does god really exist?

[Chaotic reminder]

come my children, feel the wrath of god on the back of your neck as he tip-toes into your bedroom and does things to you while you're asleep

[Mai]

WTF?....

[Symos]

Can we keep on track here people?

[Chaotic reminder]

we are on track

[kyo83]

the bible says this, the bible says that, but all it REALLY says is what the weak minded ones want to hear...

If what you’ve said is true, that Bible is what the weak minded wants to hear. Then are you saying that the President of the United States is weak minded? Are you saying that Mr. Bill Clinton is weak minded? What about Mother Teresa? What about Sir John Templeton, one of the richest and most successful mutual fund managers in history, a man of weak mind? Seriously, when you propose your claims that Christianity is false, your assertion must at least be rational.

…can you prove that he’s not just some guy that controlled people and manipulated them with magic tricks? so he can walk on water, turn water into wine, etc,..

Yes. Now think about this. If Jesus is a person as you said who manipulate people and control people. Why doesn’t He control the authorities so that He can rule Rome? Why is it that in many places that’s recorded in the Bible. It is always written that Jesus eats with the tax collectors who are disliked by the community, the poor, those who contracted leprosy, the sick, the abandoned, the blind? Why don’t he mixed around with those of a higher authority? Why doesn’t he spend more time with the rich?

In fact there is one account, whereby a rich young man wanted to follow Jesus, but Jesus told him to sell away all that he have to follow Him. The rich young man was very sad because he had great riches, the Bible says. Now think about this, why would Jesus be so seemingly stupid to chase away that young lad, and not use the lad’s riches to manipulate Jesus agenda?

…
but we have magicians these days that perform "magic" at parties, but i don’t see anyone bowing to them and calling THEM our savior,….

Of course, you don’t see them get crucified on the cross now do you? You also don’t see them claiming that they are the Son of God which has been prophesied in the Bible, and confirm by His believers that they are the Son of God, do you? By the way, Jesus don't do magic, magic are for kids. Jesus do miracles. (I'm not against magic, magic are cool too, even for me. )

Fact is, god hasn’t shown a sign he exists to more then one person at a time for the last several centuries…

I beg to differ. In fact God did and has been showing His signs to humanity. It’s just a matter of are you willing to accept it? Being willing is essential. Evidence cannot convince the unwilling.

…. for all we know, he's just part of a story book that people made up, and that ever Merical was just something someone wrote down out of their imagination for fun

"Merical"? I suppose you meant miracle. Now if the Bible is just a storybook for the gullible, weak mind, stupid, silly, can anybody try to explain to me the reason for a brilliant doctor who is skeptical of the Bible to end up believing it? Consider his story:

Viggo Olsen, a brilliant surgeon with many degrees under his name like, M.S., M.D., Litt.D., D.H., F.A.C.S., F.I.C.S. and D.T.M. & H.. He became a diplomat of the American Board of Surgery and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons.

Viggo, together with his wife, Joan were spiritual skeptics. They would come together to explain to their parents who were devout Christians, why Christianity is inconsistent with contemporary science. However, one day in frustration they decided to probe deeper into the Christian faith, intending to “dissect out all its embarrassing scientific mistakes...” In Viggo’s own words, “My intention was not to do an objective study at all.”

Viggo and Joan would spend days and nights researching, analyzing, discussing, and argued. In stead of finding mistakes, it seems like they are having trouble finding them. “We’d find something that seemed to be an error, but on further reflection and study, we saw that our understanding had been shallow. That makes us sit up and take notice.”

Later on a student handled Viggo a 1948 book called “Modern Science and Christian Faith”. Each thirteen chapters were written by different scientists about the evidence in his field and the result was astounding. They all point towards a living God. This sufficiently stuns Viggo and Joan. In fact, they said, “It blew our minds!” For the first time, we began to see there were reasons behind Christianity.

…. its clear that most of the population are atheist, and deny existence of this one supreme being…

Piro, please do a check before you post such assertion.
http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html

If you look under the statistic of non-religious. They numbered only 16%! And out these 16% half of them are theists but are not religious.

religion is a way to manipulate the masses who DO believe. think about. the world was considered flat, right?

