Understanding Christianity

[Navaros]

Original post doesn't have any misinformation in it.

[TB666]

Jesus Christ, is the Son of God

He is God!

Misinformation right there.
Atleast keep the stories straight.
Being the son of god while being the god himself is just well sick.
Like something out of "Deliverance".
Unless Jesus is one god and "god" is another which makes christianity a polytheism. Of course with the trinity factor christianity is already one so I guess that just another deity to the tree.

He will forgive you and give you eternal life

Until you die of disease, old age or shot by some random drug addict etc
Reminds me of South Park.
"having sex with children had made him immortal so he lived for an eternity until he got hit by a train"

Then as a child of God

So that's why you don't get eternal life. Jesus gets jealous.
Common problem among first born

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son

Is the one and only son us or Jesus ??
Make up your mind.

Because He offers us the gift of eternal life freely

Now that is just plain wrong.
If he offered it freely you wouldn't have to worship him or submit yourself to him or even depend on him.
That's like giving away free samples of food as long as you pay for it.

the wonderful gift of eternal life

Sorry but there is nothing wonderful about an eternal life.
It's a curse, not a gift.

[Adrian II]

If he offered eternal life freely you wouldn't have to worship him or submit yourself to him or even depend on him. That's like giving away free samples of food as long as you pay for it.

[Navaros]

Misinformation right there.
Atleast keep the stories straight.
Being the son of god while being the god himself is just well sick.
Like something out of "Deliverance".
Unless Jesus is one god and "god" is another which makes christianity a polytheism. Of course with the trinity factor christianity is already one so I guess that just another deity to the tree.

Until you die of disease, old age or shot by some random drug addict etc
Reminds me of South Park.
"having sex with children had made him immortal so he lived for an eternity until he got hit by a train"

So that's why you don't get eternal life. Jesus gets jealous.
Common problem among first born

Is the one and only son us or Jesus ??
Make up your mind.

Now that is just plain wrong.
If he offered it freely you wouldn't have to worship him or submit yourself to him or even depend on him.
That's like giving away free samples of food as long as you pay for it.

Sorry but there is nothing wonderful about an eternal life.
It's a curse, not a gift.

According to the Bible, God encompasses three distinct personalities that make up the Godhead. All 3 parts are just as much God as each other - each of the 3 personalities is 100% God all by itself, and none of the 3 personalities are any "more God" than the other. And they are also 100% God when combined together, too. Those three personalities are: God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. That is the best way to explain it in a way that humans can be able to somewhat comprehend it. But yes, it doesn't make much sense because humans have a limited, human understanding. God is one, and three, at the same time. Jesus Christ is both God, and the Son of God, at the same time.

However, this concept being confusing and hard for a human to understand, doesn't mean the OP had misinformation in it. The OP's information is completely in line with what the Bible claims.

This is why in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, has God saying things like "Let us make man in our image". The "us" and "our" is the 3 parts of the Godhead.

In regards to your problems with the statement "He will forgive you and give you eternal life ". Eternal life refers to continuing to exist after one no longer exists in his her her human body. It was never meant to refer to living eternally in a human body. That is simply a personal misinterpretation of what the OP is saying, not misinformation.

I thought you thought that Jesus was a bleeding heart good for nothing liberal? What's happened to your religious rigour man? I used to admire the way you stood up against these newfangled wishy washy cults, and how you preached hell and brimstone old testament. What's happened to the old Navaros? Has he mellowed?

I still have real trouble trying to reconcile the Old Testament with the New Testament, and still do agree with the Old Testament much moreso. But I still believe in Jesus' divinity even though I don't agree with all his teachings. And I woulda understood the content of the OP as not being misinformation even if I didn't happen to agree with the information in it. The OP did not misrepresent the information represented in the Bible, so it's not misinformation. One could argue that he or she disagrees with the information in the OP, but the word "misinformation" implies the OP was deliberately posting information that is contrary to the information in the Bible, which is not the case.

