1Sharon:



So the word evil isn't relevant to our time?

Whatever other meaning there is of evil, it is still negative.

Whether evil, "calamity", "disaster" all are still negative terms.

The point is God is responsible for good as well as bad and a Satan isn't just a force for negativity.

God also said himself that he does those things.

Well, your point is demonstrably false since "evil" here is not "bad," it is only disasters or calamities or judgments that God brings about as a response to sin. When people sin, God punishes them. Those punishments are disasters or calamities or evils for those upon whom they come.

I'm not sure what we are debating for. I made a response to a thread to explain to a fellow Christian something that the Bible teaches. What exactly is your interest in it? Do you want me to join you in hating God? That is unlikely to happen. I know that God punishes sin. I find that comforting, not revolting. Do you want to join us in our faith? That seems very unlikely indeed given your words and actions here. So, what exactly do you want from me, ma'am?

2dominate:

I believe these were the punishment meted out to Adam and Eve according to the bible's claim for disobedience

It was that punishment listed out in those verses that you referred to as eternal? Sorry, do you know what the word, eternal, means?

FatherOfJesus:
Your God kinda putting through this stress because it’s part of his divine plans that I exist

Don’t change his divine plan

Okay. This one's gibberish.

2dominate:

The eternal punishment of Genesis 3 : 16- 19

16 To the woman He said:
“I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception;
In pain you shall bring forth children;
Your desire shall be for your husband,
And he shall rule over you.”
17 Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:
“Cursed is the ground for your sake;
In toil you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.
18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you,
And you shall eat the herb of the field.
19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
Till you return to the ground,
For out of it you were taken;
For dust you are,
And to dust you shall return.”
Genesis 3:16-19 (NKJV)

There's the passage. I'm afraid I don't see this eternal punishment you speak of. Which part of it do you mean?

FatherOfJesus:
I am enjoying making fun of you and your imaginary friend

It’s pitiful that he has reduced you to an online peasant because he can’t show himself. Insane people have imaginary friends that no one can see or validate, they get mad when people try to bring them back to sanity

Exactly. Of course you are. There is nothing useful to your activities here. You don't educate or challenge. You just mock for your own entertainment. And that shows you for the fraud you are whenever you lay claim to intellectual superiority. You are not even as smart as the atheists I have played with here on Nairaland. You're one of the dumber ones really.

Online peasant? For God? Why, thank you, sir. If only it were up to you to give us our roles and places for God. You don't know what it is like to be accepted by God even if only as His doormat.

As for insanity, what an irony.

1Sharon:


You were being disingenuous.

Why did you post those translations, if not to trump mine?

I don't prefer anything, that KJV version was chosen randomly, it was the 1st on google search.

Is calamity, disaster or whatever word you prefer now any better?


Since you aren't fluent in Hebrew yourself, why did you say you're certain I don't understand Hebrew? As if you understand any better than me? Hypocrite.

Well, you could have said that without also calling me a name. Disingenuousness is an accusation. Prick isn't.

I stated my reason in my post. Those translations don't trump the KJV. They just used other words more relevant to our own time. The KJV was made in the 17th century. The English language has changed a bit now and some words are not always used in the same sense as before. That was why I pointed out to you that "evil" has more than one meaning. Even today it does, but in modern usage, it is more rarely used as broadly as it used to be.

In other words, I believe the KJV rendition as much as I believe the others. You just didn't understand it as you should have.

Funny thing about that is that you just claimed on this same thread that atheists know the Bible much better than Christians do. I didn't use Google to find those translations. I had them on my Bible app already and I already knew what that verse meant. A little respect for Christians in debate can save you a lot of embarrassment.

I'm not sure what the issue is here. You countered my argument with that verse and I was demonstrating to you that my argument accommodated it and you had misunderstood the verse. I'm not sure what the whole "better" business is. God causes calamity or evil or disaster in response to creature moral evil. I see nothing wrong with that. If God isn't just, the universe would be chaotic.

I pointed out facility in Hebrew as a way to say that you could have been just a bit more humble in your attitude to Bible issues. I'm not sure what the hypocrisy is. I use multiple translations and I rely on a professor of classics for help with original biblical languages in order to make sure that I get what the Bible is saying. You yourself clearly don't respect the Bible at all. So, what hypocrisy are you talking about?

2dominate:

All this punishment just for eating from what they were forbidden from

Hello.

All what punishment, please? I don't understand your response.

FatherOfJesus:
Sky daddy loves you

If you mean the God that the Bible reveals, then yes He does indeed.

You do see how you have nothing more to say, right? You never really had anything to say. You were here to mock and now that is all you can do. You couldn't ever show what is wrong with biblical faith even if a lot of money or your very life was on the line. That is how pitiful you are. It takes a special kind of self-hate to be who you are.

FatherOfJesus:
[s][/s] this stress because your imaginary friend doesn’t exist

I don't believe I have seen your proof for His non-existence. Must be another one of your fantasies.

1Sharon:



You're a disingenuous prick I swear.

Why does your Bible translation trump mine?? because it suits your argument?

Now all of a sudden all these Bible versions that came AFTER KJV are now more valid?



Even if evil means "darkness", you think that is still a good look for a God you claim only loves and is merciful?

Is Darkness any better?

Do YOU know Hebrew??

Exactly what called for the insult right now? Is it a crime against you to disagree with you?

My Bible translation? I just gave you a bunch of other translations to show you that that is not the only way to translate the Hebrew there? I didn't offer any translation of my own. I haven't completed my training in biblical Hebrew or else I might have provided my own translation although I'm pretty sure it would not make you any happier.

