Cogs:
Continue in ur ignorance, it is when you start to work for every penny that you earn that you will understand....

Only tithing men will understand Sha

Cogs:


Ehya, I don't work for every penny I earn man, I find help easily at times of need by a free course.

I see opportunities, invest a little and come out with great profits.

Those are some of the many testimonies that Tithing has brought through...

luvmijeje:


I understand their point of view. I understand why they believe there is no God but there are times I'm like are they in this country. Haven't they heard of black magic? Haven't they see cult guys or area guys fight with black magic?

I was born and grow up in most deadliest area of Lagos, so I have seen a lot of crazy things that if I start explaining they will say I'm lying. I've seen things that's beyond the reasoning of science.

So you will understand why I think Atheists especially if they live in this country are living in a bubble.

luvmijeje:
I'm not religious and I don't believe religion is the problem of Nigeria. Religion has rather been a solution to poverty, hopelessness and loneliness.

It's why it's the biggest creation of man.

luvmijeje:


I've read your reasons but in making your point you failed to realize that men are wired to believe in something.

For instance you. You believe in your fellow men..... The scientist. But science don't give hope. It doesn't give love. It doesn't give companionship the way religious does. You all failed to realize the need to believe in something is just as critical as the need to live.

luvmijeje:


I understand their point of view. I understand why they believe there is no God but there are times I'm like are they in this country. Haven't they heard of black magic? Haven't they see cult guys or area guys fight with black magic?

I was born and grow up in most deadliest area of Lagos, so I have seen a lot of crazy things that if I start explaining they will say I'm lying. I've seen things that's beyond the reasoning of science.

So you will understand why I think Atheists especially if they live in this country are living in a bubble.

Ihedinobi3:
If they would ever be honest, any atheist would admit to you that they believe that religion or any belief in God is responsible for everything wrong with life. They do believe that if God can be removed from the picture completely, everything would be perfect. That is the atheistic stance. It is why they are so militant about their faith (yes, it is a faith).

I think though that it is generally a waste of time to interrogate atheism. Rather than tell the truth, an atheist would deny their own existence, if they need to.

Ihedinobi3:
If they would ever be honest, any atheist would admit to you that they believe that religion or any belief in God is responsible for everything wrong with life. They do believe that if God can be removed from the picture completely, everything would be perfect. That is the atheistic stance. It is why they are so militant about their faith (yes, it is a faith).

I think though that it is generally a waste of time to interrogate atheism. Rather than tell the truth, an atheist would deny their own existence, if they need to.

luvmijeje:


I've read your reasons but in making your point you failed to realize that men are wired to believe in something.

For instance you. You believe in your fellow men..... The scientist. But science don't give hope. It doesn't give love. It doesn't give companionship the way religious does. You all failed to realize the need to believe in something is just as critical as the need to live.

luvmijeje:


You do have a point. My issue with religion is the herd mentality. It's the power it has over men. They have made it a crime for anyone to think outside of the box.

It happened yesterday to me on this section. I was pointing out a flaw and you have to see the way one guy start raining insult on me. If that kind of person sees me live, he can kill me with a gun.

Ihedinobi3:
If they would ever be honest, any atheist would admit to you that they believe that religion or any belief in God is responsible for everything wrong with life. They do believe that if God can be removed from the picture completely, everything would be perfect. That is the atheistic stance. It is why they are so militant about their faith (yes, it is a faith).

I think though that it is generally a waste of time to interrogate atheism. Rather than tell the truth, an atheist would deny their own existence, if they need to.

JeromeBlack:


What are you saying? Is there a creed or doctrine in atheism that says that God should be removed from the picture completely? Don't make up stories that you have no proof for.

JeromeBlack:
Religion is a problem. It is a problem in Nigeria. Religion needs to be controlled because it is a dangerous substance. No sensible atheist wants to remove religion and God completely- that would violate human rights in form of freedom of religion.

Religion needs to be kept personal/private. That is what I mean by religion being controlled. Religion should not be part of government decisions and policies. We should live in a secular country and not a theocracy.

When religion is not controlled, we have things like terrorism. Religion is always dangerous because it is based on faith and when that faith cannot meet reality, it becomes madness. Just like excess intake of a substance like alcohol can lead to mad behaviour, excess religion can also lead to madness. This is why religion needs to be practiced moderately.

JeromeBlack:
In Nigeria, religion is not practiced moderately. Many people do not know that there are lines one does not cross.

JeromeBlack:
Religion is a problem but it is not the only problem. There is corruption and tribalism in Nigeria as well.

JeromeBlack:
I hope I have painted a full picture for you.

frank317:


You actually sound like ur uncle, the devil, when u talk like this

tintingz:
Religion is responsible for everything? I would say No, there are other factors. God responsible for everything? Well looking at the myth associated to God especially the Abrahamic deity, he's the creator of evil, if we're to blame the original cause of evil, it should be God.

