A Reason for Faith in Jesus Christ

Jesus shed his blood to save us and erase our sins and this is the crap he gets for it. People going beyond disbelief to outright hate for God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Good luck in your eternal existence with that attitude.

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

More like we just don't want to believe in something because it sounds good. We want proof before we believe. You can wax on and on about the greatness of the Kingdom of Heaven but it is irrelevant if you can't prove it exists.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

Can you cleave the meaning and significance from the great work of Jesus Christ? It's been rendered and communicated.

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

Sure, but what's the point? I can gain more significant meaning and be more greatly inspired by more modern works of fiction. Meaning and understanding isn't proof that it is real and we should believe. I don't believe in Santa Clause but I like the ideal of selflessness he presents.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

Are you saying that there was no historical Jesus who was crucified during the governorship of Pontius Pilate?

Why is it I often wonder that people's minds and hearts are so quickly turned away from Jesus and a consideration of his teaching and his great work of all ages, to the degree that they would express a preference for anything else but Jesus?

And why do I always get the impression that behind these protestations lies a kind of seething snarkiness? I don't get it.

That said, I do realize that the "church" has in many ways dropped the ball in its representation of the Gospel message creating a strong anti-Christian bias among many, but what we're supposed to be getting from it is a model of authentic leadership and authentic love and friendship.

I get the need to rebel against it, I suppose, in so far as it's offensive in a way to the will and pride of man in his own intellectual knowledge who doesn't much like the idea of a need for salvation from above or from a domain of incorruptibility. There's a certain rebellious teenage angst of sorts in reaction/response, particularly among self-professed atheists.

Anyway, to each their own. I find it quite compelling and even breathtaking in it's significance and implications, because it happened and nothing of any lasting value is ever lost or forgotten. It has a timeless significance and it's worthy of consideration.

I guess people feel that it treads on their ego and their desire for self-determination and what the LaVeyan Satanists call a "rational self interest".

But isn't that part of the problem Jesus came to help remedy, where the human being was made in the image of God to stand next to the Godhead and thus is placed in a rather precarious predicament of sorts?

Jesus came to raise us up out of the mire of our own ignorance so that we could be with him in Spirit and know our true nature and place in the grand scheme of things and to be given the power to lay claim to our birthright as co-heirs of the kingdom of life and light and love.

His is the love that never fails and the light that never goes out.

We need that kind of thing when human love fails us, and when we fail in love and have a breakdown in integrity. He restores us, and makes us whole again even in spite of ourselves. There's a certain humor and mirth in that, and I feel sorry for people who would rather lose their own sense of humor in rebellion against it, than to celebrate its true meaning and significance both for ourselves, individually and ultimately in terms of a global salvation.

Jesus is the solution to the problems that ail us all.

Who would rather remain willfully blind to it, than to accept a gift of incalculable value for which there is nothing they can do to either earn or deserve lest they have something to brag about?

I think our collective problem and inability to "grok" what Jesus intended and had to offer, is our dualistic, materialist monist mindset and all the judgements that arise therein, which create a blockage to the higher level of understanding and comprehension that he wished to impart by pointing to it, to that most vital thing and issue at the very heart of the matter whereby the things that matter most are invisible, yet that must be made known and communicated to function as an operative principal or practical matter. So he offered it in the form of parables, told with a smile, and then went ahead and walked the walk. It points to a transcendent triumph on the far side of a necessary and a meaningful suffering for the cause of love. It alone is capable of offering consolation, and thus to fully satisfy and put our worried and dualistic mind to rest.

It's not an easy thing to come to know, and love.

What's harder though, in the final analysis, is every single defensive effort we work so hard to muster up in opposition to it's fundamental reasonableness. Then, when we come to know how truly absurd we are and were, we come to know the truth that sets us free.

Now some among us get free from time to time, for a while, and then we get sucked back in by a world gone mad, and we forget as we're drawn back into the duality of judgement and the worries of the world. He understood this too, perfectly well, which is why he also understood that we would have to press on in relative to a world in opposition to the virtuous life that God intended for us in order to be truly happy, and that therefore (said with a smile), he who's been set free on my account and for my sake (the sake of his goodness and righteousness and lovingkindness) - shall be truly free indeed!

Therefore, when you are reviled and spoken poorly of or mistreated on account of me (him) - REJOICE! and be "exceedingly glad"!

