Will that make any difference in your daily life style ?

[ppp]

There is a reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would care and want you to believe and understand, but there is no reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would want to make you understand that He exists or make you understand His message, because if God made you understand that would interfere with your free will.

When someone enters the room, are they interfering with my free will? When they introduce themselves? When they claim that they are an artist, and sketch a picture of a bowl of fruit?

 

[Trailblazer]

When someone enters the room, are they interfering with my free will? When they introduce themselves? When they claim that they are an artist, and sketch a picture of a bowl of fruit?

No.

 

[ppp]

No.

If a random person, or a cat can make me believe that they exists without impinging on my free will, an omnipotent god should be at least as capable. I am not speculating about what such a being wants. I am referring your statement that if your god made me understand that he exists, that would interfere with my free with.

 

[Trailblazer]

If a random person, or a cat can make me believe that they exists without impinging on my free will, an omnipotent god should be at least as capable. I am not speculating about what such a being wants. I am referring your statement that if your god made me understand that he exists, that would interfere with my free with.

Whenever anyone makes you believe or do something that interferes with your free will to choose whether to believe it or do it.

 

[ppp]

When someone enters the room, are they interfering with my free will? When they introduce themselves? When they claim that they are an artist, and sketch a picture of a bowl of fruit?

No.

Whenever anyone makes you believe or do something that interferes with your free will to choose whether to believe it or do it.

A cat entering the room is making me believe that it exists. I can ignore the cat. I can pretend that the cat isn't there. I can refuse to obey the cat's demands. But I cannot stop being convinced that cat exists.

 

[Trailblazer]

A cat entering the room is making me believe that it exists. I can ignore the cat. I can pretend that the cat isn't there. I can refuse to obey the cat's demands. But I cannot stop being convinced that cat exists.

God does not enter any rooms.
You atheists are so funny.

 

[ppp]

God does not enter any rooms.
You atheists are so funny.

Coward.

 

[Trailblazer]

Coward.

No, God just doesn't like to socialize.
God has no partners, He is one and alone.
And God never steps down from His Throne of Glory.

“Beware, beware, lest thou be led to join partners with the Lord, thy God. He is, and hath from everlasting been, one and alone, without peer or equal, eternal in the past, eternal in the future, detached from all things, ever-abiding, unchangeable, and self-subsisting. He hath assigned no associate unto Himself in His Kingdom, no counsellor to counsel Him, none to compare unto Him, none to rival His glory. To this every atom of the universe beareth witness, and beyond it the inmates of the realms on high, they that occupy the most exalted seats, and whose names are remembered before the Throne of Glory.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 192

No man has ever seen God at any time, not even the Messengers of God, and you think He should pay you a visit?
I would never want to see God even if I could, I like the Mystery.

John 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.

1 John 4:12 No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us.

 

[ppp]

No, God just doesn't like to socialize.

#118

 

[QuestioningMind]

Firstly, God could not just convey this message directly to each and every person in a manner that each person would accept and understand, because nobody except the Messengers of God could ever understand communication from God, because only Messengers have a divine mind that can receive such communication.

and a follower of Baha’u’llah. God does not communicate this Himself; God has people who are entrusted with this duty.

That is a Catch-22, because the Messenger IS the evidence that God exists, so you cannot put the cart (God exists) before the horse (Messenger).


There is a reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would care and want you to believe and understand, but there is no reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would want to make you understand that He exists or make you understand His message, because if God made you understand that would interfere with your free will.

God wants you to choose to believe and try to understand because you want to, not because He made you believe and understand.

And that is really the whole nine yards.

Firstly, God could not just convey this message directly to each and every person in a manner that each person would accept and understand, because nobody except the Messengers of God could ever understand communication from God, because only Messengers have a divine mind that can receive such communication.

This sounds like a REAL stretch of logic to me. So we have god who has a message for us, but he cannot inform us directly what this message is, because he is incapable of presenting it in a way we can understand. What he CAN do is convey this message to special messengers who he somehow CAN convey his message to. Okay, so why god couldn't have given all of us the same abilities that he gives to his special messengers, I'm not sure, but we'll go with it.

Now here is where the logic gets REALLY weird. Not only did god give his special messengers the ability receive his message he ALSO gave them a special ability that even god doesn't posses... the ability to convey his message in a way that normal mortals CAN understand. WHAT????? Sorry, but that's absolutely ridiculous. IF god didn't want to give us all the same abilities he gave special messengers so we could understand his message, why didn't he just give HIMSELF the same abilities that he gives to his special messengers to convey his message directly to common mortals?


