Lacewing wrote: ↑Wed Jun 02, 2021 5:33 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jun 01, 2021 10:48 pm
Lacewing wrote: ↑Tue Jun 01, 2021 5:21 pm
I'm asking, what is the point IF HE KNOWS THE OUTCOME?
I get that. But I'm answering, "You're still free, even if I know what you're going to do."
So you're not able to actually answer
what is the point.
I'm not understanding your question, apparently. Or else my explanation is somehow not reaching what's really concerning you.
Can you put it another way?
Did you really not understand that I was referring to the rewards and punishment promised after life?
Of course. But it seemed to me that you were asking about what they matter in THIS life.
Was I wrong?
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jun 01, 2021 10:48 pmTo believe that there is a reward for choosing God, one has to have faith; because one does not see it right now. To fear that there is punishment for evil, one also has to have faith; because it's not apparent right now.
But the punishment will come, whether or not it's apparent right now, correct? And most people, whether they have faith or not (as you say), have been made aware of this from any exposure to religion which claims that, correct?
I don't speak for "most people," of course. Nobody does: you'd have to ask them. The Bible does say, however, that all mankind has sufficient reason to know that God exist, and to know something about the nature of God as well.
But regarding your first question, the answer is "Yes."
So, back to my questions: Why would a creation be set up to have choices linked to promises of eternal rewards or punishments?
Well, they're not "linked" in the average practical experience at all. For people operate all the time without regard for any such "promises," even though such do exist. So to take those promises AS promises, one has to believe that God has made them in the first place.
Why wouldn't a creation be allowed to be free without any such promises?
Because if God would allow evil to rage unchecked forever, and the good to go without recompense forever, then in what sense can anybody speak of God being "just"?
It's funny how this works in cynical minds. They think that they can blame God for being insufficiently loving, because there's a Hell; and they think they can blame Him for being unjust because they assume Hitler, Stalin and Mao et al aren't in it.
They also think that the big criminals -- the Stalins and Maos -- deserve it, but that they personally don't. It's like they think there are little and big sins, and that they are personally the correct judges of which each is, and what everybody deserves...
That's human nature. We all want to tip the scales in our own favour.
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jun 01, 2021 10:48 pm
For the source of existence, the centre of goodness, the wellspring of life, the light of the world, and the ultimate judge and rewarder of those who love Him...is it right for him to ask us to come to know Him and appreciate Him as He is?
So you think he needs and desires something? This magnificent god who has created atoms and galaxies and countless creatures wants the adoration and love from skewed humans who have been threatened to make the right choices, or else. Why wouldn't such a god create an awesome goddess to exchange love with? Why play with dolls?
If I were a god, I would create and love way beyond any religious storyline, which is all so contrived and in service to humans.
I rather doubt that if you were inventing a "religion," you'd invent Christianity or Judaism. They're both far too inconvenient to basic human preferences. But then, human beings are not God.
It's a good question as to why God would love us. What would He want with such as we are? No wonder the Bible itself asks,
"What is man, that You are mindful of him / Or the son of man, that you visit him?" It's a good question.
But God is God. He is who He is. And if I can't quite fathom his purposes, it's not a surprise. I am, however, infinitely glad that God not only cares for human beings, and wants relationship with human beings, but has granted us freedom and asked us to become His friends voluntarily, having already intervened to make relationship with Him possible.
I don't know how much more it would be possible for even God to do, in order to demonstrate the sincerity of His interest in us.
As to why He bothers? I'll have to ask Him. It's a bit of a marvel.
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 31, 2021 2:27 amShould there be no answer for them?
What is the answer?
Just hang in there, I'm going to punish them after they're dead.[/quote]
That justice is coming. And it will be absolute. And its effects will be forever...so long that the pains of Earth will seem scarcely momentary, and the rewards of having done the right thing will be infinite.
In short, the world experiences moral freedom from constraint, along with the costs of that situation; but it makes its decision about what it wants to do autonomously, and then has the effects of that forever.
Seems fair. It actually seems a really, really good deal, actually.
That's why Jesus asked,
"What shall it profit a man if he should gain the whole world and lose his own soul; or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?"
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 31, 2021 2:27 amLacewing wrote:I want to understand how so many stories that don't make sense are being circulated and believed?
Like?
The ones we're talking about are a good example.
In specific?
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 31, 2021 2:27 am
Well, more than one "religion" can't be true, inasmuch as they contradict each other.
They might not be true even if there are not others that contradict them, right?
The rules of logic cover the situation nicely. In a genuinely contradictory situation, both views can be wrong. Or one can be right. But the one thing we know for absolutely certain is that both cannot be right simultaneously -- at least, not if we're using the words in the same way, at the same time.
So there are three possibilities:
1. One God exists.
2. No gods exist.
3. Many gods exist.
This covers all religions and creeds, including Atheism (which is in #2). What we learn from logic here is that two out of the three are guaranteed to be wrong. And since they cover all possible cases, one is guaranteed to be right, too.
Interesting. It means that whatever the truth is, a whole lot of people have it wrong. But it also means one of the three is right.
What God is asking you to do is place your chip on one of them. However, if you don't place your chip, it's
already placed.
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon May 31, 2021 2:27 amFor example, do you and I think Islam is true? So are we surprised when it turns homicidal and cruel? Or do you and I subscribe to Scientology? So why would we be surprised when it turns out to be superstitious and fraudulent?
Christianity's history has included all of that at times, yes?
No. But I'm sure you'll have something in mind, so I'll invite you to speak on that.
Do you think God loves Islam and Scientology. How about Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, tribal religions, etc.? Or non-theists?
You've switched terms with the last one. The former list is all ideologies. God does not love anything that is not true.
But does He love "non-theists"? Yes; but not their "non-theism."
Why would a god be limited and divisive?
As limited and divisive as truth itself always is? Is that really a question?
When will it stop unfolding?
You'll have to ask God.
But the Bible says this:
"...with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not willing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be discovered." (2 Peter 3)
Maybe all religions are false and limited in what they think and believe, but they are useful to the cultures that create and identify with them.
Is "cultural preservation" the litmus test of truth? Can a culture be "preserved" by a lie, the way Nazi Germany was, and the way Communist China or the Islamic states are today?
Would you think God would "preserve" that, and be bad if He didn't?
What I would ask any religious person is: Can you see the love and potential beyond your own beliefs and religion?
Well, you'll have to explain that.
Where is this "love and potential" in the three I just mentioned? Maybe we can ferret it out together, but we're going to have to overlook an awful lot of horrors to get there, I would expect.