To all of the Christians out there....

[Kematter]

"If your livin? like there ain?t no God,

you shore as Hell better be right."

Donny Ray Ford & The Widowmakers

[Erica S. Is A Man]

Who are you SO ALIVE? You've got some brains...

Hey Recovering Punker, you spend so much time trying to use logic in undermining evolutionary theory, yet you are willing to believe that a creator is the most likely situation based on no empirical evidence at all.

Maybe I'm just not getting a clear message. Do you believe that there is a God? Or not?

Given the present information we have you must admit that there is no way of knowing how we got here. Trying to determine why we are here is particularly difficult because we don't even really know if there is a reason in our being. Based on this information people claiming to have answers to these questions must base them on faith.

Now I must say that as long as you can make your belief system consistant than there is no way I can tell you for certain that you are wrong. Surely your belief system, if successfully defended internally, is a posibility as truth.

I propose to play a game with you. I will pick one number between negative infiniti and positive infiniti. Now we'll deem that number I have in my head as the "right" number.

A being of pure reason and logic will say that there is absolutely no way of knowing what number I am thinking of. It will reason that based on the given information the realm of possibilities are infinite and only a lucky guess would suffice in choosing the right number.

Now you are a human being and I am too. Based on this you might be able to surmise that there is a greater possibility that I would pick either a number close to zero, or a round number such as one million rather than a number with a great many digits and not round. There might even be other cognitive processes you know of that would give greater chance to me picking certain numbers over others.

Obviously you know where I'm going with this. My point is that one thinking they know the number, or the real truth is always at a loss. They can neve know for sure. This is what pisses me off about people fighting about religions or belief systems. It's like people who believe the number is 32 killing people who think the number is 45. Or people who think the number is 7 making laws that put people who think the number is 1,654,717 at a loss. It's nuts. All have the possibility of being wrong. I certainly hope that it's not a God who only rewards people who kiss his ass, not good (yes one can still happen to follow the Christian morals and not be Christian) people who don't.

And to anyone complaining about this being an Social D board...this is a good discussion, if you don't want to be involved than don't be.

PEACE!

[Jesus was BROWN]

Just to clear things up, I have never posted under any other SN here. Actually I have been sitting back enjoying watching you guys debate. It's actually been interesting seeing you guys point of view on evolution/where we came from, etc. Personally I subscribe to idea that the conditions on earth were of the right place/right time nature for life to really flourish here. I do believe in evolution, and I do find it very interesting how many similiarties various forms of life on the planet share. Unfortunately that is not an explination for how things began. I do not believe in any devine intervention though. I think that it just seems to be the nature of the universe for life to exist where it can. The earth simply contained the right set of conditions. That's most of my theory anyway.

Jesus(I think that other SN is Smaug by the way)

[img]graemlins/cry.gif[/img]

[recoveringpunker]

I understand tha tpoint, with the whole infinity number thing...by the way I guess 3.

But we don't have that many IDEAS of where we came from.

I have simply taken a look at what we have at our disposal and I have choosen to believe in a God as the starting point.

FOR ME PERSONALY, faith is more logical then believing in evolution. Evolution does not stay consistant, and yet that seems to be a main selling point. But a belief in God is a belief in God. Granted, many different people have a different idea of what it is God may and may not what from them as a form of service...but God, if real, is exactly the same as He was in the begining as He is now.

To believe in evolution was to believe something completely different 20 years ago, and then have to change when those things were proven wrong (by science) and then to again believe in something that may very be unproven again in 10-20 years.

People kill people because they can't handle being with different people in a land/world of having very little. The MIddle East is a great example of people who have close to nothing. The only they have is Allah or G-d. Give them playstations and MTV, and in 20 years you'd have people who believe in Allah or G-d yet don't feel the need to blow eachother up over a difference of opinion.

If water was the only thing they had, they'd kill eachother over who owns the water. But you wouldn't hear athiest complaining about water being the root of all evil.