As for translations coming after the KJV, I don't understand what you are quarreling about here. Are translations better because they came farther back in time or because they are simply made using better material, more complete knowledge, and better techniques? If it is a matter of time, then we should probably look for older translations than the KJV to get more accurate translations. But it is also interesting that while it seems to be a traditional atheistic position to reject the Bible because it is so old, you are preferring the KJV specifically because it is older. That doesn't seem to fit.

I'm not sure what "darkness" has to do with anything here. I told you that the word "evil" actually has more than one meaning, and I mentioned "calamity" in that same context. I didn't say anything about darkness. Three out of the four translations I gave you offer the word "calamity" too. One uses "disaster". None of them replaces "evil" with darkness.

I have never claimed anywhere that God only loves and is only ever merciful. You must mean somebody else. The God I worship, the One that the Bible speaks of is both merciful and just. He punishes moral evil and He forgives sinners. He doesn't do one and not the other, He does both. That is my discussion on this thread after all.

As for knowing Hebrew, I am studying it. It is part of my training in pastor-teaching.

1Sharon:


Now all of a sudden the word evil means something else?

Sigh.

7 The One forming light and creating darkness,
Causing well-being and creating calamity;
I am the LORD who does all these.
Isaiah 45:7 (NASB)

7 I form light and create darkness;
I make well-being and create calamity;
I am the LORD, who does all these things.
Isaiah 45:7 (ESV)

7 I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.
Isaiah 45:7 (NIV)

7 I form the light and create darkness,
I make peace and create calamity;
I, the LORD, do all these things.’
Isaiah 45:7 (NKJV)

What I don't get is why you atheists like to fancy yourselves experts on biblical theology. I can't even understand what kind of reasoning leads to something like that. You almost certainly don't know Hebrew, and you certainly appear unaware of other translations that exist of this verse.

God is not responsible for the moral evil of His creatures. That verse is most certainly not teaching that He is. Each angel or human is responsible for his or her own choices.

What God is responsible for is His Judgment brought upon such evil. When God floods a whole universe, that is His doing. And He does it in order to punish the rebellion of a third of His angels. When He destroys a confederation of cities with burning sulfur falling from the sky, He does it to punish their homosexuality and aggression against believers among them. When He will destroy so many human beings with a variety of plagues to the point that human beings are scarcer than extremely precious metals, He will be doing it to punish the wickedness of a world under the rule of the Antichrist.

It is God Who creates all that "evil." Even so, it is the sins of His creatures that occasion such things, so it is still our responsibility that such things happen at all.

Nonetheless, believe whatever you want. It really isn't my business what you believe.

I think that you think that I am like you or that you have made me like you.

It is true that my standard for conversation is respect and dignity. I have a rule to never engage in the manner that I have been engaging you. I only broke discipline for the first time in a long time.

The only reason why is sort of to give you a taste of your own medicine. The only reason people like you post the threads that you do is to annoy Christians. You make such a noise about science that one would expect that you could at least post educative threads about this God that you prefer to worship, but no, you would rather antagonize Christians.

On this account that I use, I have four topics and over two thousand posts. But I haven't posted even a single thread attacking atheism, and unless my memory is failing me, all my discussions with atheists were started by atheists. And proportionally much fewer of them have been like the one I'm having with you. That is, I don't attack atheists or atheism. I find biblical theology much more interesting than anything you believe or don't believe.

Many Christians do misguidedly attack other people's theology or lack thereof, but that is not the Christian way. That is partly what my activities here on Nairaland is meant to address. But is that the atheistic way?

Is it the atheistic way to attack other people's beliefs just because it's fun? That is, it is part of the code of atheism to have and show no respect for other people? If it is, do you recognize that anyone can be the same way?

If the Christian way does not prohibit such behavior, do you realize just how uninhabitable this world would be? If human beings showed no restraint, do you realize that you couldn't even walk the streets?

You accuse me of getting angry and insulting you because I disagree with you, but then what exactly were you when you wrote a thread to mock the Second Coming? You probably consider what you did entertainment, but then why would my mockery of your intelligence not also be entertaining for me?

Suffice to say that you have the completely wrong idea of me if you think that I care about your own thoughts. I am only responding to you here for my own reasons. I don't believe that you and I could ever have a meaningful conversation that could add value to either of us. You are too arrogant for that to be possible.

So, even if I continue discussing with you here, and I'm not saying that I will, I won't be discussing with you anywhere else until I see a good reason to do so. I am not on Nairaland for my own entertainment or to teach anyone how to reason like a normal human being. I am here to explain the Bible to anyone who may care. If a discussion is necessary to accomplish that, I will engage in it. If it isn't, I do my best to refrain.

Just a heads up.

1Sharon:



Isaiah 45:7
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.

Hello.

It probably wasn't you with whom I discussed this, but it feels vaguely like it was.

Does the word, evil, always mean moral evil or can it also mean unpleasantness or calamity?

FatherOfJesus:
Those money didn’t go to waste because they have revealed more knowledge than whatever is thought in your churches. For the past 2000years religion offered nothing but lies and idiocy.

Because you come online tagging people “unintelligent” doesn’t mean you brain has any atom of intelligence either, it’s just a way to vent your anger on people who don’t agree with you. I like how frustrated that makes you feel

Science deserves more funding, every money should go to science as far as I’m concerned because funding religious is a waste of valuable resources. It ends up brewing monumental idiots like you.

Science has flown people to the moon and spacecraft to other planets, what contribute has your religious houses offered. They only gather people with bipolar disorder in one house and tell them laughable stories written by archaic humans. You guys come out reasoning like donkeys and get angry when others don’t want to reason like pieces shit.

No religious person possess working brain, even if they do, it totally becomes nonfunctional when religious matters arise. This is why atheism is growing, your lies cannot stand the test of time hence your frustrations.

