I find it interesting that a book written by Jews conveniently calls themselves God's chosen people.
And if they are in fact God's chosen people, I wonder why he stopped communicating with them since the Bible was written a couple thousand years ago? There are so many unknown things in this world, it seems like the Bible should be continuing on and on in volumes over time, somewhat like a collection of Encyclopedias. Furthermore, I see no evidence today whatsoever that the Jewish people are any better off than any other culture.
Another observation: If you were to ask a devoted Christian if he believes that Jesus was God's son sent from heaven to die for the sins of humanity, and that he rose from the dead after being crucified and ascended back to heaven three days later, the answer would certainly be "Yes!". And if you ask that same person if Jesus returned to heaven to prepare a wonderful place of unspeakable joy for each of his followers, that answer would be "Yes!". But if you ask that person "Then why don't you go there now? Just cut this life short and get on with your trip to heaven now." then that's when the whole belief system starts to crumble.
For example, I have a 93-year-old Christian Grandmother. I had a conversation with her not too long ago, and she said, "Baron, I wish I would have died at 83 years old, because the last 10 years have just been miserable. I've broken multiple bones from falling that required surgeries to fix, I've basically lost all of my eyesight, and now I can barely hear at all. It's just been awful."
And all I could think about is that despite her strong belief in Jesus and his promise of eternal life in heaven that's free from all of the miseries of this life, she still fights tooth and nail to not go there now.
And I see that same mental state apply to every believer out there. Despite having lives that have literally been saturated in Biblical teachings since childhood, when it comes down to it, nobody really believes what they say they believe. In fact, they do the opposite. Instead of being motivated to go to heaven asap, they will cling onto their miserable lives as if this life is heaven and what happens afterward must be avoided for as long as possible.
