In all of my life, I have found that out of all religions, most people who aren't Christian dislike Christianity more out of all the other religions. My question is: why?
I agree. I think a lot of people default being Christian, but don't really know what it means.
I also think a lot of people who claim to be Christians are poor representatives of what the Gospel message is. I found that people love to point out the faults in other people (Sin), yet they continue on and do the same sin in their own life. (They are hypocrites)
Jesus spoke against people like this and he says that one should 'Take the plank out of their own eye, before pointing out the speak of dust in their brothers eye.'
Another good example, is when Jesus caught a woman in Adultery, and the town people were about to Stone Her (as it was the law and custom of the land). Jesus took up her defense and told the bystanders that 'He who is without Sin may cast the first stone'. After everyone left, He said'Has no one condemned You? Then neither do I. Go and leave your life of sin'
What's ironic, is Jesus was the one person who could rightfully have stoned the women since he was sinless, yet he choose to forgive her.
This is the message that Christians should be preaching, not the message of condemnation of judgment.
To disagree with you, for once, Moe, I must side with Grande on merely one issue - that he can, in fact, be a "republican" at 13.
Perhaps being a republican is the wrong way of putting it, but I think that you can have political beliefs at such a young age, given that you are educated and intelligent enough.
Heck, I'm only 16 myself, but I like to think that I can provide clear, logical arguments.
On that point, though, I think Grande succumbs to a rather large fallacy by stating that liberals are dumb or crazy...quite hypocritical and very stupid.
On topic, I would have to say to Daniel that yes, there are those verses in the Bible, but the message that many Christians preach - the message of condemnation that you referred to - is also in the Bible.
We can cherry-pick warm and fuzzy quotes from the Bible all we want to, but you still have to deal with those not-so-huggable quotes.
I know of all the 'not-so-huggable' quotes in scripture. (Read most of the Old Testament)
The story of the Old Testament, was a Righteous and Loving God, creating Man/Woman in his image, and them choosing to Sin and act out against God.
You then see a lot of judgment coming from God, because someone who is wholly good, cannot let evil continue. God is judge, but He is also redeemer.
Anyone who stands before God someday will have to account for their life. Since we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans), and the wages of Sin are Death (Romans), we are all going to die.
God in his love, sent his only Son; Jesus to live the perfect life and die for us. We call this Substitutionary Atonement, because He choose to Die instead of us.
So Razaki, I'm not cherry picking any verses. I'm merely showing that Jesus message was one of Love and Forgiveness and that he hated Religion.
Most of that brings me to my argument from the other topic.
One man at one point in time was all nice and forgiving and gained the attention of many people. Then he was made the poster child for a religion. Add some miracles, some crazy stories and there you go! Instant holy text.
The simple fact is that many people have claimed to be prophets from god. There are some interpretations (although I don't know how much credence they hold) that when Jesus said things to the effect that he was god's son, it was a way of saying that everyone can have a close, personal relationship with god and you don't need a rabbi to do that. The "miracles" that Jesus performed were also done by others before and after him, and so that evidence alone isn't really enough to support the claim that he's the real thing. Islam has just as much evidence to support that Mohammad was the true prophet of god, and if two hypotheses have equal evidence, how do we choose one over the other? But at the end of the day, I don't really care if Jesus was real or not - it doesn't affect me at all. The message in the New Testament (which I assume only Christians use) seems to be a nice message to treat people well and do nice things. But I try to do that anyway without needing a god to try to influence me one way or the other. People say the historical evidence for Jesus' existence is overwhelming, and that might be true, but I honestly just don't care if he ever existed or not.
When Jesus claimed to be God's Son, it was not meant as a metaphor for a 'Close' relationship with God.
Here are just a few examples of Jesus claiming to be God.
1.) Mark 2:1-12--Jesus forgives the Sins of a paralytic, which is something only God Himself can do. Then, to authenticate His claim, He demonstrated His power by healing the paralytic.
2.) During Christ's trial, the chief priests asked Him point blank, "Tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God." And He said,
"I am." (Mark 14:60-62) "Yes, it is as you say." (Matt. 26: 63-65) "You are right in saying I am." (Luke 22:67-70)
3.) In Exodus 3, where Moses encounters God in the burning bush. God tells Moses that he is the one He has chosen to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. Moses says to God, "Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me 'What is His name?' Then what shall I tell them?" God replies to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: 'I AM has sent me to you.'" God has said that His own name, His personal name, is "I AM."