Come, all ye rebels, who despise every evil and everything that's wrong with the world, including your own failure to be part of the solution instead of just another part of the problem - He will give you rest and a very good reason to retain your own sense of humor and optimism even in the face of what amounts to a bunch of nonsense by the blind leading the blind into a ditch.

What we're talking about when we talk about Jesus is authentic power where the height of virtue may be thought of as power, restrained (doesn't mean it's not there, or accumulating..).

It's all about a universal controversy surrounding an issue of authority and who is the rightful heir, and what's more, he held it all in reserve and preserved it, in himself, everything that's worthwhile in life, everything worth living and even dying for to uphold, and to top it all off, he slipped through the eye of needle this water laden camel, while a rich man went away sad and inconsolable.

It's HILARIOUS!

It's righteous, it's good, it's loving, it's cunning; a double-bind and a hoodwink of everlasting meaning and significance. "He did it!" (Psalms)

Open your eyes, your mind, and your heart. He, Jesus, shared it all with us, in the most ingenious and uncompromising and heavy handed way, while remaining forever the perfect gentleman. It just doesn't get any better than this.

I'll take it. I don't deserve it, but I'll go with it and see where it all might lead, maybe I'll even be happy, while at the same time able to carry the burden of sorrow that such a joy is capable of containing and transcending..

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

Read the Bible and pray and acknowledge that Jesus shed his blood for your sins and you will be saved.

a reply to: thepixelpusher

Good advice. Thank you.

originally posted by: AnkhMorpork
a reply to: Krazysh0t

Are you saying that there was no historical Jesus who was crucified during the governorship of Pontius Pilate?

Maybe. Maybe not. The proof is rather inconclusive at the moment, but even if I did say he existed that doesn't mean I acknowledge he was demigod or anything.

Why is it I often wonder that people's minds and hearts are so quickly turned away from Jesus and a consideration of his teaching and his great work of all ages, to the degree that they would express a preference for anything else but Jesus?

And why do I always get the impression that behind these protestations lies a kind of seething snarkiness? I don't get it.

Mostly because of Christians who feel like they need to put their religion in everyone's faces all the time, but then again questioning your beliefs is only denying ignorance. It is super funny that Christians always take questioning their faith as a personal attack on them. When -I- was a Christian, I was taught that questioning your faith is supposed to be a good thing because it makes your faith stronger in the end. Of course the people who told me that were assuming I'd come to the same conclusions they did. Though it's a good idea since questioning your beliefs is the foundation of the scientific method.

That said, I do realize that the "church" has in many ways dropped the ball in its representation of the Gospel message creating a strong anti-Christian bias among many, but what we're supposed to be getting from it is a model of authentic leadership and authentic love and friendship.

I get the need to rebel against it, I suppose, in so far as it's offensive in a way to the will and pride of man in his own intellectual knowledge who doesn't much like the idea of a need for salvation from above or from a domain of incorruptibility. There's a certain rebellious teenage angst of sorts in reaction/response, particularly among self-professed atheists.

Anyway, to each their own. I find it quite compelling and even breathtaking in it's significance and implications, because it happened and nothing of any lasting value is ever lost or forgotten. It has a timeless significance and it's worthy of consideration.

I guess people feel that it treads on their ego and their desire for self-determination and what the LaVeyan Satanists call a "rational self interest".

But isn't that part of the problem Jesus came to help remedy, where the human being was made in the image of God to stand next to the Godhead and thus is placed in a rather precarious predicament of sorts?

Jesus came to raise us up out of the mire of our own ignorance so that we could be with him in Spirit and know our true nature and place in the grand scheme of things and to be given the power to lay claim to our birthright as co-heirs of the kingdom of life and light and love.

His is the love that never fails and the light that never goes out.

We need that kind of thing when human love fails us, and when we fail in love and have a breakdown in integrity. He restores us, and makes us whole again even in spite of ourselves. There's a certain humor and mirth in that, and I feel sorry for people who would rather lose their own sense of humor in rebellion against it, than to celebrate its true meaning and significance both for ourselves, individually and ultimately in terms of a global salvation.

Jesus is the solution to the problems that ail us all.

Who would rather remain willfully blind to it, than to accept a gift of incalculable value for which there is nothing they can do to either earn or deserve lest they have something to brag about?

