If I may. I think an overview of why we as humans are all here is in order to possibly get a smidge of understanding as to what is happening.
First of all God wanted children AKA (sons) so he went through the trouble of creating all that the eye can behold and ear hear etc.... Then he forms a man and puts him in an environment that should have been perfect, as the man was with God daily and walking and talking with him, but the man knew nothing other than what God told him. The man somehow becomes lonely even in the presence of God so God makes him a mate (Eve). At the same time in this garden there is a serpent (devil) whom God placed there as well.
When the devil who has a job to deceive humans, deceived Eve then Adam listened to Eve instead of God to not take of the fruit of the tree of the Knowledge of good and evil
they both had there eyes opened and became as God. The devil and God both said so. Weird but true. The knowledge of good and evil is essential to being like God, he knows how to control it and does, however man is driven to destroy himself through knowing and doing evil as God will not allow men to have never ending life. First 4,000 years of history nut shelled. Now God who knew he would send a Spirit known to man as Jesus was born as a man outside what is called a carnal mind which causes a person to believe that they are their own God. Adam was made that way then fell and all men after that were condemned to possess that same mind which is separation from God mentally and spiritually. Now Jesus who was the physical Son of God and Mary in the flesh was born outside the curse of carnality which allowed him to be sinless during his earthly time. The curse is passed from father to child.
He was in constant communion with God his Father the whole time with about an 18 hour exception at the end of his life. He became a sacrifice for sin of ALL MEN and
thus God highly exalted him to the position of a God as the Son of God, the first born from among the dead.
Now is the time when God chooses who he will allow to know these things and be saved as he is the decider of those who receive salvation. Thing is that all men no matter what religion or atheism belief or no belief they have now will eventually come to know the love of God it's just a matter of time because as I said in opening he wants children
and everything that is being done is to perfect children that will be able to possess the capacity of God their Father. Jesus was the first and is the example as he was obedient
to his Father, also yours spiritually, and was resurrected unto the status as a Son who possesses the fullness of his Father. This knowledge that God gives to those whom he chooses is what drives us to be like Christ Jesus as we are Hoping, having faith that God who cannot lie has promised Eternal life to all men before he created the world. If
you have partook of humanity then it is a certainty that you will also take part in the process of salvation. Which will require the death of your carnality so that you may see
God as responsible for all calamity/evil that enters into your life and be able to comprehend that he is developing you to grab hold of his likeness in that you will never do evil
to any child of God once granted the status of a son of God with unlimited abilities that your imagination cannot yet comprehend. Truth be told you were promised this eternal life before you became a man by God himself. You, in spirit, came out from him and shall return to him a fully matured glorious son of God when he decides to start working on you, your life will be turned upside down and you will be seen as crazy by your friends, but yet that day will be the best day of your life on earth as reality has then set in.
Tried to keep it short but nut shelling the Bible isn't easy. Most cannot see the forest for the trees and they get even further side tracked by examining the bark on the trees.
And yes all of this is in the Bible but alot of it is hidden from the eyes of man. When they read it they do not understand it and it is meant to keep those out whom are not
chosen to participate at this time.
Thank you for the thoughtful remarks, Samson 2020.
I don’t recall having interacted here with you ere now. If that is so, I’ll paint four you a brief sketch where I come from on Christianity’s proposition.
I no longer believe there is good evidence to think any god exists. This is a departure from my former state of belief, but the transition was not a drastic one. I was raised taught the world was created by God and ran according to his rules. I never felt any particular “spirit” or “presence” of it, but for most of my life I chalked this up to some failing on my part, one among many. I just slowly grew out of that worldview through experience.
I am keenly interested in religion and, in particular, Christianity because (A) I have no proof there is nothing to it and, if it is indeed true in any real sense, I had better come to terms with it, the LAST thing I want to do is live in some form of denial about how the world really works; and (B) even if there is no “truth” in it, I can’t deny it is a main spring built into the machinery of how many of the humans with whom I share the world operate. I think intimate understanding of that mechanism serves my own individual interests as well as those of our broader community.
I find the Christian principle of redemption exceedingly meritorious, even brilliant. And revolutionary for the era in which it was conceived. Since before the time of Hamurabi’s Code humans have made an absolutely fetish of justice and social order. But have very little in the way of offering failed, fallen humans avenues via which to redeem themselves. Towards that end, I think Christianity evinces flashes of absolute genius.
If I believed in the existence of God and the reality of Christianity, there are several things I would find disagreeable about them (and, indeed, things about Christianity disagreeable even in the absence of God). I’m happy to recite my litany of complaints. (They’re very run of the mill, as you might imagine.) But I think my three most salient differences with Christian doctrine are:
1. I reject the very notion of human sacrifice, for any reason, on principle. If I had been at Calvary I would have seen it as my moral duty to thwart the Crucifixion, no matter who Jesus was. And I would consider failing to put a stop to it a great moral defeat on my part, one from which I doubt I could ever fully recover.
2. The principle of vicarious redemption is unjust and impracticable. I cannot blame another for anything Adam or Eve or anyone else ever did. No act of repentance or sacrifice on the part of any person can offset my own responsibility for any of my own wrongs. And (most especially) if in the unjust case that Jesus’s suffering can assuage the guilt of the sins of all mankind, then my own sacrifice ought to be worth SOMEthing. I don’t ask to save an entire generation, nor even just one nation of people. If I knew, for certain, sacrificing myself could in any way spare the suffering of my two children, I would offer myself up with a smile on my lips and a song in my heart. I think I would do it for some arbitrary number of perfect strangers, even. But I can’t. Can I?
3. I once was convinced that morality, as taught in the Bible, was sophisticated, enlightened and infallibly just. The more I live, the more I become convinced it is quite an uninteresting instance of “carrot and stick” morality, based entirely upon imagined (and probably imaginary) rewards and punishments. These can be very effective inducements to moral behavior, but my children are not yet out of their teens and they both outgrew this very unsophisticated, transactional ethical code years ago.
I spend a good bit of my available time reading the Bible. All that any such study elicits in me is a deeper appreciation of (what I find to be) its shortcomings. I cherish many favorite verses (All time #1 Greatest Hit is Gen 2:15. Let me know if you’d like to talk about it. And there is no entrance of any villain in all of literature as awesome as Job 2:2!) But I have a long and constantly growing list of verses I find troubling, at best. I think one verse which embodies more of what I find wrongheaded about the entire premise of Christianity is Rom 11:32 “For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.”
I love my children. I am told God loves me more than I love them. I cannot fathom any outrage for which I would not forgive my children. I am told God is willing to forgive me, but if, and only if… (X, Y, Z). Rom 11:32 tells me God made us all AND made us flawed IN ORDER TO forgive us. The ultimate self-licking ice cream cone. And he expects something, anything, from me before he is willing to condescend to it.
I’m afraid I don’t find any bit of it very enticing. But, recall, nor do I find its reality convincing.
