The Antichristian Phenomenon

CONTINUED…It's funny how you said people are being forced to adhere to a bunch of rules and that we struggle with natural urges. I agree that most organized religions go overboard with rules, but Jesus' goal was for people to grow in Spirit, so I wouldn't be surprised if he himself is disgusted at how religion has evolved since it so often turns people away from him. I don't think I really struggle with rules or urges, and I have no shame in admitting I'm a sinner. Every Christian is, just like every non-Christian, and there's nothing worse than a self-righteous Chrisitian. I accept that God knows the environment and circumstances in which we live. He doesn't expect us to be perfect, so I don't try. (CONTINUED IN NEXT POST, TOO LONG)

CONTINUED…When it comes to free will, it makes perfect sense to me. God created heavenly beings who were perfect and sinless, until the cherub Lucifer became so filled with pride and conceit that he exulted himself above God. Lucifer recruited angels to form a rebellion against God and there was a great battle in which God and his angels conquered Lucifer. They were cast out of heaven and sent to earth. The bible says Satan is the ruler of this world. At the point that God's creation no longer CHOSE to have fellowship with him, God had to allow the opportunity for choice. Humans too have that choice, because if we were forced into fellowship with God, we too might reject him. (CONTINUED…)

CONTINUED…If I go sit in my garage all night, it doesn't make me a car any more than sitting in a church, following their rules, makes a man a Christian. Only God knows what's in our hearts. So, free will makes sense to me. After living in a place where we experience evil every day, why would we not choose good?
I found this site quite engaging and will be back. Obviously, Christians misunderstand nonbelievers in much the same way nonbelievers misunderstand Christians. The truth is, we are ALL God's people. I wish you well.

angiebarna, you can post more in one post. Using the enter key will work properly when you wish to organize thoughts. You don't have to doublepost, there is no character limit as I am aware of. I also sorely disagree with you, and I am what some people would maybe label me as a spiritual person, to a varying degree depending on the personal definition with the word "spiritual".

So, I will not attack all of your arguments, but I will bring up some critique to some of your ideas to not necessarily prove you wrong, but because I think you need to reevaluate whether you truly are a Christian:

"but Jesus' goal was for people to grow in Spirit, so I wouldn't be surprised if he himself is disgusted at how religion has evolved since it so often turns people away from him."
I find it funny that you mention this, because everyone has different opinions, and that's one of my issues. While I agree that if Jesus would live today, he would probably be shocked how some people have twisted his values; but then Jesus would also consider that this might be inherent in our human nature. Humans are by default curious, we like to understand the world around us. Additionally, considering that the Bible as a scripture is never clearcut when it comes to its varying messages, obviously different people would interpret said verses differently. This is also a major problem. Every Christian claims they know what Jesus thinks or what he should do. It's fallacious, because it's clear you don't. Being a Christian or a believer does not equal to you always know what god or Jesus think.

"I accept that God knows the environment and circumstances in which we live. He doesn't expect us to be perfect, so I don't"

Here I disagree again. Why? Because if humans would admit they are imperfect, then what reason is there to repent for your sins? Repenting is a major feature in all Christian religions, and is ultimately one of the major driving forces into allowing people into heaven.

"One of the best things Chrisianity did for me was remove my self-centeredness"
Could you possibly imagine that it was not the religion itself who did this, but you? Can you imagine yourself doing this without any religion?

"When it comes to free will, it makes perfect sense to me. God created heavenly beings who were perfect and sinless, until the cherub Lucifer became so filled with pride and conceit that he exulted himself above God. Lucifer recruited angels to form a rebellion against God and there was a great battle in which God and his angels conquered Lucifer. They were cast out of heaven and sent to earth. The bible says Satan is the ruler of this world. At the point that God's creation no longer CHOSE to have fellowship with him, God had to allow the opportunity for choice. Humans too have that choice, because if we were forced into fellowship with God, we too might reject him."

But you see, once you start to logically evaluate this, it doesn't make sense. Why? Free will for example allows us to reject god even after having "invited god into our hearts". If god was so keen about keeping us humans into believing, then god would not give us free will. God is a jealous god, many times has it been stated in the Bible that god does not accept people who are not believers and that those will be punished appropriately. Free will also causes a paradox with god being omniscience and omnipotence. I will not go into that now though.

