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Does God evolve now ?

Steno
July 24, 2009
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Andrew Halloway has reviewed ‘The Evolution of God’ by Robert Wright, published over at Science and Values blog.

Science and Values – So even God evolves now ?

Comments
Hmm Tyke you stated: "Controversies about the date of a shroud and anecdotes about NDEs are hardly conclusive evidence for anything." Now this is funny, We can say for an absolute fact that the carbon date of the shroud is "conclusively" overturned and is no longer valid as an argument for the atheists to use against the shroud's authenticity, and though that issue of carbon dating is secondary to the issue of the unique 3-Dimensionality of the Shroud in the first place, which we cannot reproduce by any known means, you completely ignored that "conclusive" fact so as to say it is "hardly conclusive evidence". The only thing that has any "hardly conclusive evidence" in this matter is the very selective way in which you have practiced science with this evidence. If you were fair with the evidence you would have looked for what could be known with a fair amount of certainty, such as the shroud's 3-Dimensionality, instead of clung to what was "conclusively" overturned.bornagain77
July 28, 2009
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Barb @ 34
Because he gave mankind a brain and expects them to use it? Seriously, do you need everything spelled out to you as though you are a four-year-old?
I thought He was supposed to be a loving father. Is it too much to expect that He expresses Himself plainly and honestly?
You call God a killer, yet you refuse to acknowledge that people were free to choose whether or not to follow Noah’s lead. As Dr. House once said, are you being deliberately obtuse?
I call God a killer because, according to the Bible, He killed a lot of people. If an atheist dictator kills millions it is called mass murder or genocide or a Holocaust. If God does even worse, it is somehow a loving father expressing righteous anger and disciplining His children. Can you imagine what an atheist like Dr House would say about that?
The Bible’s description of the antediluvian world is one of deep-rooted, worldwide corruption. Noah’s ancestor Enoch is also mentioned in Genesis as being righteous amidst a crooked generation. Can you prove to me or anyone else that the antediluvian people were all good? No, you can’t.
Need I remind you of the presumption of innocence? And even if they were as bad as they are painted are you seriously telling me that it is beyond the power of an Almighty God to reform them rather than drowning them all like a litter of unwanted kittens?
Children are subject to their parents for the most part. If their parents failed to heed Noah’s warning, the children would suffer just as their parents did. Adolescents and young adults would have been able to choose for themselves possibly, but they obviously didn’t.
So the death of millions of children is just collateral damage? I am just astonished that anyone could think that this is a defensible act just because it was an Act of God. The fact is that He could have chosen to do otherwise. He could have just chosen not to do it at all. We can certainly assume that as an all-powerful deity He had the knowledge and the power to achieve His ends in a way that did not involve so much killing.
Those people had a choice: get into the ark and be saved or die in the flood. It’s not like God simply caused rain to suddenly overwhelm the Earth. Noah built the ark over a period of several decades. That was plenty of time for people to save themselves and their families. They willfully chose not to. Whose fault is that?
Whoever sent the flood in the first place since He didn't have to do that. If people are warned of a natural disaster but are dumb enough to do nothing to prevent it or at least get out of the way then they have only themselves to blame for what happens to them. But if the disaster is not natural but a deliberate act of destruction by an irate deity then who is to blame?
Do you understand the concept of obedience? God wants his intelligent creation to obey his regulations and warnings in order that nobody will have to suffer at all.
I understand that the Founding Fathers of this country fought a war to escape compulsory obedience to a state that they believed no longer had the right to expect it because of its oppressive and unjust behavior. We also allow that parents are no longer entitled to expect absolute obedience from their children once they have become independent adults. Mutual respect based on love, compassion and understanding are usually thought to be a better basis for a relationship than subservience compelled by fear.
Sorry, but you’re wrong here. God did not change his mind.
