jewelz123

Um, I've heard the statement in context and it is utterly foul and revolting. Are you really defending it? It started as an "I hate Elizabeth Edwards" thread. Is that better for you? Furthermore, I don't think anyone here has said they hate Anne Coulter. Most of us are saying we don't put up with hatred at all. That's the whole point. Hatred isn't Christian. What I defend is that her words and their meaning were quoted out of their entirety and do not convey the same meaning as what she actually said. If you truly believe the incomplete literal quote written above is from her heart then yes you should be revolted. However, I am not judging her heart as I saw the interview and know without question what she was saying - in its entirety. Furthermore - I only know of her what I saw this morning - I don't know her other than that! The rest of you have opinions of her! I'm only bothered by the purposeful distortion by a fellow christian! And no - I was not aware that this thread was started as an "I hate Elizabeth Edwards" thread. I would then again say - I expect so much more from my christian brothers and sisters than that kind of garbage. And if it was started with any kind of hate in mind - then how disgusting and hypoctritcal! I did not enter this forum with that in my mind - did you? I am only on the side of the TRUTH. I expect the truth to be conveyed by ANY christian speaking of another person. What I saw quoted was clearly NOT the truth. A Christian distorted her words. I don't care how anyone feels about either woman - nobody has the right to portray the person or their words contrary to the truth. Especially a Christian!!!!! If we are told to pray for our enemies but come online and do nothing better than gossip and spread lies about people we haven't even met - how can we declare the Holy Spirit lives in our heart? If Ann Coulter is an enemy of any of you - by the Lord's words, she deserves better treatment than she got here in a christian forum. I had learned that in the OT to lie about another person is to murder their reputation and that there is a fable whereby a person wanted to take back the lies he told of another. The Rabbi told him that he could help him do that. All he had to do was take a feather pillow to the top of the tallest mountain. Once there he was to rip open the pillow case and let loose all the feathers to the wind. The man said he could do that and was happy that was all it would take. The Rabbi said that's only half of it; once you let loose the feathers you must climb down the mountain and collect them all again. The man said that was impossible and the Rabbi said as it is also with spreading lies and gossip, you cannot take back what you have loosed. I'm discouraged. I know christians are imperfect people - but I do expect that they wouldn't do these immature things. And if they do, and are called on it - that they apologize and recant and make ammends. Not defend and deflect and attack.

Wasn't a curse according to what God himself spoke saying what was actualy cursed. He is the one who said the ground and the serpent are cursed and He is the one who didn't miss a thing. You can certainly chose to believe the passage to be saying that BUT what you cannot show is where the passage does actualy say that or speak of somekind of man/woman order therefore you are forcing your own preconcevied notions unto the text. You are kidding about birthing pains (pre fall) being a reminder to woman that she was created second, right? And even to those who do not believe in the bible? So by virtue of being created second the female is reminded of it by birthing pains, lol. Can you find that in the bible too? Birthing pains post fall are an effect of what Eve did, that is she ate and gave some to her husband. God did say to her 'what is this you have done?' Paul isn't speaking about 'women' and 'men' as he was in the immediate verses regarding worship. He's talking about a particular deceived woman, hence, 'she', in Ephesus. Childbearing also isn't a role to be played, lol, as even not all women can have children. The first pronoun is singular 'she' as in 'but she will be saved through the childbirth'. Also in the Greek it is a noun for 'childbirth' not a verb as in 'childbearing'. And too the second pronoun is plural 'they' not a singular 'she' as in 'if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control.' 15Yet she will be saved through childbearing--if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

I am not making an attack, just an observation. Anyone can observe that Ann Coulter is a vile hatemonger. For example, stating that someone that you simply disagree with should have been "killed by the terrorists", is indicative of someone who is a vile hatemonger. If I pointed out that a Neo-Nazi was a hatemonger, no one would be accusing me of making a personal attack against them. They would assume I was pointing out the obvious. To call Bush a coward or a murderer would be a personal attack. To call someone like Ann Coulter a hatemonger is simply an observation about her that any decent individual would make going by her words and actions. Ask yourself, would you say the kind of things about people you simply disagree with that Ann Coulter says about the people that she simply disagrees with? What would you think of someone in your workplace saying that they wish that a coworker would have been killed by the terrorists? Here is her quote:

So God can lust? I mean, you could try and categorise lust as being exclusively a sin rather than an emotion, but the Bible states more than once that God is capable of jealousy despite jealousy/envy being a deadly sin, so it seems just as reasonable to conclude that, working from this basis, God can feel "sinful" emotions, too, rather than just pure ones. Which raises the question: if God is perfect but can feel lust and jealousy, then are these emotions inherently sinful no matter who feels them, or are they only sinful for mankind, and not God? I think that the context of jealousy in the bible can be easily misunderstood. The dictionary defines it in 2 ways below: 1. Vigilant in guarding something: We are jealous of our good name. 2. Intolerant of disloyalty or infidelity; autocratic: a jealous God. Both of these contexts have been used in the Bible to describe God. I think that the word is used to be descriptive of vigilance or intolerance rather than describing God having the emotions of jealousy which are suspicion or resentment. Just as the word "fear" is used in the bible ( fear God). This word is not used in the traditional emotion of fear (frightened) but to describe reverence or awe. We are not to be afraid of God - we are to revere Him. Common words used in a less common way. It's also important to remember that the bible gives us the best possible understanding of the incomprehensible. Finite language to describe the infinite.

In a nutshell? I told you before, but you do not want to accept it. You claim to not believe in God, but say if He existed, He would not allow evil. You cannot have it both ways. If God does not exist, He does not cause or allow evil. He's not there, remember? Then the root cause would simply be humanity. Humanity is messed up. Always has been, always will be. Fact of life. You cannot change that, so the root question would be why are we messed up? Quite simply because humanity, by and large wants to either deny the existance of God, or refuse to allow Him to guide their lives. That's it. Why would He allow satan to control this world? God will not impose His will upon mankind. He gives us every opportunity to turn to Him, repent and accept His son Jesus, and many choose not to. Man has always thought he could make it on his own, that he does not need God. Satan steps into that vacuum that people create themselves by refusing to acknowledge God, they simply don't see it. If you choose to live your life without God, God is going to let you make that decision, but by default, you are turning control of your life over to the enemy, directly or indirectly. That is VERY well said. Sorry Ishamael - I got your name wrong! Odd how sometimes we see only what we want to, eh? When I was an unbeliever, Christians frightened me too. I actually could feel my stomach churning and the adrenaline pumping. The fight or flight instinct would be very strong. I completely understand the physical response a person can have to an overzealous believer. Now that I have gone from unbeliever to Christian I have wondered what causes that physical response. It isn't just because it's a different opinion - I never felt that way about a buddhist or muslim - have you? I really beleive it is because it's the Truth. As Cobalt says above that by default you serve God or the Other. Satan/Lucifer/Devil is the other and by default, you are serving him - your unbelief works to his advantage. Satan doesn't want you to know the truth, or hear the truth. Could it be that the physical response is Satan? We know that God does not make us fearful. 2 Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline. Romans 8:15 So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God

Ishamel - I assume you chose that name as the anti-hero to Jacob in the bible. The Ishmael whose descendants are the jealous enemy to the descendants of Jacob. The Ishmael who will always live near his brethren and act as wild as a jackass. Interesting choice. No it would not be pious to kill everyone you encounter. Do you really believe what you wrote? Do you truly not understand the concept or are you acting out in the spirit of Ishmael? You won't be able to ignore God. God fills the emptiness within you with His love. In His presence, you will find Him irresistable. This is not a wish or a hope - it's the truth. If you were to "exert your judgement over Him" - you forgot that you have no way to carry out any judgement. With judgement comes the consequences - of which you have none to exert. It is apparent that you are angry. But is it possible you might be putting the blame in the wrong place? Nobody gets through life unscathed, but it's really important not to add to our problems by blaming God for them. When we place blame, it tends to stop our brain from thinking the situation through. It stops us from growing and can make us bitter. This life is really just a sliver in time, our discomfort won't last.

