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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 2, 2018 4:33:04 GMT
Apostles John and Peter preached Jesus as the stone to all people in the below verses. Acts 4:10-12 Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here before you whole. This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. Only the stone saves which is also the chief cornerstone.
And these apostles encountered threats and so on from the people. Some apostles fell away later and some held on strong. Are you brave enough to spread Jesus as the stone who provides salvation no matter what?
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Clovis Merovingian
Prestige/VIP
Elder
Posts: 2,698
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Meta-Ethnicity: Anglo-American
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Region: The Deep South
Location: South Carolina
Ancestry: Gaelic (patrilineal), English, Ulster Scots/Scots Irish, Scottish, German, Swiss German, Swedish, Manx, Finnish, Norman French/Quebecois (distantly), Dutch (distantly)
Taxonomy: Borreby/Alpine/ Nordid mix
Y-DNA: R-S660/R-DF109
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Hero: Andrew Jackson, Thomas Jefferson, James K. Polk
Age: 30
Philosophy: I try to find out what is true as best I can.
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Post by Clovis Merovingian on Oct 6, 2018 7:27:39 GMT
Wait for an answer. If you sincerely prayed seeking an answer he will answer you in his own time. Sincerity is key also. God will not answer someone not actually seeking the truth. It isn't a moving goal post, it is what God requires. So you are going to move the goalposts too by introducing the word "sincere" into the equation. You never qualified originally. You just asked me to pray and I did. Now you want to modify your original request. That is classic shifting of the goalposts.
The problem is this. If I never receive an answer from a god you will claim that I just haven't been sincere enough and there is no way for me to ever prove my sincerity to you. Therefore you have put yourself in a position where you cannot be proved wrong under any circumstances. Heads you win, tails I lose. Do you think that is a fair bargain?
Let me make a request of you in return. In Matthew 21:22 Jesus states "If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer". You obviously claim to be a sincere believer (you have faith and do not doubt). I want you to ask in prayer for malaria to be wiped from the face of the Earth tomorrow. Jesus has said that you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer as long as you believe. There is no qualification on what you can ask for. So go ahead and let me know the result. I will be disappointed if you start making excuses as to why you can't pray for such a humane cause.
Except that there is a qualifier to the verse you have stated found in another verse in the Bible. www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+5%3A14-15&version=YLT John 5:14-15. In order to receive what we've asked from him it has to be in line with his will. If you don't like the qualifier of sincerity that says a lot about you. What I mean is that you are to pray to God genuinely seeking the truth of whether or not there is a God. This shouldn't be hard for any rational person, but I suppose it would be pretty hard for an atheist. Atheism is a ridiculous ideology because it claims based on a rational assessment of the facts and evidence for a certainty that there is no God and yet... that is not where the facts and evidence lead a rational individual. There is no evidence for a God one way or the other. The existence of a God cannot be proven, but at the same time it cannot be authoritatively disproven. The universe is a very orderly place. If one variable in any of the various laws of the universe was off even by a little bit, nothing would exist. Furthermore we have no evidence or understanding for how the universe came into being, we do not know how the first life form was brought into existence; in short we have no idea how life or the universe came into being. A being designing and creating the universe with these insanely orderly laws is just a believable as... however it is you atheists believe the universe came into existence. You will probably say, "well, I don't know how the universe came into existence but that doesn't mean I have to believe a deity did it," but honestly it is foolish to claim that you don't know how the universe came into being but state with absolute certainty that a higher power did not create it. You do not know that. You can not know that based upon any existing standard of evidence and thus you claiming with any degree of certainty that there is no God is an act of faith, whether you like it or not. Agnosticism at least makes sense. They just admit that they can not know one way or another and that they lack the faith one way or another. Atheism claims on the other hand to be based upon a rational assessment of the facts and rejects faith. However you have as much faith as I do, just on the other side of the issue. And if your belief is based on faith, that's fine but don't claim that your opinion is based upon rationality, science, and evidence because that's a bunch of BS and you know it. At least my faith is based upon something (personal experience with God.)
