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used to play that song on the guitar.. and sing

I'll have to think a while to understand what you are trying to convey.

Tomk - Aren't hosers from Oklahoma?

And then again, when gently prodded Renauda can write an excellent post.

Let's find out.

JBryan, are you a hoser!

Actually I am no longer quite the hoser I used to be some years back. Still, I do enjoy a rollicking beer drinking bout with good company, (hosers of course) fine food and hard drivin' music. heck, I'll drink with anyone if the timing and occasion is right!

Knew it! Henceforth I will consider you a friend and will dispense only kindness and good will in your direction. I have been impolite and I am now contrite. You are an interesting person.

Tom

Gee, I hope you like British beer, Deep Purple and seering Chicago and Texas Blues. Cheers!

Tadcaser Porter, Double Diamond, Whatney's and Guiness Stout--warm. (In that order.) Been to Montreaux just to see. And I'm the most bad ass blues guitar player on the entire Piano Forum!

Cool. What's your axe? Mine's a Red TexMex Telecaster with Joe Barden pickups. I use .009 D'Addarios. I also have an el cheapo Godin Radiator that I have set up for playing slide - I use .017 Dobro strings on that puppy.

Get down to some Boogie Chillin'.

Best guitar ever: a Bradlee-caster. Bought it a a cheepo store called "Bradlees's" and did it up myself. Wound the pickups, wired it in quad.

Also have a Les Paul Special that Les Paul himself played and pre CBS Srat.

Nice to meet you. You just never know.

Best guitar ever: a Bradlee-caster. Bought it a a cheepo store called "Bradlees's" and did it up myself. Wound the pickups, wired it in quad.

Also have a Les Paul Special that Les Paul himself played and pre CBS Srat.

Nice to meet you. You just never know.

Maybe, but I think that

1. Much, if not all, of our suffering is the result of our human imperfections, most notably the flaw of abusing our free will to disobey the will of God or to deny the existence of God himself. In other words, that part of our existence was not what God wanted, but since we collectively burned our butts, we've got to sit on the blister.

2. God's plan for us must include developing a love for God, and an understanding of His nature, that can only come through these negative experiences. I've learned far more about the nature of God, and my relationship with Him, through adversity than ever through comfort. As spritual beings, we will ultimately live on "this side" of creation and on the "other side." Only by living through some of the adversity of "this side" can we prepare for our ultimate destiny of undestanding God's will for us, both here and there. Another aspect is that I believe that Christians are commanded to serve as, figuratively and literally, as the body of Christ; the physical manifestation of God on earth. Experiencing these problems and having one's faith tested and refined by them helps us personally - but helping others as they experience the bad times, and equally importantly, having others observe how you, as a Chrisitan, weather these storms - is worth far more than reading a thousand pages of theology in terms of understanding what God is really all about.

Not experiencing the physical life, and just floating aorund in a happy celestial state and apparently without a free will to disobey our Creator, is apparently not what God wanted for us. Apparently he wanted better. He wants us to become Sons of God. That's a pretty high calling; "a little above angels," quoting from the Bible. I gues with a high calling comes some pretty difficult homework.

Zorro and Crash Test, you both asked sincere and good questions. I've spent much of the last several years wondering some of the same things, and I continue to search for answers. I don't claim to have all the answers; far from it actually. I'm just trying to throw out a few more crumbs of food for thought for folks going down the same path as me...

(oops...)

"If a happy, upstanding life is not the point for God, why does it matter that we live on earth to begin with?"

I suppose one quick answer is: some vessels were made for wrath.

Your original query reminded me of Mark Twain's short story "Little Bessi". Check it out sometime.

A work that I think you might like and it's quite readable is Paul Tillich's "The Dynamics of Faith". He is one of my favorite religious thinks of the 20th century. He nicely distinguishes between "faith", "belief", "knowledge". And, if I remember, rightly gets to the matter of theodicy by end of the book. Also his "Courage to Be" is a good read. But I'd start there.

