I'm not sure what "subject" line to write so I'm just going with "The Bible"

[Raineyrocks]

Yesterday I was on Infowars.com and I watched a video about the evils of Halloween: http://www.infowars.com/the-occult-origins-of-halloween/ .    This is how I ended up on this guys website : withoneaccord.org and I'm really questioning my belief system or lack of when it comes to the bible now. 

I know I have been conditioned since birth into certain religious beliefs and biblical knowledge, however I thought I was trying to undo all of this and finding my own belief system; until yesterday.  There is information on the website above that I've personally never stumbled upon before so now I'm very confused and not sure if I'm just following what someone is saying they know or the ultimate truth.

I just finished reading one of his free resource links:  (I thought about pasting it on here but it's 5 pgs long) http://www.withoneaccord.org/assets/images/freedownloads/demented-daddy.pdfand.  It really makes sense to me but if he is correct and there is only one accurate version of the bible then what this means to me is if I don't seek the one and only correct version I'm ignoring God.  It means there is a heaven and hell, judgement day, etc.   I was happily breaking free from that fear but maybe I was being misled.

One phrase in the 5 pages that I read really stood out to me more than any others,  "Most great religions agree that YHWH is loving. Would a loving father give His children a defective book that could cost them their immortal souls  and NOT warn them? Yet people believe this. They say, "I believe in God, but I don't think the Bible is true." Without realizing it, they are saying that they believe in a God who is either an idiot or a fiend!"   

Then there was also a phrase about the power of God and pretty much saying, God is the ultimate, so why wouldn't he be able to preserve an "unchanged", divine, bible.  Thoughts, anyone?

[Jim Johnson]

One of two things has to happen when you learn about religion; either your logical mind turns to mush, trying to make sense of stupidity, or you realize that all religion is bullshit.

[Pat K]

Jim to be fair some might be horse shit or even goat shit.

Yeah goat shit, nothing god likes better than the smell of a burnt goat offering.

[Kevin Bean]

One phrase in the 5 pages that I read really stood out to me more than any others,  "Most great religions agree that YHWH is loving. Would a loving father give His children a defective book that could cost them their immortal souls  and NOT warn them? Yet people believe this. They say, "I believe in God, but I don't think the Bible is true." Without realizing it, they are saying that they believe in a God who is either an idiot or a fiend!"   

Then there was also a phrase about the power of God and pretty much saying, God is the ultimate, so why wouldn't he be able to preserve an "unchanged", divine, bible.  Thoughts, anyone?

That site claims the King James version is the one true Bible. The books of The Bible began as oral traditions and were eventually written down. In the unlikely event these stories were passed from person to person without any changes (the children's game Telephone demonstrates how unlikely this is), the first texts were then copied by hand over and over by barely literate people for hundreds of years. These error-ridden copies were then copied over and over by monks who were more literate, but not impervious to making errors in copying the texts by hand. So nearly 1,600 years after the lifetime of Jesus, fragmentary remnants of these copies were used to create the King James English translation. So, without getting into the documented issues of deliberate changes made over the centuries by copyists who wanted to change the texts to eliminate "heretical" doctrines, and the issue of post-New Testament people deciding which books made it into the "official" Bible, how likely does it seem to you that this one translation of the Hebrew/Greek into a dead form of English is THE Bible?

[Kevin Bean]

Bob: The King James version is the only true Bible.

Alice: How do you know that?

Bob: I read it on the Internet. I know it's true because people aren't allowed to put things on the Internet that aren't true.

Alice: How do you know that?

Bob: I read it on the Internet.

[Russell Kanning]

So Rainey do you think God tries to communicate with us through the Bible?

[Russell Kanning]

From what I know of the Bible Kevin is very right on.
It is interesting how God has done stuff. The Bible says that he spoke the world and filled it by speaking things into existence. Then John says that the actual Word of God became a men and spoke with us.
But if God wanted us to have a perfect copy of the 15 commandments he wouldn't have let Mel Brooks drop one of the stone tablets.

[Raineyrocks]

One of two things has to happen when you learn about religion; either your logical mind turns to mush, trying to make sense of stupidity, or you realize that all religion is bullshit.

I totally agree but I wasn't really questioning religions, even though when the bible comes into any conversation it usually does have a religion dogma attached to it.  I suppose if I was discussing the King James version, christianity is the first thought to come into most people's minds, which I understand.  Couldn't someone just study and learn from the bible without joining a religion?      Perhaps, if biblical phrases really got into someone's head they could eventually conform to the belief they must attach themselves to a religion though. 

