When you say it all must be taken on faith concerning Creationist views such as the earth being created in six days and then assert that we are leaving reason out of the way in doing so, you make it sound like faith is Unreasonable.
ANASI WEAVER: Sure. I mean if faith was based on reason then when someone of faith is presented with something that contradicts that faith said person would accept the new information.

That is untrue. Creation, like evolution, is merely a model of how we think reality worked. You can no more prove evolution by concrete evidence and experiment than you can creation. There is no experiment which you could do in a lab to show a reptile growing wings or a fish growing lungs. It is supposed by the evolutionary model, it is not proven by concrete evidence which can be done in a repeatable laboratory experiment. You are setting up evolution as though it can be proven by experimentation when it cannot.
ANANSI WEAVER: Nice try but while there may be no known experiment (yet) that can be performed that I know of it is observable in nature. We have fossils that have been carbon dated that PROVE the earth is greater than 6,000 years old. We have evidence that human civilization did not exist with dinosaurs (more on that later.) We have chains of fossils that show a steady progression from one form to another.
We can see the adoptions that life has evolved to adapt to a certain situation or environment. They recently found a new species of tiger that changed from their cousins simply to adapt to hunting in swamplands.
There is evidence in abundance that supports evolution and an old earth. So far the only “evidence” you have produced about creation are passages in the bible and “God says it is so therefore it must be so.

SARAH SAYS: We find that when you do mutations to the DNA code you end up with freaks and diseases, not the supposed evolutionary positive changes which are supposedly the mechanism which drives evolution. For instance, from the U.S. National Library of Medicine:
How can gene mutations affect health and development?
To function correctly, each cell depends on thousands of proteins to do their jobs in the right places at the right times. Sometimes, gene mutations prevent one or more of these proteins from working properly. By changing a gene’s instructions for making a protein, a mutation can cause the protein to malfunction or to be missing entirely. When a mutation alters a protein that plays a critical role in the body, it can disrupt normal development or cause a medical condition. A condition caused by mutations in one or more genes is called a genetic disorder.
In some cases, gene mutations are so severe that they prevent an embryo from surviving until birth. These changes occur in genes that are essential for development, and often disrupt the development of an embryo in its earliest stages. Because these mutations have very serious effects, they are incompatible with life.
It is important to note that genes themselves do not cause disease—genetic disorders are caused by mutations that make a gene function improperly. For example, when people say that someone has “the cystic fibrosis gene,” they are usually referring to a mutated version of the CFTR gene, which causes the disease. All people, including those without cystic fibrosis, have a version of the CFTR gene.

ANASI WEAVER: The words you should take special note of are “in some cases…” meaning that there can be beneficial mutations. We see this evidenced in nature. We see this when our bodies build up an immunity to a disease (like my immunity to strep throat and the flu.) We see this throughout our biosphere. It is also important to note that mutations appear over a long period of time in tiny increments so it may not be as visually spectacular as Cystic Fibrosis or Down syndrome.
Come to think of it we do have an experiment for evolution the cockroach. Cockroaches slowly change from generation to generation to adapt to pesticides. Eventually you have whole generations of roaches that if left uncheck would eventually become immune to our pesticides. This is why we routinely have to update the chemical formulas for raid to come up with more powerful pesticides.
We also have the antibacterial soap example. If you continue to use antibacterial soap eventually the bacteria will adapt and we would have a new more virulent bacteria floating around our homes.
Further we have the common cold. A virus that evolves so often that we have yet to find a cure for it.

The National Cancer Institute provides additional information about how gene mutations can trigger disease:
Gene Mutations and Disease (see below for link)
Altered DNA, Altered Protein (see below for link)
http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/mutationsanddisorders/mutationscausedisease
This argues strongly against mutations as the mechanism for evolution. Again, there are no lab experiments which you can do to prove a new organ (such as wings evolving on a reptile) arise spontaneously from genetic MUTATIONS.
ANANSI WEAVER: Fossils. Mitochondria tracing. DNA mapping.
There is no concrete proof for the addition of organs onto an already existing organism – a change which only could happen if there were the addition of beneficial and useable genetic information to the DNA code.
ANASI WEAVER: Like nicnetating membranes to protect the eyes of reptiles? Or the whiskers of a cat? Venom sacs? Bio Luminous secretions? The capacity for invention?
All I have ever seen as an argument is that some mutations can cause a disease (like sickle cell anemia mutation or individuals carrying the G protein beta3 subunit 825 T-allele mutation) to offer some immune enhancement because an invading organism cannot hook onto the usual protein to establish itself. Because the invader cannot establish itself (because these abnormalities don’t have the “hooks” it needs and uses to proliferate itself) the people live. But it is absolutely farcical to state that these examples of “beneficial” mutations give rise to beneficial MACRO evolutionary change like wings or lungs when there were none before. These abnormal genes cause serious sickness and lack of viability. Sickle cell anemia is a terrible disease where tissues are deprived of oxygen and this causes painful attacks and organ damage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sickle_cell_anemia , and the 825T allele carriers have an increased risk for hypertension combined with features of the metabolic syndrome, such as dyslipidemia, hypercholesterolemia, insulin resistance, and obesity. http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.med.56.082103.104625 These are hardly cases of evolutionary ADVANCEMENT..
Even the “beneficial mutations” section of wikipedia can only point to a similar survivability “benefit” which is the result of the DELETION of base pair, not an addition to the genome when it says: “a specific 32 base pair deletion in human CCR5 (CCR5-32) confers HIV resistance to homozygote’s and delays AIDS onset in heterozygote’s.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation Note here that it says DELAYS the AIDS onset in the heterozygote’s – they still get the disease. (That is proof of benefit when they still get the disease and die?)

ANASI WEAVER: I see. So mutation can only benefit if it ADDS an organ or appendage…. Wait that’s not true. There is evidence of vestigial organs that serve no biological purpose (your appendix for one example.)
The point is that this is hardly proving that a dog turned into a cat or a monkey into a deer, or a reptile into a bird… those kinds of vast changes which the evolutionary mechanism must prove in abundance if molecule to man evolution actually happened by such a mechanism. It is an argument for survivability, perhaps, but not for EVOLUTION which is a change in kind like from a fish to a bird. And remember, there is not just ONE missing link from ape to man,
ANANSI WEAVER: Actually the missing link is a misconception. There is no “missing link.” And I have to dig up the correct information for you but if I remember the basis correctly that is a misunderstanding of evolutionary theory.

EVERYTHING supposedly came from a molecule in the ocean… so ALL the animals must have evolutionary changes with the additions of organs and their increasing sophistication… where is the mechanism for this?
ANANSI WEAVER: It’s in our DNA we just evolved to a point where those genes are dormant. It isn’t unfeasible that these dormant genes can be reactivated I mean after all scientists have managed to splice DNA into mice that gives them a bioluminescent glow like certain invertebrates (http://scientificcuriosity.blogspot.com/search/label/Fluorescence) and silk secretions to goats http (://www.exn.ca/sciencenews/story.asp?id=2000061956) turning on the gene for, let’s say gills in a human could be the next step.

As for the idea of natural selection being the mechanism, natural selection also does not work out of the kinds. You cannot breed a fish with a cat or bird nor can you successfully and naturally breed a man with a horse or dog. It doesn’t work. Even when you mate together species which are close genetically like a horse and a donkey, you get a sterile mule.. There are limits to natural selection. As the Bible says, there is reproduction within the KINDS but not outside of them. You can make a lot of kinds of dogs.. but dogs don’t give birth to cats. And DNA mutations give rise to diseases and freaks, not advancement. There is no provable evolutionary mechanism we can test in a lab – it cannot be proven by concrete proof. Evolutionists BELIEVE the Theory of Evolution as Creationists BELIEVE the Theory of Creation. Neither creationists nor evolutionists were there to see the beginning and so we must extrapolate the evidence backwards and postulate a theory of how things came to be. Both require FAITH in those presuppositions without laboratory experiments or concrete visible proof. Therefore, both are not science, but models which require faith in the presuppositions behind them.

ANANSI WEAVER: Natural selection isn’t about interbreeding species. Natural selection is the process by which favorable traits that are heritable become more common in successive generations of a population of reproducing organisms, and unfavorable traits that are heritable become less common. Natural selection acts on the phenotype, or the observable characteristics of an organism, such that individuals with favorable phenotypes are more likely to survive and reproduce than those with less favorable phenotypes. If these phenotypes have a genetic basis, then the genotype associated with the favorable phenotype will increase in frequency in the next generation. Over time, this process can result in adaptations that specialize organisms for particular ecological niches and may eventually result in the emergence of new species.
You know like darker skin for people living in tropical climates, blubber for animals living in cold.

We both think our models fit the facts better than the other guy’s model.. but don’t fool yourself into thinking the postulated evolutionary mechanism furnishes us laboratory-repeatable concrete proof and creation does not. And the postulated evolutionary mechanism is far less believable to my mind than an Omniscient Omnipotent Creator.

ANANSI WEAVER: It works because (see the above)

As for your argument about us having to do things for ourselves like paying rent, gathering food, and looking for ways to cure our ailments to some degree, yes, that is true. But that does not exclude God is all I am saying.
It does not mean we forget to pray before we eat and thank God for providing the food to gather, or the money to pay the rent, or the drug which is giving us the cure. Faith sees God OVER all these events, even as faith says “Thank GOD!!” when your lifeboat which you have been rowing for a long time spots land. There is an acknowledgement of your work, but that it is God who prospers and blesses the endeavor with what we are hoping for (money, health, etc). Having to do the work does not mean we forget God or His hand over everything, just because He is invisible (actually, He is too large to fit within the creation and is a spirit, so it isn’t that He is invisible so much as His being naturally uncontainable within our tiny sphere. That is why the incarnation was an act of such great condescension.. )

ANANSI WEAVER: It’s one thing to thank your god for whatever you thank god for but it’s another thing to ask god to do these things for you. It is one thing to say that the bible is a source of spiritual inspiration to you but quite another to say it holds all the answers for life’s questions and is infallible. Haven’t you noticed that when you were seeking information about genetics, mutations and the like you didn’t turn to the bible or god but you went on the web or read a book in an attempt to back you claims? You didn’t quote bible scripture then because the bible holds no information on such things and god denied to tell you.

You say, “What I was trying to illustrate with that story was that we are told that god has all the answers but is unwilling or unable to provide them.” I think you have heard of miraculous healings.
ANANSI WEAVER: Well there is that but as usual there is more to it. I’ll let you continue first.
So it isn’t that God is always unwilling nor unable to provide such healing. He has and continues to do miraculous things.. just not on tap or on command. We can ASK in prayer.. but only God can give the answer. It is when we begin to think God is obligated to give or do what we wish He would do that we make a mistake. Your friend was right to ask you to pray.. because perhaps God would hear and heal your mother. But if He doesn’t you cannot fault Him for not providing the answer you were seeking. He has all the answers, but in His infinite wisdom, the answer may not be the one we in our fallible judgement are seeking from Him. It may not be the time to heal, because it may be determined that that person’s time is up. And, as you said, in your mother’s case, it was.
ANANSI WEAVER: First let me clear something up. My mother was not asking to live forever. She was asking god not to die from stomach cancer. Any other way would have been fine just not that way.
Second it wasn’t the answers I was seeking, I understood mortality at the age of 7. My mother did not want to die of stomach cancer. That’s all she asked for.
Third my friend was wrong to believe that God would heal my mother. It didn’t answer her prayers on the subject on not giving it to her. It didn’t answer my family’s prayers or our friends, or the pastors etc. Chances are it wouldn’t answer my prayers or anyone else’s for that matter, more on this later.
When you say that men interpret the Bible wrongly sometimes, that is true. But it does not mean the Bible is unable to be interpreted or that some “enlightened few” in the clergy are the only ones with the magic key of interpretation. It only means that sincere men and women of faith can mistake the meaning of a passage just as people can mistake your meaning when you write a post. It doesn’t mean what you said was not perfectly plain, it was just taken wrongly. The fault is with the interpreter, not the author of the words. It is a normal human failing of men. For instance, when the Bible says,
Mat 12:14 Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against Him, how they might destroy Him.
Mat 12:15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew himself from there: and great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all;
I don’t think we have to fear interpreting this passage as saying that it talks of a plot to kill Jesus which, when He learned of it, He didn’t say “God will protect me” and stay there, but He prudently withdrew to a safe place. And we do not have to fear misinterpreting the passage when we say that it says plainly that Jesus healed all who followed Him to that safe place at that time. Both are plainly stated. So a great many things are easily understood by the minds of mankind because the purpose of the communication was to enlighten us and explain things to us, not to mystify and make understanding it difficult.