Secondly, a free ride means getting something for nothing. Do we a PhD degree for nothing, or do we have to work for it? Doesn’t raising children require hard work? Both are rewarding, but they require sacrifice and hard work. Why should knowledge of God be any different from anything else in our lives?

Some sacrifice of time and some effort are involved, but to varying degrees, as it depends upon how skeptical one is. Some people recognize the message of Baha’u’llah almost immediately and others never do. One reason is that some people have more obstructions to understanding than other people, given their background with religion or no religion.

I don't think this is as good an analogy as you think it is. A professor teaching students who want to earn a PHD can explain in detail on the very first day of class precisely what he expects them to know in order to earn their PHD. Of course, unless the student is very well above average, it will take most students years to fully understand everything that the professor revealed on that first day. However, by telling the students on day one what the 'message' is, he is in no way giving his students a 'free ride'. So just because I might not fully understand the message at first, by simply giving me the message god wouldn't be giving me some sort of a 'free ride'.

Furthermore, just because a professor provides evidence that the subject of let's say 'medical science' actually exists, that professor has in no way given his students a 'free ride' for understanding the science that he's provided evidence exists. So god could easily provide evidence the god exists without having to reveal all knowledge about god. Why would ANY student take a course from a professor who refused to provide evidence that the course of study he was teaching actually existed? You expect people to put in the hard work... that's fine! But you really need to give them some concrete evidence that what they're working so hard to understand is actually real.

Just because I give you evidence that the study of physics exists does not mean I've given you a 'free-ride' on understanding everything about physics. Just as if god provided evidence that god exists, it wouldn't mean that we got a 'free-ride' and suddenly know everything there is to know about god.

It is not only to distinguish between the sincere seekers who are willing to do the hard work and the others, it is to distinguish between those who are willing to take a leap of faith and those who are not willing. A person would be seeking the message in order to verify that God exists and get His message, but they would have to have “some faith” that God might exist in order to embark upon the journey and start searching for God and His message.

And here it is, what's makes your entire argument crumble. ANY method for discovering truth that requires faith is not worth pursuing, since faith simply is NOT a reliable path to the truth. People can take anything on faith, even diametrically opposed concepts. In fact falling back on faith is hardly doing the 'hard work'. It's the exact opposite. It's what people rely on when they discover that having to find verifiable evidence for what they want to believe is too difficult. And OF COURSE you need to first convince yourself that this god is real without any evidence, because who in their right mind would devote their lives to seeking out obscure prophets from throughout history and struggle to figure out if they're real or false prophets all so you can get proof that something you have absolutely no good reason to believe exist does.

In my opinion a SINCERE seeker waits for actual verifiable evidence, whereas an insincere seeker gets impatient and decides to employ a leap of faith in order to convince themselves that what they already wanted to find is actually what's there.

The Messenger is the horse that delivers what is in the cart, the knowledge of God. You need the horse/Messenger to get the goods to market. The goods are the knowledge of God and God’s Will for humanity for this age in history and the market is the human mind.

Nope, that's not the way that it works. If I have no knowledge of god (or no reason whatsoever to believe that a god exists) it would be the height of idiocy for me to devote time and energy to seeking out messengers to give me evidence that a being I have absolutely no reason to believe exists actually does. FIRST give me evidence that there is a god to learn about and THEN I'll devote the time and energy to finding out more about this god.

And this is where the need for faith comes in. You have to take it on faith that there is a god worth taking the time and energy to find evidence for. After all, you have just as little verifiable evidence that little green men from Mars exist, yet since you haven't taken it on faith that little green men from Mars exist you of course have not devoted much if any of your time and energy attempting to find messengers who will provide you with evidence for little green men.

THAT'S what I mean by putting the cart before the horse. FIRST you have to accept that there IS a wagon full of god knowledge that some horse/messenger can deliver. But you don't go searching for a horse to deliver a cart full of knowledge when you haven't even verified that the cart of knowledge even exists.

God is partners with nobody, not even His Messengers, and God is not a person in a relationship, so that analogy does not work. As I said above, God is not going to TELL you anything directly, because you could never understand God if He spoke to you directly, but also because that is not and has never been God’s chosen Method of communicating with humans.

