Continued from You must be “God’s slave.”
Have you ever heard Bob Dylan’s song, “You’re Gonna Have To Serve Somebody”? One line goes, “It may be the devil. Or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.”
Now, atheists find the ideas of being anyone’s slave repulsive. What they don’t realise is that in a moral universe, we’ll all slaves of somebody. The saddest part, in the case of atheists, is that they take the disease that is killing them (pseudo freedom) and clutch it to their bodies as though it’s their most valuable gift / trait. Freedom, as you understand freedom does not exist.
We begin this life in a dungeon of sin, alienated from our Creator. We have no way of paying our debt to free ourselves from that dungeon. The dungeon of sin is ruled by satan and we begin life as his slaves. Jesus, out of love and mercy and grace has chosen billions of people to be released from this slavery to sin and satan. He redeemed us (which is a term taken from the slave trade) by paying the debt for us. We can be freed from slavery to satan but now we belong to Creator God.
It’s one or the other. One owner will take us to eternity in hell. The other owner will take us to eternity in heaven. It’s your choice down which road you will go. Right now, by your choice, you are on the road to hell.
“For those God foreknew He also predestined and those He predestined He also called; those He called He also justified, those He justified He also glorified.” Romans 8:30
Let me explain this a bit more for any reader who is more open minded that you, Hugo.
To be redeemed means to have been bought at a price - which brings about a change in ownership. But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When He was hung on the cross, He took upon Himself the curse for our wrongdoing. Galatians 3:13. “He is so rich in kindness and grace that He purchased our freedom with the blood of His Son and forgave our sins.” Ephesians 1:7. The death of Jesus means we were bought back from captivity or slavery to sin. We were slaves, owned by satan, and Jesus’ death bought us, so that we are now owned by Him. “For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And the ransom He paid was not mere gold or silver. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. 1 Peter 1:18-19
Yet another word associated with the death and resurrection of Jesus is Justification. “And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, He will certainly save us from God’s condemnation. Romans 5:9. “Yet God, with undeserved kindness, declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when He freed us from the penalty for our sins.” Romans 3:24. Jesus’ death declared us innocent of our guilt. I was guilty as charged, but because of my faith in Jesus I have been declared not guilty
The last word that explains what was accomplished through Jesus’ death and resurrection is Reconciliation. “For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still His enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of His Son. Romans 5:10. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them.” 2 Corinthians 5:19. The death of Jesus has restored our right relationship. We have been given peace with God and now we have direct access to God. What we destroyed, God has repaired.
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...Let me explain this a bit more for any reader who is more open minded that you, Hugo....
ReplyDeleteSo I am a liar and I am not open minded?
Never occurred to you that you do not understand me... at all?
Concerning that post, nothing to quote or discuss today: it's just a story that appeal to people who already believe in Heaven and Hell. You have never given any reasons for me to believe such concepts exist.
Actually, it makes you look like the scared person I describe you to be; that's exactly what you are projecting. You are so convinced that we are either on on side or the other, on the good side or the bad side, that it scares you to even consider that you might fall on the bad side. With that mind set, it makes you feel so good to "know" that you are on the good one, and you see no reason to even consider that it might all be an illusion. It feels too right, it made you change, it grants you with a fullfiled life now and a promise of eternal bliss away from the pain of this world.
The hope is a good thing and in general I think it's perfectly fine to have this attitude. The problem is that it also makes you misunderstand others like me; you call me a liar and accuse me of being not open minded. Plus, you even claim that I am slow of mind and unaware of obvious things, when you are completely out of touch with several aspects of the real world we live in. In other words, it's very ironic that you consider that you have some spiritual grand knowledge that I don't have, while when we compare our knowledge of the real world, the universe we currently live in, you fail miserably at even coming close to express a valid understanding. You make so many mistakes and are influenced by so many people only because they believe the same thing, yet you refuse to admit that the only reason why you believe in your spiritual invisible omni-'all' god is because you have faith, not evidence.
Which reminds me that I forgot to mention that I ended up watching the documentary on Near-Death Experience, The Day I Died, recently. Nothing surprising in it really. There is just 1 case, the one with the lady who got operated on for quite some time and could recall a tool and a conversation, that is more surprising.
ReplyDeleteBut there are major flaws; she had a freaking big aneurysm in her brain, right where there are a lot of nervous cells, so her testimony is already bogus. Plus, they still don't know when she had her experience, and the facts she recalled are so tiny and anecdotal, basically nothing different than others, that it proves absolutely nothing. Don't get me wrong though, actually I know you will, so I need to clarify: I believe her; she is not lying. I just don't come up with the same conclusion.
Other point to mention that I had noted down, at around 18 minutes in, they mention 2 stats concerning 2 experiments that took place: 4 out 63 people, during a year, had NDE, while in another, 41 out of 300 had one. That's ridiculously low for something that is supposed to prove that our mind can be detached from the body.
I was laughing at more than one occasion during the documentary because of the lack of logic of the people who conclude that the experience were spiritual. I don't understand why people who believe that this is spiritual don't believe people who got kidnap by aliens and testify under lie detectors. What's the difference? Plus how naive do you have to be to think that it's all Christian... seriously, you think that it's only the Christian version of after life that pops out in NDEs? I would be willing to bet my entire life savings that Muslims have muslim NDEs... Nobody suddenly converts to another religion. The businessman who changed completely is such a good example... he changed to become someone closer to values he already knew.
The fact that the NDEs are no different than events we know are NOT spiritual, why make a special case for the ones that are "cool", as if they were more relevant? Plus, why, again, nothing specific, and NEW, comes out of these NDEs? People always recall stuff they could easily imagine if their brain was going under stress, which it did. Absolutely no new knowledge is coming out, no surprising experiences are related, it's always the same patterns. Again, one tiny exception with the blind person. However, it's not very convincing, she described her hair and her ring... seriously?
Conclusion? Ironically, I think this documentary is one more to be added to the list of experiments that show how NDEs are nothing more than the brain being messed up. Nothing special comes out of them, the patterns are always similar and we have good explanations why.