ANASI WEAVER: It is plainly stated in the bible that it took 6 days to make everything and we were created from the dust of the earth and that for some unfathomable reason god in its all knowing ways, forgot to make a mate for Adam so it took a rib from Adam to make Eve.
You stated that the bible is infallible but here you state that it is possible that whichever mortal wrote the bible (more on this later) could have misinterpreted the word of god. (Which we are incapable of understanding according to you).
You cannot have it both ways. Either the bible is infallible or it’s not.

I do think that when God decided to give an explanation of what He did when He created the universe to a bunch of sheep herders in the desert, He didn’t think they would understand the quantum mechanics explanation (though He knows that too!). Actually, they didn’t have the vocabulary for it or the advanced understanding it would take to “get” it, so He kept it simple and explained it step by step at their level of understanding. But not one thing He said is wrong in that explanation or in the other incidents explained in the Bible.

ANASI WEAVER: So he dumbed it down for us. Hmmmmm. Saying the earth was created in 6 days instead of 4.5 billion is somehow correct? I will say that I find it amazing the hoops you are willing to jump through just so you can claim your bible cannot be wrong.

You asked for examples. Well, let’s see… one instance was on a previous post where it was pointed out to me by Skepterist that the Bible was written on papyrus about 5,000 years ago, but “the Chinese have examples of writing from over 8,000 years ago”. He was using that to prove the Bible was not old, but did you know that within the last 100 years the Bible skeptics once said that the claims of the Bible that it was WRITTEN 5,000 years ago was false because no writings existed that far back? This was given as a proof the Bible was made up by men in more modern times. Then, of course, they found the writings in China which were a full three thousand years older.. thus proving the Bible COULD have been penned by Moses a full 5,000 years ago and that writing was not extraordinary or unknown in that period of history. As even you said, “the bible has not preserved us through all generations as it is a relativly new book by other civilizations standards.” That is an argument NOW – an opposite argument – but it was once the complete opposite argument the church faced. It HAS been preserved for a very long time.. from the time it was written and forward, as it says, Psa 12:6 “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. You shall keep them, O LORD, You shall preserve them from this generation for ever.” – From the time these words were penned “from THIS GENERATION” to forever.. the Bible is kept by God. And there is corroborating evidence from science of that proof.

ANANSI WEAVER: Huh? You know that there are societies that PREDATE Hebrew society in which Christianity was born from correct? And as for there being no writings older than the bible the Epic of Gilgamesh springs to mind.
Also how are “the words of the lord pure” when just a short while ago you said he dummed down the process for us?

Every time the skeptics say that there is something which proves the Bible untrue.. it is disproved. The Dead Sea Scrolls were another proof which just “happened” when the skeptics said that there was no way a book could remain unchanged for 1,000 years of time.. and to postulate 5,000 was ridiculous. Then we discovered the caves with the Dead Sea Scrolls.. proving that one wrong, too. There was one time they said the people called the Hittites were fictional. They said they never existed, though the Bible says they did. Then, of course, they found the entire civilization in an archeological dig. Every time they throw a new “this cannot be true” at the Bible.. circumstances arise to prove that is false.. almost like “Someone” is listening?? The incredible accuracy of the story concerning Egypt in the Bible is validated by the ancient Egyptian writings and artifacts. When the Bible says this is the way it was.. we can go to archeology and prove it true.. because the Bible is a book of Truth.

ANANSI WEAVER: If you knew your history the bible went through A LOT of changes over the centuries and was influenced by the surrounding cultures at the time. More on this later as well.

When it says in the Bible about how the people Moses led out of Egypt came to a mountain and there Moses received the Ten Commandments.. people have been skeptical of that claim, too. This brand new documentary has actual photo coverage of that place with evidence which proves it historic.. though if you went there the Islamics would kill you, so it isn’t exactly something I would recommend you do to verify the evidence yourself. But you may if you wish.. the place exists. Here is the documentary, free, on the web.. proof again to the skeptics of the Bible’s truth in every detail:
http://stage6.divx.com/Lost-Tribes/video/1018573/Mountain-of-Fire
The player should install itself if you do not have it when you click on it, otherwise:
Divx 6
Windows http://www.divx.com/divx/windows/download/
Mac http://www.divx.com/divx/mac/

ANANSI WEAVER: Ok I try to be fair and look at all the information with an open mind but I’m not downloading that player. It causes a lot of problems on my system. I’ll do my own digging and comment on this another time.

But when you say that men are “unable to understand your god’s superior mind” – that is true. God is INFINITE and Omniscient and we are finite in our understanding and do not know everything. God had no beginning and has no end. We all didn’t exist 125 years ago.. we had a beginning. How can our understanding ever reach near to His? That is the reason He gave us His revelation in the Bible, because men do very often not understand God’s superior mind.. and it is vastly superior. The realms string theory has only just now postulated to exist and which they think are simple planes of existence are not. They have infinite design in them and are complicated because a vastly superior and complicated mind created them.. as will become understood in time as men learn about those realms.. in the same way they recently learned that there is no “junk DNA” but that it is also a very complicated design which was simply once beyond their ability to understand. It is only when men think that all is simple and without a Designer to it that they err in thinking the DNA we don’t understand is “junk” and the realms of string theory are “simple” and without much intricacy.. or that all they see happened by mere chance.
When you say.. why did God choose not to answer your Mom’s prayers not to die of cancer.. it was because it was her time to die. None of us can stay when God decrees we will go. No one has power over their own lives to choose to lay down their life in death and take it back up again at will.. but Jesus did. Jesus had that power.. not only to lay His life down at will (when He said “it is finished” on the cross and actually DIED because He chose to) and to take it up again:
Joh 10:17 Therefore does my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
Joh 10:18 No man takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.
Why don’t you try that.. laying down your life and then taking it back up again? Who could claim that? Who could do it?

Jesus both claimed it and did it. That makes Him beyond men.. and His power beyond what men are capable of. God alone has power over life and death. He chose your mother’s death and will choose ours in His time. And only He can promise eternal life to those who follow Him:
Joh 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
Joh 10:28 And I give to them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
No mere man can claim to GIVE to men who follow them eternal life. This is a claim to Deity, as those who heard Him speak understood, because only a few verses later it says those who heard Him speak these words took up stones to stone Jesus. Jesus said to them:
Joh 10:32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I showed you from my Father; for which of those works do you stone me?
They answered Jesus:
Joh 10:33 For a good work we do not stone You; but for blasphemy; and because that You, being a man, make Yourself God.
At least they understood what He was claiming

ANANSI WEAVER: Impossible according to your previous posts.

.. to be God and have power over death. Today, many think Jesus was just some good teacher and a healer.. again, something Jesus tried to avoid giving the impression of because He was after the eternal souls of men, not healing their mortal bodies or teaching them some truth which didn’t change their inward lives.
ANANSI WEAVER: I died once and came back. So did my mom and a lot of other people. Ever stop to think that it just wasn’t jesus’s time yet and he was as mortal as you or I?

Your questions:
1) Why are there no mention of dinosaurs in genesis?
Genesis is not the oldest book written in the Bible, Job is. And it mentions dinosaurs.. here is one, an animal whose tail is big as a cedar tree. This is no elephant tail.. it is huge and has power in it. What modern animal could this be describing? But it fits the description of a kind of dinosaur perfectly.
Job 40:15-19 Behold now behemoth, which I made… he eats grass as an ox. His strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. He moves his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron.
ANANSI WEAVER: Uuuuh… yeeeah…. Question. If Adam and Eve were the first man and woman and Job their descendant how could Job be older than Adam and Eve? Or more correctly how could the book of Job be older than the book of genesis?
Also, it doesn’t fit the description of a dinosaur perfectly. Dinosaurs weren’t mammals so they wouldn’t have a navel. Also since Adam and Eve were appointed the task of naming all of creation wouldn’t said creature have a name?
Furthermore taking the Flintstones as a documentary on prehistoric human life is really really foolish.

2) Why there are two different creation stories right next to each other?
And why are there four gospels with their differing accounts? It can be because it is used as a literary device as we do all the time in our plays and pictures. We often give the overall story once, then go back and give details which we feel make the story fleshed out and real. Also, we have several networks for the news and each of them brings something different to the account, different relevant details.. this is the same. There is no contradiction in the accounts of the gospels or in the creation stories.. all can be reconciled into one story, just with different angles. Just as Fox News and CNN might cover a story quite differently, but it can be the exact same event.
ANANSI WEAVER: Bravo! This is probably the most interesting argument that would hold some weight if only it were true.
Alas!
Actually the answer to that question lies in the story of the Babylonian god Marduk. You see when writer 1 of the bible (we’ll call him “Bob”) wrote Genesis one it was to celebrate the majesty and perfection of a god which he believed in. Unfortunately for Bob this did nothing to explain why the perfect being made a world filled with strife. So to solve this problem Bob looked for a way to explain this to everyone’s satisfaction so he stole the premise from the creation myth of Marduk where the world was created in a haphazard manner and humans were created so they could suffer strife so the gods could live in leisure.
3) Why flood the world to rid it of evil when god knew (he knows everything apparently) that said evil would survive anyway?
You think THAT evil has survived to this day? I think you mistake what evil there was in the world at that time. I think God didn’t explain exactly what the sins were that they committed because He knows men would do it again if they knew what those sins were. So He purposely did not put in the account what they were doing – other than to say their every thought was evil and the earth was filled with violence. Evil happens now, but I do not think it happens now as it did then.
Gen 6:5 And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
I do not think this is true of all of mankind now. It is not true that EVERY imagination of our hearts are only evil continually.. and it certainly is not true of ALL mankind on the earth. Evil happens today, but it is not as widespread.. nor do we have whatever wicked knowledge they had which God had to destroy.. and it seems likely that it was that which continually corrupted their imaginations and thoughts. And, frankly, I do not wish to know what that evil knowledge they had was… because God didn’t like it, and see how He treated those who had that knowledge? (There is more backup for this from the Bible, but I have learned by experience it is best not to go into detail on evil, some people do take it and run with it and I do not wish to be blamed by God for helping along evil and sin in a person’s life, or their curiosity toward evil.)
ANANSI WEAVER: Ummm yes evil of the past survives today and I ask you if your interpretation is even remotely correct (which it couldn’t possibly be) what was the human race doing that was so bad that god had to flood the entire planet? They certainly couldn’t have destroyed the world with spears and swords.
And even your god noted this when he vowed never to destroy the earth again because apparently we are evil from childhood. Why it didn’t realize it earlier being all knowing?
Also if there were dinosaurs in the book of Job then why aren’t they around today? After all they would have survived the flood being on the ark and all. And there is no mention in the bible that your god smote them.
4) “How could the perfect being that could make no mistakes and knows everything make flawed beings?”
That begs the question.. is the entire enterprise of making mankind a “mistake”? OR, is it planned? I think it is planned because, as you just said, God is a PERFECT being who can make no mistakes. So how could He make flawed beings? I think the flaw you mean is sin
ANANSI WEAVER: Let me cut you off here. I did not mean “sin” I meant turning down the wrong road, picking up the wrong can of soda, banging you knee on the coffee table you knew was there, locking your keys in the car, not getting 100 on your math test kind of mistakes.
If god was perfect then the results of god’s labors would be perfect themselves therefore incapable of making any mistakes much less sinning.