I'm aware that god isn't a person in a relationship, but I think the analogy holds up just fine. Personally I hate it when people (or apparently when a god) likes to play silly mind games. If you have something to tell me, just say it. I really doesn't matter if you're far superior to me in every way. It's just a matter of common courtesy. Don't make me try and figure out IF you have something to say to me and then make me jump through all sorts of ridiculous hoops in hopes that I'll be able to figure out what it is you want to say. If this is the only method that god is willing to use then clearly god doesn't care if I hear what he has to say. And if he doesn't care, why should I?

There is a reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would care and want you to believe and understand, but there is no reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would want to make you understand that He exists or make you understand His message, because if God made you understand that would interfere with your free will.

God wants you to choose to believe and try to understand because you want to, not because He made you believe and understand.

And that is really the whole nine yards

Yet another concept that I find completely boggling. If I provide you with verifiable evidence that the Earth orbits the sun, did I MAKE you understand that the Earth orbits the sun or I have simply given you evidence that your critical thinking mind can use to determine the truth about the Earth orbiting the sun? And if I provide you with all of the evidence for my claim that has been collected over time, am I giving you a 'free-ride' because I didn't force you to gather all of the evidence that's been gathered over time all by yourself? Is your understanding any less valid or correct?

And then we have this idea about interfering with free will. By providing proof that the Earth orbits the sun have I interfered with your free will? I suppose it can be argued that if critical thinking skills are important to you that by providing proof I've somehow deprived you of the free will to delude yourself into thinking that the Sun orbits the Earth. Heck, there are people who have been provided with endless evidence that the Earth is a sphere, yet being given that evidence hasn't stop them from freely and willfully ignoring it. So on that basis I guess you COULD say that god revealing himself to me would deprive me of my free will to delude myself into believing he doesn't, all because verifiable evidence and critical thinking skills are important to me. Though in such a case is it really god reveling himself that interfered with my free will or is it my insistence on accepting verifiable evidence that has deprived me of the ability to freely will myself to ignore the evidence and not believe?

Furthermore, the bible itself indicates that being given knowledge that god exists doesn't eliminate an individual's ability to exercise free will. Paul was provided with evidence that god exists on the road to Damascus, but I have no reason to believe that afterward he lost his ability to exercise his free will. And then of course there's Lucifer who unquestionably had god's existence revealed to him; yet he freely chose to defy that same god. On what are you basing this notion that god revealing himself eliminates free will? Is it because it's the only explanation you can come up with for why this omnipotent god refuses to reveal himself?

 

[Trailblazer]

#118

Joe W said: #118 (I have no doubt that you understand the implication, which is why you keep trying to evade and obfuscate and pretend that you are being responsive. I'm not interested in lies of omission.)

I answered your question directly, unlike you, who refuses to answer my questions.
You just did not like my answer so you said I was not being "responsive."
What did I omit? What you wanted to hear that I do not believe? That would have been a lie.

Joe W said: Coward.

Trailblazer said: No, God just doesn't like to socialize.
God has no partners, He is one and alone.
And God never steps down from His Throne of Glory.

No man has ever seen God at any time, not even the Messengers of God, and you think He should pay you a visit?
I would never want to see God even if I could, I like the Mystery.

In told you I was done playing games about a week ago. Don't expect to get any more posts from me, unless you can stop misrepresenting me, talk to me directly, and answer what I ask.

If you want to know how a mature respectful atheist responds to posts, here it is:
#210 QuestioningMind, 25 minutes ago

Happy trails.

 

[Trailblazer]

Firstly, God could not just convey this message directly to each and every person in a manner that each person would accept and understand, because nobody except the Messengers of God could ever understand communication from God, because only Messengers have a divine mind that can receive such communication.

This sounds like a REAL stretch of logic to me. So we have god who has a message for us, but he cannot inform us directly what this message is, because he is incapable of presenting it in a way we can understand.

This is not about what seems logical to you because God does not operate according to logic, God transcends logic. Hypothetically, since God is omnipotent, God COULD communicate His message to everyone in the world, but humans could not understand it because they do not have that capability because they do not have a divine mind.

What he CAN do is convey this message to special messengers who he somehow CAN convey his message to. Okay, so why god couldn't have given all of us the same abilities that he gives to his special messengers, I'm not sure, but we'll go with it.

God did not give us all a divine mind because He chose not to, no doubt because He never planned to communicate directly to us ordinary humans.

Now here is where the logic gets REALLY weird. Not only did god give his special messengers the ability receive his message he ALSO gave them a special ability that even god doesn't posses... the ability to convey his message in a way that normal mortals CAN understand. WHAT????? Sorry, but that's absolutely ridiculous.

IF god didn't want to give us all the same abilities he gave special messengers so we could understand his message, why didn't he just give HIMSELF the same abilities that he gives to his special messengers to convey his message directly to common mortals?

