religion -- enter at your own risk

[pls]

I understand "God Is", Carol. What I don't understand are the superstitions, bad churches (or at least those that have been created by bad practitioners, like the so-called Westboro Baptist Church here in Topeka), and general silliness via misinterpretations of the Bible, not to mention those wrong-doers who try to hide behind what they consider religion. You see some of that here.

[LilliesCarol]

Exactly, Paul. What you speak of are the 'trappings' of religion. It is how certain men perceived God and found followers to believe their interpretation(s) of what “they” feel to be God. However, it is up to the individual to find their own understanding of God through their life experiences and interactions with God through prayer.

God Is: One can never change that as expressed in all powerful(omnipotent) all knowing (omniscient) and always present (omnipresent). If you experience that, then YOU are beginning to know God. The Bible is a good textbook, but it is just that a textbook to help explain the magnanamous wonders of God and what YOUR relationship should be towarrd God.

[Rosedarling]

[spacerebel]

Aliens kind of know what God's like and they genetically engineered us to be in his image.

[Fictional Chef]

My faith in biblical Christianity is very much the core of who I am. It's not a side hobby, something that simmers on the back burner, or just something that makes me feel good. I'm a Christ follower. I believe what the Bible says; not blindly, but first by faith, then experientially. It's not a book that you can pick apart and throw away the things you don't like and keep the rest. That's idolatry because it's creating your own religion with your own rules; i.e., setting yourself up as the god of your religion because you're dictating it. It's lowering God to that of a created being because then you're creating a god YOU like and can live with.

As a result, God's word influences everything I do, say, believe and write. As followers of Christ, we're not perfect. We still make mistakes and fail miserably trying to keep His standards. We still have our sin nature in us to be fought. But, in the end, when it's all said and done and there's nothing left to do but stand before God and answer for our lives - with nothing but an eternity in heaven or hell before us - how are Christians NOT supposed to live by God's word just to appease those who reject it? People call Christianity a "crutch" when the opposite is, in fact, true. It takes great strength and courage to live by convictions and beliefs that defy the world around you, inviting their hatred and ridicule.

[robjvargas]

Fictional Chef wrote:
> It's not a book that you can pick apart and throw away the things you don't like and keep the rest.
> That's idolatry because it's creating your own religion with your own rules;
> i.e., setting yourself up as the god of your religion because you're dictating it.

I understand, but disagree pretty strongly. I've seen the strange looks that I see in peoples' eyes when I say this, but I believe that God has spoken to me. Not in the Moses' Burning Bush sense.

I've had moments, though, of such utter certainty, that I "realized" God was telling me something. It's kind of funny, really, to watch those televangelists and tell their audience that God will give them everything they want if they just believe (and donate).

I found God when He denied my prayer(I hate assigning gender to God, but our language doesn't have a good alternative). I was so in love with this young girl when I was in High School. We had an "almost" moment where I missed my chance. Later, I saw her with someone else. It hurt so deeply, and I prayed so hard to get her back.

And then God responded. Like I said, no voice. Just a certainty that came over me. The realization that love wasn't mine to have. Neither was she. She and her heart deserved the right to live her life by her own choices, and I wasn't that choice. I cried. I hurt for months. But I got it. God had spoken to me. And said no. And I knew it was God because of the love behind the certainty.

Ever since, I hold that God speaks to our hearts. If we'll listen. We KNOW the right answers. They aren't in a book. They are in our faith and in the love we exercise towards each other. And they are frequently not universal.

I oppose abortion because of my love for life itself. It's not about when that embryo/fetus becomes a human. It's a life, and I just can't take away its future. But that same love denies me the authority to dictate that it's the right answer for anyone but me. The God I know sees our heart, knows when we act out of love and goodness, and when we act out of fear and despair. And so do we, each of us, as individuals.

Does that violate the First Commandment? I'm not a scholar, and not all that well-versed in The Bible. All I know is that I'm not telling God what he's "allowed" to tell me. I feel, down into my soul, that God has given me the love and the soul to see the right path for me. To try to shoehorn his message to me to conform to a text written by men, translated by men, and possibly misinterpreted by men, to me that's hubris, idolatry.

I guess I'll find out come Judgment.