mrbenja0618 said:
Hey gang. I used to be involved in this thread before, but had to exit because it got a bit heated at times. My goal when explaining my faith is simply to give my perspective that yes, I believe to be true.
I am what you would call a Christian, but honestly in this day in age I'm not sure it means what it is supposed to mean.
Most have been handling the faith so poorly that there are countries that when referring to "Christians" they simply mean "Americans"..... Clearly we have dropped the ball.
Ric, I'm going to respond to you in the best manner I can. I don't do it to debate or to win an argument, but to just give you a perspective to consider. I will not have all the answers, and will never have all the answers. No one else will either.You said: If you're gonna be good, do it for the sake of it, not for some sort of reward you're going to get at the pearly gates
I agree with you. We should never do anything to get a reward, and that is not what true Christianity is about.
Jesus said this in the book of Matthew, chapter 6:“Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of people, to be seen by them. Otherwise, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. So whenever you give to the poor, don’t sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be applauded by people. I assure you: They’ve got their reward! But when you give to the poor, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
So, yes there is reward for being righteous or being good. BUT, only if you do it with the mindset of not seeking reward. By doing it just to be righteous/good. God wants us to choose to be righteous because we desire to be righteous.
And on the point of no evidence of a place outside of our own. You're not wrong, or at least I have not experienced the evidence for myself yet. Some have claimed to have seen it. I can't confirm it, it's not my experience. All I can give you is my experience, and that is God has always been correct in my life, when I properly walked the path, the things God led me to believe would happen did in fact happen. That's how faith works. I see that God is good (and I use that term in non-human measurements) and tells the truth, so I trust the things I can't see yet. I haven't been to the grand canyon, but I know honest friends who have seen it and say it's beautiful, and I can trust that its there because they say so. Because I know them to be trustworthy. Of course, someone will say I'm ridiculous and that there are copious amounts of evidence for the grand canyon, but I could argue that for me the evidence isn't enough. What evidence would you have for me? A rock? I don't know it came from there. A photo with you, your wife and kids posing before it? Nah, it could be shopped. Again, you would say I'm ridiculous, but I'm not being ridiculous, I'm just in this case ignorant of truth, because we also live in an age where lies are copious, and fabrication is much easier. But maybe YOU have seen the evidence and my refusal to believe in the grand canyon is incredibly maddening to you? It's still not ridiculous if my life situation has been that of anti-exposure, and a lack of experience. My long-winded point is, we both have different sets of experiences. Those experiences have shaped how we view things. So, with that I ask, do you know everything? I don't. So, because I know I don't know everything, I have to go by what I do know, and that has been dictated by my own personal set of experiences on my journey. My experiences have dictated that God is perfect, and has been right so far in my life. So, therefore in my life all my road signs point to a place I can't see yet. But I know it's there because someone I trust told me so. Again, that's faith, but because of the source, I know that I can have that faith in God.
I don't know everything, but I try to trust the one I believe does.
You don't know everything either. I could even ask if you know half of everything, and you would probably tell me no. You couldn't know half of everything, just like I couldn't. But let's just say for the sake of discussion that you do know half of everything. But, alas, you still do not know everything, so I ask you. Is it possible that this Jesus/God/Heaven thing could exist on the other half of the stuff you haven't learned yet?
Again, not arguing. Just giving a new perspective, and I'm up for respectable conversations. I just have to exit when people get rude/angry or start barking back and forth. I've been through that, and it does no one any good. Not saying you planned on doing that. But that it has happened to me on this thread. =)
I know you said more in your original post, but I need to go milk the cat or something. =)
And after writing that long post I realized I referenced the wrong person. Sorry Ric. This is actually for you Leonardo. Sorry guys. Got my wires crossed. :/