Another is Martin Buber's old "I and Thou". Sorry I can't give you answers to your questions. The best I can do, at least for the moment, is point in the direction of some things I've found useful in thrashing through some of the same questions.

Good questions. Keep asking.

(If you've the inclination, perhaps you'll find Edwards "Sinners in the Hands of Angry God" a fun read )

Dwain and netizen, thank you both for the replies.

I will check out those books, since although we may never know the answer, knowledge sure gets us a little closer!

*bump.*

Since Larry and TomK don't are unwilling to respond to my questions I would appreciate a response from any Christian who would like to clarify these points for me. Essentially I am trying to understand the religious reasoning behind the belief that the Bible is the word of god, the last question was directed more at TomK regarding a comment he made in this thread.

Thanks,

Elena
http://www.concertpianist.com

Elena,

Sorry, I didn't answer right away. Been busy with kids, etc. Saturday is always hectic. I have tried to keep my answers "non-denominational" and to explain things as best I can in secular terms.

Well, you're making me step out of my evil clown character and be serious for a second but the answer to you question is, yes. And I'll admit it's a different book than the one I see in a religious context. In a secular context I see the letters of a seriously unhappy man who has found true transcendental love so strong so unexpectedly and so passionate that it has exploded within him and that he can barely control.

I see stories of an idea that teaches that all men are brothers; played out in the Old Testament by placing one God--one unifying creator over everything. One God over the good guys and the bad guys. No longer is my god stronger than your god, but rather one God over all. That concept is totally alien to the way people think in this world. Even today we try to make out God (Christian,) and advisary of someone else's Allah, when that's not what the Bible says.

I see true to life human dramas in the Bible, some like the Book of Job, painfully inconclusive, some like the Story of David the tale of internal failure in the midst of outward success. And lastly I see the story the spiritual world crossing the line to the tangible and showing us here in the world that we aren't at all who we thought we are and the we belong somewhere else and that we could someday go where we belonged.

Interesting stories, some soap opera, some psychological drama and some would border on science fiction.

Easy answer--it's a gift. Now the hard part: faith is something given maybe to all and some refuse to take it; maybe it's only given to some. But there is or rather I believe something called grace and it's a free gift of God. Why he's given that grace, I don't know other that I believes God created me and loves me.

Now how do I get myself out of the box of "well, that's a pleasant little rationalization, Tom"? I honestly don't know. I don't have any proofs that I can show you. I can tell you how I feel, but that's all. And that's meaningless. I honestly don't believe faith is something you can "feel" in any way. All the warm and tosties that some people feel with faith is all fine, but kittens can do as much for some other people. It's an aftereffect, nothing more. You either have faith or you don't. You can't acquire it in any way, but if you do have faith--you can discover the faith you already have by searching.

Elena, LOTS of people have written changes and additions to the Bible over the last 2000 or so years and lots will continue to do so till the end of time. The convention wisdom on any new writings is that the Bible was "finished" the day John the Evangelist died on the island of Patmos.

But, why do I believe the old Bible writers are inspired by God and the new ones are nuts? First of all because of the grace thing I mentioned above. If one believes then the grace from that belief flows quite naturally. Credo ut intelligam. Not a very good answer for someone who doesn't believe. But, there is a structural integrity, allowing for all the diverse authors, to the Bible that points in the one direction that gets us from here to there--completely. It's subtle, hard to see, yet I think it's there. Any "additions" are only commentary, which are fine, or other things--which are not so fine.