This is what I understand from your words. You are saying that religion, is the obvious gullible-ness of the believers to believe whatever the preacher says without backing up what they believe with evidence. You are quite right in this on most religion. In fact if you consider the belief that the world is flat and most religion, you will find one similarity in both of them. And that is… They have no evidence to back up their beliefs! However, I’m afraid this is where many people have mistaken about Christianity. Christianity is not without evidence; my belief is backed not only with theological evidence but also with historical, archeological, scientific, medical and most importantly, personal evidence.

kyo83
(Sorry guys for editing so many times.. )

[kyo83]

I will try to place a good and clear argument as to why I believe the Bible to be infallible and true. Since we are talking about Jesus, let’s see if the New Testament that tells us about Jesus is indeed credible.

There are ten reasons why we know that the New Testament(NT) writers wrote the Bible truthfully.

1)The New Testament writers included embarrassing details about themselves.
Nobody who wants to lead a movement will be so stupid as to bring up embarrassing mistakes that they have committed in the past, however, the NT writers didn’t even try to hide their mistakes! Let us see what mistakes have they committed.

a) They are dim-witted- numerous times they have failed to understand what Jesus is saying (Mark 9:32; Luke 18:34; John 12:16).

b) They are uncaring- they fall asleep when Jesus ask them to pray for Him.(Mark14:32-41) Not only that, when Jesus was dead on the cross, none of them take the initiative to give Him a proper burial.
c) They are rebuke-Peter was called “Satan” by Jesus (Mark 8:33). And Paul rebuke Peter for being wrong about a theological issue. (Galatians 2:11)

d)They are cowards- All the disciples but one went to hide when Jesus was on the cross.

e) They are doubters- despite being taught several times that Jesus would rise from the dead, (John 2:18-22; 3:14-18; Matthew 12:39-47;17:9, 22-23) the disciples were still doubtful.

Now think about this, if you want to manipulate people to believe in your religion, would anyone be so stupid to say that one of the leaders of the movement, the Apostle Peter, a coward, doubter, and even liken him to be like Satan?

2) The New Testament writers included embarrassing details and difficulties sayings of Jesus.

The writers also recorded embarrassing details about Jesus, their leader. Jesus…

- Is considered “out of his mind” by his mother and brothers (his own family), who come to seize him to take him home. (Mark 3:21, 31)
- Is not believed by his own brothers (John 7:5)
- Is thought to be a deceiver(John 7:12)
- Is deserted by many of his followers (John6:66)
- Turns off “Jews who believed in him” (John 8:30-31) to the point that they want to stone him. (verse 59) (Stoning is somewhat equivalent to today’s death punishment by hanging)
- Is called a “drunkard” (Matthew 11:19)
- Is called “demon-possessed” (Mark 3:22; John7:20; 8:48 )
- Is called a “madman” (John 10:20)
- Has his feet wiped with the hair of a prostitute (an event that had the potential to be perceived as a sexual advance- Luke 7:36-39)
- Is crucified by the Jews and Romans, despite the fact that “anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse”. (Deuteronomy 21:23; cross-reference with Galatians 3:13)

Wouldn’t it be silly to include accounts that have the ability to tarnish the reputation of a leader and a Saviour?

As if these are not enough to cause his reputation to be tarnish. The writers even included many of his hard and difficult sayings. Jesus…
- declares, “The Father is greater than I”(John 14:28 )
- seems to predict incorrectly that he’s coming back to earth within a generation. (Matthew24:34)
- then says about his second coming, that no one knows the time, “not even the angels in heaven nor the Son(that means Jesus himself!)”(Matthew 24:36)
- seems to deny his deity by asking the rich young ruler, “Why do you cal me good?.. No one is good- except God alone.” (Luke 18:19)
- is seen cursing the fig tree for not having figs when it wasn’t even a season for figs (Matthew21:18ff)
- seems unable to do miracles in his hometown, except to heal a few sick people(Mark 6:5)
Now consider this, if the New Testament writers wanted to prove to everyone that Jesus was God, then why did they leave these difficult sayings that seem to argue against his deity?


3) The New Testament writers left in demanding sayings of Jesus
If the New Testament writers were making up stories, they certainly didn’t make the story easy to believe. The famous sermon of Jesus, the Sermon on the Mount, for instance does not appear to be a human invention:

- “I tell you that whoever looks at a woman lustfully has committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matthew 5:28 )
- “I tell you anyone who divorces his wife, except for martial unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery” (Matthew 5:32)
- “I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.” (Matthew 5:39-42)
- “I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:44--45)
- “Be perfect… as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48 )
-“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures n heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21)
- “Do not judge; or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judge, and with the measures you use, it will be measured to you.” (Matthrew7:1-2)

4) The New Testament writers carefully distinguished Jesus’ words from their own.
During the early Church, the writers of the NT could simply have re-edited to words of Jesus to win any theological disputes, but instead they leave it as it is. They are very careful to clarify those words that are said / written by the Apostles themselves, and those that are truly the words of Jesus.

