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God, an impossible question
As a discussion point, What is your idea of God, can you difine God?.
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The notion that the God of the Old Testament was a spaceman or a space visitor defies logic. A person only has to read the Old Testament and take note or count the prophecies made for the coming of Jesus plus the future of the world to see there has to be devine intervention. How would a spaceman know them. Remembering the last prophet died over 400 years before Jesus was born. For example we all know that it is/was possible for Jesus to copy some things to make himself look like the Messiah but how could he also plan for crucifixtion, that he would die with criminals, be offered vinegar and gall, that the Roman's would cast lots for his clothing, that his bones would not be broken and organize to be raised from the dead. All these and many more that I have deliberately left out to prevent argument were foretold over 400 years and 1000s of years before his birth. Tell me how some extra terestial could do that and then Jesus would organize the above and many more to fit in with what was foretold of his life and what would happen to him in death.....not a bad trick to be able to do in that one.
Robertie, as in the post, discussion, but I expect a few reactions to this. In the old testament, God was a God of war, commanding wholesale destruction of people and states, dealing out punishment as and when he saw fit. In the new Testament, God became a God of peace, The one God also became three, i'm a sceptic, maybe you could explain please.
A question to Robertie, Just tp pursue the spaceman theory and find some logic, but what if the spaceman had the technology to be able to travel through time, would it not then be a simple task to tell the prophets what will happen?
Anyway, just to jump off at a tangent but when my son was only two years old he once told me that he knew how old God was, he then informed me he was as old as the last number! ............ The things innocent children say eh!
To Lonnie.....God in the OT was not a God of War. God did display mercy and forgiveness in many examples in the OT one eg Genesis 18:23-32 where Abraham continued to ask God would he still destroy Sodom if followers were found in the town. Yes, God did destroy whole nations but only after they had turned their backs on him completely and followed idols or in general refused to follow Him. You will not find anywhere, where God destroyed followers. When you speak about how God changed from the OT to the NT, did you know that Jesus never contradicted the OT teachings at any time. In fact in Matthew 5:17 He said 'Do not think that I have come to abolish the law of the prophets'.
To PhilBy... It is true that the Trinity is not explained or even mentioned anywhere in the Bible. However in Matthew 28:19 Jesus spoke of baptizing people into 'the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit'. The Trinity is the unique relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Did you know that on many occasions Jesus stated that he was God and/or he did not deny that he was God. One reference is John 12:45 'When he looks at me, he sees the one who sent me.' There are many more examples than this.
Just a little bit more on the Trinity without flogging everyone over it ....The term 'Trinity' nowhere appears in the Bible (it was first used by Tertullian around AD 210), but its roots are deeply embedded in the Word of God. It is mainly a revelation of the New Testament, but there are glimpses of the truth to be seen in the Old Testament also. "Let us make man in our image" (Gen. 1:26). To whom was God speaking at this stage? Some say the angels but nowhere in Scripture are angels seen as being involved in the act of creation or as being on the same level as God. Also 'Man has now become like one of us.' (Gen. 3:22) and John 14:9 'Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.'
Also when Thomas said, "My Lord and my God," If He was not God He should have turned to Thomas and told him: 'You can admire Me but you must not worship Me. I am not God.' Jesus didn't say this because He is God, and thus the right recipient of our worship. So there you are '2 in 1' and I would submit that the mere inference of a Holy Spirit coming from God determines there are '3 in 1.'
Lonnie......My answer to .....What is your idea of God, can you define God?
To keep with the Old Testament I would quote the below for food for thought....(a) Job 3:23-26 � Suffering can�t separate us from God�s love plus (b) The Various Laws mentioned in Leviticus 19 especially 10-18 and (c) all of the Songs of Solomon
When the Bible says God is Love, it is saying more than that God loves or that God is loving or even that God is lovely; it is saying that love is the power behind everything He does - love is not merely one of His attributes but His whole nature. God is not only the Author of loving acts; He is �love� in the very core of His Being.
In God there is a balm for every wound, a comfort for every sorrow, and healing for every heartache. There is nothing that calms the swelling billows of sorrow and grief as does the quiet contemplation of God.
We are taught in Scripture that because God is unique and awesomely holy - pure, separated and shining in His moral majesty - we are to draw near to Him with godly reverence and fear.
God is not only a God of love but a God of wrath and anger also (your reference to the OT). It is something to rejoice in rather than to be resented - Never view the wrath of God as a moral blemish or a blotch on His character. It would be a blemish if wrath were absent from Him.
"Fear God and keep his commandments" To "fear God" means we must reverence Him and put Him first. To "keep his commandments" means we obey Him whether we feel like it or not.
Please don't see me as some religious nut. I am currently a Private Investigator by occupation and a former Detective Sergeant of Police in Australia.
Certainly, if you met someone in a pub with the character of God as depicted in the OT, you'd probably want to steer clear of him. If my children 'turned against' me, I don't think I'd drown them, as our 'father in heaven' is alleged to have done to his 'children' in his infamous act of genocide.
But I imagine there does exist 'God' in an absolute sense, knowable only through direct experience. People who have had such experience usually say something along the lines of: ‘Those who know, say nothing; those who say, do not know.’
Some things simply defy definition or description. Try conveying the scent of a rose in words, for example. Likewise, most people have experienced love, but trying to define it is pretty pointless, if not impossible.
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Robertie, from your replies, no-one can call you a nut, and I certainly wouldn't knock someone for their views, providing they are serious, I love discussing theology, but this forum is too open, and for the record, my mother, (bless her), in the later years of her life, converted to Christianity, (Baptist), and the people in her church, some of whom I am still in contact with, took her in and accepted her as one of their own, smething I will never forget. I personally can't believe, but have the greatest respect for those that do.
Prior to the flood, God knew that the earth was corrupt and full of violence. His reason for sending the flood was to destroy all the earth�s wickedness as the people were not turning to him and they never would so He decided to start the earth all over again. The story infers the whole earth but it may have only been in a certain area of the Middle East etc. God was sorry that the people of earth had chosen sin and death instead of a relationship with him. Refer to Genesis 6:6-7.
Robertie 1010... Hi. I can't imagine that the pre-deluvian world was any more corrupt and full of voilence than it is today. I'd have thought God would have the ability to somehow kill the 'wicked' and spare all those innocent babes & children, etc. If I were in His place, I'd be more compassionate: I couldn't say - 'ah well, may as well just drown the lot."
I would suggest that the Biblical flood is the same myth which appears in earlier, almost identical, versions thoughout most ancient cultures. If one takes the Bible as historical fact, one has to wonder how Noah managed to find all those indigenous South American species of animal, some of which are yet to be discovered by present day naturalists, etc...
MrAverage....I take it that you don't deny the existenece of the flood only that it has any 'God like' theme to it. The below site has a very good version of all the various histories of the Flood.
The above site finishes off with.....and I thoroughly agree
"It is said that if Noah's Ark were found tomorrow, believers would say, "We told you so," and skeptics would still doubt. There is a curious coincidence, though. The collapse of the ice cap, the flooding of the Florida Indian caves, and Plato's story of the sinking of Atlantis all have the same date...approximately 11,000 years ago. Although the scientists are divided, they do agree on one fact: through 200 generations of folklore and legend, mankind has retained the memory of a prehistoric, universal flood."
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