See. None of this is proof of anything. It's just your feelings and how you wish the universe works. I'll be happy to believe you if you can just produce some definitive proof your god exists. God can do everything, it seems, except reveal himself to atheists in a way that even they can't deny him.

I'm also equally curious why he always needs Christians to spread his message and why he can't do it himself. Why is it Christian's responsibility to spread his message to all the heathens and unbelievers? Shouldn't he be capable of doing it himself? Furthermore, since he supposedly created us, why doesn't he realize that humans have short memories and doubt things they can't see for themselves? If I were God, that would tell me that humans would need constant reminders from myself that I exist. Especially if my ego was such that I required my own creations to worship me blindly.

originally posted by: Krazysh0t

originally posted by: AnkhMorpork
a reply to: Krazysh0t

Are you saying that there was no historical Jesus who was crucified during the governorship of Pontius Pilate?

Maybe. Maybe not. The proof is rather inconclusive at the moment, but even if I did say he existed that doesn't mean I acknowledge he was demigod or anything.

Why is it I often wonder that people's minds and hearts are so quickly turned away from Jesus and a consideration of his teaching and his great work of all ages, to the degree that they would express a preference for anything else but Jesus?

And why do I always get the impression that behind these protestations lies a kind of seething snarkiness? I don't get it.

Mostly because of Christians who feel like they need to put their religion in everyone's faces all the time, but then again questioning your beliefs is only denying ignorance. It is super funny that Christians always take questioning their faith as a personal attack on them. When -I- was a Christian, I was taught that questioning your faith is supposed to be a good thing because it makes your faith stronger in the end. Of course the people who told me that were assuming I'd come to the same conclusions they did. Though it's a good idea since questioning your beliefs is the foundation of the scientific method.

That said, I do realize that the "church" has in many ways dropped the ball in its representation of the Gospel message creating a strong anti-Christian bias among many, but what we're supposed to be getting from it is a model of authentic leadership and authentic love and friendship.

I get the need to rebel against it, I suppose, in so far as it's offensive in a way to the will and pride of man in his own intellectual knowledge who doesn't much like the idea of a need for salvation from above or from a domain of incorruptibility. There's a certain rebellious teenage angst of sorts in reaction/response, particularly among self-professed atheists.

Anyway, to each their own. I find it quite compelling and even breathtaking in it's significance and implications, because it happened and nothing of any lasting value is ever lost or forgotten. It has a timeless significance and it's worthy of consideration.

I guess people feel that it treads on their ego and their desire for self-determination and what the LaVeyan Satanists call a "rational self interest".

But isn't that part of the problem Jesus came to help remedy, where the human being was made in the image of God to stand next to the Godhead and thus is placed in a rather precarious predicament of sorts?

Jesus came to raise us up out of the mire of our own ignorance so that we could be with him in Spirit and know our true nature and place in the grand scheme of things and to be given the power to lay claim to our birthright as co-heirs of the kingdom of life and light and love.

His is the love that never fails and the light that never goes out.

We need that kind of thing when human love fails us, and when we fail in love and have a breakdown in integrity. He restores us, and makes us whole again even in spite of ourselves. There's a certain humor and mirth in that, and I feel sorry for people who would rather lose their own sense of humor in rebellion against it, than to celebrate its true meaning and significance both for ourselves, individually and ultimately in terms of a global salvation.

Jesus is the solution to the problems that ail us all.

Who would rather remain willfully blind to it, than to accept a gift of incalculable value for which there is nothing they can do to either earn or deserve lest they have something to brag about?

See. None of this is proof of anything. It's just your feelings and how you wish the universe works. I'll be happy to believe you if you can just produce some definitive proof your god exists. God can do everything, it seems, except reveal himself to atheists in a way that even they can't deny him.

I'm also equally curious why he always needs Christians to spread his message and why he can't do it himself. Why is it Christian's responsibility to spread his message to all the heathens and unbelievers? Shouldn't he be capable of doing it himself? Furthermore, since he supposedly created us, why doesn't he realize that humans have short memories and doubt things they can't see for themselves? If I were God, that would tell me that humans would need constant reminders from myself that I exist. Especially if my ego was such that I required my own creations to worship me blindly.