We will have to agree to disagree.Seversky
July 27, 2009
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Controversies about the date of a shroud and anecdotes about NDEs are hardly conclusive evidence for anything. Anyway, sorry I distracted you on that -- it wasn't necessary. I would like to know why you think it's possible to commune with God in Heaven without the freedom to commit evil when you claim we can't do that on Earth.tyke
July 27, 2009
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Seversky you stated: “I see no evidence for the existence of a God or Good or Evil except as constructs of human imaginations struggling to explain what is out there.” Thus it is hypocricy for you to state you can decide what is good or evil since you do not believe they are real in the first place..If you can't see that I am sorry, there is not much else I can do for you.bornagain77
July 27, 2009
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Tyke, I don't know your exact disposition in regards to Christ, but here is evidence Christ rose from the grave: Shroud Of Turin's Unique 3 Dimensionality - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8RVPdHMUtc Turin Shroud Hologram Reveals The Words "The Lamb" - short video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XLcdaFKzYg Shroud Of Turin Carbon Dating Overturned By Scientific Peer Review - Robert Villarreal - Press Release video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEJPrMGksUg A Particle Physicist Looks At The Turin Shroud Image - 4:25 minute mark of video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgvEDfkuhGg A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection? http://www.khouse.org/articles/2008/847 Here some pretty strong evidence that we do indeed have a spirit: The Day I Died - Part 4 of 6 - The NDE of Pam Reynolds - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WA37uNa3VGU --- As to the lunar eclipses, I put substantial weight on them because of the "precisely fulfilled prophetic" background in which they are occurring: The Scientific Method Proves Bible Prophecy and Authenticity - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1MdNLj0hPobornagain77
July 27, 2009
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bornagain77 @ 33
Thus in your mind (oh sorry, I mean brain) torturing animals, or even humans, for the sake of “having fun” is not evil since evil does not exist for you and is only a “construct of human imagination”?
As I wrote before, in my view 'good' and 'evil' are judgements we make about the acts and thoughts of others. Agnostics and atheists are quite capable of deciding for themselves what is 'good' and what is 'evil'. They do not need someone else to tell them. What is odd about your response is that it implies you do not know what is good or evil unless your god sets it out in black and white for you. In other words you - or, rather, your ancestors - would have sat and watched one person kill another in the most violent fashion and not known what to make of it until the tablet of stone came down from the mountain inscribed with the words "Thou shalt not kill".
Thus since you have clearly stated your position, Once again I ask you to justify why you are even on this site making proclamations of what a Good God should do since you believe good is an illusion of “imaginary construct”? If good is truly an illusion as you insist then what gives you the any right at all to define what is good? Can’t you even see the blatant hypocrisy of what you are doing?
It is not just me, theologians and scholars have been arguing about what the Christian God could or could not do for centuries. For example, could a necessary and perfect being like God create a contingent and imperfect Universe such as the one we find ourselves in now? If they had that right then so do I and so do you. As for good and evil, are you saying that we do not have the right to think for ourselves and work out what they are?
Thus seversky, if you truly believed what you proselytize, why do you not go over to North Korea and live free from the shackles of what Christianity has wrought in this country?
Why should I want to live there? It is a classic example of a secular religion centered on the personality cult built around the political figureheads of Kim Jong-Il and previously Kim Il-Sung. It is as oppressive and restrictive as a fundamentalist Islamic state. One of the great strengths of the US Constitution is that it is designed to guarantee the right to practice any religion or not believe as you choose and to prevent any one particular faith gaining political control of the state. Are you saying you would be happy with a theocracy as long as it was Christian?Seversky
July 27, 2009
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Is Jesus Coming Soon? - Solar And Lunar Eclipses of 2008 - 2015
Numerology? You've got to be kidding! Are you a Bible Codes believer too?tyke
July 27, 2009
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How could God create man with any meaningful ability to commune with Him if He didn’t allow them freedom; both to do good or evil?
