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Does God exist?
- Thread starter Nebulous
- Start date
Does anything exist? *shrugs* I mean all you guys exist without me ever seeing you. For all I know one of you could be an advanced software experiment and not a person at all :> and I wouldn't know it.
I can't imagine a world without a god. Just like I can't imagine life without a soul.
I can't imagine a world without a god. Just like I can't imagine life without a soul.
Perfectly said!! You basically just posted everything I was going to post.Smooth said:
( In that case; Yes I believe in God ) I WOULD post more but I am on my phone right now.
How did a thread questioning the existence of a Supreme Being turn into a "let's bash Christians" spleen venting as evidenced by Beowolf's post?
If you wish to discus the OP, I'm game.
If you want to simply do a hatchet job on believers of any and all religions, have a good time, I'll exit stage right.
If you wish to discus the OP, I'm game.
If you want to simply do a hatchet job on believers of any and all religions, have a good time, I'll exit stage right.
I believe in a higher power. Don't know if I would call it 'God' but an overarching Cosmic Force that is conceptually the same.
Sort of a false dilemma. Philosophically, should we attach such a humanistic approach of morality to a supposedly supreme being? I've wondered the same myself. To humor the choices: I find the "impotent" label to be a self-defeating paradox that attempts to divorce the supreme from the supreme being. That power is not exercised is not an indicator of its nonexistence (the idea of free will comes to mind). "Evil" is a label that is highly based in perception. (Are natural disasters, for example, evil forces?). That leaves us with "imaginary" which, as we see, is open to debate.
beowulf said:
Sort of a false dilemma. Philosophically, should we attach such a humanistic approach of morality to a supposedly supreme being? I've wondered the same myself. To humor the choices: I find the "impotent" label to be a self-defeating paradox that attempts to divorce the supreme from the supreme being. That power is not exercised is not an indicator of its nonexistence (the idea of free will comes to mind). "Evil" is a label that is highly based in perception. (Are natural disasters, for example, evil forces?). That leaves us with "imaginary" which, as we see, is open to debate.
Personally, no. I believe there is too much wrong in the world for a supposedly caring and all-powerful deity to truly exist. I can live just fine without a god. Maybe when I die I'll be wrong, and I'll have to confront whatever deity is up, or down, there. If that happens, so be it. I'm not planning on changing the way I live to please something that potentially doesn't exist.
Khalessi
Guest
LegendHidden said:Perfectly said!! You basically just posted everything I was going to post.Smooth said:
I agree entirely. Amazing post Smooth.
As usual, you are right dear lady.
And, I suppose my role as the board's resident Metaphysicist means I should be in this thread as well.
And your post about the reality of the Higher Power is spot on.
You can even call it the Universe Itself, and say that the sum total of all of Existence IS conscious, self aware, and Alive, and therefore, god. We can come back to that side of Spiritual Cosmology and Quantum Consciousness as we go.
So, I'll begin here, and, hopefully, get through most of it before... well, you know.
It is odd that, for the most part, it is only modern man who has seen his way clear to declare that there is no god. And, in fact, that in some nations, belief in No God is the official State Religion. I cite North Korea, The PRC, Romania, and so on.
Every ancient culture you can find believed that not only there WAS a Supreme Being, that they were a special creation of said being.
Even the Pre-Contact North American Indians (Native Americans/first peoples/whatever) believed in One God, the Great Spirit. Yes, those to their south were predominately polytheists with a whole softball team of gods. But in the North, they had One Great Spirit.
OK, I'm in.
Let's go.
And, I suppose my role as the board's resident Metaphysicist means I should be in this thread as well.
And your post about the reality of the Higher Power is spot on.
You can even call it the Universe Itself, and say that the sum total of all of Existence IS conscious, self aware, and Alive, and therefore, god. We can come back to that side of Spiritual Cosmology and Quantum Consciousness as we go.
So, I'll begin here, and, hopefully, get through most of it before... well, you know.
It is odd that, for the most part, it is only modern man who has seen his way clear to declare that there is no god. And, in fact, that in some nations, belief in No God is the official State Religion. I cite North Korea, The PRC, Romania, and so on.
Every ancient culture you can find believed that not only there WAS a Supreme Being, that they were a special creation of said being.
Even the Pre-Contact North American Indians (Native Americans/first peoples/whatever) believed in One God, the Great Spirit. Yes, those to their south were predominately polytheists with a whole softball team of gods. But in the North, they had One Great Spirit.
OK, I'm in.
Let's go.