Pray to God to reveal himself in your life. You are skeptical like many before you. That's okay. God understands. Call out to God to reveal himself in your life and you WILL be transformed.

a reply to: thepixelpusher

I used to be a Christian. I've prayed many times in my life and no god has appeared before me. Stop telling me to do the same thing over and over again expecting a different result than I get. That's the definition of insanity.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

Sorry you fell away from your faith. Spirituality is not just being Christian. Religion is just a means to an end…a relationship with God. Praying does not mean instant miracles, though it may happen and I'm aware of people healed by God. God responds in many ways in a persons life. Answering your prayers by introducing people and situations in your life to allow you to choose a result. God is not some puppet master. He doesn't pull your strings but may give you options in your life to help. I hope you will find your faith again and walk with Jesus and promote his loving ways. You sound like a great person. I know I've enjoyed your posts on ATS.

a reply to: Krazysh0t

God is Spirit and Truth, and His evidence is everywhere. The Kingdom of Heaven is spread out upon the Earth but men to do not see it. God is not like a genie that you can call forth to manifest in bodily form, but what we're saying is that in Jesus, God's will was rendered transparent.

God is very subtle, although some of the synchronicities that begin to manifest when you have a change of heart and mind and begin a new movement Godward, those can be rather mind-blowing in so far as they defy normal causality.

Like the other poster said, if you want God to be part of your life and to make his mysterious ways known to you, all you have to have is open-mindedness and willingness, without placing any demand on God to do YOUR will or to meet your own expectation. After all, if God is really God, why should we expect that his works and wonders would conform to what we can imagine.

The height of Virtue is power, restrained.

If God in his fullness and glory were to step into his creation whenever any atheist demands proof of his existence, things just wouldn't be the same, especially when you yawn and say, is that the best you can do?


There's no use trying to approach God or to ask for His gentle yet powerful presence in our lives with all our own aprior preconceptions and biases intact. God as Spirit and Truth (and power and self awareness) is a teacher.

We have to be open and receptive, even sincere and above all, teachable, since the Spirit who is God is as much a teacher as a comforter.

We have to dare to be willing to consider that our inclusion in the creation was and is an act of love by God towards us as children of a loving God and that in truth, God loves us and wants the best for us, even more than we can at present even begin to imagine, even if only because it also spans the whole of it all.

There's always a trial and a tribulation or an ordeal, but provided that it's a meaningful suffering, there's also a hope and promise and a light after the stone rolls away from our tomb. Jesus made it our tomb, and resurrection, and there's the key.

If our entire basis of life and our life experience radically changes when we move into a partnering relationship with God, then who knows what might be possible, including the joy that's capable of overcoming all sorrow and suffering and regret.

There is always an attachment to an outcome, and an arrow of civilized leadership that's an authentic model of what that really looks like, and for reasons both sad, yet ever moreso, joyful, it's the way of the cross.

It's a teaching, about the true life, which to be true, must break with everything that's untrue, including our own limited conceptions or expectations based on a purely materialist-monist paradigm or worldview where only matter, matters, while ignoring altogether the domain of the invisible where the truth lives. It's an involution at the far end of an evolution and the outward expression of an inward reality.

Jesus is like the height of Socratic ideals about Virtue and the height of Virtue and the twin pillars of true Justice and mercy, which is the heart of the law of life and love, where he is in himself the principal personified, but as Spirit, is also made to comingle and partner with us in "koinonia" or an intimate, participatory relationship.

Until a person reexamines with an open mind and then falls in love with Jesus, then they know him, and once you have a love relationship with God in Jesus or via Jesus as the master teacher, once you have a personal experience, which can also accompany outward manifestations, then you cannot unlearn what you've come to know to be true, deep within where a place has been made for us to cohabitate with God and there, find rest for our weary souls and worried minds.

Oh it makes me laugh and chuckle for reasons that would not have otherwise occurred to me if I wasn't teachable to begin with, then i'd just be like duh with a dour look on my face never able to get a joke that was in large part at the expense of my own prior ignorance and absurdity until the light dawned. We simply must be willing to be insulted by the truth, and allow it to be offense to our ego, as we drop our defences and find the beginning of wisdom in the fear of God and then further in the relying on God as our shield and our strength and our rock of reason and logic, and love, against which nothing else can prevail to knock our house down. Now that's real power and authority and might where God's strengths are expressed in our own weaknesses and in our reliance on His strength, making His strength our own. It raises up our joy and humor and the lost child deep within.

