The same stuff (matter) that is supposed to be involved with the big bang. Larger. No. Metaphorical. God is the eternally living God and he provided a way for us to have eternal life with him through Jesus Christ his son.
you send me a private post Wow! Really? I thought we were having a conversation that is, in essence, and exchange of ideas. To send such a message suggests that you are offended or I struck a nerve. Lack of integrity? Man that is some indictment. and then i read you post to the thread. contradictory claims I aint offended by you, but by the false representation of truth. Yur posts are a bunch of garbage. In the cowboy days, you would be dehorsed
OK. I think because God gave me the ability to do so. You attempt to insult me, which is useless. You think that science has all the answers to how things came to be. I think that because God created without specifying how he did so that science reveals the processes by which God created in the perfect order and according to the laws of science which man has discovered.
This hypothesis would need to be tweaked a little. According to most "evolutionary" thought, "Man" has been at the top of the food chain for over 100,000 to a million years... homo erectus; Neanderthal; homo sapien; whatever. If this is true - why did he only develop the architectural and other building skills in the last 10 to 25 thousand years? What suddenly increased Man's "self awareness" or intelligence?
People feel compelled to believe in a higher power. You can call it God or quantum dynamics or anything else you want to. But the truth is that it is almost impossible to prove that their is a higher power than ourself. The only thing we really know is what we each personally perceive, and that is often an illusion.
I am not addressing mankind exclusively- I am also including the billions of other inhabited words who worship the same one God and may have their own prophets but deep down they really pray to one God. THAT is a good moral starting point. And in mankind, I am only referring to "sentient beings". As far as man's progression, we all know that man couldn't start new civilizations until the little ice age ended. But "sentient beings" may also include whales, dolphins, crows and a few other animals.
It's human nature to explain what you see and to man, that which you don't understand becomes known as "the hand of God". But I honestly believe that God exists, it's just that I am unsure of anything else and NO ONE BOOK has all the answers.
There are some really deep spiritual insights in almost every major religion. I think a god is likely too, but I think that living a life of meaning and truth makes it important to live as if there is not one. If our lives have meaning I am convinced that our honesty and genuine natures are more important than a set of artificial rules and fear of retribution. If you are really seeking spiritual truth you will find it.
Things tend to become more complex over time. The universe is growing more complicated. We wouldn't recognize it in another billion years. Man used to be very primitive. As time passed he became more complex because he was able to pass on accumulated knowledge from one generation to another. Once man found out that it was more comfortable to live in a basic shelter than it was to stay out in the harsh elements he gradually improved his artificial shelters to the point where he can now build complex sky-scrappers. But that's accumulated knowledge. Most people would be hard-pressed to build a hut made out of twigs and mud for themselves if their lives depended on it. The average person is only slightly more intelligent than an ancient cave man was. But all of humanity is vastly more intelligent than people were just a few generations ago.
Cherry picking? Please...your better than that. I made a statement, and posed a question. Would you like to discuss on that basis? Or is what you posted the best you can do?
I thought that phrase encapsulated the whole of your short line, to be honest, but since you insist: "Because it does, and that I know. Why would God reveal himself falsely? He wouldn't." If God was exactly as envisioned in your worldview then obviously he would not. However you have not provided any real support for the assumption that there is a God exactly as envisioned in your worldview. So your post amounts to "It does because I think it does." Textbook circularity.
The evidence is the Bible. No contridictions. My "world view" has never been discussed. The topic of the thread is God. The second sentence I ask a question, "Why would God reveal himself falsely"? It is not what I think, but what I believe, and I believe God. God has told us everything we need to know about him. That is, however, multifaceted. He is creator, and redeemer. The law giver, the grace giver. He sent his Son to die for our sin. In all the complexity of who he is, is the simplicity of who he is.
I don't think I mentioned contradictions, but circularity. And regardless of what you think of the phrase "worldview", your statement that god would not reveal himself falsely IS grounded in your beliefs about god, and the veracity of those beliefs is not supported by anything you said here - it is mere assumption.
Circularity? As if the use of that word in itself falsifies my argument, it does not. My belifs about God are based on what God has said about himself as revealed in God's word. Therefore, it is not assumption, but evidence based. That validates my question of "Why would God reveal himself falsely"? We all know that God is, even you. If you did not know that God was we would not be having this conversation. If you were in actuality an Atheist you would ignore the subject entirely, in fact no one would ever discuss God if he did not in fact exist and we would all know it. Since God breathed his life into us when he made us, we all have an internal sense that there is a God and we all know it. Where the division comes in is that some accept the knowledge of God and worship him accordingly, and some reject the knowledge of God and pretend that he does not exist or attempt to believe that he is not serious or misrepresented in the bible.
It's true that circular reasoning does not in itself mean that your conclusions are incorrect. It does however mean that your reasoning provides no logical support for your conclusions. Now, as for the rest of your post, it is almost entirely conjecture. You have evidence - sure. But evidence of what? Evidence of god? Or evidence that someone in the past thought that he had a message from god? You jump too far to your conclusions. And then you blather some nonsense about how I 'know' god, but reject him. I do not relish the idea of being sent to horrific eternal torture by a loving god, so if I genuinely knew god was real then I can assure you, for at least partly selfish reasons, I would be singing his praises at every turn.
Finally! Cogent convesation instead of Hyperbole. Now, I do not wish you to feel that I am blowing you off. I would not do that now that we have a basis for a serious conversation. I am at work, I can post when we are not busy, but in few minutes I will be as folks start to arise. Please respond to this post so it will be marked and I will return to it with a serious response to what you posted tomorrow night. I am sincere.
Gen 3; 22 And Jehovah God saith, `Lo, the man was as one of Us, as to the knowledge of good and evil; and now, lest he send forth his hand, and have taken also of the tree of life, and eaten, and lived to the age,' -- in new western ingleesh..... the boss said, we as cool as he is.. we are 1, we can create, we can live forever! then john 14 20 in that day ye shall know that I [am] in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you; you in that day. nothing misconstrued about god, the people are just lazy to do the actual homework
I've been having similar thoughts for a while now. Its amusing when some try to prove their version of god by pointing to the universe and saying "Ain't it just grand?" That is another something that we can never know for sure. Unless someone actually observes other universes we don't know if this one is the 'best of all possible universes'. For all we know this universe is a hack job done by the hyper-dimensional equivalent of a 6th grader, and this is his science project. And for those who cry, "Well, god told us!" it is the habit of those in positions of authority to lie to us. It is their stock in trade.
I think many are starting to understand they can believe in a Higher Power without believing in man made religions
most 'higher power' diety are manmade. no diety yet , besides a nuke can unleash anything as biblically claimed
a higher power doesn't have to be a man made deity... it could just be the interconnectedness of it all .
