Is it entirely unnecessary and insulting to inform people...

[William]

Is it entirely unnecessary and insulting to inform people...That they are evil in the sight of GOD and bound for hell?

As a human being, how is such theology acceptable and a good and reasonable thing to be stating or even implying of others, on a debate forum or even in day to day life?

Are people right to be able to take a stand against such theology and call it out for being dated, dark, based upon information from dark ages, based in ignorance and evil of intent?

What gives individuals the right to say such things about others?

Is it a form of abuse?

Should others have to take that kind of abuse about their persons without protesting it?

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 68 by PinSeeker]

Aside from that, agreed. Men killed His Son. We all did. But He did all this for us despite that. Because he SO LOVED the world (us).

Pin, why do you say "We all did [killed his son]" when it is demonstrably not true? Jesus's death happened 2,000 years ago. You didn't kill. I didn't kill. My parents didn't kill him. Neither did yours.
Why are you blaming all of mankind for the act of killing Jesus?

[Elijah John]

[Replying to post 68 by PinSeeker]

Aside from that, agreed. Men killed His Son. We all did. But He did all this for us despite that. Because he SO LOVED the world (us).

Pin, why do you say "We all did [killed his son]" when it is demonstrably not true? Jesus's death happened 2,000 years ago. You didn't kill. I didn't kill. My parents didn't kill him. Neither did yours.
Why are you blaming all of mankind for the act of killing Jesus?

That's like saying "we all killed JFK, or Martin Luther King". or "Society killed them". Hyperbole doesn't always convey a deeper, poetic truth. Sometimes it's simply a fallacious exaggeration.

[For_The_Kingdom]

What sort of love requires a father to have his son tortured and killed before he can offer people forgiveness for their failings? The whole premise is devoid of love. True, unconditional love would not involve such barbarity.

Like the comedian Hannibal Buress said, "To me, that sounds like a bad parent" LOL. Do you feel that way as well? Sorry you feel that way.

First of all, you (and those who think like you) are presenting this picture of Jesus scratching, clawing, begging, and pleading to the Father "Nooooo, I don't want to goooo...I don't want to die on the cross for the sins of mankindddd...Nooo, don't make me do itttttt!!!!"

And the Father ignoring the pleads: "Do as you are told, son".

That is the way you are depicting it. However, that is not the way the Bible depicts it, as Phil 2:5-9 indicates..

5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

6 Who, being in very nature[a] God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!

So as we can see, this was something that Jesus wanted to do, not something that was forced upon him by his "Father". And if that isn't good enough for you, Jesus himself stated..

John 15:13 "Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends".

Now, I had mentioned the John 15:13 scripture to you in the earlier post, so that you can see that the sacrificial atonement was something that the Father/Son agreed upon (in comparison with John 3:16 that I also mentioned), but your obvious appeal to emotions was so high that you wasn't able to catch it.

So, like I said; the sacrificial atonement was was a dual act of love, on both the Father and the Son's part. Believers acknowledge this..and if you can't acknowledge this as an act of love, then Christianity will continue to not be for you.

[marco]

First of all, you (and those who think like you) are presenting this picture of Jesus scratching, clawing, begging, and pleading to the Father "Nooooo, I don't want to goooo...I don't want to die on the cross for the sins of mankindddd...Nooo, don't make me do itttttt!!!!"

I know of no one who presents the argument of an unwilling Christ. There is no need to invent absurdities when we already have them in the text:

(a) God GAVE his only begotten (if colluding) "son" to be crucified and this is called LOVE.

(b) The deed was done as a kind of human sacrifice, to make up for the thefts of automobiles, the infidelities of married couples, the short-changing of customers, the coveting of particularly nice donkeys and so on. It would be a good exercise to find something sillier than this theory.


(c) By dying and not really dying Christ destroyed death although everything associated with human death remained exactly as it was.


If we bury our heads deep in the sand of metaphor we might....might....make sense of the senseless.

[ttruscott]

The Bible is clear that a serpent, created by God, seduced an unwitting couple who had no knowledge of good and evil. Satan was not involved. While this was happening, God was curiously absent.

The orthodox interpretation of this story is indeed clear but it leads to such bad theology that I cannot countenance it with any understanding. IF they are newly created innocents then GOD's absence is NOT a curiosity, it is a blatant failure destroying credibility in HIS GODliness! And there are half a dozen clues they were not innocent but already sinners, knowing that GOD called them sinners but they were unashamed of their sinful choices, thinking GOD was wrong in HIS judgement.

The fact that GOD created the serpent does not imply let alone prove that HE created the serpent's evil intentions so it is meaningless in this context except as an aspersion.