Also, your final sentences makes no sense. Because without free will, if we were coerced into believing in god, we have no choice but to believe anyway. It is the choice, the freedom, the free will, that allows us to reject god is we would so wish.

"If a group of terrorists moved into your country and began a rebellion, would you allow them to dominate and bring suffering to all of those people who were happy living in that country, or would you try to remove them and let them go live somewhere else with their own like-minded people?"

This is a logical fallacy called false dichtomy. You set up two polarized examples of how you can solve the situation when there are many other choices you can take. Also, you don't quite answer your own question, you just goes into saying that god loves everyone.

What would I do? I would try to look into the reasons what would motivate such a terrorist group. More often than not, you see that these people have nothing to live for, what they do they do because it's the last stand for them to take to survive. If nothing changes or if they die it doesn't matter to them, and once you know the cause of the problem you can start working into how to make it better. Once you know how to make it better, you can start to negotiate. That's what I'll do. Not pray for god to bring sanity to their minds, not turn the other cheek, not sign on a paper to destroy the utterly.

Perhaps it gives you a text limit when you are not replying using an IntenseDebate account? The best thing for you to do would be to sign up for Intense Debate.

With Intense Debate you can also get email subscriptions to replies, vote on responses, get an icon, and use IntenseDebate on any ID enabled site, including this one. It's well worth the 30 seconds it takes to sign up. : )

It is possible that there is a text limit but I have not noticed one.

I think it may have to do something with Word? Perhaps hidden characters? Try to paste the text first into notepad and then copy it from there to paste it here. I would generally advise you to not use word for such reason. Use notepad in the first place.

This is true also, word inserts all kinds of crazy autoformatting nonsense, and it carries over when pasting.

Religion is such an interesting subject because there is no viable way to prove that either side of the debate is correct in their belief. I don't expect to convince anyone here that God is our gracious, loving father. Only he could do that, and only if you choose to be open to hearing him. Both sides are grounded in faith. I have faith that God holds in his hands the workings and inter-workings of the forces of the universe, and is able to bring into play powers that we know nothing about, including powers over Satan and his followers. I have faith that his word is truth. I have faith in a heaven free of deception, hate, fear, pain and suffering. We experience enough of that here on earth (and Americans don't even know suffering like many others who've walked this earth). I choose to experience joy, peace and happiness for eternity, while being loved and giving love, rather than endure Satan's relentless attacks for eternity.

Based on your stated loyalty to Lucifer, it sounds like you also have faith in the word, but choose an interpretation framed in an understanding of freedom and justice as we know and experience it on earth, which is Satan's world. Satan is the father of lies and master of manipulation. He absolutely wants you to believe that you have chosen freedom and justice, because in doing so he will own you for eternity, where you will have neither freedom nor justice. He will reign OVER everyone who shares an afterlife with him. In utilizing our freedom of choice, we aren't choosing independence because independence is still a choice to be separate from God – a choice for Satan. In our time on earth we are choosing our eternal teacher, mentor, leader, father, so we have to closely evaluate whose laws and leadership we find most appealing – without basing them on the temporary satisfactions we enjoy in our earthly bodies. The afterlife will be nothing like life on earth. It's necessary to view the bigger picture.

The New Testament teachings of Jesus tell us what God is like, what heaven will be like, and how to get there if you want it. He also shares the alternative – damnation, which I find fascinating that some people (such as your self) perceive to be an appealing option. Just remember that Lucifer wished to be LIKE GOD. He didn't want to free angels FROM GOD, he wanted to BE GOD. He was so filled with pride, conceit and self-righteousness that he thought he should be worshipped, LIKE GOD. People who choose Lucifer are not choosing freedom, they are simply choosing a different master – one opposite God, one who will rule with force, hate, pain and suffering.

The evil ones know they are under the command of God, and they fear their day of judgment when they will no longer roam the earth, but will be forced to the bottomless pit for eternity. If they fear their own judgment and eternal punishment, why would any person CHOOSE that same punishment with their own free will? The evil ones would never have chosen the eternal damnation they will be receiving when judgment day arrives. Lucifer had every intention of winning the mutiny in heaven. When he made his free choice to rebel against God, he wasn't planning on losing and could not foresee the consequences of his actions, the impending punishment. He, his fallen angles and any humans who choose him will all share eternal damnation together. Eternal damnation means living eternal life separate from God – separate from everything good, but instead immersed in it's opposite – everything evil. We can't picture how tormenting this situation will be because on earth we have both good and evil. Can you even conceive of what it might be like here if all of the good were gone? Even people who don’t choose God experience the good that is here on earth. Their time on earth is limited and they know their end is coming.

