| Sri Lumpa said: |
First of all, i hope everything is good on your side. Hope you and your love ones didn`t get affected by the riots.
So, in your view, God and man should be judged alike to avoid moral relativism, even if they aren`t the same?
God, nor me, has two standards for man and Himself in the way that you are trying to pass. It`s an impossibility to see them as one, when they are different.
if God created life and therefore decides who lives and who dies, who am i to say that me or someone else should have the same power as to avoid moral relativism?
Moral relativism between man can be avoided because we are all the same, the same doesn`t apply to us and God. That`s why i don`t call it moral relativism. Because, even though we share the same "morality" we can`t, given our natures, live it or apply it the same way.
About your "possibility", the problem with reason is that, in the realm of possibilities everything looks and feels the same. But to know what`s real or at least in what they differ, you have to look at reality itself.
Is Satan actually God? No. And i can honestly say that given the Bible and apparitions.
Can i say that something actually is immoral? Well, until someone tells that God told them to do this or that, i can say it`s contrary to God. Those terrorists never claimed that God appeared to them to to what they did. They just told they were themselves that in the name of God, as in, for He`s sake.
If you judge based solely on someone`s actions you are bound to overlook why such thing was done. Can you comprehend God in absolute way to call it yourself immoral?
What i said was that what comes from God is good. Which reflects more than morality. Which has been your only concern.
"You start life on the sidewalk"
This shows two ways in which we don`t agree.
You start life not on the safe side, but amidst a possibility, or risk as you call it: heaven or hell will be yours, there`s no escaping that. So that is where you start.
In that sense, everyday of your life, you do choose your path: either you go on the sidewalk or you go to the road. Of what`s given to you to choose/decide/accept - i spoke of decisions but not in a rational way - where you want to walk.
Another day comes, more choices you have to make, you keep deciding where to walk. No one, ever, throws you to the road or the sidewalk. What you accept, etc., is what makes you go one way or the other.
I speak about God: he/she decides/accepts/chooses to embrace it or not.
Giving someone a possibility, is just that. In the face of it you choose.
Your risk is nothing but a possibility. You aren`t putting no one in the road or the sidewalk, you are giving them something to act upon, without leaving your place.
That`s why i always said no one is saved or damned. Your either saved or damned when your life is over, until then, there are a lot of things that will still happen.
About salvation for the good of heart, it actually is referred to in the Bible: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+2%3A14-16&version=NIV
You say it`s cronyism for two reasons: first you downplay faith as a factor; second, you still base salvation on the fact it should rely just on morality.
Faith and morality are important. Both of them. In God rewards you based on that. God favours no one. To me that`s justice and being fair because it`s open to everybody, which isn`t the case with cronyism.
Faith is not the same as having a favourite colour, and yes, you are in control of it. Faith is a gift for those who open their hearts. If you want God and heaven, you do need to open up your heart first.
That`s how you are entitled to salvation.
Hell and heaven are a result of God`s justice. You had your life to choose and follow Him or not. What comes as a result, is the consequences of your actions.
I said this: "who says that God doesnt`t punish you or that He doesn`t try to help you change?"
That being, who says that this conversation isn`t God trying to show you the way? I might be doing a bad job though! :D
Taking what is said above, so now God is responsible for your lack of faith and possible damnation? That`s the first time i heard this.
God lets us have a say in the salvation of people and you still criticize Him? Blamed if He does something, blamed if He doesn`t.
It`s not stroking an ego, that`s what you would say if it applied to humans, and even then you might be wrong. That`s just your interpretation.