What I find missing is almost no mention of Jesus in all of this. My beliefs are that Jesus died on the cross for my sins and through my repentance or turning from sin and by putting my full faith in Him is what gives me salvation from my wickedness. It's not so apparent to people who know me here because I was saved not long before I got into forums.
The Bible is the word of God and with it tells us the story of God's involvement in the life of man and how wicked we are and how glorious He is. It shows how a Christian is to live as well as show the promises God made to those who believe and to those who don't. Having faith means trusting in those promises because they were fulfilled in the past and will be fulfilled in the present.
I will say I find it rather curious that the atheist in this discussion decided to use already made images of quotes he likely never written himself while atheists in general make the charge to think for yourself while he lets others do the thinking for him.
This world is as it is because of sin and has slowly fallen apart because we refused and continue to refuse to obey God and his laws. The more we disobey and rebel against him the worst our lives will become till we either turn to him and repent or end up dead where we face judgement by God for the lives we lived.
It's not enough for me to just say He exists because even the devil and his angels believe that and they tremble in His presence. I experienced far too much to ever doubt His existence. The reason God doesn't answer all prayers in the way you want them is because he sees our world far differently for he sees all both in this present moment and for all time.
The Bible is the word of God and with it tells us the story of God's involvement in the life of man and how wicked we are and how glorious He is. It shows how a Christian is to live as well as show the promises God made to those who believe and to those who don't. Having faith means trusting in those promises because they were fulfilled in the past and will be fulfilled in the present.
I will say I find it rather curious that the atheist in this discussion decided to use already made images of quotes he likely never written himself while atheists in general make the charge to think for yourself while he lets others do the thinking for him.
This world is as it is because of sin and has slowly fallen apart because we refused and continue to refuse to obey God and his laws. The more we disobey and rebel against him the worst our lives will become till we either turn to him and repent or end up dead where we face judgement by God for the lives we lived.
It's not enough for me to just say He exists because even the devil and his angels believe that and they tremble in His presence. I experienced far too much to ever doubt His existence. The reason God doesn't answer all prayers in the way you want them is because he sees our world far differently for he sees all both in this present moment and for all time.
One of my favorite biblical passages:
(Isaiah 45:7, KJV)--"I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things."
This is just my take on it, but perhaps sin is a necessary 'evil.' Alpha/omega, good/evil, vice/virtue just become dualistic parts of one balancing act. It shouldn't make sense for an omniscient being to be unable to foresee the fall of creation. It begs the question as to whether sin was part of the plan or that God introduced sin or simply made no attempt to stop its inception. Free will requires choices and self-determination. No sin means no choice between right and wrong (as only 'right' exists). Further, power does not always have to be exercised. (Doing so can rob us of the opportunity to exercise our own free will). Hence, it's not obligatory for a supreme being to interfere in and guide the actions of "mere mortals." There's also this theory I read somewhere that presupposes that God created us and left us to our own devices. Sort of like a human thought experiment to see if we could forge our own destinies.
(Isaiah 45:7, KJV)--"I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things."
This is just my take on it, but perhaps sin is a necessary 'evil.' Alpha/omega, good/evil, vice/virtue just become dualistic parts of one balancing act. It shouldn't make sense for an omniscient being to be unable to foresee the fall of creation. It begs the question as to whether sin was part of the plan or that God introduced sin or simply made no attempt to stop its inception. Free will requires choices and self-determination. No sin means no choice between right and wrong (as only 'right' exists). Further, power does not always have to be exercised. (Doing so can rob us of the opportunity to exercise our own free will). Hence, it's not obligatory for a supreme being to interfere in and guide the actions of "mere mortals." There's also this theory I read somewhere that presupposes that God created us and left us to our own devices. Sort of like a human thought experiment to see if we could forge our own destinies.
Yes I agree with you as well; but the reason I didn't say anything about Jesus is because the thread said do you believe in God; not the son of God, but either way I still believe that God sent his only son (Jesus) here to pay for our sins, and to make sure that we believed in him and his father, and to teach us the ways how to live a righteous life the way God wants us to live. So Yes I agree with you 100%Bluezone777 said:
Crusader said:
Religion is the primary cause of war or is it the inability of some people to coexist? How do you determine the true intentions of war?
There are people who use religion to hurt or control others and there are those whose religiosity motivates them to charity and altruism. This is a question that has more to do with the role of religion in the world than the existence of a higher power.
God is not a religious God #1.Crusader said:
Second you cannot expect God to come to the rescue for everything that goes on this earth.How do you expect him to come and save you if you don't believe in him how you suppose to believe in him?
