No you're not wrong, we are called to be kind and loving to all. But we are not called to be tolerant of other religions in the way you would wish. What I mean by that is we are not to consider them equal with Christ. Our hope and trust and faith is not in a creed, a pope, or pillar but on a God/Man. There are many religions out there but there is only one Christ. He did what no other religion could do for us. He died for us. He took our spot.

Tolerance is not to be equated with acceptance. To be intolerant is not to be equated with force either. Christ was clear. Give out the message, if they accept you win a brother. If not, walk away. Never force anyone. We can't anyhow. Some Christians don't understand this. They think it's all on them to win souls. It's not. It's the Holy Spirit's doing, not ours. We are just the vehicle. The HS is driving the car.



Of course it is. We shouldn't do this. But keep in mind Christians that have met Jesus want you to meet him too and it's out of love not to insult but I can see how that can come across just as you said. We have such a strong sense of battle going on that we believe we are taking you from the grip of Satan to Christ who sets you free.



and this is exactly where we're heading not just here but globally. From my POV this is the desire of the Anti-Christ and will be the platform on which he wins acceptance. His smooth ecumenical words will make sense. Only later will people realize they have been duped by the master deceiver himself. After they help him in, he throws them off his back and will demand worship himself. That's the whole plan. Get worship away from Jehovah God and onto himself.

Dear KFC,

Thank you so much for your thoughtful and compassonate response. As you, I pray we will all one day become brothers or as I call it, One. We may have different takes on his, and that is really OK. You have an interesting POV regarding Messianics. Your take on ecumenicalism is sad to me, but I understand it from your POV. As I see it our minds and hearts can become so cluttered with our fears and the bogeymen of religious doctrine that we live in the dark, which you call light. Too bad, really. In all sincerity, I will pray for you.

As to Jesus and the Pharisees and monety-changers, we have clear differences on this as well. Moneyt was not clean, just as many things were ordaoined by God not be be clean. What Jesus was demonstrating was a rebellious nature. He was disssatisfied with the principles. Like many immature rebellious people. It is not OK to become angry at those who you feel are wronging God. It is not OK to be angry with sin or with simnners. Anger only begets anger. Anger is a poisonous emotion. An enlightened being would not become angry. While the Hebrew Scriptures has it that God became angry, I do not think this is in fact so. I believe we want to (or need to) believe God becomes angry, but that is an anthropomorphism and more a reflection of our shortcomings than God's. God is emotionless. He is the entire universe without limit. He is not even a He. That is our own addition to the mix. And that addition distorts the truth.

God speaks to us in ways we can understand, but that does not mean that understanding is it. It is only a way wee can understand. We must get outside of the box to really understand.

May you be well.

You're basing this on what? You keep saying you believe or you think. Where are you getting this from?



How can you say this in lieu of the cross? Christ wept over Jerusalem. He wept at the tomb of Lazarus. He was troubled before he went to the cross. He was angry as we've already noticed. We see many times where God loved as in "God so loved the world...."

If we are made after the image of God, and emotion is such a big part of who we are, I believe also that God also will display emotion that we will see, feel and recognize. The first will be his overwhelming love he has for us as he welcomes us into eternity.

Hello KFC,

My experience of human beings and scholarship. How people think, project, and assign to the universe whast we either want or need from it. If you think a text is a solution to discovering the truth, you are making a grave error (in my opinion).





Christ was not God. You keep thinking he was. I weep over the universe, as well. The notions of God emoting anything is a human one attributed to Him, It, Her by men who write about him.

Be well.

Little Whip, people should attempt to get laws passed that will further their beliefs. I do not argue they shouldn't and I support their right to do so. However, I also have the right to oppose such efforts, call them nonsense, short sighted, or whatever, as well.

I do not believe evil can be applied to individuals, only their behavior. Some behavior is virtuous, some far less so. I suspect we can agree on that. But all people, all people, including you, Little Whip, are perfect as they are. You have within you the seeds of buddhahood. You may choose not to nurture them, but they are there.

