₦airaland Forum

AlbertNewton:
I really don't have the energy to respond to this now.
But just tell me summarily what do you stand to benefit as Jehovah Witnesses that other Christians or even other people will not have access to ? Or in other words, if I am not a Jehovah's Witness, what am I loosing or what will I lose ?

I love this because that's exactly what all sincere and honest hearted individuals are asking. So i will try to be as brief as possible!
Now let's go straight to the Bible and see the answer Jesus gave to one of his friends when the man asked this same question!

Jesus Kept talking about everlasting life and what those who aren't his disciples will miss so Peter one of his closest confidants asked Jesus:

“Look! We have left all things and followed you; what, then, will there be for us?” Matthew 19:27

Peter asked this same question because himself and others have left all things just to be with Jesus.

Jesus answered:

“Truly I say to you, no one has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news who will not get 100 times more now in this period of time—houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the coming system of things, everlasting life." Mark 10:29-30

So my friend, only Jehovah's Witnesses can connect with millions of people from different nations throughout the earth to make themselves one big and family of peace loving worshipers which God has always wanted and it's only those who made themselves part of this global family of peace that God is ready to give what Jesus called EVERLASTING LIFE!

AlbertNewton:
Okay just to play along with you, assuming that it is actually impossible to prove my existence to you (I believe I can prove it actually), what will that itself prove ? What does it imply ?

It would prove that your refusal to acknowledge God's existence is simply based on the exercise your power and right to refuse a thing.

Exactly like the proverbial horse that you can force to the river but you can never force it to drink.

So, let's see if you can prove us wrong.

MaxInDHouse:
I love this because that's exactly what all sincere and honest hearted individuals are asking. So i will try to be as brief as possible!
Now let's go straight to the Bible and see the answer Jesus gave to one of his friends when the man asked this same question!

Jesus Kept talking about everlasting life and what those who aren't his disciples will miss so Peter one of his closest confidants asked Jesus:

“Look! We have left all things and followed you; what, then, will there be for us?” Matthew 19:27

Peter asked this same question because himself and others have left all things just to be with Jesus.

Jesus answered:

“Truly I say to you, no one has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news who will not get 100 times more now in this period of time—houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the coming system of things, everlasting life." Mark 10:29-30

You have moved post.

He asked about the benefits of Jw yet you are talking about Jesus and the Bible

MaxInDHouse:
So my friend, only Jehovah's Witnesses can connect with millions of people from different nations throughout the earth to make themselves one big and family of peace loving worshipers which God has always wanted and it's only those who made themselves part of this global family of peace that God is ready to give what Jesus called EVERLASTING LIFE!

So this is where your answer is. And the only thing that you are giving and promising is exactly what cultist promise which is connections because you think he is hungry, jobless and cannot travel around the world.

Anyway, continue your marketing

MaxInDHouse:
I love this because that's exactly what all sincere and honest hearted individuals are asking. So i will try to be as brief as possible!
Now let's go straight to the Bible and see the answer Jesus gave to one of his friends when the man asked this same question!

Jesus Kept talking about everlasting life and what those who aren't his disciples will miss so Peter one of his closest confidants asked Jesus:

“Look! We have left all things and followed you; what, then, will there be for us?” Matthew 19:27

Peter asked this same question because himself and others have left all things just to be with Jesus.

Jesus answered:

“Truly I say to you, no one has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news who will not get 100 times more now in this period of time—houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the coming system of things, everlasting life." Mark 10:29-30

So my friend, only Jehovah's Witnesses can connect with millions of people from different nations throughout the earth to make themselves one big and family of peace loving worshipers which God has always wanted and it's only those who made themselves part of this global family of peace that God is ready to give what Jesus called EVERLASTING LIFE!

Okay, everlasting life for witnesses and everlasting damnation (aka burning forever in hell) for others. Nice 👍

Now please tell me (summarily), how or why did you become a member of the JW ?
And also, if you were born somewhere in the middle east to a devout Muslim parents, do you think you would still be a witness ?

AlbertNewton:
Okay, everlasting life for witnesses and everlasting damnation (aka burning forever in hell) for others. Nice 👍

Now please tell me (summarily), how or why did you become a member of the JW ?
And also, if you were born somewhere in the middle east to a devout Muslim parents, do you think you would still be a witness ?

Did you see the Catholic church that was damaged in the middle East?

It clearly tells you that they have heard about God and the Bible

And shey you know that this is a change of Post exactly as the op said you people do when you cannot give any logical answer?

So you see you are proving the Op right!

Dtruthspeaker:
It would prove that your refusal to acknowledge God's existence is simply based on the exercise your power and right to refuse a thing.

Exactly like the proverbial horse that you can force to the river but you can never force it to drink.

So, let's see if you can prove us wrong.

I do not believe in the existence of the biblical god because to me the evidence provided for its existence and the stories told about it are not convincing enough. It's simply like you telling me something and I refuse to believe it because it doesn't sound true to me. Is there a problem with that ?
I didn't tell you that I can absolutely prove or disprove the existence of the biblical god. I simply don't believe such god exists or is real for certain reasons.

Dtruthspeaker:
Did you see the Catholic church that was damaged in the middle East?

It clearly tells you that they have heard about God and the Bible

And shey you know that this is a change of Post exactly as the op said you people do when you cannot give any logical answer?

So you see you are proving the Op right!

Why are you being silly? That reply wasn't meant for you. I was having a conversation with someone and it lead to me asking some questions as a follow-up.