Is there freedom to do both good and evil in Heaven? Has there ever been an evil act committed by a human being (i.e. not angels) in Heaven throughout all eternity? If not, then where does this freedom to commit evil go after we've only had it for the briefest instance of our existence (compared to an eternal afterlife) at a point when we don't have a full (and may indeed have almost no) understanding of what it is to commit a sin? If there is no sin in Heaven then the nature of man is irrevocably changed and we no longer have the freedom to rebel against God. (If he just removed the desire to rebel then what good is the freedom to do it when you never want to?) So, apparently we have the freedom to do as we will for between 5 and 100 years, when we may only have the slightest of inklings that doing the right thing is important to our eternal future, but once we're dead, and if we drew the correct number in the lottery of life (imaging if you had been born to an Imam in Saudi Arabia) and got to Heaven, then for the next trillion trillion years we no longer have the ability to do evil. Why is it possible to have meaningful communications with God in Heaven where there is no sin and not be able to have it on Earth?tyke
July 27, 2009
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Barb you said: "The error that Jesus highlighted was the refusal of people to heed the warning being given." Which reminded me of these two videos: Is Jesus Coming Soon? - Solar And Lunar Eclipses of 2008 - 2015 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkOMMjAMOsY Mark Biltz Talks About The Return Of Christ On Sid Roth - Lunar Eclipses - 2014 - 2015 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AwKWAHR2KAbornagain77
July 26, 2009
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Seversky: “Yes, I know, that is the stock answer. But we are talking here about the Creator of all things who, presumably, is more than capable of expressing Himself with crystal clarity should He choose. What would have prevented Him from giving Adam a warning along the lines of: “On the day you eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil shall you be cast out of Eden to know suffering and eventually death like all mortal things.”? Because he gave mankind a brain and expects them to use it? Seriously, do you need everything spelled out to you as though you are a four-year-old? Adam lacked nothing. He had plenty of food, enjoyable work, and a loving companion in Eve. He had one simple restriction laid upon him. Compare that to the multiple restrictions, ordinances, and laws our society requires us to obey. “First, we only have the word of the killer that all those that were killed deserved everything they got. How likely is that?” You call God a killer, yet you refuse to acknowledge that people were free to choose whether or not to follow Noah’s lead. As Dr. House once said, are you being deliberately obtuse? “We know from our own times that, even in the worst cases like that of Nazi Germany, not everyone was equally guilty of the worst crimes. There were many who had no direct knowledge or involvement and some who did what they could to oppose it. Some arguably deserved to die for what they did but not all by any means. Is there any reason to suppose these antediluvian peoples were any worse than people today?” The Bible’s description of the antediluvian world is one of deep-rooted, worldwide corruption. Noah’s ancestor Enoch is also mentioned in Genesis as being righteous amidst a crooked generation. Can you prove to me or anyone else that the antediluvian people were all good? No, you can’t. Not everyone might have been equally guilty, but the Bible also indicates that Noah was a “preacher of righteousness.” He told people what was going to happen and how their lives could be spared. They ignored his warning to their own peril. Remember, too, that persons can be charged as accomplices or accessories after the fact even if they have little to do with the crime that has been committed. “Second, a Christian scholar, Henry Morris, estimated that the population of the Earth could have run into the hundreds of millions, maybe billions. Even if we allow that all the adults of that time were irredeemably evil, the same can surely not be said of the chidren and in a population of that size there would have been a substantial number of them.” Children are subject to their parents for the most part. If their parents failed to heed Noah’s warning, the children would suffer just as their parents did. Adolescents and young adults would have been able to choose for themselves possibly, but they obviously didn’t. “Instead of just reciting the text, try imagining what would have been involved. Think of all the children that would have been drowned, let alone all the other animal life that had presumably committed no offense either. This would have been mass slaughter on a planet-wide scale, a scale far greater than anything envisaged, let alone achieved, by any of the twentieth-century dictators.” Those people had a choice: get into the ark and be saved or die in the flood. It’s not like God simply caused rain to suddenly overwhelm the Earth. Noah built the ark over a period of several decades. That was plenty of time for people to save themselves and their families. They willfully chose not to. Whose fault is that? Interestingly, when Jesus referred to the days of Noah, he did not speak of the violence, the false religion, or the immorality—grievous as those were. The error that Jesus highlighted was the refusal of people to heed the warning being given. He said that they were “eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark.” Eating, drinking, marrying, being given in marriage—what was wrong with that? They were just living “normal” lives! But a flood was coming, and Noah was preaching righteousness. His words and his conduct should have been a warning to them. Still, they “took no note until the flood came and swept them all away.”