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 6, 2018 7:32:50 GMT
It's not cherry-picking and it's not dishonest. It doesn't have to be all (unlike the word "universal") and can be most. That's what "or" means in English. There are two possibilities. The two words are therefore not identical because the word "universal" has no such option. Why are you struggling with the English language so much? Point is the adage “one man’s truth is another man’s lie” is a fact. You have already been refuted. Repeating yourself just makes you look like someone who is inflexible and incapable of accepting a rational conclusion.
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Post by DKTrav88 on Oct 6, 2018 7:35:34 GMT
Point is the adage “one man’s truth is another man’s lie” is a fact. You have already been refuted. Repeating yourself just makes you look like someone who is inflexible and incapable of accepting a rational conclusion. Rationality is subjective. But we’ll just have to agree to disagree.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 6, 2018 7:51:18 GMT
So you are going to move the goalposts too by introducing the word "sincere" into the equation. You never qualified originally. You just asked me to pray and I did. Now you want to modify your original request. That is classic shifting of the goalposts.
The problem is this. If I never receive an answer from a god you will claim that I just haven't been sincere enough and there is no way for me to ever prove my sincerity to you. Therefore you have put yourself in a position where you cannot be proved wrong under any circumstances. Heads you win, tails I lose. Do you think that is a fair bargain?
Let me make a request of you in return. In Matthew 21:22 Jesus states "If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer". You obviously claim to be a sincere believer (you have faith and do not doubt). I want you to ask in prayer for malaria to be wiped from the face of the Earth tomorrow. Jesus has said that you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer as long as you believe. There is no qualification on what you can ask for. So go ahead and let me know the result. I will be disappointed if you start making excuses as to why you can't pray for such a humane cause.
Except that there is a qualifier to the verse you have stated found in another verse in the Bible. www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+5%3A14-15&version=YLT John 5:14-15. In order to receive what we've asked from him it has to be in line with his will. So Jesus lied in Matthew? That is not Jesus speaking in 1 John 5. Are you denying the unqualified words of your own savior?
You are making excuses as I predicted you would. I am disappointed.
The fact that you wanted to insist on an unfair bargain by moving the goalposts says a lot about you. I will ignore the gish gallop as it is an attempted derailing of the thread.
More gish gallop ignored. If you want to start a new thread on any of the numerous issues you have raised I will be happy to comment there. Please be civil though. Accusing someone of ignorance and lies without any evidence is rather churlish as I'm sure you will agree.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 6, 2018 7:59:22 GMT
A new thought just occurred to me. You asked me to pray and if I did so sincerely God would reveal himself to me. Now you are contradicting yourself by saying that God does things only according to his will. Therefore prayers are useless. If God wanted to reveal himself to me he would do so with or without prayer. Is that correct?
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Post by DKTrav88 on Oct 6, 2018 8:26:56 GMT
A new thought just occurred to me. You asked me to pray and if I did so sincerely God would reveal himself to me. Now you are contradicting yourself by saying that God does things only according to his will. Therefore prayers are useless. If God wanted to reveal himself to me he would do so with or without prayer. Is that correct?
He probably has revealed Himself to you before, but it seems you may have rejected Him, though I do not know if He has rejected you just yet. But this means you probably weren’t actually sincere in your prayer; the goal posts wouldn’t have moved if you had been sincere to begin with. What’s the point of praying if you aren’t sincere about it? It’s an act at that point. God will see your heart no matter how good of an actor you are. And how can someone pray to a God they refuse to believe is real to begin with? I conclude that your prayer wasn’t sincere, but I do not believe it is too late for you. Many people have come out of much much worse into faith in God.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 6, 2018 14:42:53 GMT
A new thought just occurred to me. You asked me to pray and if I did so sincerely God would reveal himself to me. Now you are contradicting yourself by saying that God does things only according to his will. Therefore prayers are useless. If God wanted to reveal himself to me he would do so with or without prayer. Is that correct?
He probably has revealed Himself to you before, but it seems you may have rejected Him, though I do not know if He has rejected you just yet. But this means you probably weren’t actually sincere in your prayer; the goal posts wouldn’t have moved if you had been sincere to begin with. What’s the point of praying if you aren’t sincere about it? It’s an act at that point. God will see your heart no matter how good of an actor you are. And how can someone pray to a God they refuse to believe is real to begin with? I conclude that your prayer wasn’t sincere, but I do not believe it is too late for you. Many people have come out of much much worse into faith in God.