AlbertNewton:
Okay, everlasting life for witnesses and everlasting damnation (aka burning forever in hell) for others. Nice 👍

Now please tell me (summarily), how or why did you become a member of the JW ?
And also, if you were born somewhere in the middle east to a devout Muslim parents, do you think you would still be a witness ?

Why not ask what the Bible says about the highlighted instead of concluding based on what other religions told you?

Well the Bible God has no intention of roasting people in fire that's what false religions teaches. Jeremiah 7:31
God said since we all have expiration dates only those who complied with His requirements will be spared from this condition as He will reward them with immortality! Psalms 37:9-11, 29

As for death God promised to erase it forever! Isaiah 25:8

Well you may be shocked to know that i was a Muslim and there are JWs in all Islamic countries throughout the world!

AlbertNewton:
Why are you being silly? That reply wasn't meant for you. I was having a conversation with someone and it lead to me asking some questions as a follow-up.

Please ignore him, remember i told you that only Jehovah's Witnesses knows the reason why we need to discuss with our neighbours about faith in God all these people are misinformed churchgoers so since they don't know what preaching or teaching means they get provoked each time they come in contact with thought provoking questions!

MaxInDHouse:
Please try to be sure of whatever you are going to say about the beliefs of any group {1Thessalonians 5:21} instead of saying what others say about them ask members of the group to know scripture upon which such beliefs are based! Act 17:11

Thanks!

Don't worry you're safe.
I think it's okay since it goes in the reverse as well.

If everyone tried to be be "sure" of what they were pushing about the other's religion, then to me you've said many wrongs about my religion, and I've said many wrongs about yours too.

We won't go there sha, we've been there before 😏

PulsingPurple:
Don't worry you're safe.
I think it's okay since it goes in the reverse as well.

If everyone tried to be be "sure" of what they were pushing about the other's religion, then to me you've said many wrongs about my religion, and I've said many wrongs about yours too.

We won't go there sha, we've been there before 😏

I don't want to say you are lying because the essence of pointing out what you said tthat's incorrect is to make you know so you won't say it before someone who will tell you:

"You are a liar, that's not what Jehovah's Witnesses teaches"

So please correct me in whatever i have said about your religion that's incorrect so i will never repeat it again because to me you don't have any religion!

AlbertNewton:
Yeah I am well aware of this paradox.
I think one of the reasons for this is because any sufficiently complex situation is open to being analyzed from different perspectives , and each perspective may lead to a somewhat rational/sensible conclusion.

True

An analogy for this is the popular story about the blind men who were asked to touch/feel an elephant and to describe it afterwards. And because of the size of an elephant, it has many different sides (perspectives) so each blind man ended up describing the animal (drawing conclusions) based on the part of it that was touched/felt.
But I always have some respect for anyone who has come to form their belief or disbelief after honestly, carefully and rationally considering the plausibility/sensibility of such a belief, rather than blindly holding on to a belief because you are born into it (which is the case for the vast majority of people).
While getting to the ultimate truth might be very difficult or at least open-ended, I do believe that when we examine the evidence for a belief honestly, carefully and rationally enough we will learn some truths. But the problem is who is going to be the ultimate judge of what the truth is ? 🤔

Exactly... 😅

Emphasis in bold, What's the definition of TRUTH.
Me I sha know that TRUTH might also be considered as "relative". As you've said with the elephant analogy, all blind men carefully acknowledged the elephant, concluded, were all right, but to each, the other wasn't telling the TRUTH.

There's something I've been focusing on lately, Point Blank Fallacy.
The fact that what my point is valid doesn't mean other people's points are invalid. Many arguments assume that their points must stand—point blank.
Politicians loot money so we conclude: All politicians are wicked.
True but first of all, not all. Secondly, humans in general have natures, humans tend to be wicked.

A majority of the time, people who speak with point blank assertions just do so with more of emotions and less logic.

I think TRUTH in itself exists, then truth at a personal level of acceptance exists too, so everyone ends up choosing for themselves what is true and what isn't, even after seeing what the assumed 'Judge' dictates as true.

For me personally, while I'm open to the possibility of a supreme entity capable of creating the universe, I simply can't see the biblical god [ a god who reduced itself to a petty tribal deity (God of Israel) in a tiny portion of the universe and commanding genocide on other tribes just so he could give some land to his chosen people ] as the mastermind behind this universe. No matter how I consider it, it doesn't make sense to me that the biblical god is the source of the universe.
So while acknowledging that I may be wrong and other people may be able to see the biblical god in a whole different perspective that makes it make sense to them, I think the best I can do for now is still to hold on to what makes sense to me personally.

Well well well... What then fits your acceptable definition of God?
Specs, character, measurements..? 😏

All is well... always and ever will be
To each a right to his own beliefs after all.


I'm sure people that completely discard the idea of the possibility of a god will have there reasons too. Particularly, almost all gods are largely human-like, either in their physical form or characteristics, suggesting that they could all just be a product of our imagination, creating beings in our minds who are like but with much greater abilities.
But to me personally, I see this universe as a very strange place and there's no telling what could be out there.

At the bolded, sure.

Then you say something about the assumed personalities of God seems too human-like, therefore it's easy to dismiss the assumptions as imaginations.

But what if the conclusion you make there should actually be the opposite?

Think of game devs creating game world's, characters, features, stuff like that... Isn't there much of a striking resemblance between them and their creations? And rightly so. Cos I couldn't imagine anything less.

Like what entity should be capable of creating emotions, if he doesn't have emotions himself?
Or capable of creating sets of interconnected functionalities, if he doesn't have things like that going on in his realm?

It's always right to assume creations mirror whatever their creator already had. Not to 1:1 levels, not to perfection at all, but just enough to count.