—Matthew 24:38, 39. “Are you really trying to tell us that this all-powerful God had no choice other than to commit what would have been the worst atrocity in recorded human history, that He could not have simply have changed them all to good people just with a wave of His hand?” Do you understand the concept of obedience? God wants his intelligent creation to obey his regulations and warnings in order that nobody will have to suffer at all. Those people had plenty of time, as mentioned before, to change their minds and attitudes. But they didn’t. That is part of the bargain when it comes to free will. You can choose to obey or disobey and you will face the consequences of your actions. And, yes, it can be read as a change of mind. If He has still thought that mass-drowning was a “good way to discipline recalcitrant creatures like us, He could have simply warned Noah and his people to heed the lesson or it would happen again. Instead, He offered a New Covenant and promised not to do it again. That, to me, is a change of mind.” Sorry, but you’re wrong here. God did not change his mind.Barb
July 26, 2009
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Seversky states: "I see no evidence for the existence of a God or Good or Evil except as constructs of human imaginations struggling to explain what is out there." Thus in your mind (oh sorry, I mean brain) torturing animals, or even humans, for the sake of "having fun" is not evil since evil does not exist for you and is only a "construct of human imagination"? Thus since you have clearly stated your position, Once again I ask you to justify why you are even on this site making proclamations of what a Good God should do since you believe good is an illusion of "imaginary construct"? If good is truly an illusion as you insist then what gives you the any right at all to define what is good? Can't you even see the blatant hypocrisy of what you are doing? As well,,,I think I was a little low on the body count for atheism: excerpt: With recent documents uncovered for the Maoist and Stalinist regimes, it now seems the high end of estimates of 250 million dead (between 1900-1987) are closer to the mark....What is so strange and odd that in spite of their outward rejection of religion and all its superstitions, they feel compelled to set up cults of personality and worship of the State and its leaders that is so totalitarian that the leaders are not satisfied with mere outward obedience; rather they insist on total mind control and control of thoughts, ideas and beliefs. They institute Gulags and "re-education" centers to indoctrinate anyone who even would dare question any action or declaration of the "Dear Leader." http://www.scholarscorner.com/apologia/deathtoll.html Thus seversky, if you truly believed what you proselytize, why do you not go over to North Korea and live free from the shackles of what Christianity has wrought in this country?bornagain77
July 26, 2009
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Barb @ 25
“Right at the beginning, God warns Adam that he will die on the day he eats the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Yet Adam does not die on that day. Instead, he and Eve are cast out of the Garden of Eden and live on for several hundred years more.” From God’s standpoint, they died that day. Why? Because two scriptures state that 1,000 years (a millenium to humans) is as a day to God. “For a thousand years are in your eyes but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch during the night.” (Ps 90:2, 4) Correspondingly, the apostle Peter writes that “one day is with Jehovah as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.” (2Pe 3:8)
Yes, I know, that is the stock answer. But we are talking here about the Creator of all things who, presumably, is more than capable of expressing Himself with crystal clarity should He choose. What would have prevented Him from giving Adam a warning along the lines of: "On the day you eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil shall you be cast out of Eden to know suffering and eventually death like all mortal things."?
The global Deluge was not a natural disaster. It was a judgment from God. Warning was given, but it was largely ignored. Why? Jesus explained: “In those days before the flood, [people were] eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark; and they took no note until the flood came and swept them all away.”—Matthew 24:38, 39. (emphasis mine) The Bible says: “The badness of man was abundant in the earth and every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only bad all the time. . . . The earth became filled with violence.”—Genesis 6:5, 11. Why should God allow Noah and his family, righteous people, to suffer at the hands of those who either condoned or engaged in wicked behavior? And God did not change his mind, as you insinuate.
