Am I a fence sitter for being Agnostic?

[Muizer]

The church that Jesus is building is made up of people in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and whom God will never let go once they know Jesus to be their Lord and Saviour. .... Despite your comments and despite what the seeker is asking God is still bulding His church through the blood of Jesus Christ and those that seek Him in earnest will find Him.

Why would god rely on word of mouth (that includes scripture of course) for people to find him? It seems to me a very fundamental aspect of Christianity, but to be fair of all religions, that this is the case: it relies 100% on mortals to propagate through time and space. IMHO this requires an explanation, but one rarely hears anyone expound on it. I'm curious what your view is.

[Prodromos]

"Why would god?" is grammatically incoherent by the way. It's very much like saying, "why would person eat this food?" Does that sound correct to you?

Since God is a proper noun, it has to be capitalized, just like Caligula, Gandalf, and so on.

[basics]

Why would god rely on word of mouth (that includes scripture of course) for people to find him? It seems to me a very fundamental aspect of Christianity, but to be fair of all religions, that this is the case: it relies 100% on mortals to propagate through time and space. IMHO this requires an explanation, but one rarely hears anyone expound on it. I'm curious what your view is.

Muizer,

Well, as Jesus puts it, " No man can come to the Father except by Me and no man can come to Me except the Father draws him." So here's the relationship between Father and Son delivered by the Holy Spirit in drawing an unbeliever to Jesus because an unbeliever cannot do that of his own volition. His heart sees him as a good person so why does he need a Saviour? God put us on this planet essentially so that He could commune with us for His good pleasure and what better way since man's fall than through Jesus Christ, the Son of God making that possible once again.

[fkizz]

fkizz,

I think you'll find in the Scriptures that once a person belongs to God the faith that Jesus endowed to them becomes the target for all that's evil meaning that faith is always being tested. One needs more and more faith as one grows in Christ not less. Jesus supplies that through the Holy Spirit and does so in abundance the more one asks for it.

You are absolutely right that I need to read more the scriptures, haven't been reading them much lately.
However some cases of mystical experiences almost erase the need for faith or even for being tested for faith, but such cases are relatively rare. In such cases it is almost empirical knowledge of God's existance/nature.

Giving a hybrid example:
St. Thomas Aquinas, part of Ecclesiastical class, who spent most of his life dedicated to Bible studies, Faith, Theology, etc, had such a mystical experience on his late life, which completly changed his worldview, and said that what he had wrote was "nothing" compared to what he had witnessed.
After that he spent his life preparing for his death rather than keeping on writing on Theology despite being a very rare talent for such Theology and lots of demand for him to write more. But he insisted on remaining loyal to what he had experienced, for the confusion of many.

Aldous Huxley also writes about this episode of St. Thomas Aquinas on "Borders of Perception".

You could say that after a lifetime of faith and having his faith tested, he had an experience which made faith redundant at the end of his life. Such cases are often well, mysterious and relatively rare even among the most devout believers. But they are cases of empirical individual experience.

So due to their rare nature it's not a good recipe to recommend. The Faith road is the most effective one.

But the existance of such mystical experience cases leaves me kinda mesmerized.

[basics]

fkizz,

To give just one example of faith, I as you know have cancer of the bladder and my brother whom I haven't seen for years has terminal cancer of the same organ so I prayed that God would provide the funds for me to get down to Hamilton to see him before he dies or even me. On Sunday someone placed a sealed envelope into my Bible when I was otherwise disposed and it wasn't until we were leaving that it fell out of my Bible yet I didn't open it until we got home, my wife doing that for me. Inside was a bundle of notes amounting to £180 yet not a word of who put it there. After some enquiries I discovered who the donour was and it turned out to be a guy who a few years ago had hit hard times whom I had slipped £80 pounds from my birthday money never expecting it to be paid back. The strange thing is that this guy never heard my plea for finance and so couldn't have known of my need. Was it a coincidence or was it an answer to prayer? To me the answer is so obvious.

[fkizz]

fkizz,

To give just one example of faith, I as you know have cancer of the bladder and my brother whom I haven't seen for years has terminal cancer of the same organ so I prayed that God would provide the funds for me to get down to Hamilton to see him before he dies or even me. On Sunday someone placed a sealed envelope into my Bible when I was otherwise disposed and it wasn't until we were leaving that it fell out of my Bible yet I didn't open it until we got home, my wife doing that for me. Inside was a bundle of notes amounting to £180 yet not a word of who put it there. After some enquiries I discovered who the donour was and it turned out to be a guy who a few years ago had hit hard times whom I had slipped £80 pounds from my birthday money never expecting it to be paid back. The strange thing is that this guy never heard my plea for finance and so couldn't have known of my need. Was it a coincidence or was it an answer to prayer? To me the answer is so obvious.

