Quote:
Originally Posted by Jito463
 
How can someone possibly convince a person they're wrong, when they flat out refuse to accept the Word of God as the final authority?
I fear for your soul, Antipas. You've obviously allowed yourself to become deceived by the vain traditions of this world. Jesus is the only way to God. Period, full stop, end of story. If you fail to recognize and accept this, you'll find out personally that your beliefs have only led you to hell. |
I am aware of many mythological expressions, misinterpretations, and contradictions in the Bible. While I believe that the Bible is "inspired", I do not set it on a pedestal of being inerrant or even complete. I see placing the Bible on such a pedestal as being close to idolatry. The only thing that is inerrant and without flaw is God himself. Obviously the Bible can't be the test of what is "Christian". After all, there are over 41,000 denominations of Christianity and even more interpretations of various doctrines. So, even if we were to say that the Bible is inerrant, obviously the inerrant text isn't easily understood. I settle with accepting the Bible as an inspired work filled with human limitations that are the natural outcome of truth being revealed to flawed human filters. I think this is by design. If the Bible were absolutely perfect.... we'd worship it. Acknowledging the Bible's flaws and limitations keeps us looking Godward for our ultimate salvation instead of gazing into a dusty book rife with errors and inconsistencies that barely anyone understands. Believers in it squabble over almost daily. Those who believe in the Bible's inerrancy seem to never agree on it anyway. They are a mess of confusion and debate. Any observer can only walk away shaking their head hoping Bible believers find God.
I do accept Jesus as being God incarnate. I accept Christ's work and teaching. However, I also believe that this same God has been manifest throughout history in various cultures and is the Source behind the core of most religions today. In other words, my Jesus is so much bigger than the small sectarian Jesus of one denomination of Christianity.
If over 41,000 divisions can exist within Christianity alone due to limited and imperfect human understandings, imagine the divisions and misunderstandings that could exist between vastly different cultures, languages, and geographic regions of the world. If such apparent differences can exist within one religion based on a single book, what apparent differences can be expected regarding a God who has spoken to the entire human race in various manners, expressions and manifestations?
It's almost like we're frightened little monkeys warning of the dangers and evils of other tribes that are just as afraid of us and think we are just as dangerous and evil. We have to evolve. We have to expand our understanding to see the greater reality.
I see it like this, there are five blind men who discover an elephant. Since the men have never encountered an elephant, they grope about, seeking to understand and describe this new phenomenon. One grasps the trunk and concludes it is a snake. Another explores one of the elephant's legs and describes it as a tree. A third finds the elephant's tail and announces that it is a rope. And the fourth blind man, after discovering the elephant's side, concludes that it is, after all, a wall. The fifth, after discovering his part of the elephant, announces that it must be two coconuts in a leather bag! LOL!
Each in his blindness is describing the same thing: an elephant. Yet each describes the same thing in a radically different way.
This is how we are with God. Each civilization has encountered God and experienced him in such a manner that is so radically different from how other civilizations have experienced him. And so we argue over rather God is like a snake, or a tree, or a rope, or a wall. We hear various revelations concerning the specific questions we have and argue over the answers we've each received. For example, one culture that has never had any interest in past lives hasn't received any revelation concerning them. Yet another has had interest and questions concerning this phenomena and has therefore received much revelation on it. Now the two argue it out and even wage war! Over what? A simple self-centered misunderstanding. We are to love others as ourselves because God wants us to realize that we're not all that different. God wants us to love our enemies because in truth, we have no enemies. Humanity is a single family seeking the light of God and experiencing that light in innumerable ways. We would do well to share what we have all gained from God, would we not?
Could I be mistaken? Of course! No one is perfect and no one has a perfect understanding about the eternal things of God. Would God condemn me to an eternal blazing and fiery Hell forever without any hope of escape or reconciliation because I simply wanted to honor what I thought might be Him in action elsewhere? Really? How insecure could a deity be? lol
If mistaken, I would expect to be laughed at by God, but condemned to flames forever? I don't see it. Such is an insult to the high character, power, wisdom, love, holiness, and compassion of an all knowing, all powerful, omnipresent deity.
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