First, we only have the word of the killer that all those that were killed deserved everything they got. How likely is that? We know from our own times that, even in the worst cases like that of Nazi Germany, not everyone was equally guilty of the worst crimes. There were many who had no direct knowledge or involvement and some who did what they could to oppose it. Some arguably deserved to die for what they did but not all by any means. Is there any reason to suppose these antediluvian peoples were any worse than people today? Second, a Christian scholar, Henry Morris, estimated that the population of the Earth could have run into the hundreds of millions, maybe billions. Even if we allow that all the adults of that time were irredeemably evil, the same can surely not be said of the chidren and in a population of that size there would have been a substantial number of them. Instead of just reciting the text, try imagining what would have been involved. Think of all the children that would have been drowned, let alone all the other animal life that had presumably committed no offense either. This would have been mass slaughter on a planet-wide scale, a scale far greater than anything envisaged, let alone achieved, by any of the twentieth-century dictators. Are you really trying to tell us that this all-powerful God had no choice other than to commit what would have been the worst atrocity in recorded human history, that He could not have simply have changed them all to good people just with a wave of His hand? And, yes, it can be read as a change of mind. If He has still thought that mass-drowning was a good way to discipline recalcitrant creatures like us, He could have simply warned Noah and his people to heed the lesson or it would happen again. Instead, He offered a New Covenant and promised not to do it again. That, to me, is a change of mind.Seversky
July 26, 2009
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Well, Seversky, you seem more sincere than I first thought---still wrong---but at least sincere. I have to get to bed, but please think this over: How could God create man with any meaningful ability to commune with Him if He didn't allow them freedom; both to do good or evil? And something else for you to think about: Evil isn't something created at all. It is simply defined. With the above question and concept, you should be able to figure out the answers to your objections on your own.Brent
July 26, 2009
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Brent @ 23
I’ll explain one thing that, perhaps, you haven’t realized, however. God doesn’t pour out wrath so that people will fear and serve Him for selfish purposes. He is saying, like I’m saying to my children when I discipline them, that if they don’t listen to someone much wiser than them that it isn’t going to go well with them. They are headed down a path of trouble, and in our ultimate eternal end, utter destruction. I love them, as God loves us, and don’t want to see them suffer utter destruction, and so offer them “light affliction” which is not “joyful for the present, but painful”, because, “afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”
You are still being misled by the metaphor of God as a father. We nay have been made in God's image but we are not gods ourselves, neither is the Christian God supposed to be a mortal human being. Being omnipotent, God is supposed to have created this Universe and everything in it; that includes all the evil out there which could not exist except by His will. Being omnipotent, He would have foreseen exactly how it was all going to turn out from the moment He created it. Being omnibenevolent, why would He punish us for being and behaving the way he created us, especially when, being omnipotent, He has the power to change us without all that killing and mayhem?
I’m not impressed with your weak excuses, and God will not be either.
If I am ever confronted by God, which I do not expect, then I will put those questions to Him. I hope you will do the same. We all deserve an answer.Seversky
July 26, 2009
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Seversky, here is your atheism/paganism in its full glory: The "Fruit of Materialism/Atheism" Matthew 7:15-17 "Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are savage wolves. You will know them by their fruit. Grapes aren't gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles, are they? In the same way, every good tree produces good fruit, but a rotten tree produces bad fruit." The Fruit of Evolution - video http://edinburghcreationgroup.org/fruit.xml From Darwin To Hitler - Richard Weikart - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_5EwYpLD6A Stalin's Brutal Faith http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=articles&action=view&ID=276 The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression: Excerpt: Essentially a body count of communism's victims in the 20th century, the book draws heavily from recently opened Soviet archives. The verdict: communism was responsible for between 85 million and 100 million, non-war related, deaths in the century. (Of Note: Atheistic Communism is defined as Dialectic Materialism) http://www.amazon.com/Black-Book-Communism-Crimes-Repression/dp/0674076087 If you still want to live in a atheistic utopia seversky, completely free from us "blind evil Christians, I am sure we can take a collection up right here at UD and buy you a one way ticket to North Korea pronto.bornagain77
July 26, 2009
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bornagain77 @ 22
Then you lose any philosophical right to argue for the existence of Good or Evil in the first place, because according to your base philosophical stance, good and evil, right and wrong, love and hate, truth and lies, are merely illusions which have no real connection to the foundation of reality in the first place.