I’m ready to knock your empty microcephalic brain to let you know how ridiculous y’all sound when you try to force your laughable stories on right thinking people

Sure, churches are hardly the place to go to learn anything of value, which is why I don't go to church anyway, but what valuable thing do you--I mean you specifically--know that those experiments have produced? Certainly, we've learned a thing or two, but they cost billions in unnecessary expense and very valuable man-hours to learn. The ROI is pretty miserable.

Religion has never done anyone any good. Biblical faith, on the other hand, has made many wise and secured eternal life for them to boot. You have neither wisdom nor eternal life in spite of not being religious. I wouldn't want to be you.

LOL. I call you unintelligent because you are unintelligent. My words easily prove whether I am or I am not. Feel free to prove my own lack of intelligence if you dare. I already showed how dumb you are. . .and not merely by declaring you to be.

As for being frustrated, how would you know that I am? What am I frustrated about? What did I try and fail to achieve? Am I frustrated that you are unable to follow a conversation reasonably and logically? Why would that be my problem?

As for funding, your money is yours to put anywhere you like. You won't hear me complain if you put all your money in a project to try and find the Flying Spaghetti Monster that you seem particularly enamoured of. But you don't get to decide where my money goes.

I don't typically fund religion myself unless I have a good reason to. But I would spend a pretty penny on learning the Bible or helping others do the same. My guess is that you can't stand that. And who then of the two of us is the frustrated one?

Science flew people to the moon? LOL. It wasn't people who did that? People who had all sorts of beliefs and who worked hard to understand and use material reality that was created by God? Or did you think that all the people who built and are currently working in, building up, and managing the space industry were atheists? Oh, I think you do.

I have debated smart atheists who actually have working brain cells. They all agree that being religious or irreligious has nothing to do with being smart. Smart people make dumb choices sometimes. It doesn't make them dumb, so while I personally think that atheism is idiotic through and through, I don't hold that atheists are necessarily dumb. It's just a really dumb choice for any smart person to make. You, though, appear to be dumb even outside of being an atheist. Your arguments have no redeeming quality at all. And the worst part is you seem to lack the basic ability to even self-criticise and self-correct.

You don't possess the basic intelligence (or the desire to use it if you do) to discuss with me. The more you respond, the more you assure me of that.

Jayrockk:
I'm a Christian and I believe God is perfect in all ramifications, but sometimes when i start to think of the evil that has happened, and the evil happening these days I tell myself this could have been avoided if God destroyed the devil. I ask myself why God didn't kill the devil and also why was the forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden in the first place. I know the devil is the cause of evil but sometimes I blame God for what's happening and doubt His existence sometimes, but then deep down i know He is real. So religious experts in the house what's your say about this?

Hi there.

God created Satan pure knowing that he was going to rebel against Him anyway. He did that because God wanted a universe where there were creatures that consciously chose to love Him and be with Him eternally.

Satan is just the rallying point for those who don't want to love God or be with Him eternally.

The tree of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil existed for two reasons. One was to allow Adam and Eve have an opportunity to choose to rebel against God if they preferred that to being His friends and servants in the Garden of Eden. The second was to provide the same rebels with an expanded conscience so that they could recognize evil and good outside the Garden of Eden and away from God's direct tutelage.

God is therefore not responsible for all the evil that is happening. He allows it because He loves us. He lets us choose whether we will love Him back or rebel against Him. The bad things that happen as a result of creature sin give us an opportunity to learn of God's justice and also an opportunity to make our own choices.

This is why the Bible is about faith. It teaches us to trust God beyond what we see, feel, hear, or think. It tells us to listen to Him and hear His side of things so that we can better judge for ourselves what the right choice to make with respect to Him is. It may not be easy, but it really is the only way to get through this life in one piece.

FatherOfJesus:
you can’t have a functioning brain and then believe the numerous unprovable nonsense in the Bible.

It’s either you read the Bible with your brain partially functioning or you are an eternal slowpoke who can’t use it.

If the scientists working hard to put humans on mars shared your reasoning, we will probably be stuck in Stone Age.

You can’t reason beyond God did and he wants it like that, that’s why you are such a lowlife ranting to prove that his imaginary skydaddy exist

LOL. That is standard circular reasoning. And here, it is a flat out fallacy.

What is the correlation between the functionality of a brain and believing the things in the Bible? Can you describe it? Of course not. You just decree that a smart person cannot believe the Bible and a person who believes the Bible cannot be smart, and because you do, it becomes true! It's the idiocy of atheistic arguments (I know I shouldn't be doing this, but I'm doing it anyway for any good it might accomplish, not that I expect that it will).

I do read the Bible. But I'm not a slowpoke. In fact, between the two of us, I would say that I'm most definitely NOT the slowpoke. You, on the other hand, . . .

I only asked you to put people on Mars permanently first, no? You're the one who thought that because scientists are fantasizing about colonizing other planets, there is something stupid about the Second Coming. What wrong did I do in pointing out that it is still a fantasy?

You want to know how much money has been wasted on fantasies like this? There are accelerators and colliders that are built to try to prove the Big Bang Theory. Billions of dollars are spent on projects like that. To what end? Has a big bang been proven? Absolutely not. We just have to wait a little bit more and spend a few more billions. Do you know who's providing that time and money? Human beings and taxpayers. What if we were not investigating brainless theories? Might we have covered the deficit that exists in medical personnel in countries across the world? Might we have more money to put in actual, practical issues of life? Maybe! Or maybe some idiot atheist like yourself would want to pursue another hare-brained idea because they can't stand the thought that God exists.

