The Bible, Man's book or God's Word?

reply to post by Titen-Sxull


Titen-Sxull:

You have not proven anything other then your desire to argue and keep from hearing what we all have been trying to tell you. Yes, the bible most likely is flawed.....big deal........that book still tells me about the love of Christ and of the Father. Though the help of The Holy Spirit and close communion (all the time) with Christ and yes reading that awful, awful book you keep bashing, a Christian does find a path to the Father and by seeking him we are given a decerning heart and mind.

We not only look to the book but upward to our Christ.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look into his wonderful face
And soon things of this earth
will dim in his mercy and grace.

That's about it in the nutshell, right there! Very simple but very powerful but I doublt if you will look into his wonderful face. You get power from being caught up in the things of this world.


Peace,
Grandma

reply to post by Grandma


If you propose the Bible is flawed, who is to decide which part is flawed? If an all-knowing, sovereign god wished to reveal himself to humankind, don't you think he would be able to bypass human failure in recording his message?

If he can't manage that objective, then he is not GOD. I think he managed the task just fine. The Bible was written over several centuries by many people, but the message is consistent.

reply to post by jped62


jped62:

I part that I believe to be flawed is the OT. I do not believe that the Father killed all those people, caused the Hebrews to kill off the people of other land and then divide it up into 12 tribes for themsleves.

Jesus showed us what God's attubutes were like and they were nothing of what God was like in the OT. Through Christ we saw that God was love, full of mercy, was faithful and forgiving. One of the commandments of the Law is "Thou shall not kill" would God brake his own commandment?

I am beginning to believe that whoever translated the OT may have had selfish reasons and issues of power.

As I have posted eariler. I love my bible and read it everday. I find encouragement and wisdom in the scriptures. But I do not limit myslef to just the bible. I depend on my communion with the Father everyday, I search out truth in other texts. I trust The Holy Spirit to help guide my spirit into spiritual enlightenment and spiritual wisdom. I look for the Father in everything and everyone. I always try to keep a humbled heart when approching the throne and an open mind and heart that he may fill as he chooses.

The heavenly Father that I know would not kill innocent people. If it was not done in love or to show love then I have a hard time believing that it is of God.


Peace to you,
Grandma

reply to post by John Matrix


thanks! i should take my own advice and look at the original word meanings of the new testament as well. i've always done so with the old testament but rarely the new testament.

Originally posted by Grandma
reply to post by jped62

 

jped62:

I part that I believe to be flawed is the OT. I do not believe that the Father killed all those people, caused the Hebrews to kill off the people of other land and then divide it up into 12 tribes for themsleves.

Jesus showed us what God's attubutes were like and they were nothing of what God was like in the OT. Through Christ we saw that God was love, full of mercy, was faithful and forgiving. One of the commandments of the Law is "Thou shall not kill" would God brake his own commandment?

I am beginning to believe that whoever translated the OT may have had selfish reasons and issues of power.

As I have posted eariler. I love my bible and read it everday. I find encouragement and wisdom in the scriptures. But I do not limit myslef to just the bible. I depend on my communion with the Father everyday, I search out truth in other texts. I trust The Holy Spirit to help guide my spirit into spiritual enlightenment and spiritual wisdom. I look for the Father in everything and everyone. I always try to keep a humbled heart when approching the throne and an open mind and heart that he may fill as he chooses.

The heavenly Father that I know would not kill innocent people. If it was not done in love or to show love then I have a hard time believing that it is of God.


Peace to you,
Grandma

It is also possible that the OT is a metaphorical description of the battles between good and evil that takes place in our minds. In other words, the people that died in the story are simply evil thoughts being wiped out in our minds.

The true circumcision, which is circumcision of the heart according to Scripture.

I too cannot accept that a Loving God, who is an immutable and eternal will to all goodness and blessing, would have the Israel army conduct genocide, even if the people were a sub-human species of animal nature.



[edit on 16-1-2009 by John Matrix]

Originally posted by undo
reply to post by John Matrix

 

thanks! i should take my own advice and look at the original word meanings of the new testament as well. i've always done so with the old testament but rarely the new testament.

You found my posts? Let me know what you think....I was fascinated.

Originally posted by Komodo
reply to post by Titen-Sxull

 

so you had to make another thread and couldn't do a search .........*sigh*.. and Anti GOD thread .. blah blah blah .. everything out of context.. no READING what so ever!


but hey .. you'll get ATS points.. right??

Um, what?

This is not an anti-God thread (I myself believe in God), this is a challenge to any Christians to explain a set of logical inconsistencies present both IN and OUT of context within the Bible. When I used to be a Christian I did plenty of reading and studying of the Bible. So in what context, pray tell, is it okay for God to kill first born children, or strip everything Job had away, or exterminate everyone in a Great Flood, or order the Israelites to kill every living thing in Jericho? In what context does a loving God KILLING make any sense at all....