[Raineyrocks]

Jim to be fair some might be horse shit or even goat shit.

Yeah goat shit, nothing god likes better than the smell of a burnt goat offering.

Ha, ha, very funny as usual Pat!   I never understood why a god would "need" any type of sacrifice at all, that means they depend on us merely low human beings to provide them with a need and according to the bible god is supposed to be complete.  There's a lot of things that like Jim said, would turn anyone's brain to mush in my opinion too.  The bible does defy even the most basic common sense.  The "Adam and Eve story" for instance, is in my opinion, totally metaphorical yet a lot of people teach thier children this dumb story to be quite literal. 

See, even as I'm writing this I have this nagging thought that I may get "in trouble" with God and go to hell for what I'm writing, gosh I can't stand that!

[Raineyrocks]

One phrase in the 5 pages that I read really stood out to me more than any others,  "Most great religions agree that YHWH is loving. Would a loving father give His children a defective book that could cost them their immortal souls  and NOT warn them? Yet people believe this. They say, "I believe in God, but I don't think the Bible is true." Without realizing it, they are saying that they believe in a God who is either an idiot or a fiend!"   

Then there was also a phrase about the power of God and pretty much saying, God is the ultimate, so why wouldn't he be able to preserve an "unchanged", divine, bible.  Thoughts, anyone?

That site claims the King James version is the one true Bible. The books of The Bible began as oral traditions and were eventually written down. In the unlikely event these stories were passed from person to person without any changes (the children's game Telephone demonstrates how unlikely this is), the first texts were then copied by hand over and over by barely literate people for hundreds of years. These error-ridden copies were then copied over and over by monks who were more literate, but not impervious to making errors in copying the texts by hand. So nearly 1,600 years after the lifetime of Jesus, fragmentary remnants of these copies were used to create the King James English translation. So, without getting into the documented issues of deliberate changes made over the centuries by copyists who wanted to change the texts to eliminate "heretical" doctrines, and the issue of post-New Testament people deciding which books made it into the "official" Bible, how likely does it seem to you that this one translation of the Hebrew/Greek into a dead form of English is THE Bible?

Hi Kevin     Yup, I know what you are saying and for the most part that's my thought on the bible too.  However, sometimes things pop up and make me wonder if it's just easier for me to believe that it's impossible for God to preserve one true, untainted version that I should be following. If I choose to look no further for possibilities then I basically get to live a life that holds me accountable to no higher being on a possible judgement day.  I'm not saying that I'm a creep and want to live an evil life hurting any being but there are all of those other numerous sins spoken of in the bible.  I personally don't like reading any bible but fear the possible consequences of not "seeking" the ultimate truth which we probably will never know.  

If God is capable of creating an entire universe let alone what is alive in that universe and how everything works in sync to make it alive, what isn't he capable of?  So is it possible that something that makes no logical sense to me, out of my realm of comprehension, as I can't even begin to touch the knowledge of "a creator"?

I think most of my questions are due to conditioning and fear but can they have a solid base if I remove my emotions?

The scrolls that were selected or not selected to make it into "the bible" is a very serious factor with all of these questions, as well as the translation accuracy because then it makes all bibles "tampered with".  If that choice was made by a counsel of men, that blows the theory of any bible being totally divinely inspired and protected.  I have the Catholic bible, Jehovah's Witness bible, NIV version, etc.  There are 6 extra scrolls selected for the Catholic version so either those 6 scrolls are fake to mislead us from the "real bible" or this entire biblical thing is a big hoax to control and divide people, create false religions, etc.

I don't know why I still search and question, it feels like there just has to be something that God has left for us unless I'm just being dumb and hopeful that there is even a God.  Something/someone had to create all of "this", right?  Do we owe "them"?  Most of us are raised to be grateful to our parents for raising us, giving us what we need, shouldn't we be indebted to the creator of all of us?

Have you ever watched, 'The Ninth Configuration'?  If so, you know about the astronaut that went insane, (of did he), when he was in space and felt so tiny and couldn't handle the possibility that we are all just this tiny, nothing in all of the vastness that he saw. I won't mention the end of the movie because it had an obvious " happy ending" and isn't based on reality.  I guess what I'm getting at here is fear and how in the world do I get rid of that?  I don't know why this particular person's information impressed me.  I'm thinking it's because he bought "possibilities" into reality for me and didn't just preach in the normal sense of the word.