If only you had some common sense, if only you even tried to be reasonable, you wouldn't keep trying to antagonize or otherwise deceive Christians about the truth. You--I mean you personally--have no common sense and barely an intelligence worth interacting with. To talk with you is to either sound abusive or to suffer abuse. There is no possibility of reasoning. You have no ability to think like a normal human being. Or else you simply choose to not use it if you do.

If this were a formal forum, you would not qualify for debate on the lowest ranks. That is how unintelligent you have presented yourself to be. But maybe that is why you came to Nairaland. It is not a place wild with thinkers

FatherOfJesus:
[s][/s]
No thinker would believe a virgin conceived without fertilization.

No thinker will believe a global flood happened about 5000years ago.

The fact that the Bible didn’t coin mars means that it was written by brainless people like you who don’t understand the universe.

My word! You're way dumber than I keep thinking you are!

Can't you walk a straight line in conversation?

Whatever you may believe is wrong with the Bible, your arguments and claims still don't line up with reason.

Why would the Bible coin the word "Mars"? Is it interested in Mars?

That is the question you should address yourself to. The fact that you are interested in Mars does not make the Bible responsible to be interested in Mars as well or to the same degree.

It's like calling CNN or Fox News unreliable because they never talk about Aiken in South Carolina. Why should they talk about it? Is it important or relevant to their interests?

The Bible does not need to teach you every single detail of cosmology or biology or anything really unless it is relevant to its goal of educating the human believer about God and His Plan for human beings.

Because of God's interest in human beings, He speaks to us of issues relevant to our relationship to and with Him. He tells us of the Virgin Birth because of our need to understand the uniqueness of the Man Jesus Christ who, while being very much human like us, never bore the taint of sin that all of us bear because we all have human fathers.

He tells us of a global flood because it is important for us to keep in mind that He is able to bring worldwide judgment upon us if His Plan requires it as it will again during the Tribulation.

That you think these things are stupid is only proof of your own deficient intelligence. You think human beings can colonize planets that until today still have never proven habitable for human beings--even just zero gravity is detrimental to human health, how much more a planet with such significantly different characteristics from earth--all because of the flights of fancy of a billionaire, and yet you have problems believing that God (an entity that, by definition, is limitless in power and wisdom and knowledge) can cause a Virgin Birth or a global flood.

That is textbook cognitive dissonance. But, of course, you don't know that. You probably think everyone on Nairaland is your fellow drunk at the bar without two brain cells worth rubbing together.

FatherOfJesus:
The Bible didn’t mention space, the people who wrote the Bible never knew about space. Infact they believed that the sun orbited the earth

FatherOfJesus:
Show me Mars in the Bible

You're not much of a thinker, are you?

First, did you need the word "space" mentioned in the Bible? When was the term coined? The Bible speaks of the "heavens" and the "stars." Why does that not tell you that it spoke of space? Are the stars on earth?

Where does the Bible say that the sin orbits the earth? If it doesn't say it, how do you know that those who wrote the Bible believed that it did? Are you just making assumptions because it suits you to make them?

When was the name Mars coined? Why should it be in the Bible? Was the Bible teaching us about the planets?

Your posts, claims, and arguments are some of the least intelligent I have seen on this platform in a while.

FatherOfJesus:
Elon Musk is viewing this thread

So?

FatherOfJesus:
It means Jesus would have to ride to multiple planets on chariot of horses to rapture believers.

Another problem is that humans would have invented floating space colonies and warp speed spacecraft to other galaxies. I wonder how Jesus is going to reach these people using horses.

LOL. You're still here?

Colonize other planets and invent your floating space colonies and warp speed spacecraft first, why don't you?

collinsEFF:
Hello �,
I was just thinking of this,
If God is a merciful God then why didn't he have mercy on Adam and Eve?
I need answers...

Hi there.

I'm not sure what answers you need since you appear to have given yourself one already.

I have not read any part of the Bible that teaches or even suggests that God might not have forgiven Adam and Eve.

In fact, God not only promised them and their children a Savior (the very one He later gave us in Jesus Christ), but He also made the first animal sacrifice for them in the Garden of Eden to show them how anyone who wanted to be saved from the Second Death that is due to all rebels against God can be saved. And they accepted that sacrifice themselves and were thus saved by it.

15 And I will put enmity
Between you and the woman,
And between your seed and her seed;
He shall bruise you on the head,
And you shall bruise him on the heel.”
Genesis 3:15 (NASB)

21 The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.
Genesis 3:21 (NASB)

I would say that God went above and beyond in mercy in this matter. What was due to Adam and Eve was death in all its ramifications: that is, alienation from God plus the end of their physical lives and every opportunity to choose again what their attitude to God should be plus the Second Death, eternal punishment for their rebellion against God.

But that is not what they suffered. They were driven from Eden and condemned to a less than perfect physical existence. But they were kept alive to continue making choices about God and to teach their children to do the same. They were even reconciled to God through the Promise and the Hope that the sacrifice in the Garden symbolized. And we have no reason in the Bible to believe that they are not with God right now in eternity.

So, you might need to explain where you got the idea that God did not have mercy on them.

Cheers.

Nana264:









I meant factions as in denominations.

I know what you meant. I was saying in response that denominations and other groupings really mean nothing.

There are only two possibilities:

1. That a given Christian or Christian group holds biblical positions; or

2. That a given Christian or Christian group holds false positions.

No Christian or Christian group is perfect, so we will get some things wrong sometimes, but that does not mean that we may form legitimate denominations. That is meaningless.

Either a teaching is biblical or it isn't. If it isn't, it is false. If it is, it is true. Every Christian should be striving to get to the truth and hold firmly to it.

officialmario:
Can we shed more light on this topic?
what is our inheritance in christ?
happy sunday.