As a religion, Christianity offers a complete package: an account of how everything began, who did the creating, a potted history of what happened subsquently and a whole suite of moral guidelines and practices including object lessons on how they should be applied. Like anyone else, I have the right to study what is on offer and point out what appear to be inconsistencies and contradictions. Also, as an agnostic and atheist (agnatheist?) I am probably less likely to overlook or ignore those inconsistencies than some believers. As for my views, I believe that there is a world beyond me about which my senses can only acquire partial information. Human science has extended what we can learn by direct observation through a whole range of investigatory methods and instruments. Even so, there is much we still do not know and cannot yet explain. Whether this will always be so is one of the things we do not yet know. All we can do is to continue our exploration until we find the boundary, if there is one, to what we can know. As I said, while a believe that there is an objective reality being reported to me by my senses, I see no evidence for the existence of a God or Good or Evil except as constructs of human imaginations struggling to explain what is out there. Truth, for me, simply describes the degree to which our descriptions and explanations are found to correspond to what we observe to be out there. As far as morality is concerned, whatever the origin, it is apparent that moral codes function as a means of regulating human behavior within society. The claim that the only authoritative version is that decreed by a god raises an obvious question: either this god created them on a whim or they are the outcome of a rational process. If they are whimsical then what makes them any better than something we work out and if they are rational what is to prevent us, as rational creatures, from reasoning our way to similar conclusions? I am not here to proclaim any Ultimate Truth, I don't know any. What I do believe is that history shows that, in some cases, those who do believe they are in possession of some such Truth, be it religious or ideological or political, have been led to do great harm to others in its furtherance. That is one reason why any such claim should be subjected to the closest scrutiny.Seversky
July 26, 2009
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However, he did have a change of mental attitude as regards the wicked pre-Flood generation. God turned from the attitude of the Creator of humans to that of a destroyer of them because of his displeasure with their wickedness. The fact that he preserved some humans shows that his regrets were confined to those who had become wicked.
Funny guy, He is “not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent” - but change his mind like man; that he can? Also, one must wonder at the naivete he displays when in his regret he thinks that anything is gained by destroying the wicked? He created man, but did not know how man's mind works? That is not the God that I know.Cabal
July 26, 2009
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Seversky, So what if there are inconsistencies in the Bible? One of the things that the Bible teaches is that we should not idolize anything and this includes the Bible. I may not speak for all Christians but my faith does not rest on whether or not the Bible is fallible. In fact, I know of several such inconsistencies. Big deal. Do scientists deny science because scientific books are full of hogwash? We Christians are told to search the scriptures for clues and knowledge. We are not told to worhsip it. Besides, the Bible is a collection of books bundled together by fallible men. Some of these books were not even meant to be books by their authors. Many were just letters written by individuals and addressed to others. Jesus told his disciples to keep searching. He did not specify that they should restrict their search to certain books, some of which had not yet been written. If Biblical imperfection is your personal stumbling block, then, by all means, stumble and fall.Mapou
July 25, 2009
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Seversky @ 21 – “What of the inconsistencies in the Bible?” I see no inconsistencies. I see atheists who don’t understand what they’re reading. Their lack of reading comprehension does not equal an inconsistency. “Right at the beginning, God warns Adam that he will die on the day he eats the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Yet Adam does not die on that day. Instead, he and Eve are cast out of the Garden of Eden and live on for several hundred years more.” From God’s standpoint, they died that day. Why? Because two scriptures state that 1,000 years (a millenium to humans) is as a day to God. “For a thousand years are in your eyes but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch during the night.” (Ps 90:2, 4) Correspondingly, the apostle Peter writes that “one day is with Jehovah as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.” (2Pe 3:8) “And what of the New Covenant? God promises Noah that He will never again wipe out almost all life on Earth in a great flood. So why do it in the first place? Why change His mind? A being of perfect knowledge and power does not make mistakes and has no need to change His mind by definition. He gets it right first time, every time. That is His nature.” I love it when atheists who don’t even understand the Bible claim to understand the nature of God. The global Deluge was not a natural disaster. It was a judgment from God. Warning was given, but it was largely ignored. Why? Jesus explained: “In those days before the flood, [people were] eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark; and they took no note until the flood came and swept them all away.”—Matthew 24:38, 39. (emphasis mine) The Bible says: “The badness of man was abundant in the earth and every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only bad all the time. . . . The earth became filled with violence.”