5) Why did god put the tree of knowledge in the garden if it didn’t want man to get to it? Couldn’t it have put some kind of forcerfield around it? After all it can do anything right?
This fits with the previous question.. without choice, how can you know someone loves you and wishes to be with you? Love requires an unforced choice.
ANANSI WEAVER: You mean like believe in me or I’ll send you to hell to live in everlasting torment?
With no tree to test our love toward God, we would only have been robots. Would you like to live with no choice in your life? Would you prefer to HAVE TO believe one way or another? Or to love someone.. to HAVE TO love them?
ANANSI WEAVER: Why would an all knowing being have to test our love unless it was uncertain of the answer? If it knew everything then it would have knew if the love was true or not making the test not necessary.
You ask if I would prefer to have to believe one way or the other but that isn’t the choice religion offers i.e. believe or go to hell.
You also said, “I don’t know. Let’s do this lets ask every subdivision of Christianity there is who has the right interpretation of the word of god and when I get one unified answer then I can tell you.”
You are expecting a unified answer from Christianity when the Bible itself says that for all of time there will be a lack of unity for a reason. Speaking to the CHURCH and not the world, it says:
1Co 11:18 For first of all, when you come together in the church, I hear that there be divisions among you; and I partly believe it.
1Co 11:19 For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.
The Bible says that there MUST be heresies among the church.. for a reason. To prove which ones are approved. You may not like that answer, but it is Biblical.
ANANSI WEAVER: I am reminded of a saying “while all answers are replies not all replies are answers. You essentially are telling me that god loves unconditionally but the only condition is you have to believe in god
You say, “I imply that by saying that the bible is infallible and possesses all the answers in light of evidence to the contrary is an act of pride.” That would indeed be an act of pride, IF the evidence to the contrary were of any weight.

You may think the arguments you cite against the Bible are worth building your life upon because they appear to you to be true…
ANANSI WEAVER: Riiiing “pot calling kettle, pot calling kettle. You’re black! You’re black!”
but God says you are like a foolish man who builds on sand.. it will fall, and great will be the fall of it.
ANANSI WEAVER: your god is welcome to sit down with me for tea and discuss it but I doubt it will because it says in the holy Lipton label that god prefers coffee and that is the TRUTH. (Note how I don’t have a shred of evidence to back my claims except a tea bag.)
The Bible will be proven to be what it is in the end – TRUTH. And He will “convince” all who are of the opposite opinion of that one day. Why He doesn’t do so now is to give you the chance to choose.. He will not force your love or obedience to the truth.
ANANSI WEAVER: Ummm hello! I stated I was open to the concept of god but I would like proof before I devote my life to something that is as ambiguous and contradicting as you have made it out to be.
You can choose sand if you wish.. but He warns you what will happen in the same way a parent warns a child not to run out in traffic..
ANANSI WEAVER: So if it let’s me have a choice to believe or not why make hell?
When you say, “religon got it wrong. Worse they are wrong for telling anyone who does not believe that they are wrong yet offers no proof as to why. Again faith does not have to be based on logic and reason. Faith can be a good thing but too much faith is a dead end because without questioning our beliefs, our world etc we would never grow. Whether or not you admit to it you do seek your own answers to problems or questions every day.”
I have to ask you.. Do you find what I have penned to you here illogical or without reason?
ANANSI WEAVER: The words “yes, yes I do” spring to mind.
Do you think I have not come up against such questions as you posed here to me and looked for answers?
ANASI WEAVER. You are asking yourself the wrong question. You should ask Whether or not you chose to believe in your religion and bible because it is EASIER than facing the possibility that your belief is flawed. I know that there is the possibility that I could be wrong and fully admit to it. I am open to all possibilities provided there is enough data for me to make an INFORMED decision one way or the other. I do not shy away from answers I don’t like that are uncontrovertibly true, that are proven time and again, that I can perform myself to see the results. What have you offered to sway me to your beliefs?
1: God doesn’t need to provide me with proof.
2: God has a plan but we have free will but if we don’t choose god’s way we are punished for all time
3: Mental acrobatics to keep yourself from facing the truth that you were wrong about the perfection of the bible.
4: An omniscient being that needs to test us to be sure we love it even though it already knows the answer to that.
5: The Flintstones as fact.
6: The book of job breaking the laws of space time and somehow being older that the book of genesis THE BEGINNING OF EVERYTHING YOU BELEAVE!
7: The fact that the perfect being who does everything perfectly and can make no mistakes makes flawed beings.
8: Biblical time’s evil being different from modern evil. Apparently an evil so bad that you god flooded the planet to wipe it out realizing too late that evil is apparent from birth. (But wait it knows everything. How could this be?)
9: God creating itself (I still can’t get over this one.) making itself prefect, (no flawed, no perfect….)
10: Great statements like we could never understand the mid of god and then you translating the word of god for me (us) which you couldn’t possibly understand according to you.
11: Unforced love: believe (love) me or go to hell forever.
12: Flaws in the bible as a literary tool.
13: God being the truth but dumbing down 4.5 billion to 6 days for humans who wrote the bible (no wait god wrote the bible, no wait humans…)
Has the CHURCH no answers to the skeptics?
ANANSI WEAVER: If they did they wouldn’t be skeptics they would be believers wouldn’t they?
. Do you think Christians never took the time to look into it? All men look for proof that validates their faith, creationists or evolutionists, that is why the evolutionists have so much material on the net, to put before the public eye their proofs, as we do for our view and faith. Validating faith is an ongoing venture.. those who believe the Bible do not stick their heads in the sand or believe in spite of good evidence but because of it. Invariably as the Creationist searches and examines the evidence it ends up proving the creationist view right and the skeptics wrong. That is because we don’t trust in man for our answers.. but in the infallible Omnicience of God – and because all He says IS the Truth, “there is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the Lord” (Proverbs 21:30) – though some men might need to wait until after they die to become “convinced” of that.
ANANSI WEAVER: See the list above. You’ll have to do a lot better than that if you want to convince me much less any other skeptic that Irreducible Complexity is a science and isn’t the church’s last ditch effort to get into the public school system.
And your proof of your god is essentially the same as the proof of Zeus, Thor, Nayambe, Marduk, Cirnunnos, Amertesaru, etc etc etc. A group of stories and passages written a log time ago long since abandoned as myth.

Before men sinned God created the trees, including the tree of the knowledge of good.. AND EVIL -

Gen 2:9 And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Who made this tree of good and EVIL – where did it come from? God.
God made a tree of EVIL as well as good? Yes, it says so here.
Does that make Him evil? No, because He said to Adam after He made him:

Gen 2:17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it: for in the day that you of it you shall surely die.

Men were told NOT to do this evil thing, just as God has the choice to be evil, but remains good.
So when you say, “according to you (and apparently the Bible), he was evil already”… I disagree.
The Bible clearly teaches that God was not evil, but had indeed CREATED evil.
There is a difference between creating something and BEING that thing.

Sara.

>Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
> God CREATES evil. You may say He has nothing to do with evil.. how then can that be if God says He creates it?

>Well, that is certainly one answer to the traditional “problem of evil”. Of course it is not one traditionally accepted by Christianity. The Christian definition of God is that he is Perfect, and by perfect, he is all Good, no Evil. Yet if he created evil, that assertion is false.

If it were true that what you consider Christianity teaches that which the Bible itself contradicts, is it real Christianity, then? And will you correct my understanding with the wisdom of men instead of the words of God as recorded in the Bible? If the Bible clearly teaches that the Lord Himself says He creates evil.. He creates it. If it says that, in spite of that creation, God is wholly good and not evil, He is good and not evil. Without the tree of the knowledge of good AND EVIL in the garden of Eden, men have no choice. Obviously, that choice is important to God. If He must make evil to give us that choice, then that is His perogative as Deity to do that.

1Co 2:4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:
1Co 2:5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

Either men’s wisdom – including any brand of “Christianity” which ignores this Scripture about God creating evil and does not preach nor believe the Scripture, OR God’s testimony in the Bible itself – is true. Take your pick about which you wish to believe, the words of men, or those the Bible says are penned by God. As Jesus said:

Luk 8:18 Take heed therefore how you hear: for whosoever has, to him shall be given; and whosoever does not have, from him shall be taken even that which he seems to have.

Sara.

If pride is a sin then God is the worst of all! Just look at the first commandment. Oh, and the creation myths in genesis. It doesn’t use the word, but God is proud of his work: “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.”

Also, you completely missed the point of the studies. It was a scientific question with scientific research and a scientific answer. I think my follow-up post, which should have been posted before yours but wasn’t, might clear up my position somewhat.

And nice job comparing me to Saddam. Good way of trying to get people to hate other people: mention the name of Hitler/Saddam/Stalin/Mao/etc. If you ever had an argument, that killed it.

I also don’t see how citing the bible really helps anything, especially countering a group of scientific studies such as those I linked to. The better thing might have been to counter the evidence, rather than bitch about it, or come up with a better explanation, rather than misinterpret mine.

“You think men approach to God in His Omniscience by their smart intellects?”
Nope. No more than I think men approach to dragons in their awesomeness.

“Jesus said the meek will inherit the earth, not the wisest and smartest.”
Interesting. So the people most likely to mimic sheep and blindly follow the shepherd of the church are promised that one day they will be in control, thus giving them not only a reason to be sheep and follow the church, which derives its power from its followers, but also gives a “them” to hate: the people wise enough to see through the ruse. I gotta hand it to the authors of the bible: they were no gods, but they were no morons either.

“ANANSI WEAVER: I don’t think one can judge intellect by ones religious beleifs [sic] as I have known many smart religious people. They may be unable to objectively debate religious issues logically but the can be smart in other arenas.

I personally think that ones major limitation to ones intellect is the inability to keep an open mind.”

I answered his question by giving him studies that compared the average IQ of those with and without religious belief. The obvious conclusion was that, on average, smart people are less religious, and conversely, on average, religious people are less smart. Smart, that is, as defined by certain tests or gpa levels or some other measurable quantity. If sara was smart, she would have claimed that the methodologies were flawed because men created the test; men who themselves assumed that they were smart.

Keep in mind that these studies are on average, and not absolute. Religious people can be smart, and smart people can be religious. At no time did I deny that. But if I were a betting man walking around MIT campus or any other elite school, and I had a bookie who would give me $100 for every atheist and I would give them $100 for every theist, I would take that bet and I would come out far ahead. Come to think of it, Sara, would you be willing to make that bet with me?

ANANSI WEAVER: I don’t think one can judge intellect by ones religious beleifs as I have known many smart religious people. They may be unable to objectively debate religious issues logically but the can be smart in other arenas.

I personally think that ones major limitation to ones intellect is the inability to keep an open mind.

ANASI WEAVER: What in the world are you talking about? That makes ZERO sense. You are essentially telling us theat god made itself. At NO time does your bible SAY THAT!

SARAH SAYS: God will have no person glory and boast of their intellectual superiority in His presence. You think men approach to God in His Omniscience by their smart intellects?

ANANSI WEAVER: Yeah that’s us. We clearly don’t understand what god wants but we are bad for asking just what it is god wants because in doing so we are questioning god. But then how would one, following your philosophy, learn what god really wants without asking questions?

SARAH SAYS: They won’t earn God’s praise by their pride but His condemnation.

ANANSI WEVAER: Ummmm doesn’t religion claim to understand the universe as your god supposedly created it? Doesn’t religion preach moral and intellectual superiority to athiests and scientists?

God did not say that Moses was a man who was the wisest and smartest person on the face of the earth.. but the humblest and meekest.

ANANSI WEAVER: And yet he was denied entry into Jorden.

SARAH SAYS: Jesus said the meek will inherit the earth, not the wisest and smartest.

ANANSI WEAVER: Did he say that before he told us how all life was going to end on earth and the final battle between good and evil would occur in heaven or after?

SARAH SAYS: Such is the inscrutable counsel of an Omnipotent Deity.. that His ways are past finding out and He stains all men’s pride that they might learn what it is to be humble before Omniscience.

ANANSI WEAVER: Uh huh. So if his ways are beyond finding out how can the bible hold all the answers? If you postulate that the bible is written by god then we lowly, stupid humans are incapable of understanding it. (That would explain all the splinter groups of religions across the globe.)

And if we are incapable of understanding the mind of god how can you claim that what god or the bible is the truth when you are incapable of understanding such perfect wisdom?

SARAH SAYS: God has hid these things from the wise and prudent Jesus said.. God gives His revelational truth not to the wise and prudent.. nor to those who profess themselves to be wise.. but to those with humble hearts who will come to Him in repentance – as a child, with the innocence and lack of guile of a babe.

ANANSI WEAVER: Ah! I see. This clears things up a lot. Your god doesn’t give information to the ones who can understand it or interpate it correctly but to people who can’t. In this way god is clear in his commands because the ones who have the ability to understand what god is saying wouldn’t muck it all up with circular logic and religious dogma.

Wait a second….

SARAH SAYS: Haven’t you ever watched a movie where the bad guy boasts himself and then gets his? Think it doesn’t accord with reality? Saddam was a real boaster once, too.. look how he ended. What goes around comes around.. what exactly are you going to get back from that prideful statement?