Hi there.

It's a pretty large question.

Suffice to say that there are two levels of response to the question.

Those who believe in Jesus Christ are granted certain rights and privileges in this world. This is part of their inheritance. In fact, they are only a taste of their true inheritance.

In the world to come, this inheritance is brought to fullness.

In short, our inheritance is God Himself. In this world, that means His special protection, forgiveness, special provision, and companionship and friendship. That means that although God protects all human beings from wanton destruction by Satan, He is particular about believers in Jesus Christ: Satan may not touch them at all without His leave. Unbelievers, on the other hand, may not be killed or otherwise crippled in their free will, but they may be "played with" by Satan in a way that he cannot with believers.

It also means that believers are forgiven by God whereas unbelievers are His enemies. If a believer sins against God and confesses and repents, the Lord generously and justly forgives Him. This does not apply to unbelievers since they are alienated from God in the first place.

Again, although God provides all things for all creatures including unbelievers, believers are specially provided for in all things. The Lord provides for them even when material circumstances should make such provision impossible.

Also, one big reason that unbelievers are so unhappy in this world even in the midst of their pleasure-seeking is that they are lonely in their hearts. We believers have God's friendship and companionship in all of our travails in this world. We are never alone, even when there is no human being with us.

In the world to come, we will be with God forever. We will never again be separated from Him. We will never be sinners again. We will never suffer anything again. We will only ever know pleasure, joy, happiness forever. We will live in a community of men and angels where we are perfectly at peace forever. We will live in a perfect universe devoid of anything that hurts or causes harm. Depending on our diligence in walking with God in this world, we may be ranked very highly in that world to come too. And all of this is barely scratching the surface of our inheritance.

Cheers.

hgnbello:
Is It Compulsory For A Christian Woman To Cover Their Hair While Praying?

Hello there.

I don't see that in the Bible.

13  Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered? 14 Does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a dishonor to him, 15 but if a woman has long hair, it is a glory to her? For her hair is given to her for a covering.
1Co 11:13 — 1Co 11:15 (NASB)

The above is what I read.

The issue that Paul was addressing was one of dressing the hair decently. Some practices by the Gentiles involved leaving women's hair untidy. Paul was telling the Corinthians that this ought not to be the case with Christian women. Their hair was to be well dressed in order to communicate their appreciation of the authority it symbolized for the angels.

Cheers.

Edited for correction.

Casemiro:
Please I need clear answers, not some random quoting up and down.


As advised, one should seek the face of God while looking for a life partner.


The question here is, how exactly will God reveal this partner to you?


Will you be shown a clear picture of the person in a dream or vision?


will the name be written for you?




I'm confused

Hello.

I'm a pastor-teacher, and as a Christian, I have read the Bible through a few times, as is the job of every Christian. Also, in order to become a pastor-teacher, one must not only be very familiar with the Scriptures, they must also have learned Bible teaching thoroughly from another qualified teacher and, best case scenario, been trained in ancient history, church history, original languages, textual criticism, and other tools useful for properly understanding and interpreting Bible truths. I have some training in some of these things in addition to my spiritual training.

It is on the basis of this qualification as a pastor-teacher that I say to you that I have never seen it anywhere in the Bible that God chooses spouses for people.

To be clear, it is true that God has a plan for each of us. There is always something that God has prepared for us and to which He wants to bring us if we are willing, but we each get what we choose.

If the issue is how we can choose the best that God has prepared for us, then the question is how well we know God. This question is important because God will never override our free will. This is what most Pentecostals ignore today in their wild theology. The idea that God leads us by the nose to things or that He reveals things supernaturally to us in order to show us His Will is quite mistaken.

God does reveal His Will to us. . .in the Scriptures. He tells us about Himself in the Bible. Learning about Him helps us to understand what His Plan for us collectively and individually is. Because God actually wants us to organically choose His Will for us, He does not generally address specifics in the Bible or even through direct revelation to us. If we are diligent in seeking Him and learning about Him, we will grow better and better at figuring out what He wants and doing it willingly.

Consider the joy of having your spouse or parents or friends or siblings give you something you want as a gift without their having to ask you. The source of this joy is the affirmation of their attention to you and their knowledge of you. This is exactly the kind of relationship that God is building with us. We have the Holy Spirit inside of us especially to facilitate this. He helps us to understand God so that we can do the things that please Him.

So, in the matter of knowing who the spouse that God has prepared for you is, the Bible only teaches you to seek out fellow believers especially those who share the same zealous attitude you have for the truth (if you have such an attitude). I have very little reason to advise you to trust that God will show you anything more specific than that regarding your spouse, not in the manner you mean, at least.

He may certainly show you--if you are walking closely with Him--that a certain candidate is His Will for you by drawing your attention to certain qualities of theirs or by granting you a reluctance to discount them because of certain preferences you may have in your taste in the opposite sex.

The Lord can certainly do anything at all, but the Scriptures lead me to think that He is probably not going to give you visions, dreams, or other supernatural communication about who they will marry.

Wishing for your peace in this matter.

Cheers.

Kingsleyokeke:
I am a sex addict. I have done all I could to stop this addiction but no way. I can't stay for two days without sex. I am just tired of life, at times I think suicide.

Hi there.

I'm very sorry for your trouble.

Many Christians go through the same or similar things to what you are going through. I don't know if you are a Christian yourself, so I don't know if my answer will matter to you, but all Christians have one solution. That solution is also available to non-Christians if they want.

The first thing to know about addiction is that it is fueled by a lie. That lie is that you have no power to control yourself in a given issue, that you cannot rule over your own desires or impulses.