At the bolded, yeah we could just discuss stuffs without necessarily trying to debate. And I even don't have much energy these days for religious debates because I've come to realise the futility of it. I've come to realise that nothing really matters after all, whether you believe or not in a god you die eventually and that is the end. So I'm just trying to enjoy the rare privilege I have to exist temporarily as a conscious being on this tiny planet in this insanely vast universe.

Is there anything in particular you would like me to say ?

Ehhh, who won't be tired of aimless arguments 😅😅

Was hoping to see details of what lead to your conclusions. You've said a bit about God's assumed character falling below your expectations from a God. Asides that?

Mind you, this exact reason is why many people don't believe the religion next door. Like Christians saying that the kinds of things Allah allegedly said and commanded are the exact reasons why they can never believe. So yhh that's fair point.

Asides that, how about the good sides?
How about the picture of Christianity that Jesus and his early followers pushed?
Any objections there?

MaxInDHouse:
I don't want to say you are lying because the essence of pointing out what you said tthat's incorrect is to make you know so you won't say it before someone who will tell you:

"You are a liar, that's not what Jehovah's Witnesses teaches"

So please correct me in whatever i have said about your religion that's incorrect so i will never repeat it again because to me you don't have any religion!

Was rushing to type.

Meant to say:

If we try to follow this idea of everyone being "sure" of what they were pushing about the other's religion, then to me you've said many wrongs about my religion, and I've said many wrongs about yours too.

That aside.

Let's focused on the bolded you typed.

The point I'm trying to pass is that if everyone follows that idea of being sure, then anytime you speak about Christianity, everyone true Christian will tell you:

"You are a liar, that's not what Jesus Christ teaches"

Just the same way to you:

"I am a liar, that's not what Jehovah's Witnesses teaches"

I don't know if you get the point now?

As for my religion and your conclusions, I don't even know what's the basis for concluding but we talked about all those in the past. 😅
I pushed to continue those conversations back then but I think you didn't reply as I expected so the conversation eventually ended. Some of those comments and replies I made on that thread, I later deleted them at some point and you got to know it later, if you remember.

I even went as far as inviting you to a new dormant thread to continue this talk about my religion (and people's religion in general) but you never responded.

These days I have only enough strength to say I'm a Christian. That's all. 😌

So yhh, back to the points we were making:
I misrepresent your religion. No offence but you can't really complain seeing that you misrepresent mine too.
That's been the norm for a while. It's awful.

(I took note of the correction you made sha).

Before you can say "this or that is what Jesus taught" you must be prepared to present a group practicing it which definitely should be your own church or group but when you claim Jesus taught something yet you can't point to any group practicing it that is delusion!

So tell me what Jesus taught that i said the opposite and the group practicing it!

PulsingPurple:
Was rushing to type.

Meant to say:

If we try to follow this idea of everyone being "sure" of what they were pushing about the other's religion, then to me you've said many wrongs about my religion, and I've said many wrongs about yours too.

That aside.

Let's focused on the bolded you typed.

The point I'm trying to pass is that if everyone follows that idea of being sure, then anytime you speak about Christianity, everyone true Christian will tell you:

"You are a liar, that's not what Jesus Christ teaches"

Just the same way to you:

"I am a liar, that's not what Jehovah's Witnesses teaches"

I don't know if you get the point now?

As for my religion and your conclusions, I don't even know what's the basis for concluding but we talked about all those in the past. 😅
I pushed to continue those conversations back then but I think you didn't reply as I expected so the conversation eventually ended. Some of those comments and replies I made on that thread, I later deleted them at some point and you got to know it later, if you remember.

I even went as far as inviting you to a new dormant thread to continue this talk about my religion (and people's religion in general) but you never responded.

These days I have only enough strength to say I'm a Christian. That's all. 😌

So yhh, back to the points we were making:
I misrepresent your religion. No offence but you can't really complain seeing that you misrepresent mine too.
That's been the norm for a while. It's awful.

(I took note of the correction you made sha).

MaxInDHouse:
Before you can say "this or that is what Jesus taught" you must be prepared to present a group practicing it which definitely should be your own church or group but when you claim Jesus taught something yet you can't point to any group practicing it that is delusion!

So tell me what Jesus taught that i said the opposite and the group practicing it!

For the first line, I'm not sure that's a valid point, seeing that the teachings have already been documented.

However, this were the exact same things you said back then, and when I followed through, it ended with the good ol' redundancy.
Won't be repeating that.

Might want to go back to some of my messages you never responded to back then if you want to know anything else.

What matters was the point I made just now. Glad you get it.

All calm here.

I can say boldly that you have no religion at all because i ignored your post as you were just trolling unable to make any valid point on what your church teaches.

I can never ever ignore anyone who says what his church teaches and mentions the name of the church practicing it for everyone to be sure of what he/she said.

So if you're still hiding behind the walls of Babylon the great (world empire of false religion claiming Christians) there is nothing further to discuss but be rest assured that you don't have any specific religion to present that's why all of you are hiding behind the anonymous name "CHRISTENDOM"

PulsingPurple:
For the first line, I'm not sure that's a valid point, seeing that the teachings have already been documented.

However, this were the exact same things you said back then, and when I followed through, it ended with the good ol' redundancy.
Won't be repeating that.

Might want to go back to some of my messages you never responded to back then if you want to know anything else.

What matters was the point I made just now. Glad you get it.

All calm here.

MaxInDHouse:
I can say boldly that you have no religion at all because i ignored your post as you were just trolling unable to make any valid point on what your church teaches.