With God or without God nothing will be perfect, nothing is perfect.

Ihedinobi3:

Okay.

About that part about God creating evil, is that according to the sacred writings you authored? That sort of thing appears to be a thing now for some people.

Ihedinobi3:

First he doesn't exist. Now he not only does but he's my uncle too. You can't keep a straight narrative, can you?

tintingz:
Let make it more plain.

Where did evil come from?

frank317:


If I insult u on this forum that u are mad... Does that mean u are actually mad?

Ihedinobi3:

I have discussed that a few times already. But one more time won't hurt, I guess.

From creature free will.

Ihedinobi3:

Why would you say that someone is mad if they are not mad unless you wish to defame their character, that is, to make other people believe that they are?

tintingz:
Satan is not the source of evil?

tintingz:
God created freewill right? why did God allow it when he knows it end?

tintingz:
If God know our actions beforehand and destined it, is there still freewill?

tintingz:
If God is all perfectly good, how does evil manage to exist?

frank317:


That's ur business, don't really have time for ur unnecessary long story. U know where i am getting at

Ihedinobi3:

No, he is not. He was only the first one to rebel against God and he is the ultimate sponsor of all rebellion against God, so he instigates every sin that is committed but each sin proceeds from the sinner's free will.

Because God is extremely generous. It is not a hard thing for God to make everybody obedient to Him. But He wanted His Children to be people who want to obey Him. So, He gave the angels and men the power to obey Him if they wanted to and the power to choose not to submit to Him if they didn't want to.

He knew everything beforehand but He did not "destine" our choices. Each person is free to choose whatever they want. That is what it means to have a free will: God does not impel or force anybody to choose anything.

Because God is perfectly wise too. Evil exists to show what treason against Him looks like. After every human being has had the opportunity to make their choice, then evil will be brought to an end.

tintingz:
So why is Satan blame for every evil? Even in the Bible we read God sending Satan for some evil mission.

Are you saying Satan is not evil?

Are you saying humans created evil?

This still doesn't make any sense, why did God give freewill when he knows the end? God already knows all what will happen if he give freewill, he knows people will be punished for eternity, he knows those that will be punished and he has destined it, he knows evil will exist when he can prevent it from onset, he shouldn't give room for it since he's ominipotent and all perfectly good?


It's not necessarily God forced it(even though he did with threats), for God to know people's end before they are born shows there is no freewill, God can easily write down all your actions, steps, decisions from beginning to end and you will follow every single step of it.

Except God is not all knowing.

Again a wise and all perfectly good God should be wise enough to know that evil is bad and people will be punished eternity for it why then allow it to exist?

There is no choice here and the excuses are lame, God knows people's end, he should know what is good for his creation if he's actually wise and all Good.

Take an example, you know that baby will crawl to the table and swallow the drugs place on it which will leads to serious health condition and death, will you give room for the baby to reach the table since you care?

tintingz:
So why is Satan blame for every evil? Even in the Bible we read God sending Satan for some evil mission.

Are you saying Satan is not evil?

Are you saying humans created evil?

tintingz:
This still doesn't make any sense, why did God give freewill when he knows the end? God already knows all what will happen if he give freewill, he knows people will be punished for eternity, he knows those that will be punished and he has destined it, he knows evil will exist when he can prevent it from onset, he shouldn't give room for it since he's ominipotent and all perfectly good?

tintingz:
It's not necessarily God forced it(even though he did with threats), for God to know people's end before they are born shows there is no freewill, God can easily write down all your actions, steps, decisions from beginning to end and you will follow every single step of it.

Except God is not all knowing.

tintingz:
Again a wise and all perfectly good God should be wise enough to know that evil is bad and people will be punished eternity for it why then allow it to exist?

tintingz:
There is no choice here and the excuses are lame, God knows people's end, he should know what is good for his creation if he's actually wise and all Good.

Take an example, you know that baby will crawl to the table and swallow the drugs place on it which will leads to serious health condition and death, will you give room for the baby to reach the table since you care?

urahara:
Why are atheists and irreligious people fond of blaming Nigeria or Africa's problems on religion.

After all we were not the only ones the whites brought the religion to. How do they associate economic failures to religion ?

I'm just curious

Ihedinobi3:

In my post, I said that Satan sponsors every act of rebellion against God. Did you read that part?

Did humans create evil? Human beings sinned when Satan tempted them. If that is what you mean by "create evil", then, yes, we did. If you mean something else, then explain it so that I can answer you better.

I don't understand the reasoning here.

Is every human being and every angel going to be punished?

How did God "destine" anybody's choice?