Right. I forgot. God is responsible for everything good and Satan is responsible for everything bad. ...Wait a second. Isn't God all-powerful? All-knowing? Didn't he create everything? Isn't he, then, responsible for the way everything is? Even Satan--who he created? You can't have it both ways, Christians. A perfect God cannot create an imperfect creation. And a perfect God would not punish his creation for its imperfections. If I saw God I would ask him what I just asked you. Why he punishes at all, and why he punishes eternally. What is the point of eternal punishment anyway? There's no chance for reform, so it just sounds like malice to me. (And a perfect God shouldn't be able to experience malice, or any human emotion for that matter.) Now let me guess. This is when someone cries "free will!" God gave us free will and with it we made bad choices. Well, if some choices are bad--so bad that they warrant eternal punishment--why would God give us free will in the first place? For his entertainment? It just doesn't add up. It all does add up - however not the way you describe. What you describe is your understanding and IF that were the way God truly is, then all of us Christians would agree with you! Most people that don't believe say similar things, and I know I had the same arguments when I didn't believe. The problem is that how you understand God and the concept of imperfection and judgement and why - is completely incorrect. Almost backwards to the truth. This is not a criticism whatsoever! I just want you to know that there is something out there for you to discover. We don't believe in the God you describe - and nobody is asking you to believe in that either. Rather - take some time to learn about what you don't understand. God is easy to love, when you know who He is.

Since we know that love conquers all....begin loving and hugging them today. Everyone wants to be loved - God made us that way. If you aren't spreading your love it is because you fear rejection or awkwardness. Very likely the same feeling that the "hugless" experience. Push past it! There is nothing anyone likes more than to feel special and important. Your display of love could just be the beginning for your church. And there is something very special about a person that has that much love to give! Everyone wants to be around a happy, loving person. You can't lose!

If there is an earthquake, it is not anyone's fault. Nobody made the earthquake happen. During the earthquake, a building collapses and a 6 month old baby is trapped and takes a day to die. In pain and agony. Broken bones. Starvation. Thirst. The baby is innocent. God could have done so many things. he could have had the baby's mother take it for a walk. He could have had a beam fall strategically, forming a barrier to protect the baby till the rescuers came. It's a hypothetical baby, but something like it has happened. In differing ways, in differing circumstances. The point is that there is needless suffering of innocents. Caused by no-one. And not prevented by the omniscient, omnipotent God. And. If ever I am before him. I will want him to explain it to me before he condemns me. I know this original post was a year ago - but if anyone is reading anymore and thinks the same way, please see that the problem with this logic is that you are assuming that death is the worst thing that can happen to us. Death is not the end and we are each rewarded with perfect justice. That baby would receive a special blessing and you will see that when you are standing before God. You will know all this for certain and you will never need the opportunity to question Him before you are also perfectly judged. And you will be ashamed of how self righteous you were. Our intellect cannot and will not ever match our creator. Just because you have a question does not mean it doesn't have an answer. And just because you think you have the answer, doesn't mean it's correct.

This is one of those things in their life that, if/when they do come to God, is going to send shudders of regret through their body like nails on a chalkboard. I know I have mine that sneak up on me without notice! You can't wash memories off. I guess it's part of growing up - if it's darkest before dawn then maybe it's also retarded before smart. And I'll join - as long as belly buttons count!!