—Genesis 6:5, 11. Why should God allow Noah and his family, righteous people, to suffer at the hands of those who either condoned or engaged in wicked behavior? And God did not change his mind, as you insinuate. In what sense can it be said that Jehovah “felt regrets” that he had made man? Here the Hebrew word translated “felt regrets” pertains to a change of attitude or intention. Jehovah is perfect and therefore did not make a mistake in creating man. However, he did have a change of mental attitude as regards the wicked pre-Flood generation. God turned from the attitude of the Creator of humans to that of a destroyer of them because of his displeasure with their wickedness. The fact that he preserved some humans shows that his regrets were confined to those who had become wicked.—2 Peter 2:5, 9. Seriously, Seversky, at least read the Bible before you criticize it.Barb
July 25, 2009
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90DegreeAngel, Love without discipline is not love. Mercy without judgment is not mercy. To say there is a contradiction with the God of wrath of the Old Testament and God of love of the New Testament is to disregard the necessary relation of wrath and mercy. You can't have one without the other. "The Lord our God, the Lord is one."Brent
July 25, 2009
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Seversky, you said:
"God, on the other hand, is not a feeble and ignorant human being but the Almighty Creator of all things, a being of limitless power and knowledge. If He wants to discipline His creatures He is not restricted to shouting at them and sending them to bed without any supper; all He needs to do is wave His hand like a Jedi master and instantly they will be chastened, obedient even servile as He chooses. Any god who uses violent coercion against His creatures, even to the extent of genocide or “bioticide”, is implicitly a being of limited powers and most certainly not the loving God of the New Testament. Such a being might be terrifying but that does not make it worthy of worship, quite the opposite. In World War II, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were a terrifying threat to begin with but that did not mean that people bowed down and worshiped them; instead they opposed them in any way they could. That should be the response of any self-respecting being to any so-called god who behaves like a jealous and petty tyrant."
You prove my point above, that you must have a reason for not wanting to see in order to "not see". I was going to explain this for you, but I won't. You already know. You know your argument is your irrational defense mechanism erected to shield you from what you know you should do. I'll explain one thing that, perhaps, you haven't realized, however. God doesn't pour out wrath so that people will fear and serve Him for selfish purposes. He is saying, like I'm saying to my children when I discipline them, that if they don't listen to someone much wiser than them that it isn't going to go well with them. They are headed down a path of trouble, and in our ultimate eternal end, utter destruction. I love them, as God loves us, and don't want to see them suffer utter destruction, and so offer them "light affliction" which is not "joyful for the present, but painful", because, "afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it." I'm not impressed with your weak excuses, and God will not be either.Brent
July 25, 2009
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Seversky, What makes you inconsistent as a atheist (unless you are just an atheist who rails only against the Judeo-Christian God as Dawkins and Meyers delight in doing) is that you, by default, become a materialist. And since you must argue, to stay consistent within your materialist framework, that there is no underlying purpose to life or the universe or anything in the universe, and that everything is the result of blind pitiless chance acting on some loosely defined material basis (multiverse-many world etc..) Then you lose any philosophical right to argue for the existence of Good or Evil in the first place, because according to your base philosophical stance, good and evil, right and wrong, love and hate, truth and lies, are merely illusions which have no real connection to the foundation of reality in the first place. Yet incredibly you want to make pronouncements of judgment on what you feel a good, holy, and just God should do. But since you must hold goodness and truth are ultimately illusions to be consistent within your framework, why do you not think that what you are thinking in this instance is in fact an illusion? Why should what you think about anything be considered any more relevant to truth and purpose than what I think since you truly can find no basis for purpose or truth within your materialistic framework? If you were actually consistent to your base philosophy of materialism you should really not even care what Christians think, or anybody else thinks, since you would "know the truth" that believing in truth and purpose was delusional to the highest degree. But alas you are on this site trying your damnedest to make us believe you have enough faculty of "the truth" as to take your objections to the Bible seriously. Maybe if you had a better grasp on exactly what your foundation was I would take you seriously, but alas I believe you really have some deeper unresolved issues with God that you are trying to placate by saying there is no God,,...I got a better idea for you, Why don't you go to the living God in prayer and seek to iron out some of these underlying issues instead of railing against Him since, as sure as the sun does shine, God is really real and you, like me, are a mere mortal who must eventually answer to Him anyway?bornagain77
July 25, 2009
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bornagain77 @ 20
while the non-consistent atheist will usually say God is both good and evil with extra heavy emphasis on trying to define Him as evil.
