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Plato's The Forms is something I have found that, with God, may be a tool to help see the spiritual. There may be a little bit of a learning curve here. I'll break it down for you Barney Style. I will references some video I advise you watch on Youtube. Introduction Video: "Plato: On The Forms" The School of Life. The Forms are an ideal vision of something. What is the Form of a great baseball team? I am going to say the 1956 Yankees with Mickey Mantle was a great baseball team. Someone could like or hate the Yankees. Given we peel back "Yankees," and "New York," and other such things, what made the 1956 Yankees a great team, and do other teams share those traits? We are looking at The Form of a great baseball team. Did the 2021 Atlanta Braves share those characteristics? Given the Atlanta Braves were a completely different team, we have some compare and contrasting to do towards arriving at The Form of a great baseball team potentially. What is The Form of The Son of Man? We are looking to see a character. To see the character, to get the Form right, we may need to break out a Bible Concordance, and look at all the mentions of Son of Man. When someone takes all the verses together, they may start to see a Form. Jesus is "The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone;" (Psalms 118:22)(Acts 4:11) The Stone rejected is in the Old Testament. It is in The New Testament. (Luke 20:9-19)(1 Peter 2) Jesus Christ is the Stone rejected by the builders. (Acts 4:11) The Stone is a Form of something. I am going to list a Bible verse referencing The Son of Man with a song. We are working to get a visual of something. We are working to get The Form right. With the songs, I am adding context the Bible verse. Is it the right context? For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. (Matthew 24:27) Song: "Thuderstruck" 2Cellos The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her deeds.” (Matthew 11:19) Song: "Think I'll Just Sit Here and Drink" Merele Haggard. Jesus replied, "Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head." (Luke 9:58) Song: "Anywhere the Wind Blows." The Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band. Given we take the verses together, we are starting to see The Form of The Son of Man. We are seeing characteristics of. The songs may add some context, some links to some things today. Some Christians have worked to make the Bible abstract. A theologian with a couple advanced degrees, he may have thought he was better than you. He writes things so that only him, and small group of elitist weirdos understand it. Jesus chose fishermen, labors, and a tax collector to be his disciples it is not that hard. In part two I may start to really hurt your feelings.

Now the reason why the word correspondence was used in stead of argument, we as Christians should preach the gospel by showing genuine love for everyone like Jesus did & not necessarily go into arguments, but now the question comes up if we engage with them, the very first thing they are most likely going to ask so why the Bible is full of contradictions & give proof that it is real, immediately changing this back into an argument, so it seems it is not wise to do this like there is many Youtube videos where Christians is being attacked & it is hard not to get in there & defend Christianity. Have really tried to engage with a couple of atheists telling them about the hope that Jesus brings, but they just come back with quotes of the Bible combined with very carefully constructed & cunning philosophies/theories & try as I might explaining each time that the verses was taken out of context with a proper explanation, but they just keep on firing their attacks with Bible verses non stop. Jesus Himself sometimes also have stopped talking to some when the conversation was just going nowhere.

I was hit by the deterioration of a terrible bone disease that was made worse by ingesting certain foods and medication. This happened after I'd already gone through many terrible trials in my life. I had turned toward studying Christianity and thought that maybe there was some guidance from a certain place. And then my health situation both mentally and physically collapsed so brutally. This time it felt like it shattered my trust in a God. Because it felt so arbitrary and cold and mechanical. I had just turned toward Christianity when this happened. I also cried and shouted that Jesus may help me but I felt no response. How do you maintain your trust given these seemingly horrible arbitrary sequences of events happen to some of us? It just seemed to me that a loving God would have helped me up and guided me in that situation but instead there was just blind cold forces of physics. How could I regain some trust and faith ; how do you succeed at that?

