Gee, turn my back for a day and 7 pages go by! Hi Wesley!
For more interesting and related debates, below are the links to the hot ones we had earlier in the year:
http://www.petflytrap.com/cgi-bin....+christ
http://www.petflytrap.com/cgi-bin....+christ
I just skimmed through the past 7 pages and was pretty impressed with Seedjar had to say.
Just so ya know, I was raised Jewish and had my Bar Mitzvah at age 13. By 15 I was an atheist. In college I met a bunch of Christians, belonging to a fellowship group called InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. And these folks, independently od one another debated with me and paryed for me and befriended me. Nearly 30 years later, we're still emailing!
I have a scientific, analytical mind. I wanted proof. I didn't get anything that couldn't be refuted or rationalized away. There was, and this was more after the fact, a lot of evidence to illustrate God's existence and that He provided us with His Son, Jesus, the Messiah. Why? No matter what translation you use or editing errors, the message has always been the same and it is clear:
God created. The Bible doesn't describe how He did it, but it is clear that God did the creating. Part of that creation was humanity. Humanity, when given a few guidelines and consequences, disobeyed. The consequences is death - eternal death. But God is compassionate. He provided a solution and the way to NOT face the consequences of our respective sin. Before Jesus arrived on the scene, some people understood that God was asking us to put their faith / confidence in Him (Abraham, David, Moses, The Prophets etc...). But God had a plan. He was taking eternal redemption to all of humanity. For this, He took His only Son, who is perfect, and sent Him to die on the cross. For those people who put their faith in Him and turned their lives around, they wouldn't have to face eternal death. For those who reject it, the consequences were same as before. Before and after Jesus the consequences and requirements were the same. Faith = eternal life. Rejection = eternal death. Forget the proofs. You won't get them You won't be satisfied.
BTW, we all have faith / confidence that when we type our messages, it will be posted and others will read them. that is just one illustration of how we put our trust in something.
Later, Jim