Posts by humbled

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

True, the WT always had an answer. Everyone gets a chance (except stillborn babies--Non-breather,don't you know). Mostly.

The trouble with a liar is you can't trust a thing they say--even if they are telling you something you like.

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

When I was a Christian theist I believed that Paul had the answer --the sacred secret in 1Cor.2 explained that it had been hidden all the time up to Jesus' arrival.

But it was only warmed over hash.

Now when trouble comes we have the horizen only exended further than ever. The sacred secret/wisdom of God, Paul says, is in Christ crucified. That is what opens the door to glory.

Suffering and death still and an unseen restitution. Paul is quick to say that it is for a select few.

The tsunami killed people indesciminately. they only get to taste wrath-- not mercy, not love.

The sacred secret is still a secret--I'm waiting for a better story.

31

in case i didn't mention it...i was born into the disgusting cult of the watchtower(r).. i left when i was as old as 50 and went to a baptist church, then when i moved house to anglican and finally to a pentecostal church.. i now do not believe in 'god' of any variety.

i do not believe because i see no obvious evidence for a 'god' and only see what people have made of 'god' in their delusions.. ok. so, the question: 'what if you're wrong?'.

well, i might be wrong about a lot but if qi and mythbusters taught me anything it's not to be so gullible mcfly!

humbled

You bet, galaxie,

1 Cor. 13:13--"Now abideth these three-faith, hope, love. But the greatest of these is love..."

The whole chapter is beautiful.

Really--"AMEN to love!"

122

Why doesn't god do anything tangible now?

by punkofnice in

i was always told that god did loads of stuff that was evidence of his existance.

ususally very brutal things too (b#st@rd).. jesus walked on water and raised the dead we are told.. it seems to me also that the older the story, the more exaggerated it is...y'know...talking snake......global flood.. there are those that claim god speaks to them now and they alone 'know' it.

(cuckoo!!!).

humbled

Punky, I like your version of fatherhood better than the OT god's. I think the OT god let Jesus down same as us.

31

Once 'saved' always 'saved'.

by punkofnice in

in case i didn't mention it...i was born into the disgusting cult of the watchtower(r).. i left when i was as old as 50 and went to a baptist church, then when i moved house to anglican and finally to a pentecostal church.. i now do not believe in 'god' of any variety.

i do not believe because i see no obvious evidence for a 'god' and only see what people have made of 'god' in their delusions.. ok. so, the question: 'what if you're wrong?'.

well, i might be wrong about a lot but if qi and mythbusters taught me anything it's not to be so gullible mcfly!

humbled

Use a canon of scriptures that jews and christian have tweezed and teased into shape, then lawyered into layers of meaning and you have a church version of salvation.

The early church(not early Jesus followers) ignored the "heretical" gospels that cast salvation and jesus as pointing out that love---not faith---is preeminent. Love is the salvation that transcends this world. Heaven is not the reward.

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

Sure, everyone knows what's right and wrong. It's just that most of us tend to flinch or run under fire in the real world. People often don't behave well when put to the test.

I have no brief for religion teaching morals. In fact, the very notion of being "saved" in church parlance is more to do with being saved from having to actually be loving and just to get heaven's reward.

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

Re words:The Christians sprouted from Judaism. the Jews evolved a god who was el shaddai, almighty--

Christians cannot now define god as less than Almighty.

T he grandiosity of the claim to this wealth of power has had to grow larger and larger with the centuries. the bankroll of power has to cover the armies, legions and continents of suffering and dead(but only the ones who knew him, only the faithful) that He is supposed to restore.

The Christ that has been conjured out of Jesus the carpenter has to be resurrected in power and majesty as a vital part of the sacred secret--"You all have to wait a little while longer for--are you ready???!!!--an INVISIBLE RESTITUTION. In a twinkling of an eye."

My point--Christian theism has a God that cannot be bothered with love anymore. Power is more neccesary in the definition. When he restores, resurrects--- then you get to feel the love--not until.

Sorry to ramble. Trying this stuff out. It seems like one could throw the word GOD out if he isn't there. but what is left seems to be a sense, a sense that love does make life coherent. Where does that come from--And is there a word I don't know for that?

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

"Surely living up to an invisible ideal can be helpful. Even if it is impotent against disaster. Even if it is imaginary."--Jgnat

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

Cofty, I enjoyed looking up "parimonious". But you must have meant it would be LESS not MORE tight-fisted of me to cashier the idea of god than to invent a weak one.

Here is my problem with the discussion--the word,the definition of "god".

Subtract POWER from GOD's qualities there may not be anything left of GOD. I just don't know what to call it--Zeus, Venus, Mars?

those names are taken and don't apply anyway. Normally a word has a fixed orbit in conversation--that's how we communicate--but as this thread shows, in striving to define the character of Christian theism words are delicate/difficult to choose. Look in a dictionary and see the varied meanings behind a single word: god, much less the 2-word "Christian Theism"

2596

The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

by cofty in

yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

humbled

It's not a system, simon. It's a struggle.

I can't know the past--the god stories-- any more than you. I know we want fair play. We try to figure out how to act with only half knowledge.

Cofty asked a while back: what's the point of an impotent god?

As though someone knew what a god was--I don't. And if I knew, I sure don't get to pick what kind I want.

If there were such a thing as god, could it be something that draws us to care about suffering and injustice? I wonder. I cannot in any way believe there is a god who has both love AND power. The suffering and death I've seen and heard of has had no help.

I do believe mankind gets swept up in trying to explain things--My post above shows that. I did write a thought that has only recently crossed my mind. I'm exploring. I have said often enough on this thread how valuable this conversation could be. You are the one who opened this forum for us to recover and support one another. And, thank you, I think I have what I need. This thread has done good for me and I gave really all I had.

It is not a belief "system"

I can never know the past any more than you can. But I can take the best and most loving things I hear from whatever flawed sources there are to help me live and give to others.

I know there is no Big "G" god. People might find a name for a thing we cannt see that holds us to hate certain hurts and wrongs to others. And maybe there's nothing there at all.

Maybe we people actually have the power ourselves to make love prevail.

If so we've wasted a long time waiting on god to do it.

So thanks for the forum. But take care that the climate doesn't get so fierce that people aren't able to explore, to share their true thoughts.

Good night.