As I just said above, God DOES have the ability to convey His message to ordinary humans, but ordinary humans do not have the ability to understand God’s message, so the LIMITATION is not a limitation God has, it is a limitation that ordinary humans have.

Now let’s talk logic. What reason on earth would God have to communicate the SAME exact message to everyone in the world (even if everyone could understand it? I have heard all the arguments as to why atheists think God should do that so I doubt you will surprise me with a new argument, but go ahead and then I will see if it is the same as I have heard before, for which I have answers memorized.

Another question is why shouldn’t God communicate one message to one Messenger in every age and allow Him to disseminate that message to everyone? That sounds a lot more efficient to me than communicating the same message to everyone. Then of course we would have to imagine what would happen if everyone got the SAME message from God. (This is not even taking into consideration what I said before, that everyone is not worthy of getting their own personal message and that that would make it too easy for people to believe in God.)

Aside from this, we have a slight detail I failed to mention before: Baha’u’llah wrote 15,000 tablets, so even if everyone COULD understand what was revealed to Baha’u’llah, is everyone going to be able to write all that down to refer to later? And then what would happen if that was even possible? Would everyone interpret the same message the exact same way? That would be impossible.

So just imagine 7.8 billion people all getting this message from God and interpreting it differently. What did God mean by that? Oh I dunno John, what do you think? And so on and so forth. Can you imagine how much conflict that would cause between all the people in the world who could not get on the same page regarding what God meant by what He said? Even though there is one Bible, look at how many different Christian churches there are, but at least those of the same denominations agree on the basics because they are all reading the same Bible. Islam also has many sects but at least they agree on the basics because they are all reading the same book, the Qur’an.

Secondly, a free ride means getting something for nothing. Do we a PhD degree for nothing, or do we have to work for it? Doesn’t raising children require hard work? Both are rewarding, but they require sacrifice and hard work. Why should knowledge of God be any different from anything else in our lives?

Some sacrifice of time and some effort are involved, but to varying degrees, as it depends upon how skeptical one is. Some people recognize the message of Baha’u’llah almost immediately and others never do. One reason is that some people have more obstructions to understanding than other people, given their background with religion or no religion.

I don't think this is as good an analogy as you think it is. A professor teaching students who want to earn a PHD can explain in detail on the very first day of class precisely what he expects them to know in order to earn their PHD. Of course, unless the student is very well above average, it will take most students years to fully understand everything that the professor revealed on that first day. However, by telling the students on day one what the 'message' is, he is in no way giving his students a 'free ride'. So just because I might not fully understand the message at first, by simply giving me the message god wouldn't be giving me some sort of a 'free ride'.

But the point of my free ride analogy was that they have to do all the work, the professor is not going to do their homework for them. The professor is not going to go online and do their research although he might provide some references. My other point was that not everyone can make the cut and get a Phd, because there are requirements, so why should everyone make the cut and get a message from God, why shouldn’t there be requirements?

I already explained the pitfalls if God giving you a message directly.

Furthermore, just because a professor provides evidence that the subject of let's say 'medical science' actually exists, that professor has in no way given his students a 'free ride' for understanding the science that he's provided evidence exists. So god could easily provide evidence the god exists without having to reveal all knowledge about god. Why would ANY student take a course from a professor who refused to provide evidence that the course of study he was teaching actually existed? You expect people to put in the hard work... that's fine! But you really need to give them some concrete evidence that what they're working so hard to understand is actually real.

Just because I give you evidence that the study of physics exists does not mean I've given you a 'free-ride' on understanding everything about physics. Just as if god provided evidence that god exists, it wouldn't mean that we got a 'free-ride' and suddenly know everything there is to know about god.

That is exactly what God did; He provided evidence that He exists by sending Messengers, but He did not reveal all knowledge about Himself and we certainly do not know everything there is to know about God, we only know very little..

It is not only to distinguish between the sincere seekers who are willing to do the hard work and the others, it is to distinguish between those who are willing to take a leap of faith and those who are not willing. A person would be seeking the message in order to verify that God exists and get His message, but they would have to have “some faith” that God might exist in order to embark upon the journey and start searching for God and His message.

