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Does Salvation by Faith Make Sense to You?
- Thread starter Sunstone
- Start date
It makes about as much sense to me as the idea of salvation in general - which is to say, not much. About the most sense I can make of it is that it is a lesson in the power of will or conviction. If a tradition has teachings about free will, lessons about the power of that will would be important.
No it makes no sense. First "salvation" strikes me as a very Western idea that there's something to be saved from. The modern version is the "get out of jail free" card. The entire frame-of-reference is alien to how I see the world.
This is a different question not one of "salvation" which is a Christian concept of avoiding paying or balancing from misdeeds. This kind of faith is about believing there is a worthwhile goal called the Divine and that it's possible to reach/attain the state where the "bubble" returns to the ocean from whence it came.
This is a different question not one of "salvation" which is a Christian concept of avoiding paying or balancing from misdeeds. This kind of faith is about believing there is a worthwhile goal called the Divine and that it's possible to reach/attain the state where the "bubble" returns to the ocean from whence it came.
Grandliseur
Well-Known Member
Due to the failing health of my wife and because we have a joint account, a while back I applied for a new credit card which was denied due to age, and not for being delinquent in any way. It is now about a year later, and I got involved with a different company through which I reapplied for a credit card. It was approved with some frills attached. Great.
Wasn't that fun to read about my silly life? Well, the point I am making, I hope, is that the first company no longer had faith in me. Was this an important difference? To me it was. The second company put faith in me, and with this new set up, I am less in a pickle if my wife dies. So, did them putting faith in me make a difference. I sure think so, and, of course, I am going to try to be a serious trustworthy customer.
God
God rewards his human servants (big subject) James said:
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
We are quite clearly told that the one without faith will receive nothing from the Lord. Ask yourself if all anyone could pay you back is appreciation in obeying some rules, and having faith in that 'you' want their heartfelt appreciation - if they never thanked you, nor felt gratitude for the things given - would you want to do anything for them?!
Faith is what makes us want to obey God and his son, Jesus Christ. Without this faith there is no impetus for obeying their edicts and rules.
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Yes, in fact it is the only way I could believe a deity to exist. Problem is complete faith would be needed, which no religion or person has. God basically wants someone be more than existence, in other words an equal. Those of us that choose any part of existence are not going to be happy with God's reality. It is an impossible thing for us to choose faith right now but God has waited Billions of years perhaps our replacements will do better.
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Does it really make any sense at all to experience and have someone tell you what to say? If I walk out into the wilder parts of the forest look around its all interconnected. Who the f@@k is darwin and science? A idiotic dog is an evolutionist. So it's not just religion please it's uncultured everywhere.
No, it doesn't make sense. We need to move onto more sophisticated beliefs is my opinion.
socharlie
Active Member
I do not think the True God has any such concerns.
Would you make someone an admin/moderator if all that person ever did was complain about how moderators suck and/or the forums suck and they actively/repeatedly try to get the website taken down/causes other problems?
Me thinks not.
So why is it even a question?
InChrist
Free4ever
It makes perfect sense to me because the Creator God I believe is a Being who desires relationship based on love and trust (faith).
Unveiled Artist
Veteran Member
No. I have a few problems with that. First, I need to know a deity exists. I read a lot of characters in books but that doesnt prove a deity's existence.
Then, Id need something to be saved from. Something I know I need to be saved from personally; a personal conviction and knowledge.
Then in order to trust/put faith in this deity, Id have to believe its worthy of my honor. The christian deity, for example, killed many people if going by scriptures. He has ordered people to kill in his name. People do kill in his name even today and all through history.
It doesnt make sense not only logically (he has to exist first) but morally too. With so much things piled up on this deity's "credit report" why would I trust him to pay off my sins without good credit? I mean, Jesus, Peter, and Moses can speak for god but the signature is in His name.
So, it doesnt make sense. But no one has explained it to me apart from emotional attachment and dependence on belief for survival and sanity.
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Makes perfect sense in terms of designing a religion. Makes far less sense (imho) for an omnipotent, omnibenevolent and omnipresent deity.
gnomon
Well-Known Member
No.
It makes no sense at all.
A child born with it's brain outside it's skull.....I could list so many degenerative disorders of childhood development which would logically conclude that such a child, in traditional religious sense, could never understand the concept of faith.
Faith in the term of required belief for salvation is absolutely offensive and derived from an ignorant mindset.
Especially in the concept that this deity created the conditions leading to such degenerative disorders but would require them to understand a complex concept for salvation......
It's disgusting. And every popular attempt or even worse eschatological attempt to explain it away....
Intellectually useless.
I mentioned religion. Religion is not about a deity.
It's about culture.
But then what does a child born of a severe degenerative disorder know about culture and the bull**** so called rich histories we make up about that and call it religion?
It doesn't.
So in my opinion there is no reason to believe in general religion or cultural religion.
Just accept, love and live.
Faith could just as well justify claiming that there are no gods. That's the nature of faith, by which one can equally well (or poorly) support any idea or its polar opposite, of which at most only one can be correct.
This is why I have no faith in faith - whether that faith be mine or that of others. Faith is not a virtue. It is as virtuous as an unjustified guess.
Agreed. In fact by faith, one can reject rules as well as accept them.
I'm not saying that one needs faith to reject unsupported claims, but faith supports such a choice if that is one's basis for making it.
Geoff-Allen
Resident megalomaniac
I like what Tolle has 2 say:
True salvation is fulfillment, peace, life in all its fullness. It is to be who you are, to feel within you the good that has no opposite, the joy of Being that depends on nothing outside itself. It is felt not as a passing experience but as an abiding presence. In theistic language, it is to "know God" ― not as something outside you but as your own innermost essence. True salvation is to know yourself as an inseparable part of the timeless and formless One Life from which all that exists derives its being.
For more, try this site -
The Power of Now - Eckhart Tolle: Excerpts
Cheers!
True salvation is fulfillment, peace, life in all its fullness. It is to be who you are, to feel within you the good that has no opposite, the joy of Being that depends on nothing outside itself. It is felt not as a passing experience but as an abiding presence. In theistic language, it is to "know God" ― not as something outside you but as your own innermost essence. True salvation is to know yourself as an inseparable part of the timeless and formless One Life from which all that exists derives its being.
For more, try this site -
The Power of Now - Eckhart Tolle: Excerpts
Cheers!
YmirGF
Bodhisattva in Recovery
Salvation is a nonsensical concept, in and of itself. Having to have faith in something well beyond our experience is expecting miracles.