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Originally posted by jmdewey60
If you did in fact study the NT you would know that it is not simple and is in fact rather complex and requires a lot of thought to understand.
Originally posted by XplanetX
Originally posted by jmdewey60
reply to post by XplanetX
A bit more complex than your one liner slogans you are fond of.
You have just taken something that is very simple to understand and turned it into gobbledygook
I suppose you never studied the NT.
I have spent a large part of my life studying old testament and new testament scripture.
If you have studied it, then you certainly do not understand it.
That much is clear.
Now do you just tell people to not look at the NT because it is too difficult and to just believe in your sloganed version of truth?
Originally posted by NOTurTypical
Really? Dbates invented fundamental orthodox Christianity?? That's quite remarkable.
If Jesus is God and God made everything then how exactly can the devil tempt God with God’s own property?
Originally posted by dbates
Originally posted by NOTurTypical
Really? Dbates invented fundamental orthodox Christianity?? That's quite remarkable.
I'm actually a bit over 1,900 years old so yeah, pretty much made up the entire thing myself. Well to be honest there was a dude named Paul that was my secretary. He wrote a lot of it down for me but it was all pretty much my idea. Silly Paul, ever since he survived that snake bite he got this huge ego and started taking credit for nearly half the New Testament. I just let it slide cause you know like I always said, "Blessed are the meek".
Back to the subject, the temptations that offered Jesus the world was an attempt at making him take the easy way out. People should not be confused about the offer for the world. It was a valid offer. The Devil isn't a creature with hooves and horns. He's fantastically beautiful and powerful and was basically running. He has much to offer those that are willing to try short-cuts but always speaks in half-truths. He'll tell you the positive side of the deal but gloss over the negative aspects of the bargain.
Originally posted by racasan
reply to post by dbates
?
Are you one the sort who thinks jesus is god (or possible 1/3 of god?)
If so then I don’t get what you put here – to me it reads as satan out ranks god because he’s just so gosh darn handsome, but good old jesus was able to see past the devils charms and tricky offers some how
look its simple, If jesus is god then he made the earth, the devil, handsome – everything, so how could he be tempted by the devils offer?
this would be the same as a man been talked out of $50 by a sock puppet he has on his hand
Originally posted by Blue_Jay33
reply to post by racasan
If Jesus is God and God made everything then how exactly can the devil tempt God with God’s own property?
As for Jesus being God himself, this question proves he isn't, Satan can't tempt God, but he could tempt Jesus the Son of God. Thus the Trinity is once again proven to be a doctrine imported from paganism, in the 4th century, as Jesus predicted the the great apostasy was well under way.
"As the early church grew, Gnostics and other cults began teaching that Jesus was a created being, inferior to the Father. This came to a head in the fourth century when Arius, a popular preacher from Libya, persuaded many leaders that Jesus wasn’t fully God. Then in 325 A. D. at the Council of Nicaea, church leaders met to resolve the issue of whether Jesus is the Creator, or merely a creation.5 These church leaders overwhelmingly affirmed the long-held Christian conviction and New Testament teaching that Jesus is fully God.
"Arius was no stranger to controversy. According to another early historian (Sozomen), Alexander's predecessor Bishop Peter had earlier "cast him out of the church" because he disagreed with the way the bishop had handled a matter of church discipline and "could not be restrained in quietness."
So not being one to sit by quietly when he did not agree with his superiors, Arius "vigorously responded" to Alexander's sermon, accusing him publicly and to his face of the heresy of Sabellianism. Those were fighting words.
Sabellianism was a view of the Trinity that emphasized the oneness of God at the expense of the true distinction between God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Also called modalism, it takes its name from its most notorious proponent, Sabellius. who tried to explain the three Persons of the Godhead as successive modes of being, not co-equal, co-existing realities. Sabellius was excommunicated for his rejection of the doctrine of the Trinity in A.D. 220— more than a century before the doctrine of the Trinity was "invented" by the Council of Nicea!"
Originally posted by racasan
this would be the same as a man been talked out of $50 by a sock puppet he has on his hand
In my opinion: It is the plan......as "time" is neither past, present, or future. There is a MASTER plan, if you will. When God "moved" and became aware he began to create, hence Light. His creation story for us does not mean nothing was created beforehand. The Angels were there at the "time" the Earth and Heavens were created. Genesis speaks of "We" (.not "I") created. In order to perfect in GOOD our spirits need to know BAD. I think this is the Ultimate Goal for the Creator we call God. To Perfect in Goodness and in the light of Love. This is how God experiences himself first hand the love not only for His creation but also for himself. As we do....so does He. We are to come here in this darkened Planet and experience the temptations of this world so we may better perfect as we cannot do that in the Light. There is no temptation and we cannot overcome anything in the Heavenly realm. Because his creation was termed, "Good" then so be it. We are all eventually going to bear the seed of good through reincarnation. I do not think it is such a human drama story. There is a plan and its a circle of life as we perfect in the will of God and not our own. Satan is a deceiving energy force that may over come souls spirits to the other side. This is where Hell resides. Eventually (death of flesh) your energy is either emotionally aware of the heavenly realm or it is emotionally aware of the hell realm. We can call on the Father and be saved though and this is what a non believer will eventually do. In the end there will only be a heavenly realm. This is the Master plan. Ok....so there is my opinion of it as crazy as it may sound to some. ETA: Also I want to add that I believe Satan to be a helper for the Master plan...He is needed in the plan so we may perfect quicker in the realm of time.....for Gods will.
