a free gospel of Mark with every order
Submitted by F.O.D. on May 09 1999 at 17:05:22
In reply to It's a really good piece of marketing....F.O.D. Submitted by tks on May 09 1999 at 01:57:38
|
Hi tks, I'm not entirely sure which of my straws you take to be the invisible one. Do you mean my conjecture of proto-knowledge of Jesus? Wouldn't it be reasonable to say to that it was the "Spirit of God" sans Jesus? Yes I think that would be completely reasonable to say, except for the sans bit. You seem to be concentrating on the time and space aspect to Jesus' visit 2000 years ago, and saying that everything thing done externally to that is done without Jesus. But I don't think that's fair. The Spirit of God is also the Spirit of Jesus (cf Rom 8:9). It's the Trinity thing, Jesus being one with the Father, and this being the case throughout all time and before time (Jn 17:5). So, if the Spirit of God is reaching out to prepare some people to serve God, it's not being done without Jesus. It's the divine nature of Jesus, that he was there from the beginning, that he is working to save all mankind, that's why it's not clutching a straws to say that salvation is only made through him. As to whether that tribe could have just as easily seen their prophecy fulfilled in Buddhism, the content of their prophecy, as far as I can remember that, precludes that. The prophecy was quite specific, more than just saying "God's going to meet you some day". So the point here is about the uniqueness of Christianity, what is it that Christ has done which makes Christianity completely unique from every other religion. The same goes for any arbitrary "spiritual" experience, including Whitman's (which I don't know about). The point is not everyone having a spiritual experience of their own that will lead them to God, but having a spiritual experience that comes through the Spirit of God himself, the Spirit of Truth. Not everyone who says they've seen the light has seen the light. Actually, I'm not at all surprised to find elements of truth in other religions. If it all happened the way we believe it from the Bible, then people started off knowing the True God, and with the passage of time they slowly came to reject him and set up their own idols and gods. But they carried over elements of the knowledge of the True God. Satan is a counterfeiter, he cannot create anything new and evil, he can only distort the original truth. Then again, maybe I'm wrong about the Spirit of God calling people to God, and everyone who didn't get the chance to be saved will be punished for the sin of being born at the wrong time and place. OK about Adam and Eve's kids. It's a dumb question heh, but a good one too ;) Personally I suspect the key may be in Gen 1, v26-28. Let us make them, male and female. God blesses them. This suggests that God created a plurality of people together at the beginning (which certainly fits in with the beliefs of modern science). In this case Adam is to be seen, then, as the "representative" of the race, rather than the sole member of the race. But even if Adam and Eve are the only sole humans, there are other ways of seeing how the propagation of man got on. Gen 6:1-4 talks about sons of God - angels - mating with humans, diversifying the gene pool. And besides, even in Abraham's time an awfully suspicious amount of near-incest was taking place. Sarah was Abraham's half-sister (Gen 20:12), both Isaac and Jacob married their cousins. Amnon son of David could have been allowed to marry his half-sister, 2 Sam 13:13, though it would have been disgraceful. Finally, death. As the great Peter Pan said, "to die must be a wonderful adventure."... "What good is it for a man to gain the whole world and yet forfeit his soul?"...the fool's answer is "well, I'll gain the whole world!"...(actually I read that one in "The Talisman") Actually, I can think of anything more to add to this thought than what Jesus has already said, so I'll stop here. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seed. John 12:24, esp v25 < br> Cheers :) F.O.D. |