Is faith a reliable way to know truth?

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Renate said:
It's just that back when I believed in God, I did ask for faith, and I prayed for the holy spirit. I never got an answer.
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He knows when each of us is ready for love. Maybe you weren't really ready yet. I think I see rain. Ask again. Turn off your computer, go to a quiet room, and ask for what you need. A verse says to keep knocking on the door. There is a parable that may help. I'm going on memory here.

There was an unjust judge who a woman kept asking for help from. She kept coming back and knocking over and over and waking him up. Finally he realized she wasn't going to go away and leave him alone, so he gave her the help she requested so she would go away and leave him alone.

And if a human, and an unjust one at that, would help someone who kept asking, then surely God, who isn't human, and isn't unjust, will help someone who keeps asking and knocking.
 
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Stunnedbygrace said:
It reminds me of a tv show I watched once. I watched a few episodes because I was stunned by what I saw. It was all of these really wealthy housewives and each episode started with snips of each of them saying things like: I'm rich and everybody wishes they were me. Or, I have a perfect life and jets and cars and maids and my life is magical and wonderful.

Then the show would start and you saw how miserable they were and it was like a huge trainwreck and they literally couldn't see they were miserable and still insisted they were living the happy dream!
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I don't mean to be disrespectful, but to me that sounds like convincing someone that they are sick and then selling them the cure. Telling people they are miserable and then telling them that only christianity has the solution, when in fact they are fine. In your example of the tv show I can imagine what you mean because they are living shallow lives, but I certainly hope you don't think all atheists are miserable. If you do, you should go talk to some atheists.
 
Renate said:
I don't mean to be disrespectful, but to me that sounds like convincing someone that they are sick and then selling them the cure. Telling people they are miserable and then telling them that only christianity has the solution, when in fact they are fine. In your example of the tv show I can imagine what you mean because they are living shallow lives, but I certainly hope you don't think all atheists are miserable. If you do, you should go talk to some atheists.
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I don't think you have been disrespectful at all! You have been nothing BUT respectful. I see less respect from some of my brothers in here, honestly. :)

This goes back to being blind and not knowing. Being miserable and not knowing it.
It is strange to me to think an atheist can say they are happy when everywhere I look is complete insufficiency. Hungry people, news stories of people doing awful things to babies, children and animals. War in many places and so many dying and being tortured.

Not only do I not see how an atheist can say they are not miserable, having to always see all of the insufficiency, brokenness and pain in the world, I do not see how ANYONE can.

Is it just grab as much as you personally can carve out for yourself, ignore the utter insufficiency of everything, and then die anyway in the end? How is that happy or sufficient?
 
Stunnedbygrace said:
I don't think you have been disrespectful at all! You have been nothing BUT respectful. I see less respect from some of my brothers in here, honestly. :)

This goes back to being blind and not knowing. Being miserable and not knowing it.
It is strange to me to think an atheist can say they are happy when everywhere I look is complete insufficiency. Hungry people, news stories of people doing awful things to babies, children and animals. War in many places and so many dying and being tortured.

Not only do I not see how an atheist can say they are not miserable, having to always see all of the insufficiency, brokenness and pain in the world, I do not see how ANYONE can.

Is it just grab as much as you personally can carve out for yourself, ignore the utter insufficiency of everything, and then die anyway in the end? How is that happy or sufficient?
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Of course atheists see the suffering in the world too. The way they (or at least me personally) deal with that is to do as much as is in their power to help. Due scientific advancements, world hunger and poverty are at an all time low, and steadily declining. Thanks to the hard work of doctors and researchers, more and more diseases can be prevented and cured, and life expectancy is higher than it ever was. Helping to make the world a better place is what makes me happy and my friends and family make me happy.
 
Renate said:
What do you mean by "We "walk" or understand him"?
Also why does Jesus say that "they which see might be made blind"?
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The scriptures use the word walk to indicate a understanding. We walk by the unseen called faith . The unbeliever is reckoned as lame r blind, deaf or a leper in need of the light of the gospel .

Those who say they can see or understand without the work of the gospel working in them will be confirmed in their spiritual blindness, no sensitivity to the work of the Holy Spirit. leprosy the disease he used to represent those who have no sensitivity to the work of the Holy Spirit .

When John was in prison and had doubt as to whether or not the Son of man was the Christ, Jesus sent him an example of the working of the gospel

Luke 7:22Then Jesus answering said unto them, Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached.