I could care less about ATS points, what I care about is freeing minds who are trapped in a false belief that the Bible is anything more than a book written by flawed men and that t is not the Word of God...

Perhaps you should spend less time accusing me of things and more time answering my claims, ball, as they say, in your court...

reply to post by Grandma


I'm sorry if I came off as overzealous or as "bashing" anything, that was not my intent. My issue is that most of those who disagreed with my original post did not offer any real arguments against my points.

I'm glad that you have found God but you must understand my own doubts. When I realized the Bible was not perfect and therefore could not be the "Word" of a perfect God the entire world opened up to me, because if one portion of the Bible can be doubted than all certainty goes out the window. God becomes a massive subject, and I finally understand that He is too big and too great to release his truth to one man, or in one measly book, to expect us to convert to one religion. Christ's teachings are a good thing, I don't think I've ever argued against that, the issue is what the Christian religion was used to maintain (tyranny, prejudice, war).

I simply don't believe the Bible is the Word of God, as my original post stated. The true God of the Universe, to the best of my knowledge, is in all things, is omnipresent, so you don't need some silly book or mind-narrowing religion to commune with God. In my mind religion keeps us mired in one narrow belief, unable to find the real truth because we have ignorantly accepted the first truth that sounded good or that we were indoctrinated with during youth...

My search for the whole truth began with doubting the Bible, with questioning what I was always told was absolute unquestionable truth.

reply to post by John Matrix


yes i did and i tend to agree with your interpretation of it, which makes a great deal more sense of the word usage as it was originally intended.
i wonder if such thinking follows over to competitive arenas. for example, does this mean that a woman shouldn't attempt to engage a man in games of domination such as beating them in a video game or at a game of chess? is it a commentary on male psychology that a woman should always maintain a lesser role in the competitive arena? topics such as this bleed over into the male psyche of christian men so that they may feel slighted or offended if they find their competition is a woman. it lends itself to the idea that women are inherently inferior in every conceivable way.

although this is somewhat off topic (maybe a great deal off topic), i think it fits into the chain of thought i've been struggling with.

several years ago, i had an out of body experience that took me completely by surprise (it may or may not have been a vision?). i was in the kitchen, middle of the day, when suddenly i felt myself hurtling threw the air. the journey stopped up into the space above the planet, where the satellites circumnavigate the globe. i had no spacesuit, no spaceship, i was literallly free-floating with no protective gear, in the vaccuum of space. immediately, several things began to happen at once.

first, i saw two gigantic transparent, holographic looking figures, just floating in space nearby. they appeared to be at a console of some kind because i couldn't see them below the waist. all i could see was from the chest up to the top of their heads. they had no facial hair but they had long hair on their heads that was black in appearance. their skin was neither black or white, sort of a tan color. they appeared to be wearing blue and white uniforms of some kind that didn't look like any military apparel i had ever seen. they were sitting next to each other. whatever they were inside of, was totally invisible. all that could be seen was the back drop of stars.

i was given an instant assessment of these 2 beings. they didn't like humans, at all. and they especially didn't like female humans because female humans create more humans. they suddenly noticed my presence and grew extremely irate. i was informed that i was not supposed to be there or even be able to see them.

i turned my head and saw the curvature of the earth going off into the distance beneath where i was floating and could hear the incessant noise of satellite chatter. cellphones, radio waves, tv stations and so on. there's not supposed to be sound in a vaccuum, so i have no idea how i could hear all this noise but there it was nonetheless.

along the top of the earth's atmosphere fast, bright white balls of light were skimming. i was told immediately, that these were piloted by human men, who were part of an organization that were in cahoots with the 2 beings in the craft. they were being manipulated to enact laws that hurt women and had done so throughout history as a form of population control.

it was at this point, i began to go unconscious as the vaccuum pressure and lack of environment began to take effect. my head jerked back and i began to feel my eyes rolling up into my head.

total length of the experience, perhaps 3 or 4 seconds.

suddenly, i was back in my kitchen. i began to exhibit symptoms immediately, of some kind of physiological change. i was itching all over, a tingling sensation like when you've sat too long on your foot and lost the blood flow and the nerves have deadened. i didn't say anything to anyone about the experience but sat there trying to figure out what had just happened.

an hour later, both my children who were below the age of 10 at the time, emerged from the bedroom they'd been playing in to complain that it felt like it was RAINING inside the house for at least an hour. i did a double take and asked them to repeat the complaint with more details. one said it felt like tiny raindrops on their arms and faces. but it was not raining in the house. apparently it was the same physiological numbness happening to them as well, as if they had been effected by whatever "field" of energy that had taken me into the vision experience. as bizaare as the experience had been, it was a confirmation of sorts, that it hadn't been my imagination.

after that, i began to study the history of women in population studies . wowzers, it opened my eyes in a hurry. something is seriously wrong with this planet.