As far as tyranny goes, it is tyrannical when people (or even just one person) seek to place their interest above the interests of the common good on the basis of their belief that their way is the only way. And to claim that it is their inalienable God-given right to do so. This is exactly what the King of England did to our ancestors and we wrote a Declaration of Independence about it.

Do they have a right to attempt to do so? Absolutely. Is it bigoted, of course. Is it tyrannical? I suppose it depends on the thing. If I am a Jewish shopkeeper and I close my business on the Sabbath, but want to be open on Sunday and I lived in a state where the majority ruled the Sabbath was Sunday and all shops were to be closed, I suspect I think that might be tyranny. Or like in those delightful home states of mine in the deep south when I was a little boy and the good Christian white folk made lots of laws keeping black folk from water fountains and voting booths, yeppers, I'd say that was tyranny, as well.

Do I hate Christians? Goodness no. I do not hate anyone. There are ways in the world thogh that I do fighth against. Hate greed, delusion, these I work against as I see them as the source of evil behavior. I will stand up against these behaviors and those who use them, including "terrorists" or "Christians" or even "Buddhists" gone puritanical. When all we see is black and white our world is petty damn colorless, don't you think?

Be well, Little Whip.

Well, Christians believe that, for the betterment of everyone, everyone should become a Christian, and live a Christ-like lifestyle. That would be the best thing that could happen. Everyone who lives in a non-Christ-like manner is acting against the greater good.

What's wrong with that? You say it like it's a bad thing!

Little Whip, May you live a long and happy life. Be well.

So you're saying....that you trust your own human experiences and intelligence, to tell you that God does not become angry? How so?

Also, can you think of a time or times when your human experiences and smarts haven't led you wrong before? When it comes to the eternal, we must be quite sure we've done our HW because eternity is such a long time to live with a mistake. How can you know what God is like outside his revealed information given to us via 1500 years of written words from so many with such similar experiences? I guess if I didn't have this I would or could think whatever I wished. I might even agree with you because what else would I have?

So you're asking me or anybody to believe that the church fathers for the first five centuries (closer in time to the action) did not proclaim the true gospel; that Origen, Justin, Iraneaus, Jerome, Eusebius, Anthanasius, Chrysostom and then later Thomas Aquinas, Huss, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Tyndale, Wycliffe, Knoox, Wesley, Whitefield... etc not to exclude the 40 writers of both OT and NT who were in complete agreement,,, all were wrong? They all believed that God does indeed get angry and they ALL agreed that Jesus IS God. This is all beside the fact that Jesus even said he was God himself and demonstrated not only that he was but also this anger as God in the flesh.

So with one dogmatic assertion Sodaiho you have pronounced them all wrong. And Because you think he wasn't God and that a God wouldn't get angry it must be so.



But that's just it Sodaiho. It's not ME thinking. There's overwhelming evidence that he was God. He said he was by his actions and words. The many eyewitnesses said he was. They saw things that would indicate his deity. He was unlike any other. The changed lives then and still now are a great testimony to encounters with this same Christ. I'm not just thinking it and pulling it out of thin air.



Well that's good to know, but you do seem to have issues at the very least Sodaiho. I think (and I could be wrong here) that you are choosing to use these bad experiences to paint Christians in the light you wish to see them in so you can discount what the true Christians are saying.

You make a very good point.

Kingdoms have risen and fallen and our history books tell the tale. According to James Michener from his book 'The Quality of Life' (2000) reckons that;

'In the last two centuries every other nation has had to revise its form of government, most of them radically. China, oldest among the continuing nations, has experienced change of the most violent sort. Russia, one of the most powerful, has undergone total upheaval. Spain, France, Turkey ... all the others have tried one form of government after another, seeking stability which we miraculously attained.'