My brother believes when we die we go into the ground or whatever and that's it.  He also has bounced around an idea that we are all pawns in someone's, (alien?), chess game to keep them amused.  I don't refute his beliefs because anything is possible and in saying that then if anything is possible is there some slight chance that there is one true way to follow god?  Would we need a "pure" bible for that?   I just don't know.

[Raineyrocks]

Bob: The King James version is the only true Bible.

Alice: How do you know that?

Bob: I read it on the Internet. I know it's true because people aren't allowed to put things on the Internet that aren't true.

Alice: How do you know that?

Bob: I read it on the Internet.

Nah, it goes deeper than that for me.   I'm not that simple-minded.  Obvisouly this guy has me questioning possibilities, he's not the first person or event that has caused me to do so and I definitely don't believe everything from the internet.  I'm not just saying I believe everything that he's said or I wouldn't have presented the questions I did on the forum; I'd have my head buried in the King James bible.

[Raineyrocks]

So Rainey do you think God tries to communicate with us through the Bible?

No, not at all.  I am open for the possibility that it may be an instruction book to learn from though. A "divine" instruction book?  I don't know, that's the part that bugs me.

[Kat Kanning]

Where did life come from, Rainey?  Do you know how incredibly complex the human eye is?  People will try and tell you that the atoms came together by random chance to create an eye.  How can that happen?  If one single part of this complex mechanism is out of synch, no vision.  Why would evolution make an eye?  It would have to create a fully formed organ all in one shot, since it won't work unless all its parts work.  Science tells us that atoms will always tend to become more random, not less.  Like take a drop of dye and put it in water.  At first it's a well formed drop, but then randomness sets in, and soon the molecules are spread all over.  You don't ever have the dye molecules form into something less random, like letters or something.

The Bible tells us that God created the world and everything all at once - in 6 days.   This matches what scientists have found about the world - that all species seem to have come as is, there have been no legitimate 'missing links' found, where there were intermediate steps found, like between monkey and man.   All those out there have been shown to be frauds.  Darwin himself said that without these missing links, his theory is worthless.  And so it is.

There are many many fulfilled prophesies in the Bible.  It contains about 3,856 verses directly or indirectly concerned with prophecy.  The destruction of Tyre, the invasion of Jerusalem, the fall of Babylon and Rome—each event was accurately predicted in the Bible and later fulfilled to the smallest detail.   How did these prophets know what would happen in the future without the intervention of God.

Millions of people throughout history have claimed to have been changed by God, myself included.  I was a pretty rotten person and I hurt a lot of people.  Now I'm different, and I couldn't have done it on my own.  Do you really believe all those people are delusional?  That's an awful lot of witnesses to an event.  Proof in court only needs a couple witnesses.

[Russell Kanning]

So Rainey do you think God tries to communicate with us through the Bible?

No, not at all.  I am open for the possibility that it may be an instruction book to learn from though. A "divine" instruction book?  I don't know, that's the part that bugs me.

well one problem with that is the Bible claimed to be God-breathed and Jesus claimed to be The Way, The Truth, and The Life and that no one could get to his Father in Heaven except through him.

[Kat Kanning]

Why would God demand sacrifices?  What God has told us about himself in the Bible is that he is perfectly holy and pure, and cannot be in the presence of sin.  When he created the world it was perfect, but he gave man free will.  Man chose to sin - to go against the one thing God had told man not to do.  In this way sin and death entered the world.  God can't be near sin, so man was then separated from God.  He tells us the penalty for sin is death.  God was merciful, and let men sacrifice a perfect animal in order to be close to God again.  So they'd take, for instance, a perfect lamb and slaughter it - this was their food and livelihood and it was just that, a sacrifice to give it up to God.  The blood would cover over their sin for a time, but if they sinned again, they would have to make another sacrifice. 

God couldn't just not punish sinners.  He also tells us he is perfectly just.  There's no justice in letting murderers and rapists and such go free.  But he did provide a method to avoid the dire punishment for sin - which is an eternity in the lake of fire.  He sent his one and only son to be the one perfect sacrifice for all time.  He lived a perfect life, without sin.  He allowed himself to be sacrificed, like those little lambs, even though he'd never broken God's laws.  God punished him as if he had lived our lives, as if he'd done all the horrible things Kat Kanning has done.  He suffered under God's punishment so we wouldn't have to.  His sacrifice made it so we can be close to God, all we have to do is beg God for forgiveness for what we've done, and accept that Jesus is Lord of our lives - he's in charge.  Jesus told us his burden is light, but the burden of sin is heavy.  I know this from experience, my life of sin was miserable, what God requires of me is not near so heavy.