[edit on 16-1-2009 by undo]

Find an online Bible search engine...

Type in 'slew'...see what comes up. Pretty neat.
Mainly having to do with Angels of God killing 'Giants.' Whom we know as offspring between an Angel and Man.

Most ignore the fact and cherrypick phrases and not take the entire work into account. The entire book of Numbers is an accounting of 'god' taking count and gathering people together to fight the Giants, of which I have identified over 20 named Giants. A genological trace identifies families and clans as being of the 'giant' race.

That is neither here nor there.

Suffice to say that we have been here before.
We have held this technology before.
And we are getting ready to make the exact same mistakes.
For with anti-gravity comes immortality because the speed of time is directly related to gravity. Remove gravity and one day would seem like 1,000 years and 1,000 years would seem like a day.

If we have technology to fly around and if we have the technology for holograms...then my vote is that the Bible is a creation of man trying to make a better world. God, aliens,and Angels are nothing more than 'original' man. Not a diety in the least.

So, I see it as repeating the past. More of the same.
'They' are going to (and in the process of) fabricate Prophecy. To tear us down and rebuild man in 'their' image.

God=Man
Angel=Man
Alien=Man
UFO=Man
Bible=Man
Man=Man

Think about it...we have been here before...

After they beat us down you are going to see God come from the sky, as Prophecy says....just, it will be a holograph, so don't buy it.

Originally posted by undo
reply to post by John Matrix

 

yes i did and i tend to agree with your interpretation of it, which makes a great deal more sense of the word usage as it was originally intended.
i wonder if such thinking follows over to competitive arenas. for example, does this mean that a woman shouldn't attempt to engage a man in games of domination such as beating them in a video game or at a game of chess? is it a commentary on male psychology that a woman should always maintain a lesser role in the competitive arena? topics such as this bleed over into the male psyche of christian men so that they may feel slighted or offended if they find their competition is a woman. it lends itself to the idea that women are inherently inferior in every conceivable way.

It shouldn't have that effect, but I suppose in many men it does. Our ego is supposed to be replaced by the self image which Christ gives us as a free gift...."I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me". What better self image is there than that? And it's a free gift. No need to waste a lot of mental energy building and maintaining, protecting and repairing a big ego when you have the free Gift from Christ. Now if more Christian men (and women) could realize that!! Just imagine how it would change us.

I hope God is ok with cultural changes that are not harmful to others. I mean the women don't walk around in the USA covered from head to toe anymore....LOL.

Don't ask me to back that up...LOL. Under Grace and all things are permissible, though all are not profitable. So what we do we should do from Faith, and as long as our consciences and the Spirit don't convict us, then what the Hey!...LOL. At least I hope I have that right.







[edit on 16-1-2009 by John Matrix]

reply to post by undo


I read about your experience. It reminded me of my own. In my dream I was also taken above the earth until it was smaller than the moon looks to us from down here. I remember a feeling of peace, like everything that ever bothered me was completely insignificant. Then instantly I was back on earth and that's when the clouds opened and the white light poured out. I had to turn away, but opened my eyes which where covered by my arm. I could see the bones in my arm, then I felt the presence of the angel I told you about. The words she spoke was, "we are one in Spirit".

When I woke up I was feeling waves, like a spinal rush, but over and over again from head to toe. It lasted for a few hours, rush after rush, then slowly went away. I still get these rushes when I recall the event. I can't explain why such a simple dream would have such a profound and life changing effect without saying it was the work of God.
There is a bit more to it, but ...I'll leave it at that.

also a bit off topic but an interview i did when my blogcast radio station was up and working. i had to quit broadcasting because i was sick alot and my mom, who was living with us at the time, had advanced alzheimers and was getting progressively worse. she died not long after, so i quit the radio show in time to focus on her last days. i loved my mom.

anyway, the radio show is about sumerian-akkadian-egyptian-babylonian mythology and how it works into not just ancient history but biblical history and biblical prophecy. the gentleman i'm interviewing is an author named peter goodgame. i have laryngitis during the show, so please excuse the scratchiness of my voice. it's also a very amatuerish broadcast, but it's a nice long interview with tons of information and interesting historical and mythological data. (you may have to right click and save to desktop and listen to it on winamp (or some software that can play .wma files) if you don't have the latest windows media player add-on for your browser)
www.thestargates.com...

[edit on 17-1-2009 by undo]

reply to post by undo


Your vision is quite a bit different than mine.

Mine happened at night on a friends back porch. It was like my consciousness was pulled into a completely white room. There were no walls, floors or anything like that in it. It was kind of like the matrix loading room. Everything was just white. In front of me is a figure in the outline of a humanoid. It has no features at all, and it is like it is filled up with the sun. Even though the room is like perfectly white, this being is brighter, and it doesn't cast a shadow onto anything in the "room".