Since I'm on the subject of Satan and his demons, I mentioned earlier that I have faith that God has power over the realm of evil. I know this to be true because I've had several interactions with evil spirits. When I was 25 (I'm now 40), I had an apartment exercised after experiencing undeniable hauntings. I lived alone (well, with a 2 year old, but no other adults.) Anyway, my son started seeing things, waving hello at the ceiling, pointing and showing me things when nothing was there. At the very same time he began the “sightings,” he also started experiencing severe night terrors.

Since I'm on the subject of Satan and his demons, I mentioned earlier that I have faith that God has power over the realm of evil. I know this to be true because I've had several interactions with evil spirits. When I was 25 (I'm now 40), I had an apartment exercised after experiencing undeniable hauntings. I lived alone (well, with a 2 year old, but no other adults.) Anyway, my son started seeing things, waving hello at the ceiling, pointing and showing me things when nothing was there. At the very same time he began the “sightings,” he also started experiencing severe night terrors. One night during one of his episodes, I brought him into bed with me to calm him down. I laid him on my chest and he eventually quieted down and started to fall asleep. Just as he was getting ready to doze off, he rolled off of me and was now on his back next to me. He opened his eyes, got a terrified look on his face, pointed at the ceiling directly above our heads and began screaming. I didn’t know how to deal with this – the screaming, pointing, and terror happened nearly every night. I began to feel very frightened and vulnerable. I started sleeping with lots of lights on, but as you can imagine we weren’t getting a lot of sleep. One night, I went to bed with 3 night lights plugged in, my closet light on, the bathroom light on, the hall light on, my son's closet light on and the kitchen light on. I woke up in the middle of the night and every single one of them was burned out! That cannot happen by coincidence. When I went to work, my mom kept my son for me at her house. (I should mention she is a Christian.) One day while my son was with her, she was walking through her kitchen when the glass top stove shattered into a million pieces and flew out toward her. She wasn't even cooking anything, just walking through the kitchen. In the midsummer’s heat when the temperature was in the 90’s, my home and car air conditioners stopped working on the same day. That could have been coincidence, but with everything else going on, I chalked it up to another spiritual attack. Another day when my son was at her house, my grandparents stopped by to visit. My mom didn't share with them that we had been experiencing bizarre, supernatural things. When my grandparents got home, they called and said their house was haunted. Their garage door was going up and down on its own, lights were turning on and off on their own and the television was turning on and off by itself. They were terrified as nothing like this had ever happened before – or since.

At that point, my mom shared that there were spirits haunting my apartment, which probably followed my son to her house and then to theirs. The spirits didn't stay with them though, they came back to haunt my place some more…I still wonder if my little guy (whose now 16) was the one they were most attracted to – it seemed that way. I can’t even express how hard it was seeing him go through this.

After several exhausting months of these sorts of incidences, a woman from church told me she knew how to cast out demons. She said the Bible teaches us how to use God's word as our sword against demons and she offered to come over and help me. I was desperate for answers. We did a lot of praying, quoting scripture and commanded the demons to leave. She said they fear God and MUST obey his word – and they did!!! I never experienced another incident after telling them to leave and my son never had to suffer another night of their torment, which was a huge relief after living through months of their mental torture every single night. I no longer fear demons because I know that I have God on my side and his power is much greater than theirs – they HAVE to obey him. I put my faith in the Creator, the real ruler of everything in the universe. He is the ruler over Satan and his demons.

That may be altruistic, but I experienced the truth in God’s word first hand. I have complete trust my personal experiences.

I’ve had other experiences with demons, so if anyone is interested in hearing about them I’d be happy to share. After interacting with the evil ones, you don’t deny their reality. I’ve always wondered why God allowed these events in my life – why the fallen angels were revealed to me instead of heavenly angels. Still wondering about that, but I have gratitude that I no longer feel vulnerable to them.

PS – I still couldn't get it all in one message, but I put in small chuncks at a time by clicking on the EDIT button.

It should not, as I was just a "guest" for a long time as well before I became an author. ID is related to the WordPress account.