ANANSI WEAVER: So god is going to smite our boasting president? That should make for one hell of a state of the union address.

By the way I’m still waiting on the answers to those questions I asked.

> God CREATES evil. You may say He has nothing to do with evil.. how then can that be if God says He creates it?

Well, that is certainly one answer to the traditional “problem of evil”. Of course it is not one traditionally accepted by Christianity. The Christian definition of God is that he is Perfect, and by perfect, he is all Good, no Evil. Yet if he created evil, that assertion is false.

Of course that position kind of destroys the moral superiority aspect of God. But hey, it’s your belief.

> None of us wants it [death] (well, maybe the insane.. ) and we all don’t wish to die of cancer. But, people do.. she did. Does that make God evil?

No, according to you (and apparently the Bible), he was evil already.

Regarding the origins of the Bible, here is a good starting place.
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mbible1.html

Obviously if something or someone made God, that which was the final creation act would be God. God is by definition the uncreated Creator of all things. That is an attribute of Deity. He is the uncaused Cause of all we see and know. The reason you appreciate beauty and have a sense of humor is because God appreciates beauty and has a sense of humor. All things are caused by or have their origin in God. That is not to say that God does not make things He is not. He states emphatically that He made evil, but He is not evil but Good. The reasons for that are awfully long to post and you didn’t ask that question..

As for Jamie and Ross both wondering if it is true that Christians are a bunch of dummies and atheists smarter (quote: My hypothesis is that the two factors feed on each other, but that smarter people tend to be less religious because they’re smarter.).. ummm.. watch out, because that is pride and:

Pro 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

Haven’t you ever watched a movie where the bad guy boasts himself and then gets his? Think it doesn’t accord with reality? Saddam was a real boaster once, too.. look how he ended. What goes around comes around.. what exactly are you going to get back from that prideful statement?
As for your boast about the wisest being non-Christians (smarter people tend to be less religious because they’re smarter), the Bible says this:

1Co 1:25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
1Co 1:26 .. you see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:
1Co 1:27 But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
1Co 1:28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, has God chosen, yes, and things which are not, to bring to nothing things that are:
1Co 1:29 That no flesh should glory in His presence.

God will have no person glory and boast of their intellectual superiority in His presence. You think men approach to God in His Omniscience by their smart intellects? I do heartily doubt that.. and think that they are more likely to be in for an almighty fall and destruction instead of the lofty heights of superiority such persons think they will. They won’t earn God’s praise by their pride but His condemnation. God did not say that Moses was a man who was the wisest and smartest person on the face of the earth.. but the humblest and meekest. Jesus said the meek will inherit the earth, not the wisest and smartest. Such is the view and aim of God on all the pride of men, as He said:

Isa 23:9 The LORD of hosts has purposed it, to stain the pride of all glory, and to bring into contempt all the honourable of the earth.

Such is the inscrutable counsel of an Omnipotent Deity.. that His ways are past finding out and He stains all men’s pride that they might learn what it is to be humble before Omniscience. It is the meek and humble of the earth, not the wise and prudent, who will receive His blessing and counsel and praise..

Mat 11:25 At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank You, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hid these things from the wise and prudent, and have revealed them to babes.

God has hid these things from the wise and prudent Jesus said.. God gives His revelational truth not to the wise and prudent.. nor to those who profess themselves to be wise.. but to those with humble hearts who will come to Him in repentance – as a child, with the innocence and lack of guile of a babe. God’s ways are not the ways of men, but “the foolishness of God is wiser than men” (vs 25, above).

Sara.

When you say it all must be taken on faith concerning Creationist views such as the earth being created in six days and then assert that we are leaving reason out of the way in doing so, you make it sound like faith is UNreasonable. That is untrue. Creation, like evolution, is merely a model of how we think reality worked. You can no more prove evolution by concrete evidence and experiment than you can creation. There is no experiment which you could do in a lab to show a reptile growing wings or a fish growing lungs. It is supposed by the evolutionary model, it is not proven by concrete evidence which can be done in a repeatable laboratory experiment. You are setting up evolution as though it can be proven by experimentation when it cannot.

We find that when you do mutations to the DNA code you end up with freaks and diseases, not the supposed evolutionary positive changes which are supposedly the mechanism which drives evolution. For instance, from the U.S. National Library of Medicine:

How can gene mutations affect health and development?

To function correctly, each cell depends on thousands of proteins to do their jobs in the right places at the right times. Sometimes, gene mutations prevent one or more of these proteins from working properly. By changing a gene’s instructions for making a protein, a mutation can cause the protein to malfunction or to be missing entirely. When a mutation alters a protein that plays a critical role in the body, it can disrupt normal development or cause a medical condition. A condition caused by mutations in one or more genes is called a genetic disorder.

In some cases, gene mutations are so severe that they prevent an embryo from surviving until birth. These changes occur in genes that are essential for development, and often disrupt the development of an embryo in its earliest stages. Because these mutations have very serious effects, they are incompatible with life.

It is important to note that genes themselves do not cause disease—genetic disorders are caused by mutations that make a gene function improperly. For example, when people say that someone has “the cystic fibrosis gene,” they are usually referring to a mutated version of the CFTR gene, which causes the disease. All people, including those without cystic fibrosis, have a version of the CFTR gene.

The National Cancer Institute provides additional information about how gene mutations can trigger disease:

Gene Mutations and Disease (see below for link)
Altered DNA, Altered Protein (see below for link)

http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/mutationsanddisorders/mutationscausedisease

This argues strongly against mutations as the mechanism for evolution. Again, there are no lab experiments which you can do to prove a new organ (such as wings evolving on a reptile) arise spontaneously from genetic MUTATIONS. There is no concrete proof for the addition of organs onto an already existing organism – a change which only could happen if there were the addition of beneficial and useable genetic information to the DNA code. All I have ever seen as an argument is that some mutations can cause a disease (like sickle cell anemia mutation or individuals carrying the G protein beta3 subunit 825 T-allele mutation) to offer some immune enhancement because an invading organism cannot hook onto the usual protein to establish itself. Because the invader cannot establish itself (because these abnormalities don’t have the “hooks” it needs and uses to proliferate itself) the people live. But it is absolutely farcical to state that these examples of “beneficial” mutations give rise to beneficial MACROevolutionary change like wings or lungs when there were none before. These abnormal genes cause serious sickness and lack of viability. Sickle cell anemia is a terrible disease where tissues are deprived of oxygen and this causes painful attacks and organ damage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sickle_cell_anemia , and the 825T allele carriers have an increased risk for hypertension combined with features of the metabolic syndrome, such as dyslipidemia, hypercholesterolemia, insulin resistance, and obesity. http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.med.56.082103.104625 These are hardly cases of evolutionary ADVANCEMENT..

Even the “beneficial mutations” section of wikipedia can only point to a similar survivability “benefit” which is the result of the DELETION of base pair, not an addition to the genome when it says: “a specific 32 base pair deletion in human CCR5 (CCR5-32) confers HIV resistance to homozygotes and delays AIDS onset in heterozygotes.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation Note here that it says DELAYS the AIDS onset in the heterozygotes – they still get the disease. (That is proof of benefit when they still get the disease and die?)

The point is that this is hardly proving that a dog turned into a cat or a monkey into a deer, or a reptile into a bird… those kinds of vast changes which the evolutionary mechanism must prove in abundance if molecule to man evolution actually happened by such a mechanism. It is an argument for survivability, perhaps, but not for EVOLUTION which is a change in kind like from a fish to a bird. And remember, there is not just ONE missing link from ape to man, EVERYTHING supposedly came from a molecule in the ocean.. so ALL the animals must have evolutionary changes with the additions of organs and their increasing sophistication.. where is the mechanism for this?

As for the idea of natural selection being the mechanism, natural selection also does not work out of the kinds. You cannot breed a fish with a cat or bird nor can you successfully and naturally breed a man with a horse or dog. It doesn’t work. Even when you mate together species which are close genetically like a horse and a donkey, you get a sterile mule.. there are limits to natural selection. As the Bible says, there is reproduction within the KINDS but not outside of them. You can make a lot of kinds of dogs.. but dogs don’t give birth to cats. And DNA mutations give rise to diseases and freaks, not advancement. There is no provable evolutionary mechanism we can test in a lab – it cannot be proven by concrete proof. Evolutionists BELIEVE the Theory of Evolution as Creationists BELIEVE the Theory of Creation. Neither creationists nor evolutionists were there to see the beginning and so we must extrapolate the evidence backwards and postulate a theory of how things came to be. Both require FAITH in those presuppositions without laboratory experiments or concrete visible proof. Therefore, both are not science, but models which require faith in the presuppositions behind them.

We both think our models fit the facts better than the other guy’s model.. but don’t fool yourself into thinking the postulated evolutionary mechanism furnishes us laboratory-repeatable concrete proof and creation does not. And the postulated evolutionary mechanism is far less believable to my mind than an Omnicient Omnipotent Creator.

As for your argument about us having to do things for ourselves like paying rent, gathering food, and looking for ways to cure our ailments to some degree, yes, that is true. But that does not exclude God is all I am saying. It does not mean we forget to pray before we eat and thank God for providing the food to gather, or the money to pay the rent, or the drug which is giving us the cure. Faith sees God OVER all these events, even as faith says “Thank GOD!!” when your lifeboat which you have been rowing for a long time spots land. There is an acknowledgement of your work, but that it is God who prospers and blesses the endeavor with what we are hoping for (money, health, etc). Having to do the work does not mean we forget God or His hand over everything, just because He is invisible (actually, He is too large to fit within the creation and is a spirit, so it isn’t that He is invisible so much as His being naturally uncontainable within our tiny sphere. That is why the incarnation was an act of such great condescension.. )

You say, “What I was trying to illustrate with that story was that we are told that god has all the answers but is unwilling or unable to provide them.” I think you have heard of miraculous healings, so it isn’t that God is always unwilling nor unable to provide such healing. He has and continues to do miraculous things.. just not on tap or on command. We can ASK in prayer.. but only God can give the answer. It is when we begin to think God is obligated to give or do what we wish He would do that we make a mistake. Your friend was right to ask you to pray.. because perhaps God would hear and heal your mother. But if He doesn’t you cannot fault Him for not providing the answer you were seeking. He has all the answers, but in His infinite wisdom, the answer may not be the one we in our fallible judgement are seeking from Him. It may not be the time to heal, because it may be determined that that person’s time is up. And, as you said, in your mother’s case, it was.

When you say that men interpret the Bible wrongly sometimes, that is true. But it does not mean the Bible is unable to be interpreted or that some “enlightened few” in the clergy are the only ones with the magic key of interpretation. It only means that sincere men and women of faith can mistake the meaning of a passage just as people can mistake your meaning when you write a post. It doesn’t mean what you said was not perfectly plain, it was just taken wrongly. The fault is with the interpreter, not the author of the words. It is a normal human failing of men. For instance, when the Bible says,

Mat 12:14 Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against Him, how they might destroy Him.
Mat 12:15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew himself from there: and great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all;

I don’t think we have to fear interpreting this passage as saying that it talks of a plot to kill Jesus which, when He learned of it, He didn’t say “God will protect me” and stay there, but He prudently withdrew to a safe place. And we do not have to fear misinterpreting the passage when we say that it says plainly that Jesus healed all who followed Him to that safe place at that time. Both are plainly stated. So a great many things are easily understood by the minds of mankind because the purpose of the communication was to enlighten us and explain things to us, not to mystify and make understanding it difficult.

I do think that when God decided to give an explanation of what He did when He created the universe to a bunch of sheep herders in the desert, He didn’t think they would understand the quantum mechanics explanation (though He knows that too!). Actually, they didn’t have the vocabulary for it or the advanced understanding it would take to “get” it, so He kept it simple and explained it step by step at their level of understanding. But not one thing He said is wrong in that explanation or in the other incidents explained in the Bible.