God has never revealed himself to me and will never reveal himself to me because he doesn't exist. The game you guys play with "your prayers were not sincere enough" is totally transparent as I have already explained. You issue a challenge which you know you can never lose because of your convenient escape clause. You (collectively) inserted that clause after the initial challenge (to just pray) which is most definitely a moving of the goalposts and a blatantly dishonest debating tactic.
Since you haven't bothered to answer my question above, you must want to talk past me and over me so I'll leave it at that for now.
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Post by Elizabeth on Oct 6, 2018 17:01:52 GMT
So you are going to move the goalposts too by introducing the word "sincere" into the equation. You never qualified originally. You just asked me to pray and I did. Now you want to modify your original request. That is classic shifting of the goalposts. The problem is this. If I never receive an answer from a god you will claim that I just haven't been sincere enough and there is no way for me to ever prove my sincerity to you. Therefore you have put yourself in a position where you cannot be proved wrong under any circumstances. Heads you win, tails I lose. Do you think that is a fair bargain? Let me make a request of you in return. In Matthew 21:22 Jesus states "If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer". You obviously claim to be a sincere believer (you have faith and do not doubt). I want you to ask in prayer for malaria to be wiped from the face of the Earth tomorrow. Jesus has said that you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer as long as you believe. There is no qualification on what you can ask for. So go ahead and let me know the result. I will be disappointed if you start making excuses as to why you can't pray for such a humane cause.
Except that there is a qualifier to the verse you have stated found in another verse in the Bible. www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+5%3A14-15&version=YLT John 5:14-15. In order to receive what we've asked from him it has to be in line with his will. If you don't like the qualifier of sincerity that says a lot about you. What I mean is that you are to pray to God genuinely seeking the truth of whether or not there is a God. This shouldn't be hard for any rational person, but I suppose it would be pretty hard for an atheist. Atheism is a ridiculous ideology because it claims based on a rational assessment of the facts and evidence for a certainty that there is no God and yet... that is not where the facts and evidence lead a rational individual. There is no evidence for a God one way or the other. The existence of a God cannot be proven, but at the same time it cannot be authoritatively disproven. The universe is a very orderly place. If one variable in any of the various laws of the universe was off even by a little bit, nothing would exist. Furthermore we have no evidence or understanding for how the universe came into being, we do not know how the first life form was brought into existence; in short we have no idea how life or the universe came into being. A being designing and creating the universe with these insanely orderly laws is just a believable as... however it is you atheists believe the universe came into existence. You will probably say, "well, I don't know how the universe came into existence but that doesn't mean I have to believe a deity did it," but honestly it is foolish to claim that you don't know how the universe came into being but state with absolute certainty that a higher power did not create it. You do not know that. You can not know that based upon any existing standard of evidence and thus you claiming with any degree of certainty that there is no God is an act of faith, whether you like it or not. Agnosticism at least makes sense. They just admit that they can not know one way or another and that they lack the faith one way or another. Atheism claims on the other hand to be based upon a rational assessment of the facts and rejects faith. However you have as much faith as I do, just on the other side of the issue. And if your belief is based on faith, that's fine but don't claim that your opinion is based upon rationality, science, and evidence because that's a bunch of BS and you know it. At least my faith is based upon something (personal experience with God.) Yours is based upon nothing but ignorance and lies. This is so true! It's like we were there to experience it and we have a nonwitness come and claim he's a know it all when he wasn't even there. Only witness cases matter anyway in any court or whatever. If one wants to learn they must ask those who've witnessed something.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2018 1:10:48 GMT
God has never revealed himself to me and will never reveal himself to me because he doesn't exist. The game you guys play with "your prayers were not sincere enough" is totally transparent as I have already explained. You issue a challenge which you know you can never lose because of your convenient escape clause. You (collectively) inserted that clause after the initial challenge (to just pray) which is most definitely a moving of the goalposts and a blatantly dishonest debating tactic.