I can never ever ignore anyone who says what his church teaches and mentions the name of the church practicing it for everyone to be sure of what he/she said.

So if you're still hiding behind the walls of Babylon the great (world empire of false religion claiming Christians) there is nothing further to discuss but be rest assured that you don't have any specific religion that you can't present that's why all of you are hiding behind the anonymous name "CHRISTENDOM"

Okay then.

The point still remains tho...

Peace.

Just had to add: Me giving you the details of my church and pushing to continue those conversations back then was trolling and hiding behind walls? Lol 😂
Maybe it's the opposite oo, the person that stopped replying immediately after I call out my church name and lay all my points at that moment... Maybe that person is the wall bender. 😅

But yhh it's cool. All these are side points.

AlbertNewton:
Why are you being silly? That reply wasn't meant for you. I was having a conversation with someone and it lead to me asking some questions as a follow-up.

True.

But in it, you are attacking Christianity so I do have a right to enter in.

PulsingPurple:
Okay then.
The point still remains tho...
Peace.
Just had to add: Me giving you the details of my church and pushing to continue those conversations back then was trolling and hiding behind walls? Lol 😂
Maybe it's the opposite oo, the person that stopped replying immediately after I call out my church name and lay all my points at that moment... Maybe that person is the wall bender. 😅
But yhh it's cool. All these are side points.

Well i've made my point and it's clear you can't be a worshiper of my own God if you're not under the umbrella of Jehovah's Witnesses!

PulsingPurple:
True


Exactly... 😅

Emphasis in bold, What's the definition of TRUTH.
Me I sha know that TRUTH might also be considered as "relative". As you've said with the elephant analogy, all blind men carefully acknowledged the elephant, concluded, were all right, but to each, the other wasn't telling the TRUTH.

There's something I've been focusing on lately, Point Blank Fallacy.
The fact that what my point is valid doesn't mean other people's points are invalid. Many arguments assume that their points must stand—point blank.
Politicians loot money so we conclude: All politicians are wicked.
True but first of all, not all. Secondly, humans in general have natures, humans tend to be wicked.

A majority of the time, people who speak with point blank assertions just do so with more of emotions and less logic.

I think TRUTH in itself exists, then truth at a personal level of acceptance exists too, so everyone ends up choosing for themselves what is true and what isn't, even after seeing what the assumed 'Judge' dictates as true.

At the bolded, I think the "personal truth" you're talking about is what is called belief. But regardless of what everyone believes as the truth at a personal level, objective truth
still exists. But when the objective truth is hard to establish, personal truths thrive, everyone feels their own personal version of the truth is the real truth 😐

Well well well... What then fits your acceptable definition of God?

Specs, character, measurements..? 😏

You're basically telling me to create a god in my imagination (as people have done through the ages) and tell you what it looks like
Well, I've actually thought about this before. When I considered the insane vastness of the universe (hundreds of billions of stars in each galaxy and trillions of galaxy in just the observable part of the universe alone, keeping in mind that the Sun, which is just an average star, is millions of times bigger than the earth), and the potentiality that each star probably has a planet revolving around it with intelligent lives, the best candidate my mind could imagine as the creator is an Eternal Infinite Energy.
Scientifically, it is established that ENERGY can neither be created nor destroyed (which essentially means it is eternal). Furthermore, we have come to understand that everything in the universe is just energy expressing itself in different forms (heat, light, photons, atoms, living organisms, stars, black holes are all just energy, in different forms). But in this case, the energy is not just "creating", rather it is transforming itself to different forms through different processes.

Any objections on this idea ?

At the bolded, sure.

Then you say something about the assumed personalities of God seems too human-like, therefore it's easy to dismiss the assumptions as imaginations.

But what if the conclusion you make there should actually be the opposite?

Think of game devs creating game world's, characters, features, stuff like that... Isn't there much of a striking resemblance between them and their creations? And rightly so. Cos I couldn't imagine anything less.

Like what entity should be capable of creating emotions, if he doesn't have emotions himself?
Or capable of creating sets of interconnected functionalities, if he doesn't have things like that going on in his realm?

It's always right to assume creations mirror whatever their creator already had. Not to 1:1 levels, not to perfection at all, but just enough to count.

Actually humans rarely create things that mirror them. The game example you cited is an exception (a very rare one) in which the developer specifically wants to simulate his world in a game. Look at all of the millions of things humans have created, how many of them are like us ?
But I guess it can be argued also that the creation of the earth specifically is an attempt by the creator (God) to simulate the realities of his realm on earth 🤔.

But this leads to a question : When humans create something (car, phone, bridge, electricity etc) it is almost always to serve a particular purpose. If we assume the creator is also like us in that regard, what purpose would you say he had in mind when he created the universe ?

Ehhh, who won't be tired of aimless arguments 😅😅

Was hoping to see details of what lead to your conclusions. You've said a bit about God's assumed character falling below your expectations from a God. Asides that?

Mind you, this exact reason is why many people don't believe the religion next door. Like Christians saying that the kinds of things Allah allegedly said and commanded are the exact reasons why they can never believe. So yhh that's fair point.

If you want more details, I think you will have to ask me questions specifically on the kind of details you want or whatever you need me to clarify about my stance which I tried to state clearly in a previous reply.

Asides that, how about the good sides?
How about the picture of Christianity that Jesus and his early followers pushed?
Any objections there?