You should read or re-read my post on this thread, and you'd have a suprising new opinion over my belief in God and the actions one should take if they truely believe in a God.

[Erica S. Is A Man]

I agree with the playstations and MTV. Good point.

Are you a monotheist or polytheist R. Punker?

Monetheism came to being at a certain point in time. There was a point when monotheism was 20 years old. The way people look at our orgins spiritually is constantly changing, since the beginning of belief systems. Just because evolution has gone through changes does not mean it is discounted as a theory altogether. Just as religions and beliefs have "evolved" the theory of evolution will evolve.

Good discussion anyways.

Peace

[recoveringpunker]

monothiest.

[59Finz]

This is something I read the other day (it's long)I figure, hell you can skip it or read it.
I found it humorous & filled with good info for atheist & those "perfect Christians".
JWB: I think you might like it, this guy is prejudice against most of the Deep South too.

* * * * * * * * *

I wanted to buy diapers.
Just diapers.
It wasn't like I was searching for something rare, like a bald eagle or a literate wrestling fan.
Just diapers.
I desperately needed the diapers because my young daughter had just magically recycled milk into a rainbow of neon colors. As I drove the car, she screamed and cried like a Red Sox fan come World Series time, because she, like a Sox fan, desperately longed for change.
But we were no longer in our sane city of Seattle. Instead, we were in parallel universe of heat and grumpy elderly men poping Viagra out of PEZ dispensers like kids on Halloween. This culture resembles hell but goes by the name of South Florida.
Leaving my daughter and wife in the car, I ran into a large grocery store and combed every aisle without finding a single diaper. Finally, I stopped a young man with a mop and asked him where the diapers were. He said I would have to go to a drug store instead because they did not have any diapers at the grocery store. Amazed both at seeing that some men mop and at the fact that some grocery store don't have diapers, I ran out and sped to a nearby pharmacy. Upon entering, I was delighted to see a row of diapers stacked to the third heaven. Quickly scanning along the row of diapers, I soon found myself at the end without having found the correct size.
They were all adult diapers!
Shaking my head and starting at the floor, I walked to the counter and asked an old women in a red vest if they carried any children's diapers. She said, "No."
No?
As she walked away, I could hear her diaper shuffling. I was so astonished that I nearly needed one off the shelf for myself.
My first thought was that God hated these Floridians and was doubled over in heaven laughing at them. My second thought was that it was only me who hated them and was double over laughing at them.
Why?
Because their universe was foreign to me. I did not-could not-understand a childles community where wealthy eighty-year-old men trade in their eighty-year-old wives for four twenty-year-old girlfriends who change their diapers for them. Upon returning to the car, I told my wife that I was grateful that God had not sent me into ministry in South Florida, because wealthy old people are like kryptonite to me.
While I know that our pluralistic and multicultural society frowns on prejudice, the fact remains that we all have prejudices. The more I read the Bible, the more I am convicted of my dislike of some people and of my arrogant self-righteousness. To illustrate my point, I will share with you some of the people whome I had sinful attitudes against that I had to repent of.
I used to dislike men with ridiculously hairy ears and noses because it looks like they snorted a cat, and I hate cats.
I used to dislike men who wore tank tops, because they reminded me of Detroit, and I don't like Detroit because it is a third-world city where a lot of people wear tank tops.
I used to not like Canada, because it is filled with Canadians, and Canadians are hockey fans, and hockey is dumb because it claims to be a sport but does not even have a ball or a pitcher.
I used to not like people who wear white shoes or socks with dark-colored pants, because they look like they attending a formal event in Canada or Detroit.
I used to dislike minivans, because they are product of a vast feminist conspiracy to inflict a dignity vasectomy upon men.
I used to dislike men who wear pastel colors, because it is impossible to be masculine wearing turquise, sea-foam green, lemon yellow, or peach, and these colors are often worn by boy bands, and I dispise boy bands because they are happy, they dance, and they encourage teenage girls to gather in groups and scream.