Yes, God knew what each individual would do with their free will. That was why He went on to create the universe. He knew that some angels and some human beings would choose to be with Him in eternity. He was pleased with that and created the Universe to give them everything they need to make that choice. And He also gave those who He knew would reject Him everything they too needed to be with Him in eternity but they are rejecting it everyday just as He knew that they would. That is why they will be punished. I don't see what omnipotence and omnibenevolence has to do with anything here.

Why should God prevent people who don't want to be with Him in eternity from choosing not to be with Him? Should He force them? Why should He?

Nonsense. How does God's telling you what will happen to you if you make a bad choice force you to do anything? Have you not heard of the Lake of Fire? Are you a Christian today because of it? No. You're an antichristian attacking the Christian Faith even though you know that there is a Lake of Fire. So, even the threat has not forced you to become a Christian. How then do you claim that God forced anything with threats?

What is this claim that God's foreknowledge is mutually exclusive with free will? How does knowledge have any kind of causative ability? Does knowing that the sun will rise tomorrow make it rise? Do you consider geniuses who know a great deal about quantum physics to also be the ones who make quantum particles act this way or that just by knowing stuff?

What are you talking about? Did God force you to reject Him? Is it not your own choice to do so? If you don't want to be punished for rejecting Him, then don't reject Him. If you don't care about His punishment, how is it His fault that you choose to be evil and suffer for it? Are other people not choosing to submit to Him everyday and be good?

Are you a baby? Do you not understand that the drugs are bad for you and that you should leave them alone? You have been told what you need to know:

1. You have the power to choose whether you will submit to God or to reject His Authority.

2. If you choose to submit to God, you will enjoy all of His blessings for all eternity.

3. If you choose to reject His Authority, then even those blessings that He is letting you enjoy today will be taken away from you forever.

A baby may not understand that those drugs are bad for him. But you understand very clearly that rejecting God is bad for you. If you go on and do so, you have only yourself to blame for what happens to you.

Religion, as practised in Nigeria, promotes a way of thinking that is detrimental to our continued existence. The notion that some messiah would come from heaven promotes dependence, unfortunately, on false hope.
If Nigerian religion taught rational thinking, which is the sort of Christianity practised in Europe, no one would mind, but ours promotes prayer instead of action, then we complain that our nation is not like Europe!

Our religion makes people reason wrong. People think paying tithes is way more important than paying their rent or childrens' school fees. Does it not make sense to save your money and earn interest, if not pay rent and school fees than pay it to an already wealthy pastor in hope of an heavenly afterlife? Why not invest that money in a heavenly current life?

-budaatum

Jayhazard:

How would you feel if you had the ability to CREATE something just like you, and that creation later turned out to claim "it" knows more than you do? "It" keeps giving suggestions on how things should have turned out, how things should and shouldn't be, when it's obvious you know it can't possibly know as much as you do, given the fact that you've been on the earth for so long and you were its creator. How would you feel?

tintingz:
Are you not contradicting yourself? Your answer was no when I asked is Satan the source of evil?

You said he's rebellious, a rebellious person doesn't necessarily has to be a bad person, he can actually be a good person fighting against a tyrant leader.

If Satan sponsors every act of rebellion against God, he's the source of evil, correct?

tintingz:
If human created evil, does that mean God didn't create ALL?

tintingz:
No, but majority will be punished, people who reject Jesus as lord and savior.

tintingz:
Because he knows your choices before you are born.

You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.
Psalm 139:16

If that book was given to you and you realized everything single damn thing you do has already been in that book, do you have freewill and choice?

tintingz:
Why does God wants all this? Like punishing some people when he already knows what will happen, what does God wants to gain in it?

Again, if God is all loving and all good, he's perfect, there shouldn't be any bad or anything that will leads to evil and punishment, a loving God should prevent it.

So the question again is, what does God wants to gain in all this?

tintingz:
If a God is actually caring, loving and good, what stops him from preventing evil and punishment. Is God malevolent or impotent?

tintingz:
Those who are born in Muslim country, those who are born in Buddhist family, those who are born in Hindu family, are they going to heaven?

tintingz:
The threats isn't working for me because I don't believe in it, the problem is the threat is reaping the choice of those that believe in it, the threats has psychological caged them.

tintingz:
Now assuming there's a physical fire in this garden and a land full of fruits in another garden and you're threatened that if you don't follow my rules you will be in that garden of fire, how does that feel to you?

tintingz:
I have quoted above your God has written down each every one destiny before they are born. If you happen to follow what the book has written down, do you still have freewill?

If I I've written down each day and time the sun will rise and I gave you the book, won't you think the sun is following my orders, that I've destined the activities of the sun?

tintingz:
If God actually doesn't want people to be punished, such thing as evil, hell shouldn't exist in the first place.

Arent you like babies before God?

No, God has the power to prevent any err that will lead humans to damnation.

Why can't God just put humans in that state?

His God bored that he wants to play hungers game with humans?