I actually do like the personality of Jesus especially with regard to how he preached about and demonstrated love, kindness and godly living.
The main issues I have with Jesus' doctrine are the following :
1. The idea of heaven and hell, which by the way seem to me as inventions of Jesus as they were not talked about in the old testament (I stand to be corrected though). The idea that a loving God will condemn people to hell for some petty sins (like fornication or not believing a particular thing) just doesn't make sense to me
2. The requirement for believing in Jesus as the Lord and Saviour for one to be saved is also something that doesn't make sense to me. I consider billions of people that lived before jesus and those that live after Jesus but without getting to hear anything about Jesus, let alone believe. What is the fate of these people ?
3. The belief that Jesus is the son of God or that he is even God himself and that he came to the world to die for our sins is also something I find ridiculous.

AlbertNewton:
I do not believe in the existence of the biblical god because to me the evidence provided for its existence and the stories told about it are not convincing enough. It's simply like you telling me something and I refuse to believe it because it doesn't sound true to me. Is there a problem with that ?
I didn't tell you that I can absolutely prove or disprove the existence of the biblical god. I simply don't believe such god exists or is real for certain reasons.

You have confessed in the bold exactly what I said you atheists are doing.

Like the horse forced to drink you are simply exercising your your right of refusal even if 100 evidence are given.

And it is funny how all it takes to sway you in all other subjects is just 1 or 2 evidence but when it comes biases like telling you your mother is bad or to the evidence of proof of God it is then you people demand hundreds and thousands of evidence even committing the fallacy of demanding the impossible.

So, no one is forcing you to believe and I hate people who do try forcing people to accept their beliefs. Left to me, preaching will only be confined in churches and I do not believe that atheists should ever be preached to.

MaxInDHouse:
Well i've made my point and it's clear you can't be a worshiper of my own God if you're not under the umbrella of Jehovah's Witnesses!

Okay oo...

AlbertNewton:
At the bolded, I think the "personal truth" you're talking about is what is called belief. But regardless of what everyone believes as the truth at a personal level, objective truth
still exists. But when the objective truth is hard to establish, personal truths thrive, everyone feels their own personal version of the truth is the real truth 😐

Yhh, objective truth is what it's called?
Trying to establish that whatever it is, no one can actually know cos like who decides? For instance just yesterday, a woman was anything with a XX chromosomes (I hope), but now people are pushing that it's just a matter of choice.
Every knowledge that counts as truth now can somehow just get changed (and I mean the useful changes like proper corrections too). So it's like TRUTH in itself is something that's we're not even capable of knowing, we're just able to have the privilege of getting all that context we need, and then we can conveniently choose to believe. Was just pondering there, nothing serious at all, if you understand the thought process there.

You're basically telling me to create a god in my imagination (as people have done through the ages) and tell you what it looks like

Bro, I mean... No. 😂
Not a bad interpretation of what I asked oo but more like adjusting the unliked characters of this "God" you grew up to know, based on the template.
I was trying to see if your acceptable version of "God" is who I already see my God as.

I guess starting from scratch is still acceptable.

Well, I've actually thought about this before. When I considered the insane vastness of the universe (hundreds of billions of stars in each galaxy and trillions of galaxy in just the observable part of the universe alone, keeping in mind that the Sun, which is just an average star, is millions of times bigger than the earth), and the potentiality that each star probably has a planet revolving around it with intelligent lives, the best candidate my mind could imagine as the creator is an Eternal Infinite Energy.
Scientifically, it is established that ENERGY can neither be created nor destroyed (which essentially means it is eternal). Furthermore, we have come to understand that everything in the universe is just energy expressing itself in different forms (heat, light, photons, atoms, living organisms, stars, black holes are all just energy, in different forms). But in this case, the energy is not just "creating", rather it is transforming itself to different forms through different processes.

Any objections on this idea ?

Noooo, not at all. The kinds of things I love to hear.

Does your "God" need an accompanying personality as well, interested in his character too?

But then Eternal Infinite Energy? "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but can be converted from one form to another", do you see how it wants to match the same energy as "[The monotheistic] God wasn't created, cannot be destroyed, and from Him everything was created, His words converting to the universe as we know it"?

Meanwhile I'm just learning something new also.
You know how one of our arguments for the existence of God is that from our observation on Earth, everything created has a creator, a source somewhere. And that our creator will ultimately be God.
Their immediate response will be: So who created God.
Even when there's other elaborate ways to try and explain the logic there, what if you've just given the best answer, the exception: Energy. Energy can not be created nor destroyed...

I imagine them proceeding to ask: What if the initial energy was just that dust in the Big?

It is well 😂

Actually humans rarely create things that mirror them. The game example you cited is an exception (a very rare one) in which the developer specifically wants to simulate his world in a game. Look at all of the millions of things humans have created, how many of them are like us ?
But I guess it can be argued also that the creation of the earth specifically is an attempt by the creator (God) to simulate the realities of his realm on earth 🤔.

But this leads to a question : When humans create something (car, phone, bridge, electricity etc) it is almost always to serve a particular purpose. If we assume the creator is also like us in that regard, what purpose would you say he had in mind when he created the universe ?

No I meant like the idea of creating something that simulates sentience.

Like, if God wanted to create stuffs that simulate sentience, the sentient characters themselves will try to reflect the qualities He's already seen over there. Their environment might try to follow some patterns that already happen over there. Same with the humans creating their own simulation of the world in open world games.

And this then would imply that maybe we didn't create God's that think like us, but we think the way we do because a God tried to make us similar to themselves in that aspect.

In terms of creation in general (asides the sentience part), we already know that every intentional creation is made with purpose, not to mirror. (As you've noted).
With "God" for instance you could say He's created some useful stuff in his realm that you've not been aware of yet, just like we create ours here.

