Post for everybody to read... especially anti-islam-orientated Christians., page 2

Originally posted by arc I don't find the idea of God in the old testament very consistent with the one in the new testament.

I can understand what you mean: The OT describes God in a more "punitive" stage, while the NT shows Him as being more "loving & forgiving".
During the times of the OT, God's Word was not as widespread as today...In order to get His point across, He found it necessary to "display His wrath" in order to get people to take Him seriously. Sort of like a parent spanking an unruly child.

With the advent of the NT, God changed His policy on sacrificing animals by giving us His son for the "Ultimate Sacrifice", thereby voiding much of His own Word in earlier times...His Word was more widespread. In the OT, He was teaching us...In the NT, He seems to be more content with seeing how well we learned. Sort of like God giving us what we need to grow up & mature, as like a parent who has raised their child & sees the child try to make a live of their own.

...And the concept of Armageddon (Revelations, The End Times, etc.) is what will happen if we didn't learn His lessons well enough...He'll let the "class idiots" kill themselves off, as He knows they will if they didn't take His lessons to heart. Sort of like a parent warning the child what will happen if they didn't take to their childhood lessons very well.

IMO, based upon what I've seen going on in the world, is that many people haven't simply lost faith or belief in God...They *hate* God for letting all of these problems go unchecked even though He *knew* what would happen. They can't seem to forgive Him for letting people get away with all of the violence & injustice that people commit on other people, even though He *knew* that they would do it. "Who *is* God to tell us all of these things, who knew all of these things & yet does *nothing* to prevent it?" To further my opinion, people need to be able to forgive themselves & actually turn around to *see* what God has given us (This *world*) before they'll be capable of forgiving Him for the bad actions that we perpetrate on ourselves. He truly *is* like a parent who knows that His children must learn how to grow up...But like any really good parent, He also knows that we must learn from our own mistakes...And learn that those mistakes may kill us if we don't *learn* from them. People have to learn how to forgive themselves for their mistakes, learn not to *repeat* their mistakes & move on with life.

We are indeed still children...But God has raised us with the values that would allow us to continue surviving & being capable of living together on this world. We've grown up to the point where God isn't going to "spank us" for our mistakes...But not grown up to the point where our mistakes can't still kill us off. This is the basis for the prophecies in Revelations...God told His prophets what the results of our arrogance & childish behavior will be. We can still *avoid* our self-inflicted punishment if we start taking God's lessons seriously & refuse to let our own selfishness rule our lives. I don't take Revelations as much as "a set future that cannot be averted" as I take it to be more of a warning of "what will happen if we don't grow up".

...And yes, I'm including in my opinion those people who only look at a *piece* of (whatever) scriptures they look at to find a meaning, instead of taking meaning from the *whole*...You're only seeing the pieces of the puzzle & not looking to find what the full picture actually *is*.

Okay, now I'm going to get off my soapbox & remind people (myself included) that this is a topic for how *religion plays a part in conspiracy*...Not a pulpit to argue about the "rights & wrongs" of any particular religion or to convert people to their own religion.

As a side note: I won't be offended if one of the Admins/Mods delete this entire post...Except the paragraph immediately above this note for the very reason that paragraph describes. It wouldn't even offend me if they removed this *entire topic* from the forums because *nobody* (admittedly including myself) has been following along with the *subject of the topic itself*.

[Edited on 5-3-2003 by MidnightDStroyer]