You asked for examples. Well, let’s see.. one instance was on a previous post where it was pointed out to me by Skepterist that the Bible was written on papyrus about 5,000 years ago, but “the Chinese have examples of writing from over 8,000 years ago”. He was using that to prove the Bible was not old, but did you know that within the last 100 years the Bible skeptics once said that the claims of the Bible that it was WRITTEN 5,000 years ago was false because no writings existed that far back? This was given as a proof the Bible was made up by men in more modern times. Then, of course, they found the writings in China which were a full three thousand years older.. thus proving the Bible COULD have been penned by Moses a full 5,000 years ago and that writing was not extraordinary or unknown in that period of history. As even you said, “the bible has not preserved us through all generations as it is a relativly new book by other civilizations standards.” That is an argument NOW – an opposite argument – but it was once the complete opposite argument the church faced. It HAS been preserved for a very long time.. from the time it was written and forward, as it says, Psa 12:6 “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. You shall keep them, O LORD, You shall preserve them from this generation for ever.” – From the time these words were penned “from THIS GENERATION” to forever.. the Bible is kept by God. And there is corroborating evidence from science of that proof.

Every time the skeptics say that there is something which proves the Bible untrue.. it is disproved. The Dead Sea Scrolls were another proof which just “happened” when the skeptics said that there was no way a book could remain unchanged for 1,000 years of time.. and to postulate 5,000 was ridiculous. Then we discovered the caves with the Dead Sea Scrolls.. proving that one wrong, too. There was one time they said the people called the Hittites were fictional. They said they never existed, though the Bible says they did. Then, of course, they found the entire civilization in an archeological dig. Every time they throw a new “this cannot be true” at the Bible.. circumstances arise to prove that is false.. almost like “Someone” is listening?? The incredible accuracy of the story concerning Egypt in the Bible is validated by the ancient Egyptian writings and artifacts. When the Bible says this is the way it was.. we can go to archeology and prove it true.. because the Bible is a book of Truth.

When it says in the Bible about how the people Moses led out of Egypt came to a mountain and there Moses received the Ten Commandments.. people have been skeptical of that claim, too. This brand new documentary has actual photo coverage of that place with evidence which proves it historic.. though if you went there the Islamics would kill you, so it isn’t exactly something I would recommend you do to verify the evidence yourself. But you may if you wish.. the place exists. Here is the documentary, free, on the web.. proof again to the skeptics of the Bible’s truth in every detail:

http://stage6.divx.com/Lost-Tribes/video/1018573/Mountain-of-Fire

The player should install itself if you do not have it when you click on it, otherwise:

Divx 6
Windows http://www.divx.com/divx/windows/download/
Mac http://www.divx.com/divx/mac/

But when you say that men are “unable to understand your god’s superior mind” – that is true. God is INFINITE and Omnicient and we are finite in our understanding and do not know everything. God had no beginning and has no end. We all didn’t exist 125 years ago.. we had a beginning. How can our understanding ever reach near to His? That is the reason He gave us His revelation in the Bible, because men do very often not understand God’s superior mind.. and it is vastly superior. The realms string theory has only just now postulated to exist and which they think are simple planes of existence are not. They have infinite design in them and are complicated because a vastly superior and complicated mind created them.. as will become understood in time as men learn about those realms.. in the same way they recently learned that there is no “junk DNA” but that it is also a very complicated design which was simply once beyond their ability to understand. It is only when men think that all is simple and without a Designer to it that they err in thinking the DNA we don’t understand is “junk” and the realms of string theory are “simple” and without much intricacy.. or that all they see happened by mere chance.

When you say.. why did God choose not to answer your Mom’s prayers not to die of cancer.. it was because it was her time to die. None of us can stay when God decrees we will go. No one has power over their own lives to choose to lay down their life in death and take it back up again at will.. but Jesus did. Jesus had that power.. not only to lay His life down at will (when He said “it is finished” on the cross and actually DIED because He chose to) and to take it up again:

Joh 10:17 Therefore does my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
Joh 10:18 No man takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.

Why don’t you try that.. laying down your life and then taking it back up again? Who could claim that? Who could do it? Jesus both claimed it and did it. That makes Him beyond men.. and His power beyond what men are capable of. God alone has power over life and death. He chose your mother’s death and will choose ours in His time. And only He can promise eternal life to those who follow Him:

Joh 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
Joh 10:28 And I give to them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

No mere man can claim to GIVE to men who follow them eternal life. This is a claim to Deity, as those who heard Him speak understood, because only a few verses later it says those who heard Him speak these words took up stones to stone Jesus. Jesus said to them:

Joh 10:32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I showed you from my Father; for which of those works do you stone me?

They answered Jesus:

Joh 10:33 For a good work we do not stone You; but for blasphemy; and because that You, being a man, make Yourself God.

At least they understood what He was claiming.. to be God and have power over death. Today, many think Jesus was just some good teacher and a healer.. again, something Jesus tried to avoid giving the impression of because He was after the eternal souls of men, not healing their mortal bodies or teaching them some truth which didn’t change their inward lives.

Your questions:

1) Why are there no mention of dinosaurs in genesis?

Genesis is not the oldest book written in the Bible, Job is. And it mentions dinosaurs.. here is one, an animal whose tail is big as a cedar tree. This is no elephant tail.. it is huge and has power in it. What modern animal could this be describing? But it fits the description of a kind of dinosaur perfectly.

Job 40:15-19 Behold now behemoth, which I made… he eats grass as an ox. His strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. He moves his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron.

2) Why there are two different creation stories right next to each other?

And why are there four gospels with their differing accounts? It can be because it is used as a literary device as we do all the time in our plays and pictures. We often give the overall story once, then go back and give details which we feel make the story fleshed out and real. Also, we have several networks for the news and each of them brings something different to the account, different relevant details.. this is the same. There is no contradiction in the accounts of the gospels or in the creation stories.. all can be reconciled into one story, just with different angles. Just as Fox News and CNN might cover a story quite differently, but it can be the exact same event.

3) Why flood the world to rid it of evil when god knew (he knows everything apparently) that said evil would survive anyway?

You think THAT evil has survived to this day? I think you mistake what evil there was in the world at that time. I think God didn’t explain exactly what the sins were that they committed because He knows men would do it again if they knew what those sins were. So He purposely did not put in the account what they were doing – other than to say their every thought was evil and the earth was filled with violence. Evil happens now, but I do not think it happens now as it did then.

Gen 6:5 And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

I do not think this is true of all of mankind now. It is not true that EVERY imagination of our hearts are only evil continually.. and it certainly is not true of ALL mankind on the earth. Evil happens today, but it is not as widespread.. nor do we have whatever wicked knowledge they had which God had to destroy.. and it seems likely that it was that which continually corrupted their imaginations and thoughts. And, frankly, I do not wish to know what that evil knowledge they had was… because God didn’t like it, and see how He treated those who had that knowledge? (There is more backup for this from the Bible, but I have learned by experience it is best not to go into detail on evil, some people do take it and run with it and I do not wish to be blamed by God for helping along evil and sin in a person’s life, or their curiosity toward evil.)

4) “How could the perfect being whom could make no mistakes and knows everything make flawed beings?”

That begs the question.. is the entire enterprise of making mankind a “mistake”? OR, is it planned? I think it is planned because, as you just said, God is a PERFECT being who can make no mistakes. So how could He make flawed beings? I think the flaw you mean is sin – Our choices to make mistakes and act in wrong ways. All mankind has choice to sin.. why? Perhaps it is to have non-robot people follow Him. With no choice to reject God, how could He know we truly love Him? It isn’t love if you HAVE TO love someone is it? Maybe He doesn’t like that kind of forced “love” either. So not wishing to have forced love, that necessitates a choice.. which means you can be flawed (wrong choice) or blessed (right choice).

5) Why did god put the tree of knowlege in the garden if it didn’t want man to get to it? Couldn’t it have put some kind of forcfield around it? Afterall it can do anything right?

This fits with the previous question.. without choice, how can you know someone loves you and wishes to be with you? Love requires an unforced choice. With no tree to test our love toward God, we would only have been robots. Would you like to live with no choice in your life? Would you prefer to HAVE TO believe one way or another? Or to love someone.. to HAVE TO love them?

You also said, “I don’t know. Let’s do this lets ask every subdivision of christianity there is who has the right interpetation of the word of god and when I get one unified answer then I can tell you.”

You are expecting a unified answer from Christianity when the Bible itself says that for all of time there will be a lack of unity for a reason. Speaking to the CHURCH and not the world, it says:

1Co 11:18 For first of all, when you come together in the church, I hear that there be divisions among you; and I partly believe it.
1Co 11:19 For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.

The Bible says that there MUST be heresies among the church.. for a reason. To prove which ones are approved. You may not like that answer, but it is Biblical.

You say, “I imply that by saying that the bible is infallable and posseses all the answers in light of evidence to the contrary is an act of pride.” That would indeed be an act of pride, IF the evidence to the contrary were of any weight. You give it a lot of weight. I do not. I think it is very light and foolish, as God says that those who think they are weighty arguments are professing themselves to be wise, but are holding to a house of cards and building their understanding on sand which will not stand the test of time. As Jesus said:

Mat 7:26 Every one that hears these sayings of mine, and does not do them, shall be like a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:
Mat 7:27 And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

You may think the arguments you cite against the Bible are worth building your life upon because they appear to you to be true… but God says you are like a foolish man who builds on sand.. it will fall, and great will be the fall of it. The Bible will be proven to be what it is in the end – TRUTH. And He will “convince” all who are of the opposite opinion of that one day. Why He doesn’t do so now is to give you the chance to choose.. He will not force your love or obedience to the truth. You can choose sand if you wish.. but He warns you what will happen in the same way a parent warns a child not to run out in traffic..

When you say, “religon got it wrong. Worse they are wrong for telling anyone who does not believe that they are wrong yet offers no proof as to why. Again faith does not have to be based on logic and reason. Faith can be a good thing but too much faith is a dead end because without questioning our beliefs, our world etc we would never grow. Whether or not you admit to it you do seek your own answers to problems or questions every day.”

I have to ask you.. Do you find what I have penned to you here illogical or without reason? Do you think I have not come up against such questions as you posed here to me and looked for answers? Has the CHURCH no answers to the skeptics? When the skeptics said the Bible could not have been written 5,000 years ago.. or that the Hittites never existed.. or that a book could not be preserved in tact for a thousand years.. or that Mount Sinai never existed.. do you think Christians never took the time to look into it? All men look for proof that validates their faith, creationists or evolutionists, that is why the evolutionists have so much material on the net, to put before the public eye their proofs, as we do for our view and faith. Validating faith is an ongoing venture.. those who believe the Bible do not stick their heads in the sand or believe in spite of good evidence but because of it. Invariably as the Creationist searches and examines the evidence it ends up proving the creationist view right and the skeptics wrong. That is because we don’t trust in man for our answers.. but in the infallible Omnicience of God – and because all He says IS the Truth, “there is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the Lord” (Proverbs 21:30) – though some men might need to wait until after they die to become “convinced” of that.

Sara.

I would really like to know.”

Oh yes. Lots. All of which, that I can find, come up with the same results. Here’s a page I found with a good compilation, with data points ranging from 1927 to 1999.

http://kspark.kaist.ac.kr/Jesus/Intelligence%20&%20religion.htm

It shows that both a) smart people are less likely to be religious and conversely b) religious people are likely to be less smart. I split those two because the question is approached from multiple angles, all of which agree.

What hasn’t been proven is that religious people can’t be smart, or a religious person can’t be as smart as a nonreligious person, or that nonreligious people are always inherently smart and religious inherently intellectually inferior, or any such thing. I don’t know of anyone who would claim such a thing.

What also hasn’t been studied well is the cause/effect of intelligence of religious vs nonreligious. That is, do nonreligious people tend to be smarter because they’re nonreligious, or nonreligious because they’re smarter? My hypothesis is that the two factors feed on each other, but that smarter people tend to be less religious because they’re smarter. That said, I know of plenty of perfectly intelligent people who are also religious, so it isn’t a necessary cause/effect, just a general trend.

Irishman says: “Unfortunately, PR notwithstanding, theories and laws are very different things, so you can’t declare one the other and be done.”

I’m aware of the distinction, and your explanation is good, but it just seems like there’s a more fuzzy line than you have painted. I’m sure if there was a sufficiently good scientist who was also a sufficiently good lawyer, they could twist the words around to make evolution, or at least some parts of it, into some phrase that could arguably be interpreted as a “law” rather than a “theory.”

Maybe, maybe not, but it might be worth exploring, if for no other reason than academic.

I came here via Universe Today – newsletter and I’m just browsing around. Wanted to say Thank You for a great, informative site! This particular article has made some things much clearer. I’m a grad student, specilizing in impact geology. Astronomy is “just” a hobby, but I teach the basics to the kids through workshops and play. I’m sure I’ll be using the goodies here as a resource.