The purpose for this "God" creating us?
I would say what I saw in the scriptures, and what makes the most sense so far to me: For His pleasure.

Wish I had other things I believed instead
Most times it perfectly makes sense to me, seeing like the video game analogy or most things that were created by man.

A few times it doesn't... Like mehn, why? (I do get my answers tho, I can live with them)

If you want more details, I think you will have to ask me questions specifically on the kind of details you want or whatever you need me to clarify about my stance which I tried to state clearly in a previous reply.

I'm already seeing a lot...

I actually do like the personality of Jesus especially with regard to how he preached about and demonstrated love, kindness and godly living.
The main issues I have with Jesus' doctrine are the following :
1. The idea of heaven and hell, which by the way seem to me as inventions of Jesus as they were not talked about in the old testament (I stand to be corrected though). The idea that a loving God will condemn people to hell for some petty sins (like fornication or not believing a particular thing) just doesn't make sense to me
2. The requirement for believing in Jesus as the Lord and Saviour for one to be saved is also something that doesn't make sense to me. I consider billions of people that lived before jesus and those that live after Jesus but without getting to hear anything about Jesus, let alone believe. What is the fate of these people ?
3. The belief that Jesus is the son of God or that he is even God himself and that he came to the world to die for our sins is also something I find ridiculous.

Omooo
Sometimes what I try to see is: asides everything that's a concern to you, would you be comfortable signing up for Christianity?

Like in your case, what if in the future you got convinced that the details in these things you believed is quite (far) different from the picture you see.

At the same time there's many doctrines flying around so again, who decides what's TRUTH and what isn't.

1. I can't really check, but what if the representation of heaven and hell that's allegedly in the new testament, isn't even there at all. Just misinterpretations, fabrications?

Then for the rest, it still comes down to the whole beliefs and truths from here.

I see all you're saying sha. Sounds as logical as it can get, then there's always room to introduce more logic, if you want.
At least to fully understand the thing that you don't agree with. So that your disagreement isn't coming from a place of ignorance.

AlbertNewton:
I didn't tell you that I can absolutely prove or disprove the existence of the biblical god. I simply don't believe such god exists or is real for certain reasons.

With this i am okay with anyone claiming ATHEIST what i can't tolerate is someone trying to disprove the Bible God i will show the person that He is the one and only God that you have nothing to say as evidence against Him!

The Bible says:

The fruitage of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith,  mildness, self-control.[color =blue]Against such things there is no law[/color]. Galatians 5:22-23


Against the spirit of the Bible God there is no law you can fabricate because He is Holy (Perfect)

Thanks!

MaxInDHouse:
Why not ask what the Bible says about the highlighted instead of concluding based on what other religions told you?

Well the Bible God has no intention of roasting people in fire that's what false religions teaches. Jeremiah 7:31
God said since we all have expiration dates only those who complied with His requirements will be spared from this condition as He will reward them with immortality! Psalms 37:9-11, 29

As for death God promised to erase it forever! Isaiah 25:8

Well you may be shocked to know that i was a Muslim and there are JWs in all Islamic countries throughout the world!

Jeremiah 7:31 is talking about something completely different, the verse is not relevant to any discussion about hell fire. Perhaps you should take some time to read the entire chapter and understand the context.

A more relevant verse is Matthew 25:41-42. Read that and tell me what it means.

Yeah, I'm truly shocked to know you converted from Islam to JS. Your case is certainly an exceptional one. I'm curious to learn about the circumstances that led to your conversion, if you don't mind to share.

In any case, the point I was trying to make is that the vast majority of people generally end up following whatever religion they are born into. (Why do you think this is the case by the way?). And if a person's religion is now an important factor that determines whether they go to heaven or hell, this means those who are born into the wrong religion (through no fault of theirs !) will at a great disadvantage. This doesn't seem to me like the system a loving and intelligent god will use to punish or reward people.

MaxInDHouse:
With this i am okay with anyone claiming ATHEIST what i can't tolerate is someone trying to disprove the Bible God i will show the person that He is the one and only God that you have nothing to say as evidence against Him!

The claim about the biblical god's existence or inexistence is difficult to prove absolutely. So at the end of the day, everyone is left to believe or disbelieve whatever makes sense to them based on the evidence available to them. I examined the evidence (the stories and accounts in the bible) and I'm not convinced that such a stupid, petty tribal god could be the creator of this wonderful universe. It is just as simple as that.

The Bible says:

The fruitage of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith,  mildness, self-control.[color =blue]Against such things there is no law[/color]. Galatians 5:22-23


Against the spirit of the Bible God there is no law you can fabricate because He is Holy (Perfect)

Thanks!

How did the biblical god exhibit the fruits of the spirit you mentioned when he was commanding the Israelite to occupy the lands of other people and to slaughter every living thing they find on those lands: animals, children, women etc ? Deuteronomy 20:16-17.

AlbertNewton:
Jeremiah 7:31 is talking about something completely different, the verse is not relevant to any discussion about hell fire. Perhaps you should take some time to read the entire chapter and understand the context.

God said the thought of roasting people in fire never occurred to him!
That's the point.
Why?
Only sadists can't look away from errors whereas the Bible God is always happy to see nice people {1Timothy 1:11} but as for evildoers He knew it's not their fault rather most are molded by the circumstances they find themselves so He keeps pleading with them for a change {Isaiah 1:18 compare to {Ezekiel 34:11} so when any evildoer makes a u-turn God wipes their errors without remembering it again! Psalms 103:10-14

AlbertNewton:
A more relevant verse is Matthew 25:41-42. Read that and tell me what it means.

