Greatest I am

That and the 10 commandments. Commandment play havoc with free will. Orders always negate free will if enforced. Regards DL

You asked a question and I answered it. Is that trolling? Regards DL

2 Peter 3:9 KJ The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Seems like it. Regards DL 2 Peter 3:9 KJ The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. If the above is true, then God wants all of us to sin so that we can repent. Sinning is generally profitable to the sinner, and often fun, and since we are cursed with original sin and a sinning nature at birth, according to dogma, then all we can do is follow our sinning natures. Enjoy your sins then, as I have often enjoyed mine, but keep them small. Regards DL If not, consider. Punishment is given to change attitudes or actions. To torture forever without purpose is then just done for the sake of cruelty. Hardly what a God would do. Regards DL Is, though shalt do this and though shalt not do that, not interfering? Do you realy think you can get away with your simplistic one liners in debate of complex issues? Do you really see God's idea of free will-----Do things my way or burn forever---- as any kind of free will. That is a threat. Especially knowing that the first time A & E did their will instead of God's, he threw a super sissy fit all over all of mankind. Regards DL

God 3%. Satan 97%. Does God needs a new marketing man? Many Christians take the view that the Bible says only a few will be saved. There are verses which show just that. You know, the narrow road and the wide road. It also shows that God would have known ahead of time that his program of salvation would be a marketing disaster. Scripture says he is all knowing. Yet he carried on with his present plan rather than choose a different program which could have been a marketing coup and show him as a successful planer instead of a dismal marketing flop. Why would God not put forward a successful marketing plan? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3LNL6wKhXA It should have been quite easy for him. He had all the answers to any survey question he could have asked in order to gage the best approach to winning the hearts and minds of the population. Omnipotence includes infinite powers of persuasion and any sales or marketing man will know that with that at hand, anyone could deal with any objections to the sale, which is usually the only hindrance to the sale. In this case, selling us on the notion that he is God and should be followed. Give those same tools to any fool and he would become the new Man/God of the whole world hands down. I am not saying that God is a fool but any marketing firm would fire his ass. I find it quite strange that at the end of days, Satan will be sitting there in hell gloating over the fact that God has only a small % of all the souls he has created even as scripture says he created all of those souls perfect. Perfect souls would of course make the perfect choice. Perfect souls choosing who we are told is the bad guy? What the hell. Poor God could not get out of heaven in the beginning without losing Satan and 1/3 of God’s angels. He could not get out of Eden without losing Adam and Eve. He could not impress all those of Noah’s day. Not even the dumb animals and even today, he is losing most of us to secular law instead of Biblical law. Adam and Eve should have been a trophy for God as they did exactly what scripture says we should all do. Learn of good and evil and emulate him and be as bright as Gods. Yet when Adam and Eve became as Gods, God showed great displeasure and cursed everybody up and down including the earth. This I find really strange but then, God works in mysterious ways. Perhaps that includes being a loser to Satan. Can’t fight the Bible facts folks. What do you think? Does God need a new marketing man to reverse his dismal showing? Regards DL

I agree. Punishment is earned by offense. That does not take a way from the fact that we punish to change the attitude of the perpetrator so that he will not do that offense again. If I think it immoral to take advantage of the murder or suicide of an innocent man, why should I be condemned for choosing the moral high ground and following Jesus' own words? Matthew 10:38 And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. I will carry my cross and responsibilities thanks. You go ahead and take the immoral path if you so choose. Regards DL

Punishment is given to change attitudes and actions. God’s punishment ignores any change of attitude as it is eternal torture. Torture without purpose is what God offers and just done for the sake of cruelty. Parents make sacrifices for their children all the time. We do not torture our children if and when they do not accept them. Your God is a piss poor example of parenting love. And your attitude that we should try to profit from the murder or suicide of an innocent man is immoral to the max. You follow your immoral genocidal God quite well. You have taken on his evil inclinations. Regards DL

The point is that if following Caesars law is going against a law of God’s, then the believer is breaking the first commandment. I guess the type of infraction I am thinking of is like though shalt not kill. If all Christians refused to follow Caesar in war, then war would end. They do not and go directly against God and the first commandment. Yes I have and know that God himself broke a few of his big ten and that Jesus/God also said to love the sinner and hate the sin but you will know that God does not punish sin but for sure punishes the sinners he loves for eternity with fire and torture. Quite the way to show your love that. Regards DL This says that they are but I do not attribute them to a God. They seem to be hard wired into our DNA. http://edmonton.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20100511/study-infants-morality-100511/20100511/?hub=EdmontonHome Regards DL

Yes. Christian should be thanking Judas instead of vilifying him if they believe that Jesus planed to die for them. They would have to see Jesus using him as a tool. That is the Gnostic view BTW. Regards DL