[Tribesman]

I still have real trouble trying to reconcile the Old Testament with the New Testament

well that might be because you are tryng to reconcile very different things by many different authors that have been altered countless times ... or it could be that as Zuch suggests you havn't heard the word of god .
Then again it could be that Zuch hasn't really heard the word of God and is claiming he has so he doesn't have to address the contradictions .

[Banquo's Ghost]

According to the Bible, God encompasses three distinct personalities that make up the Godhead. All 3 parts are just as much God as each other - each of the 3 personalities is 100% God all by itself, and none of the 3 personalities are any "more God" than the other. And they are also 100% God when combined together, too. Those three personalities are: God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. That is the best way to explain it in a way that humans can be able to somewhat comprehend it.

What you need here, good Navaros, is a shamrock.

[Don Corleone]

The elephant head was in reference to Ganesh.

The way I had the Trinity explained to me was with reference to geography (courtesy of Sister Priscilla Paradis). The Atlantic Ocean is NOT the Pacific Ocean, yet they ARE the same body of water, no?

[Geoffrey S]

Three sides of the same coin springs to mind.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

For those among us who do not regularly spin off the Creeds and have them down by heart, wiki is fairly accurate here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicene_Creed

Mind, I can't imagine how you'd fake the Creed.

As to the issue of the resurrection, I'm afraid the Dean of Exeter doesn't agree with you Nav. Jewish, and hence Christian resurrection is a bodily matter as well as spiritural one. Have a look at revelations again.

As to the Holy Trinity, to paraphase Boethius, "If I say; one sword, one brand, one blade, I am still only referring to one sword." I rather like that, even if it is unfortunately martial.

[Sigurd]

What about the Godhead actually being 3 seperate enteties? It too will fit into what is written in the Bible.
And it will actually make sense as to one being the father of the other.
Oh wait, the polytheistic problem

[Kralizec]

The way I had the Trinity explained to me was with reference to geography (courtesy of Sister Priscilla Paradis). The Atlantic Ocean is NOT the Pacific Ocean, yet they ARE the same body of water, no?

Somebody once explained it to me using a three leafed clover as an analogy. I like this one better, though.

[MilesGregarius]

But I still believe in Jesus' divinity even though I don't agree with all his teachings.

Huh?

What I can never get about certain branches of Christianity is their need to proclaim their personal relationship with Jesus and that He is their Lord and Savior, but that they prefer the Old Testament's fire and brimstone or Paul's ego-stroking proclamations of Christians' specialness.

To me, the only relevant part of the Bible to one who sees Jesus as the Messiah are the Gospels. If Jesus is the Messiah, how can His teachings be subordinate to those of the Old Testament writers or to those of the Epistles? If there is conflict or contradiction between the them, how can Jesus' own words not take precedence?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Huh?

What I can never get about certain branches of Christianity is their need to proclaim their personal relationship with Jesus and that He is their Lord and Savior, but that they prefer the Old Testament's fire and brimstone or Paul's ego-stroking proclamations of Christians' specialness.

To me, the only relevant part of the Bible to one who sees Jesus as the Messiah are the Gospels. If Jesus is the Messiah, how can His teachings be subordinate to those of the Old Testament writers or to those of the Epistles? If there is conflict or contradiction between the them, how can Jesus' own words not take precedence?

You can't, the Gospels come up trumps.

I recently worked out what bothers me about Evangelical Christians, the whole focus of Jesus tends to ignore the Almighty and hence there's far too much focus on Jesus' love.

What's the problem with that you ask?

Well, it allows you to beat up on hummanity without reservation, we're all wretched, the only reason God saves us is because he loves us, we don't deserve it etc... What I realised is that God is not only Loving, he is Just, so there must be something in hummanity worthy of redemption or at least the chance of it.

Ergo, we don't completely suck, just mostly.

[Navaros]

What I can never get about certain branches of Christianity is their need to proclaim their personal relationship with Jesus and that He is their Lord and Savior, but that they prefer the Old Testament's fire and brimstone or Paul's ego-stroking proclamations of Christians' specialness.