What is all knowing, present everywhere, and all powerful? You could be forgiven if you said: “Google”. The statistics speak for themselves. The Internet has endless knowledge, but how do we search for wisdom? https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/10/31/google-or-god-searching-for-wisdom/

Existing in the smallest to the largest parts, in living and also in non-living things, the Golden Ratio reveals the awesome "hidden hand" of God and His interest in beauty, function, and order. It is truly the mathematical language of the universe: https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/09/26/gods-secret-for-constructing-the-universe-the-golden-ratio/

How can an educated person believe God created the world? How could a loving God send people to Hell? Didn't science disprove Christianity? Many Christians hear objections to Christianity and have a crisis of faith. Let's explore these questions now. https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/08/22/end-times-crisis-believe-science-or-the-bible/

Through Biblical archaeology, science has been confirming the historical claims of the Holy Bible. Thousands of discoveries of archaeology since the mid-1800s have demonstrated the reliability and plausibility of the Bible narrative. https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/08/01/the-temporalscope-science-confirms-bible-claims/

From counting farm animals, we have invented the natural numbers. The need to count faster lead to the computer. But, we don’t need computers to determine when the end will happen. There a way we can calculate it with simple addition. https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/05/02/rapture-2020-the-countdown-to-the-end/

Nations have built walls to keep others out for thousands of years. The first order of business for a country is always security. Building border walls is the simplest solution. Who could be against it? https://raptureandendtimes.com/2020/05/16/right-and-left-behind-rebuilding-the-walls/

TL;DR Why doesn't God reveal himself to humanity in a stronger, more conclusive way? Hey fam! So I think it's time to do my first post so I apologize in advance if this is in the wrong spot. I wanna discuss with everyone the whole idea of argument from non-belief (a.k.a "divine hiddeness".) So this can be simplified as: 1. If God exists (the greatest possible being), then God is all-good. 2. If God is all-good, then God is perfectly loving. 3. So if God exists, then God is perfectly loving. 4. But a perfectly loving God would ensure everyone is always able to be in relationship with God just by trying. 5. And that ability requires belief that God exists. 6. So, if God exists, then God would ensure all believe. 7. So, if God exists, all persons believe God exists. 8. But not everyone believes that. 9. So no God has ensured everyone believes it. 10. So no God has ensured everyone is able to be in such relationship just by trying. 11. So no perfectly loving God exists. 12. So no all-good God exists. 13. So God does not exist. This has always been troubling to me because growing up I've always read stories of people like Moses, Elijah, and even John the Baptist...etc that had first hand experiences and/or conversations with God. God seemed to make himself very evident between 1500 bce to the mid first century ad. After that God seemed in directly interact with humans less and less until today where human/God interaction seems almost non existent. I understand the counter argument of free will but if someone is actively seeking God, why does he seem so elusive? Let's start here and see if we can reason through this together ??

Can we gain knowledge of God based on observed facts and experience apart from divine revelation? 50+ years ago in the US, the culture still accepted the truth of the Bible. Evangelists like Josh McDowell or Billy Graham could expound truths in the Bible to lead people to the gospel message. Today no such assumptions are held by our culture. Trying to convince them that the Bible is a legitimate source of knowledge, let alone "truth," meets with derision or at best, suspicion. And yet we spend our entire lives gaining knowledge about our world by using our faculties. Memory Testimony Sense perception Rationality Introspection These faculties are all potentially defeatable (fancy term meaning they can be wrong from time to time). Despite the fact that a stick appears to bend when we put it in the water, through the use of our other faculties (memory, rationality, and introspection) we overcome our misunderstanding of our sense experience alone. When we perceive that the universe began to exist what does that imply? When we recognize that nothing can't possibly produce something, what does that imply? We perceive desires such as the one to live a meaningful existence, again what does that imply? When we experience natural beauty do we stop and ask why is anything beautiful? What would create a universal standard of beauty? When we are upset that someone mistreated us do we ask why is there a moral value or duty to treat people a certain way? What is the origin of that duty? To whom do we owe that duty? There are dozens of similar questions that lead one to the inference of a Creator. Please feel free to comment on other features of our world that appear, upon some careful reflection, to be transcendent in their origin. Or are these just brute facts? Or perhaps accidents or coincidental to evolution and therefore not actual features of our external world but rather delusions?