Your own body will help to prove this lie to be true too by producing consequences for any rebellion against the desire or impulse that it throws at you so consistently.

But it is still a lie. Every human being has a free will. We have the power to choose whatever we want to do from among the array of options that we are given by God. That it isn't easy to choose a given thing or to carry out our choice does not make this false. Choice is weird like that. We sometimes have to defend our choices very vigorously.

The thought of fighting a battle like that everyday for the rest of our lives or for an extended undefined future is often what makes it difficult for us to fight. But this too is where the Bible is such a big help. First, the Bible tells us that we can fight, and, second, it tells us that we only need to fight today's battle, the battle of right now.

This second truth is the one that makes the first one easier to use, but it is also the harder one to believe. Our bodies are bodies of sin, so they actually are the enemy that we are fighting or at least the rebellious servants that we are fighting to subdue. It is therefore to their benefit if we believe that winning today's battle is meaningless given all the losses of the past and the absolute certainty of a new battle tomorrow and a real and strong potential of future losses. So, this second truth is the one more attacked by our own selves. That is, we find it harder to believe that we only have to win today's battle than to believe that we do have the power to win. The latter remains a theoretical axiom that is meaningless as long as the former is not practical.

But that is what the Bible says:

34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Matthew 6:34 (NKJV)

That is, tomorrow is not your fight. Only today. This is the key to beating addiction of any kind: You only need to not give in right now, today.

However, there are no vacuums in life. If you have grown used to doing something all the time, and if your body has restructured itself through habit to doing a given thing all the time, then stopping it is going to have both physical and psychological feedback. You will very likely find yourself bored, distracted, irritated, and maybe even suffering real physical illness because of it. What then?

Some of these effects you will have to wait out. Some of them you may be able to completely eliminate by engaging yourself in other things. Whatever we addict ourselves to costs us in time and energy and almost certainly money. If we are no longer spending these resources on these things, what are we spending them on? If nothing, then we are priming ourselves for incredible relapse. If nothing more productive and desirable, then we are still priming ourselves for incredible relapse. In other words, to stay free of addiction, we must be choosing to break out of addiction so that we can dedicate ourselves to something more productive.

16 Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? 17 But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. 18 And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. 19 I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness.
Rom 6:16 — Rom 6:19 (NKJV)

So, those who would be free of addiction must be willing to commit themselves to something else, something more worthy of their resources and more rewarding in the long term. Human beings are built to seek out compensation for every investment of themselves. Addiction works because of the payout in pleasure. Therefore, to break it permanently, it must be replaced with something that is more rewarding in both the short and long term, at least in some way.

For believers in Jesus Christ (and for all mankind really), there is nothing sweeter or more rewarding than God's truth.

7 The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul;
The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple;
8 The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart;
The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;
9 The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;
The judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold,
Yea, than much fine gold;
Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
11 Moreover by them Your servant is warned,
And in keeping them there is great reward.
Psa 19:7 — Psa 19:11 (NKJV)

Committing to hearing (or reading), learning (by listening to pastor-teachers), believing, and applying the truths of the Bible in all the multitude circumstances of our lives has a payout in pleasure in this world that can leave even the worst skeptic stunned with surprise. Only those who have never tasted it doubt this. Those who tasted and left it are those who forgot it because of a failure to continue over time.

The intricacies and variety of Bible truth can really bring one to experiencing something of the sweetness of Heaven here on earth. It makes for an excellent replacement of anything that anyone is addicted to.

Alternatively, some of us fill up the vacuum with exercise, social interaction, and/or work. These things work too to the degree that anyone pursues them. They also have their own payout in pleasure. And they are necessary to some degree in this world anyway. The primary problem with preferring them to Bible truth is that they cost those who prefer them the eternal pleasures that Bible truth guarantees to those who seek them.

I'll say a prayer here for you.

Cheers.

Nana264:
Some factions of Christianity believe that you can lose your salvation, while some believe otherwise.


What exactly is the true fact?


Once you are saved, is that all? Can you never lose your salvation?

If no, what exactly makes one lose their salvation?

Hi there.

First of all, I don't think there are factions in Christianity.

11 For I have been informed concerning you, my brethren, by Chloe’s people, that there are quarrels among you. 12 Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul,” and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas,” and “I of Christ.” 13  Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?
1Co 1:11 — 1Co 1:13 (NASB)

Obviously, there is only one Jesus Christ that the Bible talks about and He is the One who died for us all. That Jesus Christ is the Man Who is also God. There is no one else like that. So, how can there be factions? It is true that no two Christians, however mature they may be, always agree on everything, but this does not mean that all positions held by all Christians are equally legitimate. Some positions will be wrong and others right. Because Christians are not perfect, they won't get every single thing right, but it is still every Christian's responsibility to seek out and find and hold on to the truth in all things (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

The question then is what is true, not what different factions believe. The answer to that is whatever the Bible says. So, what does the Bible say regarding the permanence of the salvation of believers?

It says, first, that as long as anyone continues to believe in Jesus Christ (that is, as long as anyone believes that Jesus is God Who became Man and died for our sins and rose from the dead for our Salvation), that person is saved.

16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
John 3:16 (NKJV)

14 We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end.
Hebrews 3:14 (NIV)

That is, only those who continue to believe until the end of their earthly lives are saved.

Second, the choice to believe the Gospel or not is wholly and entirely ours. We believe because we choose to believe. Nobody can deny us of the right or the power to believe.

13 for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.
Philippians 2:13 (NKJV)

That is, God guarantees to every human being both the right and the ability to make his or her own choices. We have the power to will (that is, the spiritual ability to identify and select from among options available to us) and to perform (that is, the ability to act out or demonstrate our choices) because God gives it to each of us and guarantees it to us. Not even Satan can prevent us from making any choice we want to make. He can try to persuade us to make a given choice by threatening or seducing us, but in the end, we are the only ones who can choose for ourselves what we want to have.