Now...
a) John 8:56-58. Jesus is talking to the unbelieving Jews. "Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing My day; he saw it and was glad." "You are not yet 50 years old," they said to Him, "and you have seen Abraham?" "I tell you the truth," Jesus announced, "before Abraham was, I AM!" Jesus was the great I AM from before the beginning of time; He existed before Abraham ever was. He is claiming here to be the I AM of the Old Testament. Verse 59 says the Jews picked up stones to stone Him, but the Lord Jesus slipped away. The reason they wanted to stone Him was because stoning was the death penalty for blasphemy. He was claiming to be Yahweh--Jehovah--Almighty God--I AM. (Of course, it wasn't blasphemy when Christ claimed to be who He truly was!)
b) John 8:24. "I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I AM, you will indeed die in your sins." In your Bible, it may read "if you do not believe that I am the one I claim to be...." The extra words are supplied by the editors; they're not in the original text. If you're familiar with Exodus 3 you don't need the extra words for it to make grammatical sense. The Lord Jesus is again claiming to be God.
c) John 18:4. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas and some priests and soldiers are about to take Jesus prisoner. "Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to Him, went out and asked them, 'Who is it that you want?' 'Jesus of Nazareth,' they replied. 'I AM,' Jesus said. When He said, 'I AM,' they drew back and fell to the ground." (Again, in your Bible the editors may have supplied "I am [he]" to make it grammatically correct. The Greek just says, "I AM."
The force of Jesus' claim to be Yahweh (I AM) was so powerful that it literally knocked the arresting officers and the Jewish priests off their feet!
I don't believe that Mohammad and Jesus have the same amount of evidence supporting them.
For one; Islam is the youngest of the three monotheistic world religions (with Judaism and Christianity). Judaism has been around since the beginning of Mankind, and people who Follow Jesus are essentially following Judaism through to completion. (Judaism claims that a savior will come and set the captives free. They see the savior as someone who will come and conquer and force their kingdom by war and judgement. When Jesus showed up; He didn't not match their expectations so they rejected Him)
Dan, You're certainly very knowledgeable, and you support your claims really well. It seems the information I got about the metaphorical statements of Jesus aren't as legitimate as I though they were. As far as evidence goes, I don't the length of time a religion has existed as a sound way of analyzing that religion. Mohammed's existence, since he was alive in like the 7th or 8th century (I think) seems like it would be easier to prove that Jesus'. From what I understand most of the gospels in the new testament were written well after Jesus died. Also the selection of which books to put into the bible seems pretty selectively biased - completely ignoring the earliest Christians - the Gnostics.
Moegreche, you have to realise that the Bible is far more credible that the Coran, from my point of view at any rate: the Coran was written by a single man who was influenced by different "friends" during the writing period; you should look for all the contradictions you can find in it (and there are many); On the contrary, the Bible was written accross a very long period of time and by many different authors and there are no contradictions!! They all point to the same evidence! Also, the gospels were written during the lifetime of jesus's disciples, and they didn't live for long after jesus' death (30 years or so, I guess) so they weren't written well after his death (as you had said)
I agree that the Bible is a reliable source, even if solely used as a historical document.
I've heard people claim that the bible was written to far after the Life and Death of Jesus to be accurate. When looking @ the Bible as a history book, you will notice that it records important events for the early church.
The most cataclysmic event of the first century was the First Roman-Jewish War (aka âthe Great Revoltâ), which lasted from 66 to 73 AD. One of the tragic episodes of this war was the destruction of The Temple in 70 AD.
None of the Gospels (or Acts) mention this in their writings, which gives very strong evidence that these books were written between 34 and 65 AD, or approximately 30 years after the Life of Jesus. When compared to other historical writings, the bible stands alone.
Fair enough. What is your opinion of the so-called "Lost Books" of the bible? I've read some of these that tell about Jesus' adolescence and coming to grips with the sacrifice he was here to make. I think it makes for a terrific story, but these books aren't included in the bible. Some scholars say it's because they cannot be credibly traced, but looking back at events like the Council of Nicea (not sure on the spelling), it is unclear at best as to how they would trace back the books that were included to determine their reliability. Hmm, I just realized we've gotten way off topic, but at least I'm learning quite a bit.
Here are some comparisons of other historical documents. (These documents are considered true and accepted by the majority of scholars)
Aristotle Time of Writing: 384 - 322 BC Earliest Copy we have 1,100 AD Time Span 1,400 Years # of Copies = 5
Pliny (Ancient Historian) Time of Writing: AD 61 - 113 Earliest Copy we have 850 AD Time Span 750 Years # of Copies = 7
Here are the statistics for the New Testament Writings. Time Written: AD 35-70 Earliest Copy we have 140 AD Time Span 70 Years # of Copies = Over 24,000
I think these numbers show that the bible we have today, is a historically accurate document that can be trusted.