. If G-d exists, then what he says about you is true. You prefer darkness to light. Your heart is desperately wicked. There is no good in you. Your heart/mind actually denies His existence. You are blind You have already been judged guilty and sentenced. Your destiny is defeat and destruction. Why would G-d want to help you out of this predicament? What are you to Him? Cheers for all the replies. Sorry for not getting back sooner. I shall give them all some thought. I will reply to this post though. 1. You prefer lightness to dark. No i don't. 2. Your heart is desperately wicked. No it is not and for you to judge my heart is way out of line. 3. There is no good in you. Again you don't know me. Way out of line. 4. Your heart/ mind actually denies his existence. I'm on a journey and am undecided. 5. You are blind. Again No. 6. You have already been judged guilty and sentenced. I'm not even going to respond to this. Lastly why would god want to help me out of this prediciment. Well if i am one of God's creations made in his likeness then i would expect a little help in seeing the light. I don't know if your post was serious or not, if it is you have not helped me in any way. I'll try to respond to a few other posts later on. Later Dudes. What you saw as accusations above were actually paraphrased bible verses. But you didn't recognize them. The poster was declaring what the bible says about all of us in our sinful nature. They don't have to know you personally to know what God says about you. It wasn't out of line, it wasn't a personal list of your iniquities. The questions asked, if you knew Him or His Word, you should be able to easily answer. I went to church until I was 13 - Presbyterian church. Somehow, I too came away with the belief that being nice or good was enough to go to heaven - and now it's a ridiculous thought. I never learned who God was at all. It took until my late 30's to learn the truth and accept Jesus. But just so you know, there is none of us good without Jesus - not one, and being good means nothing (besides, it's subjective). It's a terrible shame that any of us could spend every Sunday in church and come away with no knowledge of the truth at all. And to respond to your first question - I always say that God gave me a Bible AND a Brain - and with the two of those together I have what I need to get through life. A brain without a bible is just as dangerous as a bible and half a brain. Use your brain and ask God to reveal his Word to you - it WILL blow your mind.

My pastor gave the best sermon on this topic - I wish I could remember it verbatim for you. Basically, God created us so He could experience himself as God. In the Garden His fullness was known to us and we walked together but when Adam fell, we could no longer walk with God and "know" Him in that way. Yet even in the Garden we see that we were created with the ability to choose Him or the serpent even when we "knew" Him. His love for us is so great and He will never reject us -yet he made us with the ability to reject Him. Can you imagine a creator not requiring his creation to love and obey Him? Would you want a child if you knew it would reject you no matter how deeply you loved it? Wouldn't that pain be almost to much to bear? But wouldn't having that child anyway be the greatest expression of your ability to love it? It is in this choice that we make that God experiences Himself with his creation. God's love is pure and what every person on this earth requires just as much as air and water - yet he made Himself (which is pure love) resistable to us in order that we choose Him rather than choosing what we need(or what we get from Him). It's the closest thing that we as the creation can do for God to experience his own love thru us. And for those that reject/judge/resist/hate Him and His love - he experiences that as well thru them AND gives us a glimpse of how great his ability to love is. I am sure I didn't do the sermon justice - it took him about 40 minutes to deliver the message but I hope at least one of his thoughts appeals to you enough to roll it around in your head for a while.

Let's break this down. You say wars are wrong, but based on what standard? How do you know wars are wrong? You say I can understand good and evil, but based on what? If I steal from you, how do you really know it's wrong? I take it you are referencing the 10 commandmends as the standard of what is good or what is evil and these are the words written by God given to Moses. Nothing else such as rape, genocide and the spreading of disease...and I forgot pedofilia, incest and SLAVERY. How is it that we know that these human inclinations are evil?.How can slavery be good?,murder? the old testament is filled with such acts.These acts described by the words of God?....Vengence is mine sayeth the Lord.....An eye for an eye. Yet God is LOVE. Sounds like a human to me. An eye for an eye is a measurement of justice that cannot be greater than the crime - it is not a tit for tat declaration! Vengence is mine is about the fact that God will handle our problems we are not to retaliate against others. Your understanding of these "goto" verses are incorrect and out of context. Since you don't understand their true meaning, it makes it very hard to believe in His son. And once again, who benefits? The Son or the otherone?