Since you haven't bothered to answer my question above, you must want to talk past me and over me so I'll leave it at that for now.
You’re really confused. Seems what I’ve said is correct. You don’t believe God exists, hence someone can’t sincerely pray to a God they don’t believe exists, so when you said you prayed, your prayer could never have been sincere... and you said your prayer, when you did pray, was sincere, correct? How can the sincerity of your prayer be qualified as a yes when you don’t believe in the God who you are praying to? That makes no sense. So either you aren’t being honest with yourself, which I believe is the case, or you’re not being honest with us, which I hope isn’t the case. Either way, I still think it isn’t too late for you, but I can’t be certain of that. I suggest you go back and read my original answer. I have nothing further to add. Since you are still fixated on the question of my sincerity (your escape clause when God does his usual non-appearance act) there is nothing further to say. If you want to have a conversation, answer the question I posed. Stop dodging it.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2018 2:02:56 GMT
This is so true! It's like we were there to experience it and we have a nonwitness come and claim he's a know it all when he wasn't even there. Only witness cases matter anyway in any court or whatever. If one wants to learn they must ask those who've witnessed something. What "there" are you referring to?
Have you ever heard of forensic evidence?
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Post by Elizabeth on Oct 7, 2018 5:41:06 GMT
This is so true! It's like we were there to experience it and we have a nonwitness come and claim he's a know it all when he wasn't even there. Only witness cases matter anyway in any court or whatever. If one wants to learn they must ask those who've witnessed something. What "there" are you referring to? Have you ever heard of forensic evidence? You weren't there. No need to bring you into what you don't know about. Oh forensic evidence which has many limitations? Yes, what about it?
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Post by DKTrav88 on Oct 7, 2018 6:03:45 GMT
You’re really confused. Seems what I’ve said is correct. You don’t believe God exists, hence someone can’t sincerely pray to a God they don’t believe exists, so when you said you prayed, your prayer could never have been sincere... and you said your prayer, when you did pray, was sincere, correct? How can the sincerity of your prayer be qualified as a yes when you don’t believe in the God who you are praying to? That makes no sense. So either you aren’t being honest with yourself, which I believe is the case, or you’re not being honest with us, which I hope isn’t the case. Either way, I still think it isn’t too late for you, but I can’t be certain of that. I suggest you go back and read my original answer. I have nothing further to add. Since you are still fixated on the question of my sincerity (your escape clause when God does his usual non-appearance act) there is nothing further to say. If you want to have a conversation, answer the question I posed. Stop dodging it. You can't admit that your prayer wasn't sincere. What a shame.
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Post by DKTrav88 on Oct 7, 2018 6:05:11 GMT
What "there" are you referring to? Have you ever heard of forensic evidence? You weren't there. No need to bring you into what you don't know about. Oh forensic evidence which has many limitations? Yes, what about it? He wouldn't be able to prove the four gospels are a false testimony anyway shrug
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2018 9:13:21 GMT
What "there" are you referring to? Have you ever heard of forensic evidence? You weren't there. No need to bring you into what you don't know about. I repeat. What "there" are you talking about?
It's used to convict criminals during court cases. Your claim was " Only witness cases matter anyway in any court or whatever". Would you like to amend your claim?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2018 9:16:45 GMT
I suggest you go back and read my original answer. I have nothing further to add. Since you are still fixated on the question of my sincerity (your escape clause when God does his usual non-appearance act) there is nothing further to say. If you want to have a conversation, answer the question I posed. Stop dodging it. You can't admit that your prayer wasn't sincere. What a shame. Instead of putting words into my mouth I suggest you go back and read my original answer. I have nothing further to add. Since you are still fixated on the question of my sincerity (your escape clause when God does his usual non-appearance act) there is nothing further to say. If you want to have a conversation, answer the question I posed. Stop dodging it.
Here is that question again in case you have forgotten:
"A new thought just occurred to me. You asked me to pray and if I did so sincerely God would reveal himself to me. Now you are contradicting yourself by saying that God does things only according to his will. Therefore prayers are useless. If God wanted to reveal himself to me he would do so with or without prayer. Is that correct?"
Still awaiting an answer.
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