He continues:

'The four nations which might seem exceptions to this theory are Great Britian, Switzerland, Sweden and Thailand, but upon inspection they are not. Since we started our history as a constitutional democracy in 1789, Switzerland has been forced to change its basic law several times, often to a radical degree. Sweden and Thailand have shifted enormously in their attitudes towards their kings; and even stolid Britian has changed from strong kingly privileges to weak, and from a powerful House of Lords to one which serves principally as a cautionary figurehead.'

and finally:

'Therefore, when I look at my country, I see the oldest continuing systme of goverment and I take pride in the fact that we have founded a stable system while so many other nations did not. I think of the United States as a rather old nation, experienced, tested, so I tend to be occupied with the problems that overtake successful and established nations. I find no sense in theories which refer to us as a young nation, for among the family of nations we are the oldest brother.'

Jesus taught us to pray:

'Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.'

Jesus taught us a code that I am not sure any nation follows wholeheartedly:

'A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another as I have loved you.'

I think the best we have managed is 'my kindgdom come, my will be done, on earth as it is in .... where' and 'a new commandment I give unto myself, is that I love myself as much as I can manage, after all that is good therapy etc.'

The idea of a Theocracy or one nation under One GOD, has not really worked for Israel, for unless the Lord brings a nation to it's knees in repentance, we will just have as Jythier notes, reforms, more laws and eventually if God decides a nation 'given over' (Romans 1). I hate to say it but on a world wide scale our planet is in one sorry mess... The Judeo-Christian system is the only one that offers a definite plan, but there is only one who can properly impliment it, and well He is not here yet.

Come Lord Jesus.


Aeryck.

Believe what you wish, but you don’t have a Divine right to chastise and pillory those who don’t. I maybe a "heathen non-believer", but I sometimes wonder who understands the teachings of the person they labeled Christ more ...... as I understand it he was supposed to have taught tolerance and understanding. I see little around on this thread - more a competition as to who can prove the sky is falling tomorrow, or who can conjure up a more dramatic scenario.

In my 56 years on the planet to date, I have lost count of the number of times I am told by a religious zealot (some believe it, most like Bandwagons) that the world is socially corrupt, doomsday is due next week. Fifty years later we are still here. Despite that I do believe in an individuals right to believe what they like, and have fought and been shot at doing so. If individuals wish to believe in what I consider to be an unproven myth, that’s genuinely fine, if it gives them an inner peace that’s a wonderful thing.

What is despicable, is when those individuals have the arrogance to believe they can "save the world" and insist on painting this myth of a white knight savior when connected with an unproven myth. This wallowing in self righteous condemnation of all those who don’t "believe", is arrogance of appalling depth. The difference between them and the average "non-believer", is the latter is ultimately prepared to give the believer their rightful freedom to believe in what they like.

The same freedom is rarely given in reverse, it breaks the myth and introduces an uncomfortable reality into their lives, that they face privately, but hate seeing the same dilemma publicly. Dont wallow too much, you ultimately drown, even the person labelled Christ in the Fable tried to teach humility, not much evidence of it here.

Just out of curiosity, what is your opinion of this thought?

Person A lives a filthy life. He rapes, pillages, burns, steals, kills - you name it. All his life. On his death bed, he repents - truly repents - and finds Jesus. He goes to heaven.

Person B lives an honorable life. He's kind to people. He helps his neighbors. He works for charity. He gives of himself to others in all ways. BUT...he sees Christianity as lacking, and never believes any of it. He goes to hell.

And a second thought I am curious about your opinion on. If Christians TRULY believe that a person who lives in Christ all their lives goes to eternal paradise when they die, then why are they always crying at funerals? I'd expect there to be a big party. "WOOT! Dad has crossed the line into Paradise!"

I think that very fact betrays the truth.

As a brief aside, thank you Sadaiho for eloquently stating earlier that everyone is Buddhist and in different stages of knowing it. John Q. Public, or should I say "Joe User"?, seems to think that Buddhism is a religion. That, of course, makes it an affront to Christians, who, by and large, are so immersed in their own dogma, they literally can't see the forest for the trees. I don't really buy that you and everyone else is a Buddha, but that one statement was nice.