Basics,

To me the answer is obvious as well, someone pulled a few strings in your favour using the means avaliable, obviously I do not mean to downplay the power of Faith and the Scripture, for some reason the Scriptures have endured for Millenia, despite the tendency of this planet to erase things in just a few generations.

Faith and Mysticism have always co-existed, and there are cases of Hybrid experiences (not just St. Thomas Aquinas). One does not imply the invalidation of the other.

The case of your cures/softening of cancers that normally would've finished someone off, linked with getting attached to the Bible, is too much of a recurrent coincidence to not have something more, but what I'm implying is that asides from benefits of Faith and Works, you may (or not) have the privilege of you having some mystical experience one day, added to what you already went through.

Well I'm writing this because more or less God is what truly makes sense, and plenty of inconsistencies of "Faith" in truth inconsistencies of Churches being non-perfect (otherwise Protestantism wouldn't ever have been a thing) rather than Faith or the Divine being non-perfect.

So going beyond and to the next layer, there is the concept of mystical experience, which oddly enough from a rational PoV, fufills even the empirical requirements, albeit in an individualist level.

Regardless it's not much of a choice to have such type of experience or not, while reading scripture and developing faith is closer to being a choice. (and increasing odds of such experience)

[basics]

fkizz,

Do I detect a wee bit of fence sitting on your part too?

[fkizz]

fkizz,

Do I detect a wee bit of fence sitting on your part too?

Nothing against God and Jesus authority as the Divinity, nor against Faith and Scriptures as a way to develop your character and spirit, but I admit Christian Mysticism as a concept is yet a new discovery for me that genuinly has been confusing my head. Since learning about Padre Pio's miracles I look at this in a different manner.

If you consider this as fence sitting or not is up to you.

[basics]

So any Christian who doesn't believe in YEC isn't a true Christian? Really? Get off your high horse, man. Just because not everybody subscribes to your extremely obscure and odd version of Christianity doesn't make them un-believers--seriously, who made you judge and jury on who is a true Christian or not?

Genghis Skan,

Well, as Jesus said, " A man must be born again of the Spirit of God to enter heaven." This is authenticated by His endorsement of the Scriptures as being the word of God. Therefore a born again person will not doubt what is written or take anything away from it whatever denomination they find themselves in. What's odd and extremely obscure about what's written in the Bible?

[Genghis Skahn]

Well, as Jesus said, " A man must be born again of the Spirit of God to enter heaven." This is authenticated by His endorsement of the Scriptures as being the word of God. Therefore a born again person will not doubt what is written or take anything away from it whatever denomination they find themselves in. What's odd and extremely obscure about what's written in the Bible?

What's odd and extremely obscure about your religious views is that, for example, that you believe that Original Sin isn't removed by baptism(which is a VERY common belief among Christians), but only by being "born again in the spirit of God"(whatever that means). Your past posts on the subject, as I've already indicated, represent only a tiny minority of Christianity.

And once again, as if it wasn't self-righteous of you enough to make a silly list of "what believers actually believe"(seriously, who made you a religious authority among Christians?), the idea that all Christians MUST believe in YEC is ridiculous... Apparently radioactive dating is an instrument of the Devil in your book, who'd a thunk? And here I thought that God was all about Truth and it was the Devil who delighted in lies, but apparently not...

[basics]

What's odd and extremely obscure about your religious views is that, for example, that you believe that Original Sin isn't removed by baptism(which is a VERY common belief among Christians), but only by being "born again in the spirit of God"(whatever that means). Your past posts on the subject, as I've already indicated, represent only a tiny minority of Christianity.

And once again, as if it wasn't self-righteous of you enough to make a silly list of "what believers actually believe"(seriously, who made you a religious authority among Christians?), the idea that all Christians MUST believe in YEC is ridiculous... Apparently radioactive dating is an instrument of the Devil in your book, who'd a thunk? And here I thought that God was all about Truth and it was the Devil who delighted in lies, but apparently not...

