do white lies count?
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Why does God allow...
- Thread starter peilthetraveler
- Start date
do white lies count?
Quote from Free Thinker:
that depends. if you lie to spare someones feeling instead of hurting them i do not consider it the same.
wife asks. "does this dress make me look fat". whats a man to do?
Nice avoiding the questions, besides trying not to insult your girlfriend or wife, have you ever told a lie, or stolen anything, and while we are on the conversation of females, have you ever looked lustfully on another person and one more - have you taken God's name in Vain.. even though I know you say you don't believe in Him.
just answer please without the attempt to side step.
Quote from Free Thinker:
so then was god just lying when he promised many times in the bible to help people?
This is very odd. Jesus makes specific promises in the Bible about how prayer is supposed to work. Jesus says in many different places that he and God will answer your prayers. And Christians believe Jesus -- according to this recent article, "54% of American adults believe the Bible is literally true." In some areas of the country the number goes as high as 75%.
If the Bible is literally true, then something is seriously amiss. Simply look at the facts. In Matthew 7:7 Jesus says:
Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
If "every one who asks receives", then if we ask for cancer to be cured, it should be cured. Right? If "our Father who is in heaven gives good things to those who ask him", then if we ask him to cure cancer, he should cure it. Right? And yet nothing happens.
In Matthew 17:20 Jesus says:
For truly, I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you.
If "nothing will be impossible to you", then if we ask to cure cancer tonight, cancer should disappear. Right? Yet nothing happens. Note that if we take the Bible less-than-literally here, the statement "nothing will be impossible to you" becomes "lots of things will be impossible to you," and that would mean that Jesus is lying.
In Matthew 21:21:
I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.
If "you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer", then if we ask to cure cancer tonight, cancer should dissappear. Right? Yet nothing happens. Note again that there is not a non-literal way to interpret "you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer", unless you replace "whatever" with "nothing" or "little."
The message is reiterated Mark 11:24:
Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.
If God says, "believe that you have received it, and it will be yours," and if we believe in God and his power, then what should happen if we pray to cure cancer tonight? It should be cured. Either that, or God is lying.
In John chapter 14, verses 12 through 14, Jesus tells all of us just how easy prayer can be:
"I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it." [ref]
Yep, I wouln't argue that there are tons of contradictions in the Good Book. IF God did grant us free will and intelligence then I can't see those things coexisting with prayer as in prayer for assistance in solving problems we could work out ourselves if we behaved like the social beings we're genetically programmed to be.
Quote from Free Thinker:
wow you got me there.
They are not trick questions, I'm sure (myself included) have taken something in our lifetimes that didn't belong to us , even though it was small and would not be noticed (or worse). We all have at sometime told a lie to cover a misdeed.
You would say you have lusted or taken God's name in vain, it called blasphemy.
All of us if we are truthful with ourselves are liars, thief's, blasphemers and fornicators at heart or in deed.
Freethinker,
If you are truthful with yourself, you are an admitted blasphemer, fornicator at heart, liar and thief. The thought of having to be morally responsible to God is abhorrent to you, so you deny God's existence.
Quote from Wallet:
They are not trick questions, I'm sure (myself included) have taken something in our lifetimes that didn't belong to us , even though it was small and would not be noticed (or worse). We all have at sometime told a lie to cover a misdeed.
You would say you have lusted or taken God's name in vain, it called blasphemy.
All of us if we are truthful with ourselves are liars, thief's, blasphemers and fornicators at heart or in deed.
Freethinker,
If you are truthful with yourself, you are an admitted blasphemer, fornicator at heart, liar and thief. The thought of having to be morally responsible to God is abhorrent to you, so you deny God's existence.
see. you start with the indoctrinated conclusion there is a god up there to answer to. that scares you. i dont. using my mind to examine the evidence allowed me to throw off that superstition. once you free your mind from that superstition fear of imaginary things is not on your mind.
"Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones."
Marcus Aurelius
Atheism is not a conscious act of turning away from all gods. It is simply the final destination for those who think. You will be pleased to discover that the sky does not fall down on your head. If you still want to pray, you can; the success rate of your prayers is unlikely to change. (Guy P. Harrison)
Quote from Free Thinker:
see. you start with the indoctrinated conclusion there is a god up there to answer to. that scares you. i dont. using my mind to examine the evidence allowed me to throw off that superstition. once you free your mind from that superstition fear of imaginary things is not on your mind.
"Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones."
Marcus Aurelius
Atheism is not a conscious act of turning away from all gods. It is simply the final destination for those who think. You will be pleased to discover that the sky does not fall down on your head. If you still want to pray, you can; the success rate of your prayers is unlikely to change. (Guy P. Harrison)
The thought of God doesn't scare me. The though of no God scares me, is this all there is? If so why do anything good, better party hard as tomorrow we are all wormdirt.
Marcus was wrong, if God is just then and we are judged by our works in this life. Then we are all doomed. Of course I can say that I'm better than some mass murderer and hardened criminal, or I never did this or that..... but we all have those little "oops... shouldn't have done that one: in our lives.
In comparison to a Perfect God, we are all stained to some degree in our eyes, but to Perfection we all fall short. Perfection and Imperfection cannot be put together lest one taints the other.
Likewise God cannot allow any sin into his presence, regardless of how "good we think we have been".
by biblical discriptions god himself was a sinner. he was a mass murderer, a racist, a slave supporter and an all around asshole. so much for god not allowing sin in his presense.Quote from Wallet:
The thought of God doesn't scare me. The though of no God scares me, is this all there is? If so why do anything good, better party hard as tomorrow we are all wormdirt.
Marcus was wrong, if God is just then and we are judged by our works in this life. Then we are all doomed. Of course I can say that I'm better than some mass murderer and hardened criminal, or I never did this or that..... but we all have those little "oops... shouldn't have done that one: in our lives.
In comparison to a Perfect God, we are all stained to some degree in our eyes, but to Perfection we all fall short. Perfection and Imperfection cannot be put together lest one taints the other.
Likewise God cannot allow any sin into his presence, regardless of how "good we think we have been".
if somehow something convinced you that it was all a myth would you go out and start killing people for fun? there must be something else that sets our actions since all evidence indicates that nonbelievers live just as believers do in society.