Why is God speaking in riddles? (page 3)

cofty

Jesus' style was enigmatic.

You can ponder about deeper meanings as christians have done for 2,000 years, or you can accept the uncomfortable truth that it is actually vacuous.

The Emperor is bollock naked.

Ding

Bible parables generally have one main point such as, "Practice what you preach" or "Be ready for Jesus to return at any time."

The WT, however, reads its own speculation into the text and tries to make everything stand for something else. In the Luke 16 story of the rich man and Lazarus, for example, the WT has Abraham represent Jehovah, Lazarus a JW, and so on. The WT thereby injects itself into the Bible and convinces JWs that the GB are Bible scholars. JWs conclude that no one can understand the Bible without the GB to explain it all.

Once they accept that premise, the Bible becomes a total mystery and the JW turns over all his thinking to a small group of men he can't even name.

return of parakeet

Sosoconfused: " WHY WOULD GOD WANT TO DO THIS INSTEAD OF JUST TELLING PEOPLE WHAT HE WANTS?"

Adam -- direct communication with God, talking snake, angels with swords.

Noah -- direct communication with God.

Abraham -- direct communication with God.'

Lot -- visits from angels, wife turns to salt.

Moses -- burning bush, saw and heard God, received stone tablets carved by God.

Apostles and others -- saw a bunch of miracles including resurrections of the dead.

What do we get? Nada, zip, nothing at all. But we're supposed to believe in God based on stuff that supposedly happened thousands of years ago.

Thanks for nothing, God.

Kosonen

I think speaking in parabels is an excellent way of preaching. I have tried to explain truths in very cIear terms but people have shown very little interest. l am amazed. So I have contemplated to start preaching mostly with parabels just as Jesus did. And if some from the audience want to know better then they will come with sincere questions.

prologos

Kosonen, yeah but now seaker(s) want logical answers, scientific stuff, verifyable, replicable facts, observations, not stories, not preaching, thats over.

ablebodiedman

This is why there are so many difficult to understand riddles and symbolgies in the Bible:

Matthew 4:5-7

Then the Devil took him along into the holy city, and he stationed him upon the battlement of the temple 6 and said to him: "If you are a son of God, hurl yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will give his angels a charge concerning you, and they will carry you on their hands, that you may at no time strike your foot against a stone.’" 7 Jesus said to him: "Again it is written, ‘You must not put Jehovah your God to the test.’"

It only started to become apparent to the Apostles some time after Jesus Christs death and resurrection that everything happened exactly the way the old testament "riddles" said it would happen.

Jesus Christ was crucified because Satan arranged the circumstances for this to happen.

If Satan had understood then he would not have done what he did.

In this present time that we are living in, the Bible says that Satan would mislead the entire inhabited earth.

If God simply came out and explained in plain terms how Satan would do this then Satan would read the bible and then choose some other way for his deception.

The symbology and mystery however, help us understand exactly how Satan would mislead us.

The reason the Bible is written in a mysterious way is to help us ....... and not Satan.

abe

GLTirebiter

The parables are fables, moral teaching in the form of fictional stories. By removing the narrative from the present time, place and persons, they allow us to listen to unpleasant truths about ourselves.

Kosonen

Prologos,

The kind of seekers you mention are maybe not of the right kind. May be they are too demanding just as the Jews who required signs from heaven to put faith in Jesus. But Jesus already had given enough miracles as signs.

If you want to believe why don't you pray to God for more faith? That would solve your problem.

'

Black Man

Great thread!!

prologos

Kosonen, I am in awe what the creator has presented to us.

I have read and preached, taught the stories of the bible much of my adult life, mostly full time. note:

STORIES of the bible. The miracles of Jesus are just stories written DECADES after the fact.

My parents. grandparents also read to me Hansel and Gretel, Little red riding hood, Snow white and the seven dwarfs.

STORIES ALL. religious credulity is pathetic.

Of course preachers are not looking for the Einsteins of this world, they are looking for the "right kind"-your words.

the kind that believes in talking snakes, water above Mt everest, floating axes, walking on water, water into wine, wine into blood.

teaching the bible to my kids: yes, great literature, some truism. helps to understand JW mentality, doctrinal dilemmas.

Prayer, yes, always thankful to the misterious, creator that will yet speak truth to us,-- scientificly.,

as he already has, and we can test it, use it and make it work.

Why is God speaking in riddles?

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