5) The New Testament writers included events related to the Resurrection that they would not have invented

6) The New Testament writers include more than thirty historically confirmed people in their writings.
These surely increase the risk of their invented stories been exposed; now why would anyone wants to expose their own make up stories?

7) The New Testament writers include diverge details.
Instead of writing the same account about Jesus, the NT writers, wrote with different perspectives. And because of this they risked the chance of having people to criticize the Bible as contradictory and inconsistence.

8 ) The New Testament writers challenge their readers to check out verifiable facts, even facts about miracles.
Now, who would be so silly to ask his critics to find fault in his miracles unless he had have the assurance that his miracles will surely be backed with credible evidence?

9) The New Testament writers describe miracles like other historical events with sample, unembellished accounts.

10) The New Testament writers abandoned their long-held cherished sacred beliefs and practices, adopted new ones, and did not deny their testimony even under persecution or threat of death.
We humans are people of habits. So to change our habits and form a new one isn’t going to be so easy especially, those which we have been practicing for so many years. However, it seems virtually overnight, the believers of Jesus were willing to abandon all that they had believed in the past. These practices were…
-The animal sacrifice system- they replace it forever by the one perfect sacrifice of Christ.
-The binding supremacy of the Law of Moses- they say it’s powerless because of the sinless life of Christ.
-Strict monotheist (the belief of one God) - they now worship Jesus, the God-man, despite the fact that 1) their cherished belief has been, “Hear O Israel: The LORD our God, the Lord is one.”(Deut. 6:4); and 2) man-worship has always been considered blasphemy and punishable by death.
-The Sabbath- they no longer observe it even though they’ve believed that breaking the Sabbath was a punishable by death. (Exodus 31:14)
- Belief in a conquering Messiah- Jesus is the opposite of a conquering Messiah. He’s a sacrificial lamb (at least on his first visit!)

It’s not only the early Jews who have done this, thousands of Jerusalem Jews, including Pharisee priests, convert to Christianity and joined the NT writers in abandoning their treasured beliefs and practices.

These are not all. Not only have they rejected the old beliefs and practices, they have also adopted new radical ones. These include:
- Sunday, a work day, as a new day of worship.
- Baptism as a new sign that one was a partaker of the new covenant (as circumcision was a sign of the old covenant)
- Communion as an act of remembrance of Christ’s sacrifice for their sins. (Now this is especially weird for somebody who wants to manipulate others to join their movement. Consider this, why would anybody want to celebrate the death of their leader? Surely we would want to remember the victory of our leaders instead! Is there any religion or philosophical belief in the world that tells it’s believers to celebrate the death of their God?)

More astounishing evidence to come...
kyo83

[kyo83]

Sidetrack, I assure you guys that my initial reason for coming here is not to debate. My ulterior motive is however, to show my drawings!

Please do take a look at my drawings which I've done. Comments are appreciated.

http://www.absoluteanime.com/forum/view ... 46371b8b6c

[Chaotic reminder]

the bible says this, the bible says that, but all it REALLY says is what the weak minded ones want to hear...

If what you’ve said is true, that Bible is what the weak minded wants to hear. Then are you saying that the President of the United States is weak minded? Are you saying that Mr. Bill Clinton is weak minded? What about Mother Teresa? What about Sir John Templeton, one of the richest and most successful mutual fund managers in history, a man of weak mind? Seriously, when you propose your claims that Christianity is false, your assertion must at least be rational.

…can you prove that he’s not just some guy that controlled people and manipulated them with magic tricks? so he can walk on water, turn water into wine, etc,..

Yes. Now think about this. If Jesus is a person as you said who manipulate people and control people. Why doesn’t He control the authorities so that He can rule Rome? Why is it that in many places that’s recorded in the Bible. It is always written that Jesus eats with the tax collectors who are disliked by the community, the poor, those who contracted leprosy, the sick, the abandoned, the blind? Why don’t he mixed around with those of a higher authority? Why doesn’t he spend more time with the rich?