Folks, true Buddhism doesn't ask anything from anyone. We all must walk our own paths. Christians, be well while walking yours. I wish you the very best because our beliefs are not mutually exclusive (at least from a Buddhist standpoint...I know they are from a Christian standpoint, and perhaps you should think about that briefly. After all, what does it mean when Buddhists are more forgiving than Christians? Hmmmm?)



Brilliant, Zydor. Thank you. This is wisdom.

"Person A lives a filthy life. He rapes, pillages, burns, steals, kills - you name it. All his life. On his death bed, he repents - truly repents - and finds Jesus. He goes to heaven.

Person B lives an honorable life. He's kind to people. He helps his neighbors. He works for charity. He gives of himself to others in all ways. BUT...he sees Christianity as lacking, and never believes any of it. He goes to hell."

"For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard. "About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.' So they went. "He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, 'Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?' " 'Because no one has hired us,' they answered. "He said to them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard.'

"When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.'

"The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 'These men who were hired last worked only one hour,' they said, 'and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.' "But he answered one of them, 'Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?'

"So the last will be first, and the first will be last." (Matt.20: 1-16)

Also, if you work in someone else's field, or your own field, you don't get a denarius from him. You might work hard, harder than anyone else, but it was in the wrong field.

Can you not see that that makes God out to be a pompous asshole? I read He's a loving God. Hell, I'd cut Person B more slack than he would according to you, so what does it mean that I am more forgiving? Nothing to you, I'm sure, because you have it all figured out. I suppose I should just offer my congratulations. Your place in heaven is secure. Awesome, man. Have a good time.



And your answer to this? All I heard (which is what I expected to hear) was the deafening sound of crickets.

This is the most misleading statement ever said about how God judges humans on Judgement Day. this is due to the misunderstanding of:



This statement doesnt mean the above example. Considering the fundamental principle that "Justice and Mercy " are God's rules for judgement the last statement means that your time of believing (your work starting time) is immaterial. What counts is your productivity, honesty and sincerity in doing your work regardless of the lenght of the time you spent doing it.

That is a misconception of what God say. On death bed, it is too late to repent. repentance is not a escape hatch. it must be followed by honest regret and good deeds to validate your intention.



yes Believing in God, not necessarily Christianity, is a must for any work to be accepted. Nothing really starnge in that. Regardless of your knowledge and intellectual output you dont expect to be say a "Yale" Graduate if you dont believe in their existence and accordingly didnt even apply to join? do you?

If you dont believe in His existence, how do you expect your work to be considered by Him on the day of Judgement? however, since He is Just he promised to reward your good work as you intended to be. i.e. as a good way to live THIS life. He promised to reward you for that also in this life. That is what you worked for and that is what you get.

If however, you believe in Him and you do the good deeds for His sake He promised to reward you in two ways: In this life and in the hereafte.

Fair, isn,t it? you get rewarde according to what your intentions are.

Well, that's what I was trying to say with the quote, that the amount of time you believe is immaterial.

The passage Jythier put forth is one that many don't get. If one is looking at it from a human perspective it doesn't seem fair at all. Those who work all their lives for God inherit the same eternity of those who came in at the last hour? Doesn't seem to make sense until you think about it.

Think about it this way. A baby born into a family has mom and dad and siblings. Child grows up with memories of happy and sad times with said family. Lots of family trips,photographs, school and sport events, etc. Later in this child's life the family decides to adopt a 17 year old. This new addition to the family is now part of the family but has missed out by not being part of the family for the first part of his life. He has no memories. He has no box of artwork in the closet nor pictures of the family all together with him included. But he is now family nonetheless. He has no choice but to go on from here.

It's the same with the workers. They didn't have the love, joy, peace and deep knowledge and relationship of God until late in life, perhaps not even until near death. He missed out. Those that had God their whole life shouldn't complain. They lived better lives if they just thought about it with God in them.