To me, the only relevant part of the Bible to one who sees Jesus as the Messiah are the Gospels. If Jesus is the Messiah, how can His teachings be subordinate to those of the Old Testament writers or to those of the Epistles? If there is conflict or contradiction between the them, how can Jesus' own words not take precedence?

The New Testament doesn't make a crystal clear statement about the Old Testament being invalid. Jesus said he did not come to abolish the Law (meaning, the Old Testament). Yet at the same time, he also contradicted a whole whackload of what the Old Testament said. Jesus also made references to much of the content of the Old Testament being accurate.

His teachings should logically be subordinate to the Old Testament because the teachings there were given by God the Father, who Jesus prayed to and was subordinate to during his time on Earth. Besides that, God is supposed to be eternal and unchanging, and Jesus' words as recorded in the Bible, do not bother to explain what caused God to "change his mind" about all these things.

Then there is Paul and the Apostles who in the New Testament, affirmed the validity of the Old Testament's teachings in addition to Jesus and claimed that both are to be practiced together, even though they can't be totally reconciled with each other.

I have to come to realize that there is no infalliable way for a human being to interpret all of these and similar things, and that is why there are so many different labels of Christianity and interpretations of what it means to be Christian.

The root cause of all these problems is that a book is an inadequate format to contain all these things. The only format that would actually work would be an interactive format, with God and/or Jesus directly answering every specific question that is ever put to them, live on demand, to every person who ever asks them something.

[Tribesman]

OK enough of that , stop it , bring back the other Navaros .

[Geoffrey S]

The root cause of all these problems is that a book is an inadequate format to contain all these things. The only format that would actually work would be an interactive format, with God and/or Jesus directly answering every specific question that is ever put to them, live on demand, to every person who ever asks them something.

Sounds like we need a message board with the Bible as FAQ?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

The New Testament doesn't make a crystal clear statement about the Old Testament being invalid. Jesus said he did not come to abolish the Law (meaning, the Old Testament). Yet at the same time, he also contradicted a whole whackload of what the Old Testament said. Jesus also made references to much of the content of the Old Testament being accurate.

His teachings should logically be subordinate to the Old Testament because the teachings there were given by God the Father, who Jesus prayed to and was subordinate to during his time on Earth. Besides that, God is supposed to be eternal and unchanging, and Jesus' words as recorded in the Bible, do not bother to explain what caused God to "change his mind" about all these things.

Then there is Paul and the Apostles who in the New Testament, affirmed the validity of the Old Testament's teachings in addition to Jesus and claimed that both are to be practiced together, even though they can't be totally reconciled with each other.

What about this: The Old Testemant was transmitted through human prophets, while the Gospels are the words of the Christ, the manifestation of God on Earth. So logically God came down himself to iron out the kinks and that is why the Gospels are the ultimate authoriety.

[KukriKhan]

What about this: The Old Testemant was transmitted through human prophets, while the Gospels are the words of the Christ, the manifestation of God on Earth. So logically God came down himself to iron out the kinks and that is why the Gospels are the ultimate authoriety.

That's a tempting tack, but wouldn't it only work if the Nazarene (or his dad) had authored his own book/gospel? In the end, the gospels are the accounts of men, about the christ, the same as the pentateuch is/are the accounts of men, about god, the father.

[Ronin]

Original post doesn't have any misinformation in it.

you are a lot of fun too Navaros....don´t worry the new guy won´t make us forget about you

Navaros might be feeling a bit threatened in his position here guys....let´s make sure we make him feel he is still important...

I´ll still laugh at your posts first Navaros...this new guy won´t take your place don´t worry.

[Pannonian]

Original post doesn't have any misinformation in it.

I thought you thought that Jesus was a bleeding heart good for nothing liberal? What's happened to your religious rigour man? I used to admire the way you stood up against these newfangled wishy washy cults, and how you preached hell and brimstone old testament. What's happened to the old Navaros? Has he mellowed?