In fact there is one account, whereby a rich young man wanted to follow Jesus, but Jesus told him to sell away all that he have to follow Him. The rich young man was very sad because he had great riches, the Bible says. Now think about this, why would Jesus be so seemingly stupid to chase away that young lad, and not use the lad’s riches to manipulate Jesus agenda?

…
but we have magicians these days that perform "magic" at parties, but i don’t see anyone bowing to them and calling THEM our savior,….

Of course, you don’t see them get crucified on the cross now do you? You also don’t see them claiming that they are the Son of God which has been prophesied in the Bible, and confirm by His believers that they are the Son of God, do you? By the way, Jesus don't do magic, magic are for kids. Jesus do miracles. (I'm not against magic, magic are cool too, even for me. )

Fact is, god hasn’t shown a sign he exists to more then one person at a time for the last several centuries…

I beg to differ. In fact God did and has been showing His signs to humanity. It’s just a matter of are you willing to accept it? Being willing is essential. Evidence cannot convince the unwilling.

…. for all we know, he's just part of a story book that people made up, and that ever Merical was just something someone wrote down out of their imagination for fun

"Merical"? I suppose you meant miracle. Now if the Bible is just a storybook for the gullible, weak mind, stupid, silly, can anybody try to explain to me the reason for a brilliant doctor who is skeptical of the Bible to end up believing it? Consider his story:

Viggo Olsen, a brilliant surgeon with many degrees under his name like, M.S., M.D., Litt.D., D.H., F.A.C.S., F.I.C.S. and D.T.M. & H.. He became a diplomat of the American Board of Surgery and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons.

Viggo, together with his wife, Joan were spiritual skeptics. They would come together to explain to their parents who were devout Christians, why Christianity is inconsistent with contemporary science. However, one day in frustration they decided to probe deeper into the Christian faith, intending to “dissect out all its embarrassing scientific mistakes...” In Viggo’s own words, “My intention was not to do an objective study at all.”

Viggo and Joan would spend days and nights researching, analyzing, discussing, and argued. In stead of finding mistakes, it seems like they are having trouble finding them. “We’d find something that seemed to be an error, but on further reflection and study, we saw that our understanding had been shallow. That makes us sit up and take notice.”

Later on a student handled Viggo a 1948 book called “Modern Science and Christian Faith”. Each thirteen chapters were written by different scientists about the evidence in his field and the result was astounding. They all point towards a living God. This sufficiently stuns Viggo and Joan. In fact, they said, “It blew our minds!” For the first time, we began to see there were reasons behind Christianity.

…. its clear that most of the population are atheist, and deny existence of this one supreme being…

Piro, please do a check before you post such assertion.
http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html

If you look under the statistic of non-religious. They numbered only 16%! And out these 16% half of them are theists but are not religious.

religion is a way to manipulate the masses who DO believe. think about. the world was considered flat, right?

This is what I understand from your words. You are saying that religion, is the obvious gullible-ness of the believers to believe whatever the preacher says without backing up what they believe with evidence. You are quite right in this on most religion. In fact if you consider the belief that the world is flat and most religion, you will find one similarity in both of them. And that is… They have no evidence to back up their beliefs! However, I’m afraid this is where many people have mistaken about Christianity. Christianity is not without evidence; my belief is backed not only with theological evidence but also with historical, archeological, scientific, medical and most importantly, personal evidence.

kyo83
(Sorry guys for editing so many times.. )

accept it? accept it? wtF are you talking about, i've looked for it for the last 7 friggin years (since i study every religion, i dont practice and (esp one) but i study lots of religions and stuff) and i havent seen anything! GOD! YOU ****ING MORON! IF YOU ****ING WANT THESE ****ING PEOPLE TO ****ING BELIEVE IN YOU, SHOW YOURSELF IN A ****ING FORM THAT EVERY ****ING PERSON CAN ****ING BELIEVE IN! BECAUSE THE ONLY PEOPLE THAT ****ING BELIEVE IN YOU, ARE PEOPLE LIKE THIS, AND THOSE DAMN FANATICS THAT THINK THAT EVERY MOTHER ****ING GOOD ****ING THING THAT ****ING HAPPENS TO ****ING THEM IS A ****ING SIGN OF ****ING GOD! AND EVERY ****ING THING THAT DOESNT ****ING BELIEVE IN ****ING GOD IS A ****ING FOLLOWER OF ****ING SATAN! AND IF YOU ****ING WANT ME TO ****ING BELIEVE IN YOU, THEN ****ING GET THOSE ****ING FANATICS IN ****ING FLORIDA TO ****ING STOP ****ING CALLING ME ****ING SATANIC JUST ****ING BECAUSE I ****ING DONT BELIEVE IN YOU! I MEAN, FOR GOD'S (if he exists) SAKE! SURE, I DONT WANT YOU RUNNING MY LIFE, THE ONLY PPL THAT DO ARE THOSE DAMN FANATICS, BUT LEAST YOU COULD DO IS GET PEOPLE TO STOP PREACHING IN UR NAME TO GET POWER! (no, i doubt god exists and i dont think he's actully going to read that, but hey, why not say it?)