And while I have no time to read through all the comments on this article, and I certainly don’t want to get into any science vs. creationism debates, just throwing in my two cents: when I have the encounter of the fifth kind with believers in creationism (and it does happen more often than I’d like), I usually start it and end it (at the same time) with “Who created God?”. Obviously, I never get the answer.

I would really like to know.

ANASI WEAVER: The difference between quoting Einstien and quoting god is that I can perform Einstiens experiments to test his theories. I can PROVE relativity and provide concrete evedence of it. I can PROVE the speed of light and provide concrete evidence. I can PROVE that the faster we go them more our weight increases towards infinity. I can not only provide various documented experiments from various sources to prove Einstien is right.

What I cannot do however is prove or provide concrete evedence that the earth was created in 6 days. I cannot prove or provide concrete evedence that there was a race of half angels half man on earth. I cannot prove that god stoped the sun in the sky for a day. These are things I would have to take on FAITH. Faith does not provide proof. Faith does not provide concrete evedence. Faith give you hope that everything is going according to some plan or belief but that hope isn’t founded in REASON.

SARAH SAYS: I have to disagree with you that,“We as a race have to do it ourselves. And if that means we have to stop clinging to god’s coattails, admit that religion doesn’t have all the answers then so be it.”

ANASI WEAVER: But earlier you said:

“He doesn’t even LIKE to be seen as a “magic cure all for mortal problems”. Did you notice that when Jesus healed people in the Bible, He then told them NOT to tell anyone about it? That is because He didn’t want them to think He was a magic cureall for their mortal ailments. It isn’t that God cannot heal.. obviously Jesus did do a lot of healing and God can heal today. Even you would admit that He CAN heal if He chooses to. But He is not a performing dog who will do what we ask of Him on command.

And so if god CHOOSES not to do something for man then man has to do it for themselves. God chooses not to hunt and gather for us therfor we have to do it ourselves. God chooses not to cure disease therefore we have to do it ourselves. God chooses not to pay our rent therefore we have to do it ourselves.

SARAH SAYS: I would say your Mom’s time was up, not that she or you didn’t do something right. Because if she was praying, God answered.. He just didn’t answer the way we all would have wished Him to.

ANANSI WEAVER: I know that it was my mothers time to die, I accepted that fact that when I heard the doctors prognosis. What I was trying to illustrate with that story was that we are told that god has all the answers but is unwilling or unable to provide them.

SARAH SAYS: Those who look to God for help in those circumstances have great inner peace and calm and resolve so that, though we sorrow over them, we are not anxious about them “breaking” and losing it.. or suffering beyond their ability to bear, because God helps them in it, as He promises He will in the Bible.

ANANSI WEAVER: Right. That would be the same book that was interpited by man who are unable to understand your god’s superior mind? Again, you must provide proof of your claims.

SARAH SAYS: You ask me to ask myself if I REALLY believe what I have posted here.. 110%, I assure you. Faith is a shield, but not from hard questions. I have asked them.. that is why I have a Scripture for everything you have thrown at me. It is the answers to me. And when you speak of “contradictions inherent in my beliefs” I see none. I see some things which make me dig harder for answers. But I see an inexhaustable supply of answers.. and one very large book which apparently claims to be infallible and to answer all questions we may need answered in this life.

ANASI WEAVER: Great! So you could reach into your inexahustable supply of answers found in you big book and tell me why your god chose not to answer my moms prayers not to die of cancer (in no way saying that she wanted to live forever) because?

Why are there no mention of dinosaurs in genesis?

Why there are two different creation stories right next to each other?

Why flood the world to rid it of evil when god knew (he knows everything apparently )that said evil would survive anyway?

How could the perfect being whom could make no mistakes and knows everything make flawed beings?

Why did god put the tree of knowlege in the garden if it didn’t want man to get to it? Couldn’t it have put some kind of forcfield around it? Afterall it can do anything right?

Or any of my other questions I asked throughout this string.

SARAH SAYS: But trusting in God and His all-wise counsel which HE says He put in a book and preserves to us through all generations to me seems very wise, so I will do what I please to do.. trust in the One wiser than Einstein in all matters of this life and His written counsel. And I suggest you do, too. It just seems wiser than relying on yourself and your own wisdom.

ANANSI WEAVER: It is only wiser if and only if you were garanteed an answer. As you have stated god can choose not to answer which considering it’s track record seems improbable.
Also the bible has not preserved us through all generations as it is a relativly new book by other civilizations standards.

SARAH SAYS: WHY should I reinvent the wheel when this wheel has sufficed so many men and women throughout history and been reliable?

ANANSI WEAVER: Why not? Religion has been reinventing the wheel since it’s inception. The most recent reinvention would be Irreducable Complexity.

SARAH SAYS: Why must I handicap myself to the understanding of mere men and their counsels and views?

ANASI WEAVER: You already have you just refuse to see it.

SARAH SAYS: Why should I live in a world without the enlightenment Einstein’s theory of relativity gave to men?

ANANSI WEAVER: I don’t know. Why should I live in a world without the enlightenment Darwins theory on the evolution of life gave to men?

SARAH SAYS: Or the enlightenment from the Bible?

ANANSI WEAVER: I’m not saying you should. I just think that in it’s zeil to explain our world and by extension our universe, religon got it wrong. Worse they are wrong for telling anyone who does not believe that they are wrong yet offers no proof as to why.

SARAH SAYS: You state, “No one belief system, theory, book etc. can have all the answers to all the questions that life presents to us.” Really? How many Christians would agree with that assessment?

ANASI WEAVER: I don’t know. Let’s do this lets ask every subdivision of christianity there is who has the right interpetation of the word of god and when I get one unified answer then I can tell you.

SARAH SAYS: Do you really expect me to agree with you on that point?

ANANSI WEAVER: No I didn’t. The probability of you agreeing with me on this point was extremely low.

You go on to imply that to state that we CAN have the answers to life is prideful, all the while admitting that “Faith can be a wonderful thing. It can move people to do great things and to sacrifice for others..” but then say that people of faith must “admit that something isn’t working and take the steps to find the answers on our own.”

ANANSI WEAVER: No. I imply that by saying that the bible is infallable and posseses all the answers in light of evidence to the contrary is an act of pride. Again faith does not have to be based on logic and reason.

Faith can be a good thing but too much faith is a dead end because without questioning our beliefs, our world etc we would never grow. Whether or not you admit to it you do seek your own answers to problems or questions every day.

You said, “Is it really that difficult to come to terms with the possibility that the bible could be wrong?”

When you say this, you are already thinking it is a foregone conclusion that the Bible IS wrong. You say, “So far in this discussion you have offered no definitive proof of your claims other than to quote passages in the bible”.. but if you were to quote Einstein (who, by the way, was brilliant but not as brilliant as God) as your authority because you found his understanding superior, am I wrong to quote GOD when I speak? (The Bible says God wrote those words and I believe that, remember?) I have yet to see where Einstein.. I mean God.. is wrong in anything He has said. If what I quote in the Bible is incorrect, let me know. So far, I have not heard a peep saying I had misquoted Him.. and His understanding is worth knowing and following, more so than even Einstein’s.

You say that faith is good, but it must never be “BLIND”.. by that you mean it must be completely explained to your satisfaction, I believe? That there can be no mystery about God’s work or anything which is trusted to Him by.. faith? But those who are of faith do trust God..

2Ti 1:12 I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him against that day.

If you truly are of faith and have believed in Him.. you can say with the apostle here.. I KNOW WHOM I HAVE BELIEVED.. anything less than that is a guess at faith.. not real faith. And it only comes by true and heartfelt repentance before God…

You state, “No one belief system, theory, book etc. can have all the answers to all the questions that life presents to us.” Really? How many Christians would agree with that assessment? Do you really expect me to agree with you on that point? You go on to imply that to state that we CAN have the answers to life is prideful, all the while admitting that “Faith can be a wonderful thing. It can move people to do great things and to sacrifice for others..” but then say that people of faith must “admit that something isn’t working and take the steps to find the answers on our own.” I say it IS working because it does have good results as you pointed out (do great things and sacrifice for others, as you said) and we people of faith do not need to try and find answers “on our own” because we are not relying on OURSELVES to be infallible, Omnicient and all wise.

As for your mother’s death.. I am truly very sorry to hear of it. Death is an awful reality we all struggle with. It is the ultimate in pain infliction and evil. And God does not always answer our prayers with miraculous healings, so I do not fault you as though you are responsible for your mother’s death. Such an attitude would be ridiculous. You say, “she only asked god for one thing…. she didn’t want to die of cancer.” I think.. if I might gently remind you.. that all of us must die?? And, that none of us wants to die.. of cancer or any other way, really. It is an enemy, death.. as the Bible says it is. Our greatest enemy. None of us wants it (well, maybe the insane.. ) and we all don’t wish to die of cancer. But, people do.. she did. Does that make God evil? I don’t think so. I note that there was cancer in the family.. seems to me genetics plays a part and I would be first to say to look to medical solutions, too.. sort of, trust in God and pray, but make use of all means to help yourself. That is practical and wise, in my opinion. If you are shipwrecked you pray to God and row for shore. You don’t sit in the lifeboat thinking God will save you. You work toward that as much as you can.. so it is with sickness such as cancer. Pray to God for healing (I am sure she did, aren’t you?) but still use all means possible at your disposal. I think you will agree with me in this. But obviously it was her time to go, so that didn’t work because it wasn’t God’s will. And I am sorry for what you had to go through with her.

You say, “And it’s not because she didn’t pray right or because she didn’t have Jesus in her heart or she didn’t come to god as a child as you would have us believe”… errr… who me? I don’t think that. It is because she is human and subject to death as we all are. Death is not a salvation issue. You say she was very religious? Chances are she was already saved. PHYSICAL salvation from all pain is not promised in the Bible. Remember the apostles of Jesus Christ who wrote the New Testament.. they were not exempt from it as almost all of them died very disagreeable deaths. Yet, the church never faults God for it or says they were not saved because of it. It does not follow to say she did not have Jesus in her heart just because she died of cancer. God never promised us a rose garden along with the sunshine.. He only promised He would go with us through whatever we face and make it bearable and in the end work it all for the good.

And I agree with you “god isn’t going to wave its hand (if it even has such an appendage) and solve our problems simply because we ask.” He doesn’t even LIKE to be seen as a “magic cure all for mortal problems”. Did you notice that when Jesus healed people in the Bible, He then told them NOT to tell anyone about it? That is because He didn’t want them to think He was a magic cureall for their mortal ailments. It isn’t that God cannot heal.. obviously Jesus did do a lot of healing and God can heal today. Even you would admit that He CAN heal if He chooses to. But He is not a performing dog who will do what we ask of Him on command. And Jesus did not want people coming to Him JUST to get healed of a physical ailment. He was after the eternal change of heart.. He came to bring men to repentance, not to heal them of physical sickness. So He told them not to tell people He had healed them. He didn’t want a reputation as a healer of bodies, but of souls… And God, when we pray to Him about illness, sometimes His answer to our prayers is a doctor’s prescription, sometimes it is surgery, sometimes, yes, He can do a miraculous healing, and sometimes, praying people whom God loves die. We all must die sometime.. and sometimes it is His will for us to die, our time is “up”. I would say your Mom’s time was up, not that she or you didn’t do something right. Because if she was praying, God answered.. He just didn’t answer the way we all would have wished Him to. I am sorry for your loss, truly.. very sorry. HUG!

I have to disagree with you that, “We as a race have to do it ourselves. And if that means we have to stop clinging to god’s coattails, admit that religion doesn’t have all the answers then so be it.” I have seen cancer and other diseases ravage a life of a loved one close up, and I agree with you, it isn’t nice. But when I have contrasted those who have faith in God and trust in Him through that evil circumstance of their lives and those who do not have that faith.. I find that those who cling to God’s “coattails” and trust Him that, even if they don’t understand it all, God is good and has the answers and all will work out for the good in the end.. are blessed. They have more peace about the situation, and are not in such fear of death, nor do they have a fatalistic and almost suicidal look which drives you to feel apprehension and fear over them. I think clinging to God in the worst of times is a precious place where God can be of great comfort and help to those who are so afflicted. So long as God is with them, they can walk through that valley of the shadow of death and fear no evil.. and His rod and staff COMFORT them in that place of shadows between this life and the next. (Psalm 23, one of the most beloved Scriptures of all time.) God is a help when we are helpless and suffering.. I believe that death is often far too hard and we cannot do it ourselves. Those who look to God for help in those circumstances have great inner peace and calm and resolve so that, though we sorrow over them, we are not anxious about them “breaking” and losing it.. or suffering beyond their ability to bear, because God helps them in it, as He promises He will in the Bible.