It asks me a single question - "Do you want it to end". To which another part of me answers "No, there is still good out there". And then I see myself leaving my friends house like above the truck I am in. The entire thing happened without me thinking anything. It was like I was watching it happen. It all happened in like a blink of an eye. In the process of this, I experienced and understood John 14:20, but the way I understood was - I am god and I am arguing with myself. Which was the first thing out of my mouth, and my friend just kind of laughed at me. Meaning, I am a son of god, and I am arguing among other sons/daughters. I also had understanding that time wasn't real, and how everything in "time" is actually connected. Meaning, instead of just how you see 1 single frame of "time", I seen an entire "timeline" as 1 solid "object".

This was followed for a short time by things that seemed to happen in "synchronicity". But I now realize they were always there, it seems that way because it is your and your perspective that is opening/changing as my entire perception on things spiritual changed very quickly. The things were always there, I just never noticed or looked at things "that way". Because of the new way I understood things, they things were just sticking out more. I would understand one thing, and it would immediately open up a new question, and immediately an answer would come, or a possibility on what something could be true. And then I would see it repeated in just non related events around me. Always there, I was just blind to it. Nothing changed for me physically at all. I still "see" with my 2 eyes the same way. A glass still looks like a glass. What changed is how I understood things, my perspective was different.

From that point it's mostly been about trying to explain the things I came to understand to people, and the majority of my "learning" over the past year or so has been improving that. Trying to figure out the best way to explain an understandings. A few months after that happened to me, I was struck by the words of Jesus. For the first time I actually understood exactly what he is talking about. I couldn't believe the level of knowledge he was speaking, deep truth, and how people just simply did not get it. So it has been big in helping me explain what I've learned, as well as finding people who actually do seek truth.

I've never had an astral plane or obe experience that I know of where I was looking at the physical. I wonder about it a good bit, don't rule it out or anything. I think people are given what they need, and that is different for each of us at different times.

Your experience sounds symbolic in many ways. For example, not supposed to see them. That sounds alot like the way politicians are wolves in sheeps clothing, and they don't want you to see them as such, or the way people hide things, and you are now starting to see them for what they are. That is something I am able to do after my experience, it's like I can almost see right through them and my BS detector pegs out. When I see symbolic things, I try to look at them as multiple things as opposed to just symbolizing 1 thing. The important part was the actions that happened - you seen things you weren't supposed to see, in a way you were supposed to see. Rather than just the experience/vision, see how that applies to many those actions/patterns fit into other things ya know.

I apply the same thing to stuff like revelations. I don't know exactly what symbols are symbols of. But I know the actions themselves, and I know the actions themselves are bad, and that is what I keep an eye out for, and then I look for things that fit the patterns/actions.

Originally posted by undo
also a bit off topic but an interview i did when my blogcast radio station was up and working.......................
..............it's a nice long interview with tons of information and interesting historical and mythological data. (you may have to right click and save to desktop and listen to it on winamp (or some software that can play .wma files) if you don't have the latest windows media player add-on for your browser)
www.thestargates.com...

[edit on 17-1-2009 by undo]

Undo, it sounds very professional to me. Well done. I have a much better understanding of you now, and great appreciation for you.

reply to post by Grandma


Where should I start? There is a difference between killing and murder. Translations differ on the word used for 'kill'. Some use 'murder'.
Obviously God cannot violate is own commandments because they reflect Truth. It has been noted by some that God did not command the Jews to kill other forces that were perceived as enemies to Isreal. Why would a 'loving' god do such things? Well, God is loving, but also just. If not, no one would be destined for Hell.

Originally posted by jped62
Well, God is loving, but also just. If not, no one would be destined for Hell.

If that's "just" - sending someone to Hell for not believing in an invisible being - then I'd hate to see what's unjust ...

To bad people rarely look at the reality... they cover it up with pretty pictures.

reply to post by TruthParadox


Humans are fallen because Adam and Eve rejected God and trusted Satan instead. This continues even today. Given that fallen state, I would say our concept of justice is also flawed.

To quote the Bible, "does the creature say to the creator, 'why did you make me this way?'"

Originally posted by jped62
Humans are fallen because Adam and Eve rejected God and trusted Satan instead. This continues even today. Given that fallen state, I would say our concept of justice is also flawed.

To quote the Bible, "does the creature say to the creator, 'why did you make me this way?'"

Well if God is all powerful and all knowing, then it is far from "just" to punish us for being how he made us. If Adam and Eve "rejected" God then it's quite obvious that an all powerful and all knowing God would have created them to do exactly that - as he would have known the effect before he created the cause thus making him responsible for both.
If you would only think about it without bias for 5 seconds you would understand - but faith doesn't allow this.