Not antagonize the Jewish hierarchy for one and just keep his mouth shut for another. Scripture shows, with his knowledge of Judas' forthcoming kiss, that he would be arrested. He had lots of time to get out of town. Regards DL

Was Jesus a victim of self aggrandizing suicide? http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/expedition-week/4290/Overview#tab-Videos/07451_00 My position is simple. To offer or be a scapegoat for others who will not step up to their own responsibilities and consequences for their action is immoral and self aggrandizing. I see mythical Jesus as doing just that. To accept the sacrifice of a scapegoat Jesus and to try to profit from his death is also immoral. Scripture indicates, Trinitarians aside, that God the Father sent his son to die for mankind to fulfill a need that God himself created. That of a blood sacrifice to forgive sin when he has the power to forgive sin without it. As above so below. For us to believe that God would plan for and send his son to die, we would have to think it normal and good for a father to bury his son. Any good man would reject such an example of good conduct as definitely not good, natural or moral. Any God the father, or earthly father, worth his title, would step up himself for such a task yet Bible God takes the cowardly route and sends his son. What a pathetic God. What pathetic followers he also has who would think that this is the way things should be. Eze 18;20 The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him. Psa 49;7 None of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him: Do you recognize the immorality of believers using Jesus as a scapegoat and of them trying to profit from his murder? If his death was a suicide, which is the way I see it, is it moral for believers to try to profit from his pathetic self aggrandizing sacrifice? Regards DL

I agree. That is why I put this bit in the O P. " There are ample examples in scriptures where the basic law of an eye for an eye is promoted. IOW, the penalty should suit the sin. A graduated scale of fault. A do onto others and brotherly love type of fiduciary thinking. Reciprocity is fair play type of thinking." In you example, the cyclops would keep his eye and some other form or retribution would have to be found. Regards DL Well. If you are a Bible believer, then you should kow that it tells you that God's laws are written on, or is it in, your heart. Regards DL

Is there a limit to this give to Caesar? The ancients were were told to kill the enemy and rape their women etc by the state. Can all of God's laws be ignored and if so, what good are they? Regards DL Yes. Other than the Jews, most of the Abraham cults are rather draconian. Regards DL

Bible law exceeds God’s “Eye for an Eye” law. From this fact, it follows that human institutions have placed themselves higher than God, in terms of what laws they will follow. This includes religious hierarchies. They all break the first commandment. All believers also break the first commandment if following secular law over God‘s. There are ample examples in scriptures where the basic law of an eye for an eye is promoted. IOW, the penalty should suit the sin. A graduated scale of fault. A do onto others and brotherly love type of fiduciary thinking. Reciprocity is fair play type of thinking. Lev 24;20 Breach for breach, eye for eye, tooth for tooth: as he hath caused a blemish in a man, so shall it be done to him again. You might note that this passage indicates that man sins against man and shows that we do not and cannot sin against God. Forgiveness comes from man. God cannot be hurt by mere men. There are also ample instances where the Bible urges us to kill our own for reasons that are less offensive and that do not meet the notions of the justice of an eye for an eye. Fornication and disrespecting parents being two of the many reasons to exact holy revenge by death. Exceeding an eye for an eye by a long shot. It is these more barbaric law that has helped secularism grow. In following secular laws, we seem to be ignoring God’s laws and thus breaking the first commandment. God. The word God, means many things to many people but at the root of your understanding of the meaning of that word-- should be rules for living a good life. Secularism has wisely, chosen to discard some of the older notions and draconian laws. As more people become educated to secular standards, religions will decline. God’s laws will die in the hearts of men. Should believers of the Bible God follow God’s laws or the laws of man? Does it break the first commandment or not if believers follow mans laws? Is this an end to religion’s and God’s relevance in terms of law? Is the mythical God no longer required for the best law? Remember please that we are in 2011. Not 111. Regards DL

I cannot believe you said this last idiocy. I guess you have forgotten that God could only save 8 souls out of the millions of Noah’s day whom God murdered with genocide. Even innocent children and babies were corrupt by God's misguided standards. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3LNL6wKhXA You want to hate others so much and make them suffer that you forget that a God would rather cure those he thinks defective rather than kill them of sake them suffer torture and burning forever without purpose. Regards DL

Why not side with the talking snake? It, as well as A & E are victims of Christians not reading Genesis the way the authors intended. They turned a successful rite of passage story into a fall. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XnnKA4o2Ao Regards DL

True but they did not die did they? In fact, depending on how you look at God preventing them from eating of the tree of life, it can be seen as more of a murder. A good analogy but in the case of the Bible, when we fell, God added on the obstacles for us to fall over. That is the insane part. Further, I see man gaining the moral sense that comes with the knowledge of good and evil as a blessing without the failure that you indicate. It is not a failure or defect in ignoring a command to remain as dumb as a common animal. What you see as a bad apple, I see as a perfect apple. Regards DL If we were to embrace your idea that to grow up is a fall, I wonder what the world would look like if we all tried to keep our children from growing up. Yuk. Regards DL