You ask me to ask myself if I REALLY believe what I have posted here.. 110%, I assure you. Faith is a shield, but not from hard questions. I have asked them.. that is why I have a Scripture for everything you have thrown at me. It is the answers to me. And when you speak of “contradictions inherent in my beliefs” I see none. I see some things which make me dig harder for answers. But I see an inexhaustable supply of answers.. and one very large book which apparently claims to be infallible and to answer all questions we may need answered in this life. When you say to “back up my claims with something other than bible passeges” it is like asking someone who is relying on Einstein to put away from themselves all that he taught and make up their own ideas about physics without referring to Einstein ever. WHY should I reinvent the wheel when this wheel has sufficed so many men and women throughout history and been reliable? Why must I handicap myself to the understanding of mere men and their counsels and views? Why should I live in a world without the enlightenment Einstein’s theory of relativity gave to men? Or the enlightenment from the Bible?

I agree with you that those who think God will miraculously cure every ailment with a snap of His fingers are wrong (can I have the winning lotto ticket, too.. please?) But trusting in God and His all-wise counsel which HE says He put in a book and preserves to us through all generations to me seems very wise, so I will do what I please to do.. trust in the One wiser than Einstein in all matters of this life and His written counsel. And I suggest you do, too. It just seems wiser than relying on yourself and your own wisdom. I will now read the next post you just made.. but it will have to be later, going out for a bit. Sorry if anything seems redundant in this, no time to go over it again. Thanks for the discussion… I appreciate you for it.

Sara.

ANASI WEAVER: No, the inherent contridictions and fallicies in the bible does that for us. For example:

God loves us but makes evil.

God loves all it’s children, mass murderers, pedopphiles, rapists, thieves and the like but not homosexuals.

God knows everything but constantly feels the need to “test us”. (Knowing everything, including the outcome of the test, renders said test moot.)

God says Thou shalt not kill but then has us stone people for not keeping the sabbath or being gay or having an affair.

SARAH SAYS: Nor do your “proofs of science, FALSELY so called” make Him wrong in one iota of truth or doctrine.

ANASI WEAVER: Since you pointed out earlier in your post that “You are merely discovering by Science what He has done.” then the science must be true since god is the truth.

SARAH SAYS: You dispise what you do not know and proclaim that you have all truth

ANASI WEAVER: At no time do we make this claim. We repeatedly said that we don’t have all the answers and are searching for the truth while you have stated repetedly that your religoius dogma holds all truth. We just want you to provide proof of your claims without falling to the bible.

But apparently you can’t which isn’t surprising.

SARAH SAYS (CONTINUED): ….and DO know better than He does.. better than the Bible says is truth.

ANASI WEAVER: Again not what we are saying at all. We question your doctorine BECAUSE WE DON”T UNDERSTAND. IF you were able to provide a satisfactory answer, which didn’t come from a faulty source, then we wouldn’t keep having to ask questions would we?

Again, it’s not that I don’t believe there is or isn’t a god. I have no proof either way so I am open to the possiblity of there being one (or many) but if you are trying to prove to me that YOUR beliefs PROVE the existance of said god then the burden of proof falls to YOU. YOU have to provide FACTS not CONJECTURE. YOU have to SHOW why Irreducable Complexity PROVES the presence of the creator. YOU have to show SCIENTIFICALLY why IC works and evolution DOESN’T.

Don’t say that we are afraid of what we don’t understand when you are the one hiding behind vague quotes from a poorly edited, incomplete book. If you can do any of what I said above and prove your case then we would have to admit we were wrong and you were right, but you can’t. Faith isn’t about proof and since you have nothing but your faith in your god and religion to fall back on you cannot debate your point effectively.

I challenge you, before your god, to prove to me that what you believe is true and provide SOLID facts outside of your bible. If you can do that then I will concede to your viewpoint. If you can’t the you have to admit that the bible doen’t hold all tha answers.

Gentilemen, ladies, place your bets!

SARAH SAYS: I believe God’s testimony that the Bible is not a book written by humans, but that its testimony is true that the ALL Scripture in the Bible is given by inspiration of God.

ANANSI WEAVER: Which was translated and interpited by your admittably flawed, imperfect human(s) who could never understand the mind of god. So how can you say that the human(s) who wrote the bible got it 100% correct if it isn’t possible for any human to understand what god was talking about?

The very definition of the word inspiration (1 a: a divine influence or action on a person believed to qualify him or her to receive and communicate sacred revelation b: the action or power of moving the intellect or emotions c: the act of influencing or suggesting opinions.) suggests that it wasn’t god who wrote the bible but man.

When I quote this Scripture where it says that you cannot judge God, (reply against His all wise counsel) you say that you will and that your understanding is fully complete and that you have the right to do so and that you consider this understanding of God juvenile. (DTdNav said, “The god she describes reminds me of a child.” And Irishman said, “Any response you give will boil down to “Because God said so”. That is not an explanation or justification. That is merely a pronouncement.) “Just because I say so” is a foolish argument, even when applied to God, you say. He must explain Himself to your satisfaction and be subject to YOUR judgement, not you to His. You say that your view is wise, and that this one expounded in Scripture is foolish but…

Pro 14:12 There is a way which seems right to a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.

I can see you standing in a courtroom and telling off the judge.. saying His judgement means nothing and that “Because I say so” means nothing and your judgement is wiser than His. It is the same thing here.

Irishman, you say that you are correct to judge God and say that He is evil by what I have said when you said, “You have just stated that God, who is by definition all good, is also evil. I’m sorry, now you’ve failed basic logic and semantics.” You do not believe that He can possibly be the author of both good and evil.. Still.. it is the truth.

Isa 45:6 That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.
Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

God CREATES evil. You may say He has nothing to do with evil.. how then can that be if God says He creates it?

Pro 5:23 He shall die without instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.

Perhaps this does not mean that the instruction is not given, but only that it is rejected.. As the Scripture says.. “they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD: They would have none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.” And those who reject His knowledge will “eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices” which doesn’t mean you will subject to superior and wiser consequences, as you may think you will..

Pro 1:29 For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD:
Pro 1:30 They would have none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.
Pro 1:31 Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.
Pro 1:32 For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them.
Pro 1:33 But whoso hearkens to me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil.

Oh, and I use those words, including the words “FEAR of the Lord” in the ancient usage, not the modern..
so hopefully you won’t accuse me there, but chances are you don’t even know the ancient usage of the term…
(Try an old Oxford Dictionary for clarification if you need it.)

I leave you to His all wise and Omnicient, compassionate and kind judgement.
And I hope you will turn from trusting in your own understanding and thinking yourself wise and God’s words foolish..
before it is too late.

Sara.

PS Skepterist, as for my saying the Bible is ANCIENT.. that was in relation to how speech is used and the difference pointed out in the dictionary about “ancient” use of words (archaic) and the modern usage of words. By this measure, which was the context of those words, the Bible is ancient usage of words and the definitions of those words must be understood in the ancient way, not the modern (the point of my using the words ancient and modern). Again, context is important..

You also said, “You base your entire belief system on an invisible being you’ve read about in a book (written by humans) that totally contradicts the evidence gathered and verified by thousands of scientists all over the world, from hundreds of cultures, and yet you dare to call any non-believers fools?!?”

The Bible does not have this viewpoint. First of all, it states that God wrote the Bible (2Ti 3:16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God..) not humans. You may say you DISBELIEVE that, but.. it is what the Bible itself states. As for it being contradicted by “thousands of scientists from hundreds of cultures”.. it says that all such contradictions are only apparent, not real. That they are “oppositions of science FALSELY SO CALLED” (1 Timothy 6:20.. keep that which is committed to your trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called:) because there is no understanding which can be used against God or His Holy Truth (Pro 21:30 There is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the LORD.). This becomes apparent when you search out carefully those “oppositions of science falsely so called” with an eye toward truth without prejudice. You say to put down God’s counsel (the Bible) and find a PERSON instead to talk to.. well.. do you then think they are infallible, Omnicient, Omnipotent and all wise? That if I listen long enough to the counsel of man I will become wiser and reject God’s counsel as you have done? If that is the case, truly He is right to say Rom 1:22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools…

I cannot turn from God to the counsels of men as though they are of greater inspiration and wiser. I have indeed researched what I believe (the Bible) and rely on its counsel as correct against all who say it is not. I believe God’s testimony that the Bible is not a book written by humans, but that its testimony is true that the ALL Scripture in the Bible is given by inspiration of God.. There is no point against it that has withstood true inquiry, and those who set out to disprove it find themselves Christians because they realize that book is divine in origin (see “Many Infallible Proofs”, for instance). Your disbelief in the Word of God does not invalidate the truth of its pages. Nor do your “proofs of science, FALSELY so called” make Him wrong in one iota of truth or doctrine. You dispise what you do not know and proclaim that you have all truth and DO know better than He does.. better than the Bible says is truth. If relying on God’s counsel in the Bible is to you a reliance on circular reasoning, then I will gladly accept that fault rather than rely as you do on your own incomplete (human and fallible) understanding, false proof of science, and the counsels of mere men which, according to Scripture, cause you in the greatness of your folly to go astray.

Sara.

So far in this discussion you have offered no definitive proof of your claims other than to quote passages in the bible and offer your interpretations of its meaning. While at times I do find it amusing I fail to understand why you continue to use circular logic to justify your beliefs.

Is it really that difficult to come to terms with the possibility that the bible could be wrong? Is it that hard to admit that even with your faith you still have unanswered questions? Is it that difficult to say ” I don’t know.” instead of “The bible says?”

I am by no means saying that there is no god. I cannot say that god simply does not exist because I have no evidence of its existence and I can’t deny the POSSIBILITY that there is a god for the same reasons. Faith can be a wonderful thing. It can move people to do great things and to sacrifice for others but it is a double edge sword because BLIND FAITH can stifle life and promotes elitism, pride and stagnation.

No one belief system, theory, book etc. can have all the answers to all the questions that life presents to us. Sometimes in order to find the answers we seek we have to let go of our pride, admit that something isn’t working and take the steps to find the answers on our own.

I have a friend who is very religious and he really believes that god has the answer for everything. “All you have to do is ask and god will provide.” he would tell me. Then one day my mother was diagnosed with stomach cancer and given 6 moths to live and his first words to me was to pray for my mother’s good health.

He got really upset that I didn’t believe that prayer was the answer. I told him, as I believe, that god isn’t going to cure my mother. That’s not how the universe works and that we as a race, should have spent more time trying to solve the problems of the world i.e disease, famine, war, and less time asking god to do it for us. If we, as a race spent less time trying to prove whose god is the “one true god” and worrying about who is getting into heaven and who will burn in hell we could have found a cure for cancer, an answer for famine ended war and saves the lives of billions.

Now before you start to think that if I had taken my friends advice my mother would be alive today and / or that god was “testing my faith” I ask you to consider this:

My mother was a devoutly religious person. Even though she was chronically ill since she was a kid she went to church, kept up with all the holidays and followed all the rituals. She was a good person who never in her life wished anyone, even people who took advantage of her, any ill will. She always put a persons needs before her own and asked that her children do the same. Through all the illness and pain and hardship she endured she only asked god for one thing….

….she didn’t want to die of cancer. She saw what it did to her husband, she saw what it did to her mother and she asked god that if she had to die so be it that’s a part of life, but please I don’t want to die from cancer.

So naturally she got stomach cancer and my family got to watch as this wonderful, gentile, caring, kind, loving, supportive, intelligent woman who already suffered so much in her life slowly and painfully slip into dementia then a coma and finally die.

And it’s not because she didn’t pray right or because she didn’t have Jesus in her heart or she didn’t come to god as a child as you would have us believe it’s because god isn’t the magic cure all for mortal problems. It is apparent even in your bible, that god isn’t going to wave its hand (if it even has such an appendage) and solve our problems simply because we ask. We as a race have to do it ourselves. And if that means we have to stop clinging to god’s coattails, admit that religion doesn’t have all the answers then so be it.