We are free to do evil outside of Christ, or free to come to Christ and live in His righteousness. There is nothing we can do outside of Christ that God calls 'good.' All our deeds are like filthy rags. So, from a worldly perspective, we have free will to do good and evil. From God's eyes, only His righteousness counts, and we're only free when we're saved by Christ. If “free will” means that God gives humans the opportunity to make choices that genuinely affect their destiny, then yes, human beings do have a free will. The world’s current sinful state is directly linked to choices made by Adam and Eve. God created mankind in His own image, and that included the ability to choose. Again, from gotquestions.org (Use it, it's AWESOME) "However, free will does not mean that mankind can do anything he pleases. Our choices are limited to what is in keeping with our nature. For example, a man may choose to walk across a bridge or not to walk across it; what he maynotchoose is to fly over the bridge—his nature prevents him from flying. In a similar way, a man cannot choose to make himself righteous—his (sin) nature prevents him from canceling his guilt (Romans 3:23). So, free will is limited by nature. This limitation does not mitigate our accountability. The Bible is clear that we not only have the ability to choose, we also have the responsibility to choose wisely. In the Old Testament, God chose a nation (Israel), but individuals within that nation still bore an obligation to choose obedience to God. And individuals outside of Israel were able to choose to believe and follow God as well (e.g., Ruth and Rahab). In the New Testament, sinners are commanded over and over to “repent” and “believe” (Matthew 3:2;4:17;Acts 3:19;1 John 3:23). Every call to repent is a call to choose. The command to believe assumes that the hearer can choose to obey the command. Jesus identified the problem of some unbelievers when He told them, “You refuse to come to me to have life” (John 5:40). Clearly, they could have come if they wanted to; their problem was they chose not to. “A man reaps what he sows” (Galatians 6:7), and those who are outside of salvation are “without excuse” (Romans 1:20-21). But how can man, limited by a sin nature, ever choose what is good? It is only through the grace and power of God that free will truly becomes “free” in the sense of being able to choose salvation (John 15:16). It is the Holy Spirit who works in and through a person’s will to regenerate that person (John 1:12-13) and give him/her a new nature “created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). Salvation is God’s work. At the same time, our motives, desires, and actions are voluntary, and we are rightly held responsible for them. It is impossible for us to fully understand the dynamics of a holy God molding and shaping the will of man. Scripture is clear that God knows the future (Matthew 6:8;Psalm 139:1-4) and has total sovereign control over all things (Colossians 1:16-17;Daniel 4:35). The Bible also says that we must choose God or be eternally separated from Him. We are held responsible for our actions (Romans 3:19;6:23;9:19-21). How these facts work together is impossible for a finite mind to comprehend (Romans 11:33-36). People can take one of two extremes in regard to this question. Some emphasize the sovereignty of God to the point that human beings are little more than robots simply doing what they have been sovereignly programmed to do. Others emphasize free will to the point of God not having complete control and/or knowledge of all things. Neither of these positions is biblical. The truth is that God does not violate our wills by choosing us and redeeming us. Rather, He changes our hearts so that our wills choose Him. “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19), and “You did not choose me, but I chose you” (John 15:16). What are we to do then? First, we are to trust in the Lord, knowing that He is in control (Proverbs 3:5-6). God’s sovereignty is supposed to be a comfort to us, not an issue to be concerned about or debate over. Second, we are to live our lives making wise decisions in accordance with God’s Word (2 Timothy 3:16-17;James 1:5). There will be no excuses before God for why we chose to disobey Him. We will have no one to blame but ourselves for our sin. Last but not least, we are to worship the Lord, praising Him that He is so wonderful, infinite, powerful, full of grace and mercy—and sovereign.