It depends on how you define spiritual. There can't by definition be any divine spirituality without a divine being. But on the other hand there is a commonality of all human being as brothers that can be expressed in a very spiritual sense. Even if one doesn't believe in the creator, one can still see what creation looks like. As to the moral and ethical questions--I can't say what best motivates people to be good, if it's a jackpot, that's fine with me, though being good to get a reward is not in essence a Christian notion. I'll say this: if someone isn't living in the land of the jackpot when they are alive, they certainly won't be living there when they die. Life for a Christian is a journey to the spiritual. As son's and daughters of God christians are hiphonated creatures. We are fathers-sons of God, and buisnessmen-sons of God, and accountaints-sons of God and mothers-daughters of God and drug addicts-son's of God and bank robbers-sons of God and this and that and everything else all strung out on a line to forever. And then one by one these thing fall away and when it's all over we find out who we really are.

That comment must be addressed only to Larry so I won't answer.

I hope I answered you questions a little.

Tom

These are serious questions I would appreciate a thoughtful response, not a vindicative one.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That comment must be addressed only to Larry so I won't answer.

I hope I answered you questions a little.


Quit talking about me like that Tom, or I'll get you if it's the last thing I do.........


Elena, I haven't been ignoring your questions. I've been very busy since you posted it. And even now, I only have time to explain why I haven't answered you. But by tonight, I will do so. Answering you will take some time - it is a deep question that will require careful thought.

I really am pretty good at knowing my own mind about lots of things. I read a lot, get lots of information and can hold my own on those topics I discuss.

I consider myself a religious man, a deep believer in God. When I read questions like those that started this thread and many of the responses, I have pat answers -- because like many of you, I have thought about this stuff and have worked it through in my own mind.

But then, once in a while, I realize the pat answers about God are not good enough and really explain very little. That in reality, God is unfathomable and I will never really understand His ways.

Let me share a little something that keeps me from having so much arrogance that I think I have God all figured out. Perhaps it will be a challenge to those of you who believe, those of you who scorn other's beliefs and even those of you who are searching.

It is from Fr. Anthony DeMello, a Jesuit priest.

BELIEF

The Master had quoted Aristotle:
"In the quest of truth,
it would seem better and indeed necessary
to give up what is dearest to us."
And he substituted the word "God" for "truth."

Later a disciple said to him,
"I am ready, in the quest for God,
to give up anything:
wealth, friends, family, country, life itself.
What else can a person give up?"

The Master calmly replied,
"One's beliefs about God."

The disciple went away sad,
for he clung to his convictions.
He feared "ignorance" more than death.

I like that.

I personally feel that a state of absolute humility is the "closest" you can be to God.

You all have presented some very interesting, deep, and well written religious/spiritual thoughts here. The original question about how one sees the Bible--as the actual Word of God written through man and accepted on faith, as a collection of ancient historical writings, or as just a really long book written by multiple mostly unknown Jews to assist in keeping them collectively bound by word and thought since they never had a country to sink their culture into, were therefore prone to wandering around, which resulted in them being separated from each other and scattered all over the place. I digress here--my lifelong question is why are certain "biblical" texts (e.g., The Gospel of Thomas) written contemporaneously with the "accepted" books of the Bible, but totally and apparently irrevocably rejected? And rejected long, long ago by "who knows who" (there he is again!) and who knows why. So we currently don't read them. It would heresy to read them, some say. Why? Do you think there's a valid reason the ancient scholars rejected so many texts--I mean, like, does anyone think they actually had PROOF these texts were not The Word of God and the others were? After all, they accepted some writings on faith--meaning, I would interpret, they had no proof those texts WERE the real thing, they just didn't question it--so how could they prove other texts WEREN'T the real thing when they obviously couldn't prove anything about any of them? Why did they have "faith" in some texts and none in others? That's why I have trouble with the Bible--I'm not sure about any of it, really. But I do believe in God, usually--and as for atheists or non-believers or skeptics and their chances at going to Heaven, if there is one...well, I think they do get to Heaven. Because I feel if a person is inherently good and live their life in accordance with, say, God's teachings (the BIble?) then it doesn't matter if they are believers or not. I think their good spirits, unbeknownst to them, place them as one of God's children simply because they're following his path--God is within them, too, they just don't realize it. I hope this is true, because most of the really decent, good people I've met fall into this category.