Genghis Skahn,

How can it be odd when Jesus Christ Who is God said that a man must be born agin of the Spirit of God to enter heaven? He also said that the pathway there is so narrow that few get in. I only repeat what is written and therefore am doing what is expected of me by Christ Jesus.

Now as far as the age of the earth is concerned again I take God's word on that and the reason for that is that when God made all things in the six days, resting on the seventh, all things were mature and up and running. In doing so anyone using dating methods have to come up with measurements way beyond God's timing. Things that were once accepted as needing millions of years to be what they are are now seen quite differently because it never took millions of years to make them. Rock, diamonds, coal, stalagmites and tites can all be made in days not millions of years. That's the power of Almighty God.

[Sogdog]

If you're not sure pick any of the other 3000 gods currently and in the past that were worshipped. See how it goes.

[AqD]

I was never a "bible thumper" but I would also think atheists were crazy not to believe in at least something.

I believe we're destined to become Gods in our ancient stories. Why would you need a God when you can be one?

[swabian]

I believe we're destined to become Gods in our ancient stories. Why would you need a God when you can be one?

Why do people "need" a god at all? I doubt they actually do.

[Stone Cold Shogun Panther]

Yeah I always did think about the number of gods out there and thought "What makes "my" God better then the others"? Even when I was thought I remember asking my brother that.

[AqD]

Why do people "need" a god at all? I doubt they actually do.

So that we can feel divine and above other creatures, and that there can be some afterlife after our miserable present life, or final justice in this unjust world?

Somehow nobody finds the idea laughable that a real god or gods would care about humans. We'd be like masses of brainless worms to them. And if it does love everything, it'd probably love all the pigs and cows we farm for food.

[swabian]

Can you get a little creepier pls...

[Prodromos]

27 The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for:

The dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God. This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into being. For if man exists it is because God has created him through love, and through love continues to hold him in existence. He cannot live fully according to truth unless he freely acknowledges that love and entrusts himself to his creator.1

28 In many ways, throughout history down to the present day, men have given expression to their quest for God in their religious beliefs and behavior: in their prayers, sacrifices, rituals, meditations, and so forth. These forms of religious expression, despite the ambiguities they often bring with them, are so universal that one may well call man a religious being:

"From one ancestor [God] made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him - though indeed he is not far from each one of us. For 'in him we live and move and have our being.'" -Acts 17:26-28

29 But this "intimate and vital bond of man to God" (GS 19 § 1) can be forgotten, overlooked, or even explicitly rejected by man.3 Such attitudes can have different causes: revolt against evil in the world; religious ignorance or indifference; the cares and riches of this world; the scandal of bad example on the part of believers; currents of thought hostile to religion; finally, that attitude of sinful man which makes him hide from God out of fear and flee his call.4

30 "Let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice."5 Although man can forget God or reject him, He never ceases to call every man to seek him, so as to find life and happiness. But this search for God demands of man every effort of intellect, a sound will, "an upright heart", as well as the witness of others who teach him to seek God.

You are great, O Lord, and greatly to be praised: great is your power and your wisdom is without measure. And man, so small a part of your creation, wants to praise you: this man, though clothed with mortality and bearing the evidence of sin and the proof that you withstand the proud. Despite everything, man, though but a small a part of your creation, wants to praise you. You yourself encourage him to delight in your praise, for you have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.6 -St. Augustine, Confessions

Starts at 22:14

[Cope]

I recognise my own near-total ignorance and can't bring myself self to "bow down to a shadow", an unknown possible deity. I accept others sincerely experience "religious revelations" but I put them own to malfunctioning software. Its the height of arrogance to denigrate other's beliefs in this wayso I mostly keep quiet about this.

"Whatever experiences we may have, we shall not regard them as miraculous if we already hold a philosophy which excludes the supernatural. Any event which is claimed as a miracle is, in the last resort, an experience received from the senses; and the senses are not infallible. We can always say we have been the victims of an illusion; if we disbelieve in the supernatural this is what we always shall say. Hence, whether miracles have really ceased or not, they would certainly appear to cease in Western Europe as materialism became the popular creed."

C.S Lewis, Miracles, 1942.

[basics]

Isn't it funny how we can enjoy the supernatural when reading or watching heroes like Superman, Spiderman etc, yet a true Hero like Jesus Christ has long been abandoned to weekends or religious holidays with perhaps the only longrunning event where He is brought up being funerals which have no special days? That's mainstream life nowadays.