And the judgements came....so quickly. As expected, the faith turns to hate right away. At least you weren't blind sided by it. What faith turned to hate? I am coming against a book that seems to be attacking the faith. Certainly that is why the title indicates. The God Christopher Hitchens serves may not be great, but that is not the case with my God who is the God of the Holy Bible. The God of the Bible is the same God that man has created in His own image. He has created an egotistical,jealous,vengeful,merciless,sadistic and insecure persona of all the most negative traits of man. This image of God given to the world by christians has manifested countless wars,ignorance and utter pain to millions of people...and in the name of who may I ask? My question is - without the Bible, how do you validate the existence of God? The problem is, without an absolute source for describing God's character, you inevitably have to turn to atheism or pantheism. It is impossible to be a theist (Jew, Christian, Muslim, Mormon, et al) while at the same time denying an absolute foundation for God or a god. The reason for this is that, without an absolute standard, God becomes whoever we want Him to be on a personal level. You are opposed to the Biblical version of God, but you are opposed on literally no ground. This is an existential view of God, where God does not really come into being until we experience Him in a way we believe validates Him. This view does not cause conflict so long as you embrace anyone's view of God - however, at the point you reject a view of God, you must offer an absolute standard for the definition of God. This means that you are then removed from the process, it cannot be subjective, it cannot be experiential, and you must find an absolute standard. As an example, if I say, "The earth is the ninth planet from the sun" and you say "The earth is the third planet from the sun," you are right and I am wrong. The reason for this is that we have an absolute frame of reference from which to work. My idea, though my idea, is still invalid. If, however, we were discussing Dali's "Persistence of Memory" and I said it was good, while you said it was awful, there is no real way to discuss who is correct. I have certain ideas that dictate what I think is good in art, while you have different ideas. The taste becomes subjective within a certain field and there is no absolute frame. In other words, you may not like a piece of art while I love it, but both opinions are valid and there is no way for me to say you are wrong and mean this with certainty. If we apply this same standard to God, then it remains the same. If you do not like the God of the Bible, and lack an absolute standard upon which you can rely (remember, personal experience is not absolute), though you may not like the God of the Bible, you cannot make this a valid opinion. You cannot say the wars caused by this God are wrong because you have no absolute reference to how it would be wrong. Thus, even though you claim Christ, by your own philosophy - whether you realize it or not - you are essentially an unbeliever. I think the moderators made a wise choice in moving you to that category. By word you might be a Christian, but operationally you are an unbeliever. I won't discuss the believer status not more since it gives certain people pleasure to demote me. Wars are wrong period,reference or not.There is no need for an absolute standard to base oneself on to understand evil/good. You can have goodness in you without following absolute standards. I am glad that is Almighty who decides my status in the end. Oh Boo Hoo! It was YOU who took pleasure in creating this thread. Now that you weren't gratified in whatever way you hoped, you pout and say others have taken pleasure to demote you. Why do you consider the truth about you to be a demotion? It was your desire to get someone to read a book based on the LIE that you were a christian. As far as evil and "goodness" goes - you displayed the evil in your heart with this thread and "there is none good - not one" and THAT is what causes war - but what difference does it make how war starts since goodness won't get anyone thru that narrow door including YOU. Blame whomever you want or whatever you want for the problems in the world - the longer you ponder that question with senseless acts such as this, the less time you spend reading God's word which will answer those questions clearly. If you truly are glad that "the Almighty" is the one who decides your heart in the end - then you should be shaking in your boots if you don't repent your ways now. You already laid it out in black and white that you don't know His son. Since he died for you, shouldn't you consider that worth understanding? As a believer it is very clear that you don't really understand what the faithful know - you may think you do but you don't. And the real outrage if any was shown towards you is because you could have caused a baby christian to read that book before Butero exposed you as a fraud. So do you think "the Almighty" would be grateful to you for causing others who are seeking Him to fall away from Him? Or would satan be grateful? hmmmmm.......... You can only serve ONE and since you declared that you don't serve the Son then you serve the other. I will pray that you find your way soon and please, never pull a stunt like this again.