Therefore, our salvation is entirely ours to have or give up. Nobody can take it away from us if we want to keep it. That is the first level of security.

Third, when we choose to believe, we are baptized by the Holy Spirit into Jesus Christ so that we become one with Him (that is, so that He recognizes us as His own), and we are baptized with the Holy Spirit so that we have Him living inside us to help us walk with God as we should.

13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit.
1 Corinthians 12:13 (NKJV)

9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.
Romans 8:9 (NKJV)

This is the one baptism that Ephesians 4:5 speaks of, that Peter clarifies in 1 Peter 3:21, and that John the Baptist prophesied when he said that Jesus would baptize with the Holy Spirit.

What this means is that when we believe, we become the Lord Jesus's responsibility to protect and defend from Satanic attacks and we receive divine help inside of us that is able to defend our salvation as long as we are willing until we come to the end of our earthly lives.

4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.
1 John 4:4 (NKJV)

This is the second level of security that we have. The first makes it clear that no one can strip us of our salvation. Only we may give it up if we please. This second makes it clear that we will always have Heaven's support to defend our salvation even against mounting satanic pressure. In other words, our salvation in Jesus Christ is not at all easy to lose.

Fourth though, it is not impossible to lose our salvation. Not only does the Bible tell us that we should be careful to guard our salvation, it warns us that others have lost and will yet lose it too.

3 Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, 4 who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.
2Th 2:3 — 2Th 2:4 (NKJV)

The above is a prophecy of the apostasy that will happen during the Tribulation before the return of Jesus Christ to resurrect the Church and establish His rule over the earth.

10 for Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and has departed for Thessalonica—Crescens for Galatia, Titus for Dalmatia.
2 Timothy 4:10 (NKJV)

The above is one example of a believer who gave up his faith because of his love of the world.

11 This is a faithful saying:
For if we died with Him,
We shall also live with Him.
12 If we endure,
We shall also reign with Him.
If we deny Him,
He also will deny us.
13 If we are faithless,
He remains faithful;
He cannot deny Himself.
2Ti 2:11 — 2Ti 2:13 (NKJV)

The above is a warning that it matters what we choose to do. If we decide to stop believing (that is, we deny Him and become faithless), the Lord Jesus is not obliged to continue to defend us or to save us in the end. In other words, we are not going to be saved against our will. We choose whether we will be saved or not. Our choices matter.

In short, we can lose our salvation, and throughout the history of the world, many believers have lost theirs by giving up their faith for different reasons. This is why we are warned to guard our salvation diligently.

12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling
Philippians 2:12 (NKJV)

​1 Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed through the sea, 2 all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ. 5 But with most of them God was not well pleased, for their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.
6 Now these things became our examples, to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. 7 And do not become idolaters as were some of them. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.” 8 Nor let us commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell; 9 nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents; 10 nor complain, as some of them also complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer. 11 Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.
12 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.
1Co 10:1 — 1Co 10:12 (NKJV)

These warnings are to be taken most seriously. This is precisely why the teaching that believers cannot lose their salvation is so wicked. All false teaching is evil and able to do damage to the spiritual health of believers, but few indeed of those are as wicked as the teaching that believers cannot fall away again in this world. It leads many of us into a false sense of security that eventually costs them their salvation. There is nothing worse than that. People who teach such things risk a very terrible response from the Lord as a result.

Fifth, on the question of the how, the Bible teaches that we can stop believing for different reasons. We can fall away through growing sinfulness and an unwillingness to give up our sinning in the midst of divine discipline.

12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; 13 but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
Heb 3:12 — Heb 3:13 (NKJV)

Now, because this is one of the most abused truths of the Bible, it is important that we take care to understand that sin itself does not cost us our salvation. Everyone sins all the time (James 3:2; 1 John 1:8-10). It doesn't matter what our spiritual attainment, we all sin regardless. If we end up with the Lord in eternity, it is not because we stopped sinning in this world. It is because we continued to believe the Gospel until the end of our earthly lives.

But sin does have an impact on our salvation in an indirect way. Sin opposes faith since it comes from an attitude of rebellion. We all have a sin nature in our bodies. That is, our bodies are bodies of sin (Romans 7:18-24). This does not change just because we become believers in Jesus Christ. Rather, it becomes a fight for us instead, a fight between our bodies and the Spirit in us (Galatians 5:17; James 4:5 in Greek). We have to constantly choose to walk in the Spirit and not in the desires of our bodies. If we choose to walk in the desires of our bodies, we end up feeding the rebelliousness of our bodies against God (Romans 8:5-8 ).

Since God responds to all sin with divine discipline (Hebrews 12:4-11), sinning egregiously without confessing and repenting will bring increasing levels of discipline from the Lord upon us until we either repent or are killed by the Lord (that is, the sin unto death spoken of in 1 John 5:16-17; 1 Corinthians 5:5; 11:30). The increasing discipline can make the sinning believer bitter against the Lord so much so that he decides to stop believing in Him. If that happens, then he stops being a believer and has lost his salvation. This is how sin can cost us our salvation.

As I said, it is important to keep in mind that sin does not directly cost us our salvation, so even a believer who continues to sin without repenting and confessing to the Lord can end up killed by the Lord through discipline and yet be with the Lord in eternity. The most visible example of this in the Bible is King Saul, but it is also obvious that if the man in 1 Corinthians 5 had not repented, he too would have died and been with the Lord in spite of his sin of sexual immorality.

So, one way we can lose our salvation is through sinning recklessly and then rebelling against divine discipline by throwing our faith away.