P.S. sorry for the ****ing swearing, i know that [censored] aint friggin cool, but...meh

[GravyTrain]

Aw, Lawdy. I don't care at all about persuading people to believe in my religion. I'm just happy if they aren't stupid and think that I'm some fearful fool for practicing one. But damn, some of you people on my side make it so f**king hard.

[nozomi]

The important thing is learning to understand anothers religion instead of displaying acts of discrimination... here's something for you, perhaps you'll understand: I found this on my bullettin on myspace.

This is one of the best explanations of why God allows pain and suffering that I have seen. It's an explanation other people will understand.

A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed. As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation. They talked about so many things and various subjects.


When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said: "I don't believe that God exists."


"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.


"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist. Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people? Would there be abandoned children? If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can't imagine a loving a God who would allow all of these things."

The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond because he didn't want to start an argument. The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop.

Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and unkempt.


The customer turned back and entered the barber shop again and he said to the barber: "You know what? Barbers do not exist."


"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber. "I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"


"No!" the customer exclaimed. "Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."


"Ah, but barbers DO exist! What happens is, people do not come to me."


"Exactly!"- affirmed the customer. "That's the point! God, too, DOES exist! What happens, is, people don't go to Him and do not look for Him. That's why there's so much pain and suffering in the world."

[Raoul Duke]

That analogy has no merit at all. It's the worst one ive heard.

Are you saying that if everyone believed in God diseases like cancer would suddenly cease to exist? Are you saying that people who believe in God dont get hurt? That they dont die? Ironic and silly. If that is what you're saying, which it is, then you're saying that God is a tyrannical/omnipotent dictator who hurts you if you dont come to him.

[nozomi]

No, I'm just saying that you never know until you try. All religions really teach is to be the best person you can be and have a little faith. I believe God exisits and that's my favor. Why I believe this? Because I feel it. I didn't choose Christianity, it chose me.
Yet, it shouldn't be so hard for you to understand why I feel this way. People who are ill have nowhere else to turn to except to prayer when they are so near death, I sometimes wonder why these people turn sides at the last minute. All of sudden it's "I believe! Save me!"
Well it doesn't work that way..
But having just the tiniest bit of faith should be enough..

[Mai]

Sooo if I some how get cancer then I should turn to god?


Psssh.

[Chaotic reminder]

No, I'm just saying that you never know until you try. All religions really teach is to be the best person you can be and have a little faith. I believe God exisits and that's my favor. Why I believe this? Because I feel it. I didn't choose Christianity, it chose me.
Yet, it shouldn't be so hard for you to understand why I feel this way. People who are ill have nowhere else to turn to except to prayer when they are so near death, I sometimes wonder why these people turn sides at the last minute. All of sudden it's "I believe! Save me!"
Well it doesn't work that way..
But having just the tiniest bit of faith should be enough..

satanism doesnt teach you to be the best (atleast i dont think it does) person u can be...

and hey god, i believe, now tell me the damn lotto numbers! *crosses his fingers*

[nozomi]

Sooo if I some how get cancer then I should turn to god?


Psssh.

xD Not what I'm saying, but sometimes people turn sides at the last minute.

And it's not a bad thing to believe in something good. You don't have to 'see' something to know it's there. Like your soul. You believe you have a soul right? But you can't see it, yet you believe it's there...

Believing is like seeing in a way.

[nozomi]

Sidetrack, I assure you guys that my initial reason for coming here is not to debate. My ulterior motive is however, to show my drawings!

Please do take a look at my drawings which I've done. Comments are appreciated.

http://www.absoluteanime.com/forum/view ... 46371b8b6c

They're great, Kyo! Keep up the great work!