I still like my concept better. I mean....why do so many wish to dramatize God and His Master plan? It is all quite simple. ALL that is knows ALL.The Plan is a "good" plan and its one that MUST take place so Good will know bad and be able to observe and experiences the difference in this realm of "Time" and be able to perfect in Good! Lucifer is an Angel who took on a role for God and all of us to perfect in Gods will and not ours. He shows us we are easily deceived and this is not wanted in the Heavenly realm. Only goodness can be in that realm. On this planet though we are allowed to perfect in "time" which allows the soul a quicker advancement for the spirit to know Good out of their wrong doings. We feel and sense this when we do something wrong. We know it and try to learn from it (mistake) and perfect on it as to not do it again. We chose to come here and the Angels are indeed non- human and never will be. They were here when we were created and they guide us daily to perfect in the goodness of our free will and that of Gods Master plan. This plan has been set in motion and we continue to come back to perfect in the will of God. Our will is the same when we are not on this Planet. When we are back home our will is that of Gods. To perfect in goodness and light. Its just there is a much slower process as we are always in the light there. Only good prevails. Why can it not be that simple?? Just askin....please no one get mad. This is merely my perception of the Word.
The Creator God, makes a creator god as an avatar within the universe, while the Creator God sits outside of the universe the avatar is working in?
The first act of creation was Jesus and we're told in John and it's alluded to in many places in the Old Testament that Jesus actually created the Universe as an agent of God.
Originally posted by jmdewey60
So no worship of God is possible, since practically speaking, none exists, at least not in this universe?
Anyone and everyone are welcome to their own opinions of course, however no one is entitled to their own facts.
Although there is much debate as to whether the beliefs of the Apostles were merely articulated and explained in the Trinitarian Creeds, or were corrupted and replaced with new beliefs, all scholars recognize that the Creeds themselves were created in reaction to disagreements over the nature of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These controversies, however, were great and many, and took many centuries to be resolved. Of these controversies, the most significant developments were articulated in the first four centuries by the Church Fathers in reaction to Adoptionism, Sabellianism, and Arianism. Adoptionism was the belief that Jesus was an ordinary man, born of Joseph and Mary, who became the Christ and Son of God at his baptism. In 269, the Synods of Antioch condemned Paul of Samosata for his Adoptionist theology, and also condemned the term "homoousios" in the sense he used it. Sabellianism taught that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are aspects of how humanity has interacted with or experienced God. In the role of the Father, God is the provider and creator of all. In the role of the Son, God is manifested in the flesh as a human, in order to bring about the salvation of mankind. In the role of the Holy Spirit, God manifests himself from heaven through his actions on the earth and within the lives of Christians. This view was rejected as heresy by the Ecumenical Councils. Arianism, which was coming into prominence during the 4th century, taught that the Father was a superior and distinct being from the Son, and that the Son was a superior and distinct being from the Holy Spirit. In 325, the Council of Nicaea adopted a term for the relationship between the Father and the Son that from then on was seen as the hallmark of orthodoxy; it declared that the Son is "of the same being" (ὁμοούσιος) as the Father. This was further developed into the formula "three persons, one being".
Saint Athanasius, who was a participant in the Council, stated that the bishops were forced to use this terminology, which is not found in Scripture, because the Biblical phrases that they would have preferred to use were claimed by the Arians to be capable of being interpreted in what the bishops considered to be a heretical sense.They therefore "commandeered the non-scriptural term homoousios ('of the same being') to safeguard the essential relation of the Son to the Father that had been denied by Arius."
There is still no God, from the viewpoint of anyone who exists, seeing how none of us is God.
Why would an all-knowing God need to be in this Universe to realize if you were worshiping it? God isn't expelled from the Universe, just chooses not to reveal himself directly here.
Originally posted by jmdewey60
So your point is we are to worship a thing which He designates as an object of worship and don't be thinking about an actual God.
You said he was created.
Originally posted by dbates
Originally posted by jmdewey60
So your point is we are to worship a thing which He designates as an object of worship and don't be thinking about an actual God.
We're having some kind of disconnect. I didn't think I ever insinuated anything but that the worship of Jesus or God was just. I don't advocate the worship of anything else. That was one of the key points Jesus made that was pointed out in the original post. We're just to worship God.
Are you saying that the worship of Jesus is idolatry?
Originally posted by jmdewey60
You said he was created.
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
Colossians 1:15-17