Another way is by getting offended at the trials and tribulations of this world. The Lord Jesus warns us of this in Matthew 24 and we see that in 2 Thessalonians 2, so very many believers will stop believing because of the difficulties of the Tribulation.

So then, how can we secure our salvation and not fall away?

​1 For I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh, 2 that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, and attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
4 Now this I say lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words. 5 For though I am absent in the flesh, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.
6 As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, 7 rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.
Col 2:1 — Col 2:7 (NKJV)

11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.
Eph 4:11 — Eph 4:16 (NKJV)

The above speaks of growing to have a full knowledge of Jesus Christ. This is what spiritual maturity is and what spiritual growth (see the link) is about. When we hear and believe the Gospel, we have accepted a new way of thinking and living. In order to become better at thinking and living like that, we need to learn everything that the Gospel is really saying. The Gospel that we hear--that is, that God put on human flesh and died for our sins as the Man Jesus Christ and rose again from the dead for our justification with the Father--is only a seed. There is a vast world of truth only hinted at by that statement. If we don't explore it, we remain ignorant of very much indeed. That ignorance is what makes us susceptible to apostasy.

The Bible likens believing the Gospel initially to being born as a baby. Babies cannot defend themselves effectively. So, Peter urges us through the Spirit to grow from babyhood into manhood (1 Peter 2:2-3) so that we can fight this fight of ours effectively. If we don't grow, it remains a real struggle to keep our faith in Jesus Christ. We will continue to have lies thrown at us by Satan and the world-system that he designed and built around us. Those lies may not be recognizable to us as lies if we have not learned the truth.

If we do not grow, we will remain spiritually weak and thus very limited in ability to resist the cravings of our own flesh. That means that we remain significantly crippled by our body's strong desire to sin. It is only as we develop spiritually that our ability to resist the untiring pressure of our bodies to sin against God grows too.

How do we grow spiritually? As you will find in the link I referred you to, it takes reading the Bible to know what it says, listening to spiritually qualified pastor-teachers who can explain it clearly to you, actively applying what you learn to your own life, and helping others to do the same. As we do these things, we secure our salvation and grow less and less likely to apostatize from the faith.

Cheers.

OkCornel:
Hebrews 13 v 10;

10 We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat.


Thoughts and view points are welcome on this verse. Thanks.

Hello.

This is a fuller context of that statement:

9 Do not be carried about with various and strange doctrines. For it is good that the heart be established by grace, not with foods which have not profited those who have been occupied with them.
10 We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat. 11 For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned outside the camp. 12 Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered outside the gate. 13 Therefore let us go forth to Him, outside the camp, bearing His reproach. 14 For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come. 15 Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. 16 But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
Heb 13:9 — Heb 13:16 (NKJV)

To begin, Paul is continuing his comparison of the New Testament and the Old. He is pointing out that just as the sin offering was not eaten under the Old Covenant, the New Testament is not concerned with food per se.

You will see from Leviticus 4, for example, that the sin offering is not eaten by the priests. It is wholly consumed by fire. Although the Lord Jesus did institute a memorial meal to keep us remembering His sacrifice so that we don't lose sight of our salvation, the highly ritualistic system of eating and drinking under the Law has now been removed for Christians.

This is what Paul is warning the Hebrew believers to beware of. They were no longer to get hung up on ceremonial feasts etc. The altar at which we worship now has nothing of that kind prescribed. Even the "Communion," as it has come to be known, is not ritualistic. It is merely a meal that we can individually or collectively have at any time of day on any day of the week according to any cuisine we like in memory of the Cross. The issue is not what we eat or how we eat it, but that the meal is used as an opportunity by us to remember that our eternal life was bought and paid for and sustained wholly by the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ just as the food we eat sustains our physical life in this world.

Paul urges these Hebrew believers and us who read these words today then to turn theirs and our attention away from this world and the material system of things to the world that is to come and to make a habit of praise, of offering thanks to God (as we most definitely should when we remember the great Price He paid for our Salvation) since that is what God prefers to ceremonial feasts.

Cheers.

KaideeGee:
I have always been so fascinated by God's word cause it's so full of mysteries.
In church this morning we studied on the Holy Spirit and it came around to the scripture (Lk 3 vs 16) '...He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire'. That struck a chord and I've been trying to decipher it can someone care to explain?

Hi there.

This is the full quote:

15 Now as the people were in expectation, and all reasoned in their hearts about John, whether he was the Christ or not, 16 John answered, saying to all, “I indeed baptize you with water; but One mightier than I is coming, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.”
Luk 3:15 — Luk 3:17 (NKJV)

To be baptized with the Holy Spirit is to be made one with Jesus Christ (Romans 8:9). To be baptized with fire is to be burned up like chaff.

This latter is what will happen to all unbelievers in the Lake of Fire, but it also applies to Armageddon when the Lord Jesus will destroy all those who have the mark of the beast with fire at His Return.

Cheers.

ogtechinc:
While growing up, I have had different sayings on the above.

Can Jesus be the Son of God and at the same time be the father or Almighty God?

Someone once told me that when Jesus came to the earth, it was God Almighty that came down because he has been taught that Jesus and God shared the same body as part of the Trinity (more confusion). Is there a scriptural backing to this teaching?

This scripture though got me thinking -

John 14:31:

"But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do."


If Jesus Christ is God Almighty or the Father, who is the father he is referring to that gives him commandments? (clarification needed here).

I honestly don't think anyone should be commanding Jesus if he is the Almighty God or the father.

Dear Nairalanders, what is the truth on the subject matter?

Hello.

Jesus Christ is not the Father. They are two different Persons. But they are both equally God.