I've wondered a bit, while we're here, where are we going, what's the point, why is it so hard, tings like that, you know? It sounds like the lyrics to some Jack Johnson song (and they are), but still, I have to remark that all of it just seems beautiful. I believe in God ... you know? I believe in the sheer beauty of it all, all the stupid incongruences of everything, every blemish, every scar, every shade of black, blue, red, green, surreptitiously gray, all of it. I love it, I bask in it, I enjoy being a part of it.

I've heard people say...that God made us because He was lonely, but I don't buy that. God isn't a person, I don't see Him like that, I see God as a concept, an ideal, the perfect image of perfection, except, with a will.

Complete perfection, harmony, understanding. Sheer mastery over everything; the self, the world, everything. God wouldn't be lonely, because God is really three, right? That, the Father is the Will of God, and the Son is the Law of God, and the Holy spirit is like God's little messenger, God's connection to us, you know? I listen a lot to what my friends tell me about all of this, and I rarely ever say anything, but I just find it all so beautiful.

They say that God is Love, or that God loves us, or that, well, we are made and saved because God loves us. But, why? Why would He love us? I- I just don't get it. No, I do, I really do get it.

We're his Art, you know? Little sculptures, little bits of paint, little poems and beautiful structures and complex figures and everything, just one big tapestry of sheer art. It's beautiful. That's why God loves us, right? Because, we're His artwork, right? We belong to Him. But ... that's so sad, that He would just ...... own us, you know?

So, he gave us a choice, a wonderful choice, be His, or not. Isn't that beautiful? I ... I love it, I think it's beautiful.

We can be beautiful, we can be ugly, we can scar, we can paint, we can be Art, or we can be some horrible splotch on the canvas, but we're never erased. We're never forgotten, because He looks at us, he's there, watching, poking, asking us to be this color, or telling us to paint over that color.

Or we can choose not to, and color ourselves, though we're more likely to color ourselves black.

You know, I think it's really beautiful, you know?

I ... I'm in Love, right now. It's weird, how I was sooo, depressed. I thought I lost Love, but God gave it back to me. It's beautiful, and I just wanted to say so.

It is a beautiful thing. By all rights God should have just let us all rot and gone to hell. Hell, he could've done it. But he chose to show mercy. To show it when it would gain him nothing, in fact, he had to lose something.

I don't see it that way. You're certainly right, of course you are. But, I see it more that God wanted us to have Heaven in the first place, and Hell is just what we get when we deny it.

It's like the difference between being dragged off to the lions, or marching proudly to face them.

But, you never deserve hell until you get there.

Well the thing is, that God and Sin are polar opposites. The whole Eden fiasco turned us into moral abominations, not wholly good, not wholly evil. We could never be in heaven this way, since God can't tolerate evil, not even a little.

For all the sins we committ, justice would reap us hell. And we know that God is just. But it is because he loved us, when he had no reason to, when we had spat in his face with the very breath he gave us, that he chose to show mercy and save us from ourselves.

I'm not saying whether or not I belive in God or not, but I definately think that if there is such a thing as Heaven, it won't be only for "belivers". I think that if an Athiest lives a good, kind life and, although doesn't believe in God, will still go to heaven. Because lets face it, if God is benevolent, omnicient and omnipotend, he won't send people to hell out of spite. "HA! Ye of little faith, now you must suffer becuase of your beliefs!!". We don't accept that from people, why from a god?

But then there's the logical side of me which believes in the "lights out" theory and in evolution and that the solar system, galaxies and the universe is all there is, no God or any of that crap.

I am ever trying to think of new ways to merge the two stories.

I agree. I am always hearing stories of "Science vs Religion". Why not attempt to go into religion into greater detail using Science, rather than say one or the other? For example, treat the creationist theory as a metaphore for evolutionism. After all, they both tell the same order of events, don't they? (Water animals THEN land animals THEN humans).

No, I don't think Christanity need be all about blind faith.

P.S. Sorry if this has kind of hijacked your "God loves us" thread. I didn't mean it to.

[Edited on 27/1/06 by Samsara]

The Bible is full of controversial things, Flare, because it's not a book of happiness and sunshine and and flowers and unicorns. It is the truth: both sides of it.
God doesn't want to laugh and spit in your face when you get to heaven: he wants you to turn to him. He has said that faith in him is the way and if you do not believe in him, you will not reach heaven. That is because you have not acknowleged him, and praised him, and therefore have sinned. It's not that God doesn't like you; he loves all of us. But he hates sin; it cannot enter the perfect Kingdom of God. If he let sin in, heaven wouldn't be perfect. God can cleanse our sins when we pray to him. So, even we, imperfect men, can enter the kingdom by believing in him and praying for his forgivness. If he turns you away, it's not because he hates you and doesn't want you to enter, or even doesn't like you; he hates sin and CAN NOT allow it to enter heaven.

Bedebadaba doo. This topic needs to be locked because OMG relgon si 2 contrvesrial.

I don't think that this needs to be locked yet. So long as we are thinking our arguments through, it is not so much an argument as a debate.

However, have you sat and counted the contradictions in your post, Heatman?

I agree that if God were real (remember, I'm refraining from saying one way or another), he would probably value being a good person over which God you believe in. It may affect it, but I think that a good person who is just and has no prejudice and never said anything or did anything wrong but happens to be athiest would still get to heaven because the good person they were overweighed the lack of faith.

I love God. He gave us all life to come here live here to live and love. Wait up though, is this like love for God or like a person? Well, I also really like this one girl at my school, almost love. There are other beautiful girls at my school, but this one I really like, and even though I'll never be in her league, I will always like her... But love is beautiful, even if I'll never get the one that should be with me...

Love is great. Although I may never get it again, it's great.

1. You expected him to flood the world and then just look the other way? He means he's sorry he had to do that, not sorry that he did it. I think, of course, this is my interpretation.

2. If man hadn't had the OPTION of eating from the forbidden tree, he wouldn't have had free will, and without free will, he would not have been able to love God.

3. I'm sort of under the impression there were only a few of each species of animal at the time. He and his family would get it, therefore, because he had it himself. That's simply hereditary.

God's perfect, and I can't explain that articulatly for him. But that's my faith's founding, and I'm sticking to it.

And the topic still needs to be locked.

EDIT: Heh, X beat me to the punch, but I like his snake explanation better.

[Edited on 27-1-2006 by Heatman.EXE]

How about this? This topic is only meant for those who believe it. If there is going to be a debate, make a topic for it.

Indeed, it is not man's place to be judge of himself or other men. So, yeah.

And yes, he gave us free will even so. Something without free will cannot love, and one of the requirements for entering heaven as I see it is that you must love God with all your heart. He made the tree to test our faith, as he says he shall test it, because that is the test of the extent of our love: and it was a test we failed.

[Edited on 27-1-2006 by Heatman.EXE]

I'm pretty sure it goes without saying that I disagree with most of your post. Respectfully, of course.

(and yes, I know you weren't making an attack, but I had to cut the rising tension)

Anyway, I'm wondering that if I put a christian message in my sig, would I get debates in my PM box?

"Yes it does!"

"No it doesn't!"

"Yes it does!"

"No it doesn't!"

Yep. I think that the issue here is pride. Neither side will give into the other, even if that side knows that the other is right.

Really, how can the Bible not make sense? It makes perfect sense if you look at it without your own beliefs getting in the way.

So...

HOW ARE THOSE STEELERS?

And Flare, I don't think there's any chronological record of when Satan and his demons got thrown out of heaven. I'm sure it was before the Fall of man.