I beseech you to take a step back and look, really look at what you are telling us here and be honest with yourself. Ask yourself “Do I really believe what I posted here or am I using my faith to shield me from the hard questions and the contradictions inherent in my beliefs?

And if you continue to post in this thread I would ask that you back your claims with something other that bible passeges.

The Bible is not a “very ANCIENT book” by any means. Even if you go back to the original papyrus the first passages were written on, say 5,000 years ago (and that’s being generous), that’s not even close to being old compared to the age of the earth. If we round the age of the earth to 4.5 BILLION years, the old testament has been around for about 0.0001% of the time. Human beings (and I mean Homo sapiens) have only been on this planet for the last 200,000 years or so – only 0.004% of the time the earth has existed. That is an insignificant amount of time, geologically speaking. Not to mention, the Chinese have examples of writing from over 8,000 years ago. So, even if you consider the brief amount of time humans have been able to write, the current Bible (New Testament) is less than 2000 years old. Not ancient by any standard.

You seem thoroughly, passionately convinced that the book you read today (printed in what year?) is the only “truth” because that book TELLS YOU it is the only truth. That means to me that you have not at any time QUESTIONED the validity of what you are reading, because it TELLS YOU NOT TO! You seem unable to find any answer to anyone’s questions without quoting a line or two from scripture, with no empirical evidence or personal observation to back up your claims. You base your entire belief system on an invisible being you’ve read about in a book (written by humans) that totally contradicts the evidence gathered and verified by thousands of scientists all over the world, from hundreds of cultures, and yet you dare to call any non-believers fools?!?

I’m not trying to shake your faith, but I think you need to open your mind a little. You’re a victim of one aspect of human nature – the need to follow what someone else tells you to do. It makes your world a safe and comfy place, where you have a peace of mind because you believe your immortal soul will be granted eternal life, as long as you do not question what you are told. I suggest you consider allowing yourself to experience one of the many other traits of human nature – the need to question and understand the world around you. I have learned to question, with growing passion, what I have been told, because it does not match what I have seen myself. I see there is a much larger universe out there than what a holy book can possibly explain. I have taken off my blinders. I think you should try the same. Even for a moment.

Put down the bible, and take a step outside. Find a person (a real human being) and talk to them about something OTHER than the bible. Don’t talk about religion or faith, but something else. And then come back and tell us if that person you spoke with is less “real” to you than God. Its just a suggestion.

B-)

> ALL things are worked after the counsel of His will.. even evil? Yes, He says here ALL things, even evil.

> God can do that. He has the power to work good out of evil, according to the counsel of His own will. So I ask you, how can you say that because there is evil it MUST disprove God in some way.. such as His Omnipotence, Omnicience, His being wholly good, or even His existence? Your view is that God therefore is outside of that evil, not working through it for good.

You have just stated that God, who is by definition all good, is also evil. I’m sorry, now you’ve failed basic logic and semantics.

> As for your acknowledgement that God considers men who do not believe in Him fools, and that His words which I quoted offend you. I think you need to deal with the reality of the authorship of those words and not fault the messenger. Railing as the signpost on the roadside which says “watch out for falling rock” is not getting to the importance of the matter at hand or the intent of the author of those words (which you are also assuming was ridicule and not merely descriptive).

You example would be more appropriate if the sign said, “Watch for falling rock, you moron!” You know, if God wants to call me a fool, let him do it to my face, and not have self-appointed lackeys chasing me down on internet blogs who think insulting me is the way to get me to listen to them.

> Religious truth requires a radical paradigm shift which is so revolutionary that Jesus described it as being like being “born again”.. something which means coming into a completely different world of understanding. It may do no good to explain this world to you because you will not go through the door into that other world by repentance to see for yourself..

Once again, you make assumptions about me that are not true. You do not know my history, my childhood raised in church, my study of the Bible, my sincere prayers, my baptism. You know nothing about me, and assume that my beliefs have always been what they are now.

> When you ask, “Why is death the magic line?” Because by the time a person gets to the point of their death, the choice has been made.

Sorry, that is not an answer to the question, it is merely restating it. Why is the choice concluded at death? If our souls/spirits are eternal, and bound for an eternal existence independent of our bodies, why is the removal from the body the critical decision time? Why is that the point that matters?

I’m sure you don’t have a real answer. Any response you give will boil down to “Because God said so”. That is not an explanation or justification. That is merely a pronouncement.

I think this last post of yours pretty much proves that the constructive conversation is over, and all that’s left is the preaching.

The god she describes reminds me of a child. “I’m not gonna come out until you ask me in JUST the right way. And you have to tell me I’m the bestest most smartest god ever and you are nothing compared to me and you have to apologize to ME for not being created so you can live up to my standards that, admittedly, only I can live up to. Oh, if you don’t do that, when you die I’m going to finally give you the information you need to succeed…Oops, darn, it’ll be too late then and I’m going to make you suffer for all eternity. But it’s your choice, you have the free will.”

Maybe Zeus is not too busy to talk.

Dan 4:34-35 I blessed the most High, and I praised and honoured him that lives for ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation: And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he does according to His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say to Him, What are you doing?

This says that you, indeed, are the Lord’s..

ALL those who dwell in the earth belong to Him as His own creation, the works of His hands. ALL, you ask? Yes, ALL.. all those who dwell in the earth, even those who do not acknowledge Him now or deny His very existence, this says.

And no one can say to Him “What are You doing?” when He chooses to do something or act in some way they disapprove of. That does not mean they cannot say the words.. it means that such words will not stand. It is a losing proposition to choose to judge God. He cannot lose. Only man can. Infinite wisdom and knowledge cannot be corrected by fallible man with his incomplete understanding. NONE can stop His hand or say to Him.. “what are you doing?”

When you say, “.. the simple answer is that the existence of evil disproves either that God is all-powerful (he can’t prevent all evil), all-knowing (he is unaware the evil is occurring), all-good (God likes a little evil now and then), or else that he exists at all (the simplest answer).”

You are again making up with your incomplete understanding ideas which are incorrect. You cannot stop His being all powerful and all knowing and all good.. by saying that evil is incompatible with it. Just as you cannot bring order out of chaos, but God does all the time. God says He uses evil to work good. It is part of His plan for mankind.

Rom 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good …

Here Scripture says ALL things work together for the good. ALL THINGS??? Even evil? Yes. ALL. And further that it is worked:

Eph 1:11 .. according to the purpose of Him who works all things after the counsel of His own will:

ALL things are worked after the counsel of His will.. even evil? Yes, He says here ALL things, even evil.

God can do that. He has the power to work good out of evil, according to the counsel of His own will. So I ask you, how can you say that because there is evil it MUST disprove God in some way.. such as His Omnipotence, Omnicience, His being wholly good, or even His existence? Your view is that God therefore is outside of that evil, not working through it for good. Your view conflicts with His.. whose do you think will win?

As for your acknowledgement that God considers men who do not believe in Him fools, and that His words which I quoted offend you. I think you need to deal with the reality of the authorship of those words and not fault the messenger. Railing as the signpost on the roadside which says “watch out for falling rock” is not getting to the importance of the matter at hand or the intent of the author of those words (which you are also assuming was ridicule and not merely descriptive).

From http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/fool:

- a person who has been tricked or deceived into appearing or acting silly or stupid: to make a fool of someone.
- “fool with” – to handle or play with idly or carelessly: to be hurt while fooling with a loaded gun; to fool with someone’s affections.

If the term is descriptive of playing idly or carelessly with sacred truth.. and is an act of someone who has been tricked or deceived into acting stupidly thereby.. then we are not talking about a term of ridicule, nor of contempt, but one of DESCRIPTION:

1) One who acts unwisely on a given occasion: I was a fool to have quit my job.
2) One who has been tricked or made to appear ridiculous; a dupe: They made a fool of me by pretending I had won.
3) “The word has in modern English a much stronger sense than it had at an earlier period; it has now an implication of insulting contempt which does not in the same degree belong to any of its synonyms, or to the derivative foolish.” [OED]

Remember the Bible is a very ANCIENT book.. and modern English is not the right standard to judge the words used in it by. Though sometimes modern uses can almost resurrect the old:

n. As used by hackers, specifically describes a person who habitually reasons from obviously or demonstrably incorrect premises and cannot be persuaded by evidence to do otherwise; it is not generally used in its other senses, i.e., to describe a person with a native incapacity to reason correctly, or a clown. Indeed, in hackish experience many fools are capable of reasoning all too effectively in executing their errors. See also cretin, loser, fool file.

We use the words Paradigm Shift for those who are able to make the leap from one set of premises to another. Religious truth requires a radical paradigm shift which is so revolutionary that Jesus described it as being like being “born again”.. something which means coming into a completely different world of understanding. It may do no good to explain this world to you because you will not go through the door into that other world by repentance to see for yourself.. but you cannot reason your way into that other world because:

1Co 2:14 … the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness to him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

Since you are in the natural state, the Bible says these truths appear to be foolishness to you. How can you get to the point of understanding a world which you cannot see? I know God as a person.. He is more real to me than you are. You can know Him too.. if you would humble yourself and ask His forgiveness. If you will not do so, you cannot reason yourself into faith because such truths are from another dimension and are spiritually discerned. I am like the man in the book “Flatland” (a classic, hope you have read it, by Edwin A. Abbott) explaining to you the person from the fourth dimension who has spoken to me. It is beyond your current knowledge and it will seem to you that I am FOOLISH.. all things from this other realm will be “foolishness to him: neither can he know them” because they require something you do not have, a kind of “spiritual discernment” which man does not naturally have in his unrepentant state. The only thing I can do is urge you to the only petition God will hear from a sinner.. repentence. Beyond that door, there is much more. Without it.. discussion will indeed seem futile.

To that end I will give it one more try..

You say, “Why is a serial mass murderer able to “repent” at the last second before death and get into Heaven, but a decent person who tries his best to help others but waits for the evidence can’t change his mind right after death and be saved?”

You obviously consider yourself a decent person who tries to help others.. and so.. deserving of heaven? That goodness you hold onto which says you are adequate before God and do not need to repent to Him is an error. Though the serial mass murderer is guilty of more evil.. you are not guiltless. EACH person is a sinner and all deserve the same penalty, eternal separation from God (which is called hell). The difference comes when a person knows they are guilty before God and asks Him for forgiveness. God made the way back to Him easy enough a child can do it. All it takes is a bit of humility and willingness to admit fault. Stopping relying on your own goodness and decency and realizing that your own decency has flaws in it which God considers as sinful as that mass murderer.

Pro 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart; and do not lean to your own understanding.
Pro 3:6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct Your paths.
Pro 3:7 Do not be wise in your own eyes: fear the LORD, and depart from evil.

Does this not say that our own understanding is inadequate? That we must acknowlege Him, come to Him in repentance, and not think ourselves wiser than God? And if you turn from Him this day, saying you will not repent of your sins and saying you are wiser and can judge Him (as you did in this post by saying, “.. the simple answer is that the existence of evil disproves either that God is all-powerful (he can’t prevent all evil), all-knowing (he is unaware the evil is occurring), all-good (God likes a little evil now and then), or else that he exists at all (the simplest answer).” ) will you be justified in doing so?

Those who repent are forgiven.. it is the repentance which God wishes and will not allow any into heaven without. He made the bar to Heaven easy to get over for anyone.. without partiality. So long as they are willing to admit their sin, asking forgiveness, and turn from it.. that is. If the mass murderer will do so and the decent person who tries to help others will not.. God will not forgive the decent person because they did some good in their lives. He will show them the evil they ignored and glossed over and which offended His Holiness and Righteousness and condemn them justly. He offers forgiveness, but it is not a cheap or lowly offer.

When you ask, “Why is death the magic line?” Because by the time a person gets to the point of their death, the choice has been made. Saddam had a lot of time in prision to think about his eternal destiny and repent. He never did. But he was given the opportunity and can never fault God for his destiny. He can never say God is merciless and wicked and cruel when he was given the opportunity to repent and rejected it. He chose to spend eternity without God.. and what does a place without God look like.. without goodness, and mercy and peace and joy and love and kindness and gentleness? What do you think that place looks like? That is what hell is. And the choice to be with God (whose goodness is experienced by all every day) or not.. (ever heard the saying ‘hell on earth’??) belongs to each person, as it does to you.