What of the inconsistencies in the Bible? Right at the beginning, God warns Adam that he will die on the day he eats the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Yet Adam does not die on that day. Instead, he and Eve are cast out of the Garden of Eden and live on for several hundred years more. And what of the New Covenant? God promises Noah that He will never again wipe out almost all life on Earth in a great flood. So why do it in the first place? Why change His mind? A being of perfect knowledge and power does not make mistakes and has no need to change His mind by definition. He gets it right first time, every time. That is His nature. As you rightly quoted Malachi 3:6 in the first post in this thread:
“I am the LORD, I change not.”
Seversky
July 25, 2009
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while the non-consistent atheist will usually say God is both good and evil with extra heavy emphasis on trying to define Him as evil.bornagain77
July 25, 2009
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Brent @ 14
It’s glaringly simple: I love my children, even when I discipline them. I exercise wrath on my children’s bad behavior, and love them at the same time.
You are missing the point. You express wrath over your children's bad behavior and attempt to discipline them because you are, I assume, just a human being and your power to change the way others behave is very limited. God, on the other hand, is not a feeble and ignorant human being but the Almighty Creator of all things, a being of limitless power and knowledge. If He wants to discipline His creatures He is not restricted to shouting at them and sending them to bed without any supper; all He needs to do is wave His hand like a Jedi master and instantly they will be chastened, obedient even servile as He chooses. Any god who uses violent coercion against His creatures, even to the extent of genocide or "bioticide", is implicitly a being of limited powers and most certainly not the loving God of the New Testament. Such a being might be terrifying but that does not make it worthy of worship, quite the opposite. In World War II, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were a terrifying threat to begin with but that did not mean that people bowed down and worshiped them; instead they opposed them in any way they could. That should be the response of any self-respecting being to any so-called god who behaves like a jealous and petty tyrant.Seversky
July 25, 2009
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In some what related interest: I have been told many times by agnostic/atheists that a "loving God" would never create a hell. To that I usually reply, "And exactly what did Christ die on the cross to save us from anyway if it was not to save us from being separated from God in hell?" Turin Shroud Hologram Reveals The Words - "The Lamb" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XLcdaFKzYg This following video is sobering in its description of hell HELL: A Warning To Atheists! ; Bill Weise http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK5g6uCgNVE Though people may have a hard time accepting his testimony, Bill Weise is deadly serious in his testimony and backs his "visions" with numerous scripture. As well, To my common sense way of thinking, The fact there actually is evil in this world, powerfully suggests there must be a primary source and "place" for evil. The same goes for good. To deny this line of logic the atheist, who is consistent in his logic, must deny the existence of good and/or evil, while the non-consistent atheist will usually say God is both good and evil with extra heavy emphasis on trying to define Him as evil. I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside. —excerpted from The Problem of Pain and The Great Divorce, by C.S. Lewisbornagain77
July 25, 2009
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CannuckianYankee, That was a cool post.bornagain77
July 25, 2009
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PaulBurnett, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth by their unrighteousness,.." Romans 1:18 "Then I looked when the Lamb opened the sixth seal, and a huge earthquake took place; the sun became as black as sackcloth made of hair, and the full moon became blood red; and the stars in the sky fell to the earth like a fig tree dropping its unripe figs when shaken by a fierce wind. The sky was split apart like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved from its place. Then the kings of the earth, the very important people, the generals, the rich, the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains. They said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of the one who is seated on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, because the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to withstand it?” Revelation 6:12-17 Then Jesus began to criticize openly the cities in which he had done many of his miracles, because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you! And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be thrown down to Hades! For if the miracles done among you had been done in Sodom, it would have continued to this day. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for the region of Sodom on the day of judgment than for you!” Matthew 11:20-24 Still think the God of the Old Testament has evolved?CannuckianYankee
July 25, 2009
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Brent, I don't know about you, but excercising wrath on children whether with love or without ain't cool. Love the children so that they may know love....90DegreeAngel
July 25, 2009
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Anybody who reads the Bible can see this evolution.
Except, PaulBurnett, you'd be wrong in that this figment of your imagination "God of love of the New Testament" is really a God of wrath who promises next time He comes He isn't going to be so nice. It's glaringly simple: I love my children, even when I discipline them. I exercise wrath on my children's bad behavior, and love them at the same time.Brent
July 25, 2009
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