Why does he wants this?


Lol, the baby stands as the state of ignorance, not born, the crawling stands has God knowing human's actions beforehand, while the drug on the table stands as the end of it.

Since a mother knows this, what is the wise thing for the mother to do as a caring mother?

Ihedinobi3:

1. No, I was not. "Sponsor" is an English word. It means "to instigate or encourage or enable or incite or promote". It does not mean "to originate".

2. Define "good" and "bad". You will find that it is impossible to do so without appealing to some objective authority.

Whatever yardstick any given person measures good and bad by is what they worship as God. In the Bible, "good" is willing submission to God and consequent obedience to His Will and "bad" is rejection of His Authority and rebellion against His Will with consequent disobedience to it.

Satan is thus not a good person in the Bible. But I'm sure he doesn't think he's a bad person at all.

3. As I said in #1, "source" and "sponsor" are not synonyms.

See the definition of "evil" as moral badness above.

It is not something that is created. It is an attitude or a spiritual position that creatures take relative to God. As such, it comes entirely from creature free will.

If a creature decides to rebel against God, that is the creature's choice, not God's Choice for them. The creature has a will which, while limited, is not directly acted upon by God's Will. That is why the Bible calls angels and men gods and teaches that we were made in the Image of God.

Yes, majority of human beings will be. . .because they prefer to be. Should God force them to love Him? Why should He?

That makes no sense. Knowledge is a passive attribute. It is not causative of anything. So why do you claim that omniscience (which is only perfect knowledge of all things actual and potential) can affect free will in any way?

In chess, we often try to guess at other people's moves and plans. What if you played a supercomputer that knows every possible move you could make on the board and can accurately figure out exactly what move you will make if you are faced with a decision, would that computer then be responsible for the move you make?

1. God is Perfect. He existed before there was anything else. He has always existed and will always exist. He needs absolutely nothing and can gain absolutely nothing. Everything gains from Him. His Decree to create the Universe was His Own Will. He didn't need to. He just decided to. And He doesn't need to answer to you or anyone about that. That is what being God means. Still, He created the Universe so that He can have a family of creatures who having the ability to define themselves relative to Him choose to love Him and be with Him forever. That is what He set out to get and what He will have when this war is over.

2. Do you not know anything about good or love?

It is love when you let a woman decide whether she wants to be with you or not. It is hostage-taking when you force her in some way to stay with you when she doesn't want to. It is good when the authorities throw the wicked in jail or execute them. In the same vein, God lovingly allows everyone to choose whether they want to be with Him or not. And when people choose not, they tend to harm themselves and others and damage the beautiful world that God made for all of us. So, our good God will also in time remove them from the society of good people who are always threatened by them and punish them for all the wickedness that they have done to others and to His Creation.

3. The loving God gave you a free will to choose to escape punishment by submitting to Him. After all, He made you and He made this universe so He must know what's best for you and for it. If you choose to use your free will to rebel against Him, then you deserve what you get.

These questions are run-of-the-mill. They are barely as potent as you think they are. If you had actually bothered to think about them before adopting them as your characteristic attack/defence, you would know that they are actually empty.

A loving God will let people choose to be evil if they don't want to be good.

A loving God will punish evil so that the good will rejoice in His justice.

If they want to go, yes, they will. The Gospel is available to everyone everywhere if they want to hear it. If they don't want to hear it though, they will go to hell.

So, God's threats have not removed your free will then. Why do you think it has removed anybody else's? Have you not seen Christians who became atheists? People can stop believing whenever they want to. So, your argument about threats is dead in the water.

How else would it feel to me? If those are my only two choices, then I must ask myself whether burning is better than lounging and eating pleasant fruits.

See my response above then.

The sun has no free will.

1. See my response about punishment etc above.

2. Of course, compared to God we know nothing. But, in fact, we have been given all the information we need to make an adult choice in this regard. So, even compared to God in this case we are not babies who don't know what the issues are.

3. LOL. You don't want to choose good. You want God to choose it for you (making Him the tyrant you accuse Him of being) or just not punish you for being evil (making Him unjust as you also accuse Him of being). Classic. LOL.

4. He can. He is God. He can do anything He wants. This is what He wants. What are you going to do about it? Can you go and beat Him up? Or will you go and take away His Deity and become God instead? You will spend eternity in the Lake of Fire (and I assure you, it is no garden) if you do not submit to Him.

5. Because He wants it.

6. Then your parallels are bad because they misrepresent the true situation. We are not in a state of ignorance: you have heard the Gospel. We have free will: you clearly make choices everyday even if you think it is an illusion. God will either reward you or punish you for those choices. So, ball's in your court, man. You decide whether you will spend eternity with the Lord in a perfect universe where there is only delight and joy and righteousness or whether you will spend it in the Lake of Fire in pain and misery ruing your fate.