John received the Sabbath rest, it softened John's heart so that he could believe or understand , "mixing faith" in what he did hear and see as the Holy Spirit gave him ears to make it possible to believe the gospel

Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed "with faith" in them that heard it. For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his works.And in this place again, If they shall enter into my rest.Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief: (no faith) Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts Hebrew 4:1-7

Again it is Christ who does make our hearts soft , no mixing of faith as did John in Luke 7 hearts remains hard.

I would suggest to study by searching for the understanding in regard to the phrase" being mixed with faith in them that heard it".
Its the key that the gates of hell could never prevail against
 
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Renate said:
Of course atheists see the suffering in the world too. The way they (or at least me personally) deal with that is to do as much as is in their power to help. Due scientific advancements, world hunger and poverty are at an all time low, and steadily declining. Thanks to the hard work of doctors and researchers, more and more diseases can be prevented and cured, and life expectancy is higher than it ever was. Helping to make the world a better place is what makes me happy and my friends and family make me happy.
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And then you die anyway. So it's just a temporary existence where you try to relieve some of the misery, try to shut out the remaining misery, grasptightly the few things and people that give you some temporary comfort and happiness and then die and cease to exist. This makes me think those who commit suicide are the smartest among us...
 
Stunnedbygrace said:
d


And then you die anyway. So it's just a temporary existence where you try to relieve some of the misery, try to shut out the remaining misery, grasptightly the few things and people that give you some temporary comfort and happiness and then die and cease to exist. This makes me think those who commit suicide are the smartest among us...
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It would depend whose will a person is following after as to who ceases to exist ? Some will rise to new eternal spirit life ?

John 8:44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
 
garee said:
It would depend whose will a person is following after as to who ceases to exist ? Some will rise to new eternal spirit life ?

John 8:44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
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Yes. But have you noticed I'm talking to a nice gentleman who does not have the gift or the sure hope that you do? :D

And have you further noticed that he says he is happy despite the fact that he thinks life is temporary struggle and strife? ad that his trying to relieve what misery he can is like sticking his finger in a hole in the titanic but that doesn't phase him at all and he is still insisting he's happy? I think he sees all of the misery and insufficiency but that he is able to dampen or tamp it down or find distractions from the horror of it.
 
Renate, I regret that I have to go do some work right now because it has truly been a pleasure to meet you and talk with you! I hope to see you later. :)
 
Renate said:
Thank you! It has also been a pleasure talk with you. By the way, I am a woman, not a gentleman. :)
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Ah...they just changed the site. I am used to seeing pink and blue and took your purple to be a blue-ish one. Mine is now blue come to think of it and I'm a woman.

I'm glad you are a woman because you aren't starting with one strike against you! :p:censored:
 
Renate said:
That in itself is not evidence of anything other than that it is very difficult to do science in that area. Also, in your statement you are assuming that the universe was created. How do you know that?
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The same way as those who believe the universe wasn't created - by faith.
 
When scientists proved the Big Bang and atheists had to accept it with gnashing of their teeth (they tried to postulate that the Universe is eternal), I think there is no honest reason to believe in atheism.

Theism is currently the only one elegant game in town.

Some atheists try to invent other explanation for "how something got from nothing" and for "the fine tuning of the universe", creating wild quantum fluctuations hypothesis, multiverse, string theory etc.

Hawking was very active in this, but he himself was not satisfied with his solutions. He did not think its elegant.
 
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trofimus said:
When scientists proved the Big Bang and atheists had to accept it with gnashing of their teeth (they tried to postulate that the Universe is eternal), I think there is no honest reason to believe in atheism.
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Proved? Science can't prove anything. It only takes one thing that we don't know about to disprove any theory.
 
Renate said:
If, for example, a Hindu says "I have faith that Vishnu is my lord and saviour", does that make Vishnu true?
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The only faith that is of any consequence is faith in the living God. God has revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and Jesus has said that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
 
trofimus said:
So, for example, it cannot be proved that the earth is not flat, in your opinion?
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I don't consider empirical discoveries to be science. Determining the earth was not flat was simply a matter of getting high enough to see its curvature. That's no more science than Columbus sailing far enough to discover America was.
 
HeRoseFromTheDead said:
I don't consider empirical discoveries to be science. Determining the earth was not flat was simply a matter of getting high enough to see its curvature. That's no more science than Columbus sailing far enough to discover America was.
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Ok, my definition of "science" is probably more broad than yours. Yours is more technical.
 
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