This is an illustration!

AlbertNewton:
Yeah, I'm truly shocked to know you converted from Islam to JS. Your case is certainly an exceptional one. I'm curious to learn about the circumstances that led to your conversion, if you don't mind to share.

You're wrong here!
Because all normal people ask questions like:
How did life begin?
Why are we here?
Why do innocent people suffer?
What happens to us when we die?
Will suffering ever end?
If 98% love peace why do much wars?

All these questions Jehovah's Witnesses answered convincingly so what stops me from becoming one of them?

AlbertNewton:
In any case, the point I was trying to make is that the vast majority of people generally end up following whatever religion they are born into. (Why do you think this is the case by the way?). And if a person's religion is now an important factor that determines whether they go to heaven or hell, this means those who are born into the wrong religion (through no fault of theirs !) will at a great disadvantage. This doesn't seem to me like the system a loving and intelligent god will use to punish or reward people.

God loves people so there is a provision for sincere and honest hearted people who lived and died in false religions for instance He said about them.

For when people of the nations, who do not have law, do by nature the things of the law, these people, although not having law, are a law to themselves. They are the very ones who demonstrate the matter of the law to be written in their hearts, while their conscience is bearing witness with them, and by their own thoughts they are being accused or even excused.

God will resurrect both righteous and unrighteous people {Act 24:15} the righteous are people who knew God's laws and lived by the laws the unrighteous are people who don't know God's laws but lived and died by their own conscience so God will give them a second chance after Satan and his demons has been locked up for thousand years by then only Jehovah's Witnesses will be practicing their religion so no more confusion but whoever refuse to join us then will be allowed to live for just a hundred years before he die naturally as a youth! Isaiah 65:20

So our God has a purpose for both those who knew the truth and those who doesn't know it but as for wicked people who doesn't care at all their death means their end because they have no good records for which God needs to remember them for! Psalms 9:11

AlbertNewton:
The claim about the biblical god's existence or inexistence is difficult to prove absolutely. So at the end of the day, everyone is left to believe or disbelieve whatever makes sense to them based on the evidence available to them. I examined the evidence (the stories and accounts in the bible) and I'm not convinced that such a stupid, petty tribal god could be the creator of this wonderful universe. It is just as simple as that.
How did the biblical god exhibit the fruits of the spirit you mentioned when he was commanding the Israelite to occupy the lands of other people and to slaughter every living thing they find on those lands: animals, children, women etc ? Deuteronomy 20:16-17.

This is the reason why i said you haven't studied the Bible with His Witnesses!

God wanted to restore paradise on this planet but first He need a place where people who knows His standards will stay as an example for all other nations who doesn't know Him so He allowed the Israelite (chosen nation) to be enslaved in the world's most powerful nation (Egypt) then He went to Egypt with two feeble octogenarians to release His people without a military force.
So tell me between such a God and those stubborn nations who refused to leave Canaan for Him after hearing what He did to Egypt who is WICKED?
Remember that all the nations back then believe in their Gods because they feel it's these Gods that's helping them to win battles so if the God of Israel can conquer Egypt without a military force is that not enough warning sign for them to leave Canaan for His worshipers?

PulsingPurple:
Yhh, objective truth is what it's called?
Trying to establish that whatever it is, no one can actually know cos like who decides? For instance just yesterday, a woman was anything with a XX chromosomes (I hope), but now people are pushing that it's just a matter of choice.
Every knowledge that counts as truth now can somehow just get changed (and I mean the useful changes like proper corrections too). So it's like TRUTH in itself is something that's we're not even capable of knowing, we're just able to have the privilege of getting all that context we need, and then we can conveniently choose to believe. Was just pondering there, nothing serious at all, if you understand the thought process there.

Yeah, I get you. You're basically saying some truths are unknowable, so everyone just believes whatever makes the most sense to them. And since there's no ultimate judge for who's right or wrong, everyone just hold on to their own "truth".
I guess you may also be insinuating that the truth about God may fall in this category of unknowable/unverifiable truth.

Bro, I mean... No. 😂
Not a bad interpretation of what I asked oo but more like adjusting the unliked characters of this "God" you grew up to know, based on the template.
I was trying to see if your acceptable version of "God" is who I already see my God as.

1. Perhaps if the biblical god were not as tribalistic and murderous as the bible accounts show him to be, I would find him much more acceptable.
2. If he didn't create hell for people to burn in forever as punishment for different petty sins, then I would like him more.
3. If he demonstrates more intelligence and compassion in dealing with people, realising that they cannot be entirely blamed for their flaws (because they are largely controlled by their biology and psychology), he would seem more real to me.

I guess starting from scratch is still acceptable.


Noooo, not at all. The kinds of things I love to hear.

Does your "God" need an accompanying personality as well, interested in his character too?

No, the Energy I am proposing as the source of creation is completely devoid of personality. Characteristics and personalities merely emerge in the various things the energy transform to: greenness of vegetation, speed of light, gravity around massive bodies, emotions in human beings etc are all qualities that emerged as a result of energy transforming to different things. The energy itself doesn't have those qualities.

But then Eternal Infinite Energy? "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but can be converted from one form to another", do you see how it wants to match the same energy as "[The monotheistic] God wasn't created, cannot be destroyed, and from Him everything was created, His words converting to the universe as we know it"?

Of course anything that can be considered as the creator or source of the universe must be itself "uncreatable" and indestructible. But the idea of a personal God with certain qualities is problematic for being the ultimate source, because it makes us start to question how such specific personalities or qualities emerged in such an entity. Why is he good and not evil ? Why does he have certain emotions? These questions imply that something must have caused the entity to have the specific set of qualities it has, meaning that it is itself subject to something external, thereby invalidating it/him as the ultimate source.