Do Christians value their moral sense? Was Eden, the fall or the elevation of mankind? A moral sense is what is developed by our study of morals and ethics. In Eden, this study came in the form of a tree of knowledge of good and evil. Adam and Eve, as neophytes to life, were not aware of what was good or evil because they had yet to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and had yet to develop morals, until after absorbing the information set out by God for their consumption. This assumes of course that God wanted man with autonomy and a moral sense. This gain is clearly spoken of by God when he stated that A & E had become as God’s, knowing good and evil. The fact that he threw a sissy fit when we did elevate ourselves is why Christians call Eden the fall of man. I find it strange that Christians see our gaining of a moral sense as a fall. Christians do not seem to give a high value to their moral sense and think that we were in Eden strictly to obey and not learn that we are autonomous beings. Yet strangely, most Christians say that they would do exactly as Eve did and that they would not stop her. They value it yet call it a fall. The Jews and Hebrew interpreted their scriptures as Eden being our elevation. Not our fall. They were quite surprised when Christianity began to read scriptures literally, even the Jewish ones, that the Jews never took literally. Did Christianity get the story wrong? Was Eden our elevation and not our fall? Do you value your moral sense or would you stop Eve if you could? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0kdxgJB9is http://www.mrrena.com/misc/judaism2.php

Jews seem to forgive more than Christians do in all areas except murder. Murder is when the community exacts justice for the victim. Jews seem to believe that man sins against man and not against God and that it is to man to forgive and not God. I tend to agree with them. Christians seem to hate too much to be a forgiving lot. They invented hell to make sure no forgiveness could ever reach those not of their tribe. Too much tribalism I guess. Regards DL

Perhaps we see ourselves as our brothers keeper. It is my view that all literalists and fundamentals hurt all of us who are Religionists. They all hurt their parent religions and everyone else who has a belief. They make us all into laughing stocks and should rethink their position. There is a Godhead but not the God of talking animals, genocidal floods and retribution. Belief in fantasy is evil. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HKHaClUCw4&feature=PlayList&p=5123864A5243470E&index=0&playnext=1 They also do much harm to their own. African witches and Jesus http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlRG9gXriVI&feature=related Jesus Camp 1of 9 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOqGhcwwE1s Promoting death to Gays. For evil to grow my friends, all good people need do is nothing. Fight them when you can. Regards DL

Yes. I admit that there is no evidence for God or for his having set up conditions. I believe that notion to be fantasy based since it goes against the laws of nature and physics. Yes again. But again, nature has inadvertently set up the conditions we have here, and for man, they are as perfect as they can be and this perfection will continue to evolve as man does. To me, this perfection started with the big bang. Physicists have pointed out that in the math that explains the universe, if we changed any of the constants by even .00000000001, man would disappear and would not have ever been born. Regards DL We do not comprehend all of it at this point in time but mankind has many generations ahead of it and I think that eventually we will know all the workings of nature. You may be right about us never knowing how God thinks and works if it is different that the natural world that we live in. As far as I am concerned, the word God was meant as a moral standard and a set of rules for a good life and that is all that that word was meant to represent. This quote seems to indicate that as A & E, nor us, ever became miracle workers. Gen 3;22 And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: As this next says, only a ver few of us may ever truly understand it all. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6O9cYTZXekA&feature=related Regards DL

You don't. Some do. To do so, you would have to ponder my baby analogy as well as the Candide quote. Your observations are correct. That does not take away from the fact that nature is doing the best possible creation out of the DNA and conditions at hand. Defects and extra organs and all. Regards DL What you say is true enough for the super Christian God scenario. You might remember that scripture says that A & E became as Gods.The ancients, it seems, thought we could understand God. It is my belief that our first God was a man and so I think we can have a pretty good idea how God would thing. Who but a man can put words to the will of God. There has always only been man. I agree and the U S version of perfection does as well. At least for some. Even their constitution says that things can go to a more perfect state. You are bang on on idol worship. If we ever think we have found God, we should discard those notions, raise the bar, and look further. The search should never end. Regards DL I would say, keeping to the script in that link, that since this is the only possible world. it is the best that the conditions at hand can create at any given point in time. Regardless of the time we are looking at. As we start to add what we think would be better condition, Jimmy not falling for instance, we must remember all the conditions that would have had to be different or changed before hand, right back to the beginning including the big bang. Regards DL