I used to not like people who eat lots of food that end in "-itos," listen to country music, or refer to Jesus, Elvis, and Dale Jarrett as the Holy Trinity, so I was prejudiced against most of the Deep South.
I used to not like people who wear a mullet (a haircut prevalent at state fairs, NASCAR races, and wrestling matches that is long in back and short in the front. It is also referred to as the Soccer Rocker, Camaro Cut, Tennessee Mudflap, Kentucky Waterfall, Ape Drape, Achey Breaky Bad Mistakey, Beaver Paddle, Canadian Passport, Crazy Charismatic Coiffure, and the Hockey Hair), because they look like one of the guys in the middle of the evolutionary chart and remind me of my photo in my late-1980's highschool yearbook.
I know this all sounds terrible, and it is. But I'd apprecaite your being honest also and admitting that you too have your list of people whome you dislike. You probably think your list is better than mine because it has rapist, pedophiles, corporate thieves, used-car salesmen, politicians, and evil dictators on it. But the fact that we each have a list means that we are all pretty much the same and are just haggling over the details of who should wear the white hats and who should wear the black. This also helps explain the finger-pointing both in the church and in the culture between blacks and whites, young and old, rich and poor, ugly and beautiful, smart and dumb, urban and rural, self-help and self-acceptance, victims and perpetrators, Republicans and Democrats, Chevy and Ford, Mac and PC, married and single, homosexual and heterosexual, male and female, and educated and uneducated, to name a few. The more we understand the concept of reformission, the more we realize that everyone is unlovely, Jesus loves everyone, and it is his love alone that makes us lovely.
The bottom line is that we are self-righteous. We are all prone to secretly believe that we are somehow better than others because of things we do or do not do. The Scriptures teach that no one is inherently righteous and that our only righteousness comes from Jesus as a gift. Anyone who fails to embrace this humbling fact invariably pursues righteousness on his or her own, which is the grievous sin of self-righteousness.
As long as Christians fail to repent of self-righteousness, we will continue to speak of evangelism in terms such as 'outreach, which implies we will embrace lost people but will keep them at least an arm's length away. Unreptant self-righteousness also permits us to justify our sin by viewing ourselves as "clean" and others as "dirty", which then causes us to avoid others in an effort to remain untainted. Repentance enables us to kneel humbly with fellow sinners at the foot of the cross so they can see Jesus with-out our pride rising up to encumber their view.
Self-righteousness has so seeped into American Christianity that being a missionary to one's neighbors is easily overlooked because of the sickness of our faith. How sick are we when the most popular books among American Christians are about how to get blessed by praying a small section of Old Testamnent Scripture like a pagan mantra, and about the Rapture, as if the goal of the Chrisian life were to get more junk and leave this trailer park of a planet before God's tornado touches down on all the sinners? Only through repentant eyes will we see that God has a plan, by the power of the gospel of grace, to build a community of transformed people.

[two drink minimum]

Originally posted by Moral Threat Motorsports:
"If your livin? like there ain?t no God,

you shore as Hell better be right."

Donny Ray Ford & The Widowmakers

<font size="2" face="verdana, arial">How about if you live like there is a God but don't believe in Him?

[QCPunkRock]

I'm kinda jumping into this late, but I figured I oughta add my two cents.

The point was made (I don't remembber by who, it's a long topic)that evolution is hard to accept because it keeps changing.

The thing is, that's precisely why it's more likely to be correct. Instead of accepting something as fact, it's continually questioned, and if it doesn't hold up, it's thrown away and a new theory takes it's place. Also, the general theory has hardly changed since darwin's day, it's just specifics that keep changing.

I'm in school right now, majoring in Biology, and not taking the evolution route kind of makes a lot of stuff, ie animal physiology and behaviour really random and confusing

[Kematter]

That's an even better one. Check out Donnie's web site. He is the coolest.

www.donnierayford.com