[marco]

[Replying to post 71 by marco]

From this theology we read hate into love; bitterness into sacrifice; and we even see death as life. What a work of art is man!

Maybe it is just some form of poetic licence?

That's the best and perhaps the only way to make sense of the theology. John shoots someone so we kill James. Dad gets upset with someone so has his boy killed to make up. No one after Christ's pantomimic act has survived death but people insist that Christ destroyed death. Was Christ a good poet, then?

[Elijah John]

[Replying to post 71 by marco]

From this theology we read hate into love; bitterness into sacrifice; and we even see death as life. What a work of art is man!

Maybe it is just some form of poetic licence?

That's the best and perhaps the only way to make sense of the theology. John shoots someone so we kill James. Dad gets upset with someone so has his boy killed to make up. No one after Christ's pantomimic act has survived death but people insist that Christ destroyed death. Was Christ a good poet, then?

Poetry in theology is one thing. I doubt that NT theology was intended that way. Paul, after all, seemed to have believed in a literal Adam, Jesus, in a literal Noah.

That literal Adam is the foundation for Paul's whole blood-atonement theology.

Moving on to the ethical teachings of Jesus. It really seems that Jesus was a poet with regard to his teachings. Else devout Christians would go about plucking out eyes, chopping off hands, literally hating their parents, drinking poison, and playing with poisonous snakes. Oh wait...that last one, oh well.

Does the constant use of hyperbole in and of itself make one a poet?

[ttruscott]

Yeah, we've talked about this before. Yes, Adam fell, and because he is the federal Head of the human race, all men, in Adam, fell. All are in need of redemption.

This theory of our becoming sinful makes GOD the creator of sinners which should cause great cognitive dissonance among the churches but doesn't.

GOD supposedly created Adam and Eve innocent so why should we believe HE created the rest of HIS Bride as disgustingly evil people whose righteousness is a filthy rags? This contradict too much of the rest of scripture to be given any credence at all.

If Adam is the federal headship of anything, he is the federal head of our death, uniting all elect sinners in his death so that Christ need only die once to cover us all and not once for each of us but applying that to our sinfulness was the failure of the sinners who became the orthodox.

[For_The_Kingdom]

I know of no one who presents the argument of an unwilling Christ. There is no need to invent absurdities when we already have them in the text:

Hey marco, that was the implication..or did you not read what I was responding to?

(a) God GAVE his only begotten (if colluding) "son" to be crucified and this is called LOVE.

Then I guess we have two different depictions of what "love" means and entails.

(b) The deed was done as a kind of human sacrifice, to make up for the thefts of automobiles, the infidelities of married couples, the short-changing of customers, the coveting of particularly nice donkeys and so on. It would be a good exercise to find something sillier than this theory.

The idea is; "this (Jesus' suffering) should be you (us)". Well, if it should be me, I'd rather be thankful for the grace/mercy of the "judge" for offering me a way out, and ensure myself that I won't put myself in a situation where it WOULD be me.

(c) By dying and not really dying Christ destroyed death although everything associated with human death remained exactly as it was.

But mankind's eternal fate didn't remain exactly as it was. So, there was a change there.

If we bury our heads deep in the sand of metaphor we might....might....make sense of the senseless.

Naturalists make sense of the senseless every day, when they wake up with the belief that chaos turned into order, life came from nonlife, a universe either came from nothing, or was always here....and also that consciousness came from unconsciousness.

Talk about senseless.

[marco]

Then I guess we have two different depictions of what "love" means and entails.

Apparently we have. I can go along with Paul's poetic definition. Introducing killing and calling it love reminds me of what Tacitus said of the Roman conquest of Britain: They create a wilderness and call it peace. So here they create savagery and call it love. Yes, my understanding of love differs from yours and mine is correct.

The idea is; "this (Jesus' suffering) should be you (us)". Well, if it should be me, I'd rather be thankful for the grace/mercy of the "judge" for offering me a way out, and ensure myself that I won't put myself in a situation where it WOULD be me.

I happily admit to complete ignorance of what might be meant here. It reminds me of my earliest efforts to penetrate the meaning of a Sumerian text.

But mankind's eternal fate didn't remain exactly as it was. So, there was a change there.

Ah, yes - that invisible theoretical shift that nobody noticed. People stubbornly continued to die and get buried. Tsk tsk.

Naturalists make sense of the senseless every day, when they wake up with the belief that chaos turned into order, life came from nonlife, a universe either came from nothing, or was always here....and also that consciousness came from unconsciousness.

Talk about senseless.

You are arguing that a second wrong nullifies the first, rather than defending against the charge of senselessness. What naturalists might eat for breakfast is not my concern.