Can you know God without understanding or recognizing his perfect works? The whole notion of knowing and following God, is to know how he works and thinks, tied to a belief that he is perfect in all things and has the miracle at hand to create things the way he wants. Scripture tells us to look to the universe around us for proof of his reality. Logic and reason tell us the same thing. This indicates that we should see the perfection of his works all around us. Deut 32;4 He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he. Mat 7;18 A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. The logic trail of these two verses says that God’s works all begin as perfect and that that perfection is maintain and passed up through history. I like to think I know a bit about God because, as I look about, I see that ever lasting perfection as it moves to a more perfect state over time. Evolving perfection. Consider a baby, all babies including you and I. We all begin life as perfect as nature, or God, can produce with our DNA and all other conditions at hand. This is a truth even if we are born with flaws and is irrefutable in terms of both nature, logic, reason and the Bible. This truth led to my apotheosis and knowledge of God and nature. I offer it here for your contemplation and comments. I cannot see anything that would my view but am willing to listen. If you cannot see the perfection that I do, then I will try to persuade you. Perhaps the best way to begin would be in you opining on the following and telling me whether you think it is a cynical view of life or if it is a real and true view of life. Candide "It is demonstrable that things cannot be otherwise than as they are; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPClzIsYxvA Regards DL

He did not say he would kill them. I wrote, “was closer to,---if you eat of it, I will kill you”. Scripture shows God preventing them from eating of the tree of life. That is definitely killing them. He warned them but it was him decision to let it happen. That is murder. He denied them access to life. If they could not, then they could not be held responsible. It would be like you telling your six week old baby not to crawl in a huge hole in your back yard and then leaving it there unattended and letting him fall in. That would be your fault. Not your child. Dogma says that death had yet to be born on earth so they could not have known what it meant. In that day, might made right. Who was deceived. They did die. Better knowledge? If I discover a new bit of knowledge, it is no better or worse for being deceived. The resulting bit of knowledge is the same. We are all slaves to something. Some to their fears and some to their demographic position. After the fac is hardly beneficial. Scripture does not show them twisting anything or indicating they would turn into liars. You're changing the subject. You were claiming that free will wasn't free if there are consequences for choices. I gave an example of what it would mean to lack free will to make bad choices completely. Perhaps the serpent did not think God evil enough to kill his new proto humans. As to eating of the tree of knowledge, it was vital information to becoming both truly human and God like.. No parent in their right mind would deny their children vital information. The judgments you speak of cannot be made without it. Perhaps but that does not take away the fact that God would decide what was evil and writing the information, so to speak, on the tree of knowledge. He would still be creating evil by naming them so. Regards DL I tried a new quote method and it still came out the sam. I will try something else next time. Regads DL

First of all, I see God as playing with language. He said, you will surely die. He did not tell the truth which was closer to,---if you eat of it, I will kill you by preventing you from eating of the tree of life. So the snake, in a sense, was more truthful than God. As to God’s warning, he is guilty of omission here. He did not tell them of the other negative consequences nor did he tell them of the benefits of knowing good and evil. Becoming as Gods with the moral sense that comes with that knowledge. Man is a better man with a moral sense than without it so Eve did the right thing. She was first to elevate man‘s nature. As to work itself. That is not a curse at all. We all get a great satisfaction from work. Work is a blessing. We all like to feel we are contributing to society. We can all curse the earth but have no power to enforce it. Scripture says God does. A huge difference. Not at all. No argument and I have no clue as to what I said to send you on that tangent. This assumes that God’s miracle are limited. Impossible. I have no problem with natural consequences to natural acts. That has little to do with God offering infinite purposeless torture for a finite sin. That is quite immoral. It was in the O P. It has to do with the notion that if God is omnipotent then he has infinite powers of persuasion and in that sense will override with persuasion, our will. Sorry for the inconvenience. Satan aside, moral evils, as far as a law maker is concerned, is definitely something that he will create is it not. Is the law maker not the one who decides, thus creating in a sense, what is evil? I say yes. Regards DL

Yet the dogma says that the moment A & E showed they were autonomous with the exercise of that free will, God jumped all over them and caused the fall of man. Hardly free will that. I see him as also owning the earth because he cursed it. One cannot curse what one doees not own. That belies his --do it my way or burn forever--free will joke. Did he not do so at Sodom or in the genocidal flood of Noah's day? If those are not limits to our actions then you would have to tell me what they were. Dogma says that God gave Satan the power, and scripture says he will, deceive the whole world. That is messing with our free will. Yes we do. Bur is it truly a free will when the only other choice is to burn forever? Not to me. If 2 Pete 3;9 is true, his will will somehow overrides ours. That or his will is thwarted and I cannot see a miracle worker ever allowing his will to be thwarted. If one truly believes in an eternity in heaven waiting for us, then obviously one would be a fool to indulge in anything for .0000000000000000000000001 of their life in exchange for the lose of heaven. Yes. Especially when the prayer indicates that it is God who might lead them to temptation. I have to wonder what the writer was thinking. Regards DL