I'll answer this. What are you talking about? I've been to many funerals and there is a BIG difference going to one who died a believer and one who did not. There is JOY in the room. Sadness too but the sadness is not the same as going to an unbeliever's funeral, one with no hope of ever seeing this person again. I've seen many Christian funerals that were indeed celebrations. It doesn't mean one isn't going to still cry. It's for the pain of separation they cry. I mean, don't people cry when others move away? It's the same thing.

This is a joke, right?

Yale has never claimed to love everyone though. Yale has never asked to be worshipped, or claimed omnipotence or omniscience. Subtle differences, really, but important nonetheless.



But they clearly didn't. They could have been loafing around in the marketplace having a good time and just waited until the 11th hour and then got the same pay. Instead they did a day of backbreaking manual labour and got paid exactly the same as the cleverer ones who waited. They got shafted big-time - they should have listened to the union reps in the marketplace and held out for a better deal which involved working hours that could support a more healthy work/life balance.

If that example is supposed to make God look good then it's not working; it just makes him look like a cheapskate, or a pompous knob-jockey as the good Mr Razor pointed out.

oh yeah???

First who said that Yale doesnt love everyone?

Second, They have their own conditions, rituals and many other criteria that they use to decide if you are accepted or not. Comon ..... i never expected you to ask that. If you look at it closely it is easier to be accepted in Heaven than into Yale .... and i really mean that. Just because they dont call it "worship" it doesnt mean it is not. God's rituals and conditions are much more democratic and lenient than Yale.

You are correct. the misunderstanding of that quote gives God a bad reputation for sure. But people still insist on it and try to manipulate their way around it. it makes Him look very .... i cant even say it. but you know what.

It is another misunderstanding to say anyone knows who is and who is not going to paradise. That is God's call ON THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT. He never promised anyone in advance that his decision will be in their favor only it will be: Just, Merciful and Compassionate. The actual result is unknow but to him and him alone. Anyone who takes Him for granted is in big trouble.

Your original quote left no doubt that not only time is immaterial but also was the work done itself. And that is the big problem with the misunderstanding of the quote. Time is immaterial. Work quality, intention, and amount arenot and they are the criteria for getting paid. The example you mentioned is sooo undgodly as you can get.

as you can see from other's comments, these kind of quotes and misunderstandings give God and Religion in general BAD name.

But that's it Cacto. If you are planning on waiting until the 11th hour you may not know that it's the 10th hour that your time is up! We have no idea when we will draw our last breath. Besides that, we're not going to fool God. It's up to him to allow us into his home in heaven. If that's our goal, to do what we want while all the while thumbing our noses at God until the 11th hour, don't you think he'd know? I don't see this in the parable that Jythier brought up. The workers found out about the great job opportunity and applied for the job. While they all received the same end wage, the others got benefits along the way by being with and knowing the owner.

Besides all that, working for God, while it can be frustrating at times, it's also filled with unexplainable joy that cannot compare with working for the world. Christ said when you come to him, he gives us abundant life; something the world can only try to counterfeit.

As far as union reps? Who needs them. We've got Jesus! He's worth more than all the union reps you can supply....LOL.



well maybe I went a bit overboard but I was basically saying that people are going to cry at funerals no matter what. I mean if people cry at others moving away why wouldn't they cry at funerals as well? To a Christian death is nothing more than a change of address when they say goodby to another believer.

This week I'm going to a woman's conference in Boston where there will be thousands of women from all over the globe meeting together to worship God from all denominations and walks of life. It's called "Woman of Faith." This has been a yearly event for many years all over the country. One of the women in the forefront of all this, comedian and writer Barbara Johnson, died this year of cancer. She asked that we do a "clapping ceremony" for her at her death. She wants us to clap because she's entering the gates of heaven where her husband and two sons will be waiting for her. No tears, just clapping.