre-existing belief in such.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10486 on: March 02, 2016, 02:48:15 PM »
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

wigginhall

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10487 on: March 02, 2016, 02:50:08 PM »
Yup!  It's one big protection racket.

Or Stockholm syndrome.
They were the footprints of a gigantic hound!

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10488 on: March 02, 2016, 02:50:42 PM »
Evil.
People succumb to evil every day of every year regardless of what they believe or don't, Alan.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Rhiannon

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10489 on: March 02, 2016, 02:51:45 PM »

Bubbles

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10490 on: March 02, 2016, 03:25:32 PM »
If it's not the way you would wish to be saved, how is it being saved at  all? And from what?

This message board and the posters on it, I reckon.

Cut him some space, folks.......

Freedom of religion and all that.

 :o

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10491 on: March 02, 2016, 03:47:17 PM »
Who's denying him or impinging on that?
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

SqueakyVoice

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10492 on: March 02, 2016, 03:53:13 PM »
Quote from: Mr Burns
Evil
By?...
Evel Knievel
"Let us think the unthinkable, let us do the undoable, let us prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all" - D Adams

torridon

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10493 on: March 02, 2016, 04:00:59 PM »
Divine revelation through prayer and the scriptures.

That's not answered the question though.  How would you discern a genuine divine revelation from an identical one supplied by the Devil with the intent to fool ? After all, everyone believes they are right, but all good onetruewayists must believe that all the other poor souls following different or wrong religions have all been unknowingly hoodwinked by the devil into false paths. Especially since all these paths depend on faith, and that is the core vulnerability at the heart of the concept of faith.
« Last Edit: March 02, 2016, 04:04:02 PM by torridon »

ippy

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10494 on: March 02, 2016, 05:29:57 PM »
This thread is a good example of how thin the line can be between the rational and well, the slightly off balance.

ippy

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10495 on: March 02, 2016, 05:31:21 PM »
That's not answered the question though.  How would you discern a genuine divine revelation from an identical one supplied by the Devil with the intent to fool ? After all, everyone believes they are right, but all good onetruewayists must believe that all the other poor souls following different or wrong religions have all been unknowingly hoodwinked by the devil into false paths. Especially since all these paths depend on faith, and that is the core vulnerability at the heart of the concept of faith.
I must admit that personally I have no concept of what it is like to not have faith.  I am quite certain that I could never have been an atheist.  If I had not been brought up in a faith environment I would have to choose to take on one of the religious faiths, and I do not know which I would have gone for.  But having said that, I have no inclination to change from my Roman Catholic faith, for which I am profoundly grateful to have been born into.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10496 on: March 02, 2016, 05:53:12 PM »
I've no conception of what it's like to have it but that's neither here nor there. That didn't actually answer the question. Though most of them seem to have gone unanswered today.
« Last Edit: March 02, 2016, 05:56:29 PM by Shaker »
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

wigginhall

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10497 on: March 02, 2016, 06:37:56 PM »
I've no conception of what it's like to have it but that's neither here nor there. That didn't actually answer the question. Though most of them seem to have gone unanswered today.

Quite comical really, as torridon had already said to AB, 'you haven't answered the question', and asked it again, that is, how do you distinguish demonic influence from a genuine revelation, to which AB, naturally enough, made no reply, but answered a different question.   Possibly because there is no sensible answer.  Well, I just squints eyes, look at yon barleycorn, and there y'are, you can see devil in the wibblewobbles, see'un wavin' n' shakin', that be devil alright.
They were the footprints of a gigantic hound!

Walt Zingmatilder

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10498 on: March 02, 2016, 06:43:31 PM »
Does that differ from reading the Quran in some way?
If your still at the knuckle dragging moronic ''It's all pissin' religion innit'' level then probably not.

If you realise that the Quran holds a similar position in Islam as Christ does as God's word to man. Then the differences are immense.

Leonard James

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #10499 on: March 02, 2016, 07:07:00 PM »
God can save us - that is the message of the NT.  It may not be the way we would like to be saved, but it is our only choice.

I have no idea of what you mean by "save us". I don't believe in "God" and I don't believe there is any life after death, so what is it I need saving from?