Meanwhile I'm just learning something new also.
You know how one of our arguments for the existence of God is that from our observation on Earth, everything created has a creator, a source somewhere. And that our creator will ultimately be God.
Their immediate response will be: So who created God.
Even when there's other elaborate ways to try and explain the logic there, what if you've just given the best answer, the exception: Energy. Energy can not be created nor destroyed...

I imagine them proceeding to ask: What if the initial energy was just that dust in the Big?

It is well 😂

The simple problem is that our mind simply can't process the idea of something being eternal. Our brain power is just not equipped for something like that. So it will still actually make sense to question the source of this "energy". But since we also know logically that something has to be the ultimate source of everything we see around us, our best bet is just to look for the best candidate that could be the ultimate creator. So to me, based on what is known scientifically (for now), an Eternal Infinite Energy is what makes the most sense to me as the ultimate source of creation. But as I've emphasized before, I'm open to other possibilities and theories.

No I meant like the idea of creating something that simulates sentience.

Like, if God wanted to create stuffs that simulate sentience, the sentient characters themselves will try to reflect the qualities He's already seen over there. Their environment might try to follow some patterns that already happen over there. Same with the humans creating their own simulation of the world in open world games.

And this then would imply that maybe we didn't create God's that think like us, but we think the way we do because a God tried to make us similar to themselves in that aspect.

In terms of creation in general (asides the sentience part), we already know that every intentional creation is made with purpose, not to mirror. (As you've noted).
With "God" for instance you could say He's created some useful stuff in his realm that you've not been aware of yet, just like we create ours here.

The purpose for this "God" creating us?
I would say what I saw in the scriptures, and what makes the most sense so far to me: For His pleasure.

Wish I had other things I believed instead
Most times it perfectly makes sense to me, seeing like the video game analogy or most things that were created by man.

A few times it doesn't... Like mehn, why? (I do get my answers tho, I can live with them)

I get you now. I agree that if we specifically want to create sentient entities we will most likely take a cue or inspiration from what is already available in our environment and then perhaps make some modifications. So it makes sense to assume that if we are indeed created by a sentient creator, then part of his personalities will show up in us. But the reverse is also true. If we, as sentient beings, want to imagine a sentient entity that supposedly created us, then part of the attributes and characteristics we will ascribe to this entity will most probably mirror our own personalities.

As for the purpose of the universe (and us), I think if we take religion and religious teachings out of the equation and just observe the universe objectively, there is no real purpose in the grand scheme of things. On some level though certain things may serve some valuable purposes: like the Sun sustaining life on earth, certain microorganisms being essential in the human body to carry out different vital processes, or an individual living his life for a particular cause. But it doesn't seem like there's any specific purpose to it all.

I'm already seeing a lot...



Omooo
Sometimes what I try to see is: asides everything that's a concern to you, would you be comfortable signing up for Christianity?

Like in your case, what if in the future you got convinced that the details in these things you believed is quite (far) different from the picture you see.

At the same time there's many doctrines flying around so again, who decides what's TRUTH and what isn't.

Actually if I put aside certain events recorded in the bible (especially in the old testament) and some core Christian beliefs (heaven and hell, Jesus dying for our sins), Christianity in its modern form is largely appealing. Far more good than evil have been done through Christianity and Christians generally just want to live good lives and go to heaven when they die. So even though I believe Christianity is based on falsehoods, I think Christianity is good for the world for the most part. It is a great social gathering for people to meet others and have fun (which is part of what makes us human).
I still go to church once in a while by the way (I always enjoy the singing and dancing, and sometimes interesting motivational sermons by intelligent preachers about general life matters). And sometimes when I see people in such joyous mood while singing and dancing, I wish I could also throw away my rationality and be like them.
While atheism is liberating (you're no longer living under the shackles of religion), but if you ask me if I would rather have the whole world become atheists, I would say no. I'm not too sure about how good it will be for the world if the vast majority of people become atheists. When people realise there's no sky daddy monitoring their every move and who has written some laws they have to obey, I don't know what they would choose to do with that freedom.
So summarily, I acknowledge that Christianity (especially in its modern form) is generally good for the world (if we regard it merely as a social organisation), but I do not believe in the core tenets of the religion.

1. I can't really check, but what if the representation of heaven and hell that's allegedly in the new testament, isn't even there at all. Just misinterpretations, fabrications?

This is actually a big issue for me. If the bible is the best means the "all-knowing" god could think of to convey the truth to the people, then he has failed very woefully. Many passages in the bible, which are supposedly meant to address crucial issues, are ambiguous and open to different interpretations. This is why it's very easy for pastors to form different denominations based on their own interpretation and understanding of what god wants. And since there is no final judge, everyone keeps believing his own "truth" (as you would say), and the confusion continues!

Then for the rest, it still comes down to the whole beliefs and truths from here.

I see all you're saying sha. Sounds as logical as it can get, then there's always room to introduce more logic, if you want.
At least to fully understand the thing that you don't agree with. So that your disagreement isn't coming from a place of ignorance.

So one of my main issues with the biblical god is promising the land of other people to the Israelites and eventually ordering the Israelite to murder everyone in those lands. As a believer in a "loving" god, how do you rationalize this act ?

Which parts of the bible have you had to question seriously when you started to study the bible, and which explanations did you come up with eventually that make sense to you ?

Are there still parts of the bible that don't quite make sense to you ?