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Thursday, June 25th, 2009 at 9:22 am by Vital Signs
Category: Christianity, MORALITY, Vital Signs #2: Life with God
Enjoy our first interview with a Christian. PLEASE take our brief survey and leave a comment.
Dr. Drew, you missed a huge opportunity on this one. I know your objective is to get baseline answers and not necessarily grill these people, but she basically admitted that all men already have an innate sense of right and wrong and do not need God to provide it via the Bible.
Not to mention the many horrible things God has done Himself…
Kudos to hitting the idea of not following the list of good/bad things to do. The difference between not doing well in school and not following Gods list should be readily apparent, the later leading to eternal damnation. I honestly do not understand how someone who believes in this genuinely ever, and I mean EVER, slips up and doesnt follow these lists (of which she didnt really provide).
I get the whole “we are human” argument, but if you told me I would get to go to HEAVEN or HELL based on my actions here on Earth, there is no amount of temptation that could sway me to even have a sliver of a chance of going to Hell.
Hi Lonnie, thanks for the comment. Yes, I did say that men already have an innate sense of right and wrong, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t come from God! I based my answer off of Romans 2, which talks about men who “show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.” We know what is right and wrong because God has given us a sense for it. Not everyone has access to the Bible, and not everyone can read, not to mention the men and women who lived before and during the time the Bible was being written. God provided to them a conscience so that they too might understand the law. They still need God to reveal the law to them–He just chose to reveal it internally through the conscience.
However, that does not mean we don’t need the Bible, either! The Bible clarifies the law, because as humans we often try to justify our behavior or stifle our consciences in order to get rid of guilt. So the Bible sets down the law in writing so that we cannot simply ignore it. And of course, the Bible also tells us how we can permanently get rid of our guilt and how our punishment for violating the law has already been taken for us (which I am so thankful for!).
By “the many horrible things God has done Himself…” I can’t respond to in full without more explanation of what you meant, but I can tell you that God is not only merciful, but He is perfect. Would you allow someone to steal from you on a continual basis? My guess is that you would probably seek means of punishment for the theft by calling the authorities. God also requires punishment for wrongdoing, which in eternal terms “the wages of sin is death.” Hell might seem terrible and unloving to us, but it is justice. It is only because God is loving that any of us get a chance to live! He also sometimes punishes people on earth, in an attempt to get their attention, and sometimes He will test people to teach them in His ways (sort of like the only way for gold to be purified is heat, God sometimes uses difficult circumstances to improve us). We do not always know why something is happening, but then, we also do not know everything that God knows.
And yes, having trouble in school and not obeying God’s law are too very different things. I brought up the school example to show why the law is helpful to us: when we see how far we are from keeping the law, we realize how hopeless we are. And once we realize that, we are more likely to ask for help–which is available to us, but we have to ask for it.
Unfortunately, as far as never slipping up, we do slip up on a daily basis. Here’s the deal: we get to go to heaven or hell based on our actions here on earth. But either people simply don’t believe it or we just get too caught up in everyday life to remember that eternity is at stake. And ever since Adam and Eve sinned, we have all been born with a propensity to sin. We were all sinners from the time we were tiny (think about it–how many two year olds do you know who are never selfish?).
So the main idea under morality is not that you can be saved by doing good things, because it’s impossible. We’ve already messed up, and getting to heaven is impossible on our own. We’re finished. I can’t get to heaven on my own, because my actions here on earth are just not enough. From here on out, the point isn’t salvation. Salvation is only obtainable through faith and the grace of Jesus Christ.
The point of morality is two things: first, it shows me just how short I fall. Again, I HAVE to ask God for help through Jesus Christ because that is my only hope. Second, by living a moral life I can foster a closer relationship with God, because I am being like Him. He wants me to have eternal life, but He wants me to live a more satisfactory life here on earth too…and one way for that to happen is through doing my best to live according to His morality, and accepting His forgiveness when I fail.
On a final note, as for the lists…well, if I had listed them in full it would have taken a while. But here’s a partial list: hatred, envy, selfishness, theft, murder, sexual immorality, thoughtlessness, all are evil. The opposites of those would all be examples of morality.
Thank you for the thought out reply, I will provide you the same courtesy, however I will not spare any thoughts on the matter:
You said ” we get to go to heaven or hell based on our actions here on earth” … Which is just flat wrong. There is only ONE unforgivable sin, and that is blasphemy. The only requirement for getting into Heaven is to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior… Thats it. You can do whatever the hell you want after that, and quite frequently people do.
If, on the other hand, you are an individual who accepts that this life is the only one we get, you have much more of an imperative to do good because there is no make up time after you die. Just a thought.
You honestly cant think of anything bad God did in the bible? I’ll start off with an easy one… Noah’s ark. God kills every single living being on the planet except for 2 of each kind (or was it 7… ) regardless of whether or not they have done evil. God sent a plague to people for complaining about not having food (instead of, I dont know, feeding them)… God commanded a man be put to death for gather sticks on the Sabbath… God kills the first born of every person in Egypt, because we know those little babies deserved it.
I wont even comment on the fact that you think babies are sinners, really a sad statement in my opinion. If you can look at a child who has just been born and call that human being a sinner, I dont know what to say.
God commands moses to kill the Midianites, but to keep all the virgin women (including the little girls) to have for themselves. Atrocious.
Heres a few more: http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com/2008/05/top-50-bible-stories.html
So let me ask you a question, if every person in the country had a police officer following them around 24 hours a day, how often do you think we might slip up? Once a day? Once a month? … Very close to never. That is exactly what God is, he says and hears EVERYTHING right? So how do you allow yourself to slip up knowing that he will find out? Oh thats right, you just ask for forgiveness and go along as if nothing happened at all. How very nice of him.
As for your list at the end, god himself is Selfish, he says so right in the book. He frequently Murders people, many of the people in the bible commit Sexual immorality (Lot impregnates his daughters and offers them to a mob of sexual predators), so I really dont know where you are getting that God is this perfect being.
Maybe we are reading too different books.