No fear only faith, and love.

Sounds like you haven't lost your faith. God is the way you live your life and express yourself too. Nice post.

I believe that people misuse God as a fear weapon. The bad things on this planet can be the result of our choices or the influence of Satanic forces or both. If we all followed Gods word this planet could be heavenly. But God gave us the gift of choice and the universe with a set physics. At least that is my imperfect understanding, I'm no bible scholar.

a reply to: thepixelpusher

Were you replying to me?

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

Yes, I liked your post. You sound like a great person! Starred it.

a reply to: thepixelpusher

I've had a lot of experience. It's not always an easy thing to find one's self relying on God for protection and care with complete abandon, and to begin to trust in his strength and power, but when we do, look out!

Jesus blazed one heck of a trail to make it all possible. I'm not such a great person of myself, but the best parts of me were made for God to magnify Him through me, in partnership. For better or worse, I am a bride of Christ.

We each of us have so much potential, so much untapped power and performance right where the rubber meets the road and goes places far and wide.

I've come under Satanic attack before, and I've also come through with flying colors as a fearless untouchable, thanks to God.

To follow Jesus is a way both of humility and great power, which makes life a lot more interesting and a lot more fun than if I was just left to my own devices or wasn't a seeker and a searcher.

God restores my sense of joy and wonder and humor and gives me the courage to be more freely and fully self-expressed as a sacred being.

We are trained very early on to hide our light lest we show someone else up and there's a LOT of opposition, but oh what an opportunity to get to be part of the process that Jesus set in motion.

I'm only just beginning to better understand, that what God has in mind and in store is by far better than what I might have chosen for myself, which always goes nowhere fast.

I am like a born again and again and again Christian, or like the prodigal son who keeps on running away and then coming to his senses and returning home again.

In part i'm afraid of God's glory, and how he might wish to make use of me and my own gifts and talents.

It's like an aversion to becoming rich and getting corrupted by material things where in this case it might be said that there's a rather fine line between holiness and assholiness.

But there's nowhere else to go, nowhere else to turn, and nowhere else where it's truly safe and nothing else that satisfies. "Vanity, vanity all is vanity!" King Solomon, who after his own search, prayed for wisdom instead, was granted it, and went on to write Proverbs.

Many are called but few are chosen. I think I'm a chosen person and that scares me, but it's where the fun is. It's both dangerous, and worthwhile.

We were all of us once on the outside looking in, or rebelling, and running off into a distance land owned by an unscrupulous landlord.

God chooses us, and plucks us out of the # we might have gotten ourselves into, and it's ironic really where it might be said that he who's been forgiven more, loves more.

God, in my experience, is very VERY funny. He's so funny that if we really got the joke he's telling we might die laughing, but wouldn't that be the way to go..

Personally I have no idea who and what I really am any more, and it doesn't even matter.

When we begin to take God more seriously and ourselves and even our own meager short lives less seriously, then we are let in on the joke.

And when the epiphany comes and you know God was there all along, we might be astonished and exclaim - but how did you know?!!

God eventually ends up all over our timeline, by forever remaining one step ahead of the curve, so it's no wonder when we start working to be with God that signs and wonders become possible.

Oh sigh, I just hope I don't blow my assignment whatever that might be..

Thank you btw, for the feedback. That means a lot.

I think the real problem anyone of no faith at all might have in closely following this thread, is that I might not be crazy at all but represent the epitome of good reason and sanity, and that would be scary, but a good scary.

Be blessed!

Ankh

Jesus was kind of like the first popular motivational speaker. His words living on long past his life. Impressive even if you don't believe a thing about him.

Your welcome on the compliment. You always seem so thoughtful and insightful in your posts.

a reply to: thepixelpusher

I just don't see it. I am a very logical person and there are too many leaps in logic that must be made to come to the conclusion that god exists. If it is important for god that I know he exists then he can demonstrate it to me himself in a way I can't refute. That is the simple way I see it.

a reply to: AnkhMorpork

See here's the thing. Jesus, if he existed, lived 2000 years ago. That is many many generations removed from me. When is god going to update his image for the modern world? It's really hard to relate today's problems to the problems of a carpenter's son who lived at the beginning of the Roman Empire.