And here it is, what's makes your entire argument crumble. ANY method for discovering truth that requires faith is not worth pursuing, since faith simply is NOT a reliable path to the truth. People can take anything on faith, even diametrically opposed concepts. In fact falling back on faith is hardly doing the 'hard work'. It's the exact opposite. It's what people rely on when they discover that having to find verifiable evidence for what they want to believe is too difficult. And OF COURSE you need to first convince yourself that this god is real without any evidence, because who in their right mind would devote their lives to seeking out obscure prophets from throughout history and struggle to figure out if they're real or false prophets all so you can get proof that something you have absolutely no good reason to believe exist does.

I said that a person would have to have “some faith” that God might exist in order to embark upon the journey and start searching for God and His message. I did not say that they would BELIEVE on faith that God exists with no evidence because that would be blind faith.

Moreover, if you already KNOW that something exists, why would you be seeking it? So if you already KNOW that God exists, why would you be seeking God? What you want is for God to prove that He exists to you so you will not have to seek, but it doesn’t work that way, not anymore than you are going to get a PhD without doing lots of research.

In my opinion a SINCERE seeker waits for actual verifiable evidence, whereas an insincere seeker gets impatient and decides to employ a leap of faith in order to convince themselves that what they already wanted to find is actually what's there.

In my opinion a LAZY seeker is impatient and expects God to hand deliver verifiable evidence, whereas a sincere seeker patiently looks for the evidence and after he finds the evidence God had provided, the Messenger, he realizes that God exists and he chooses to believe in God. A sincere seeker does not employ a leap of faith and fool himself into believing that what he already wanted to find is actually what's there; rather, he does not make any assumptions until he has found the evidence and investigated it for himself. In the Baha’i Faith we call this the Independent Investigation of Truth.

How to Independently Investigate the Truth

(Continued on next post)

 

[Trailblazer]

The Messenger is the horse that delivers what is in the cart, the knowledge of God. You need the horse/Messenger to get the goods to market. The goods are the knowledge of God and God’s Will for humanity for this age in history and the market is the human mind.

Nope, that's not the way that it works. If I have no knowledge of god (or no reason whatsoever to believe that a god exists) it would be the height of idiocy for me to devote time and energy to seeking out messengers to give me evidence that a being I have absolutely no reason to believe exists actually does. FIRST give me evidence that there is a god to learn about and THEN I'll devote the time and energy to finding out more about this god.

The Messenger IS the evidence, like it or lump it.

Yes, that is the way it works if you want I believe in God because that is how God set it up. No Messenger, no evidence of God.

If you HAD the evidence that God exists you would have no reason to go searching for God, now would you? That would be like the teacher giving you the answer to the exam so you won’t have to read any books. If you already KNEW that God existed you might get lazy and decide you do not need the message from the Messenger. God does not only want you to know that He exists, He wants you to get the message He conveys through the Messenger.

And this is where the need for faith comes in. You have to take it on faith that there is a god worth taking the time and energy to find evidence for.

THAT'S what I mean by putting the cart before the horse. FIRST you have to accept that there IS a wagon full of god knowledge that some horse/messenger can deliver. But you don't go searching for a horse to deliver a cart full of knowledge when you haven't even verified that the cart of knowledge even exists.

Yes, that is about the size of it because God wants us to have faith that He exists and then search for the evidence, so we have gone full circle and we are right back to square one.

Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who approaches Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.

God is partners with nobody, not even His Messengers, and God is not a person in a relationship, so that analogy does not work. As I said above, God is not going to TELL you anything directly, because you could never understand God if He spoke to you directly, but also because that is not and has never been God’s chosen Method of communicating with humans.

I'm aware that god isn't a person in a relationship, but I think the analogy holds up just fine. Personally I hate it when people (or apparently when a god) likes to play silly mind games. If you have something to tell me, just say it. I really doesn't matter if you're far superior to me in every way. It's just a matter of common courtesy. Don't make me try and figure out IF you have something to say to me and then make me jump through all sorts of ridiculous hoops in hopes that I'll be able to figure out what it is you want to say. If this is the only method that god is willing to use then clearly god doesn't care if I hear what he has to say. And if he doesn't care, why should I?

I guess that flew right over your head. God is a not a person so God cannot talk to you and say things.

There is a reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would care and want you to believe and understand, but there is no reason to believe that a perfect and omnipotent God would want to make you understand that He exists or make you understand His message, because if God made you understand that would interfere with your free will.

God wants you to choose to believe and try to understand because you want to, not because He made you believe and understand.

And that is really the whole nine yards

Yet another concept that I find completely boggling. If I provide you with verifiable evidence that the Earth orbits the sun, did I MAKE you understand that the Earth orbits the sun or I have simply given you evidence that your critical thinking mind can use to determine the truth about the Earth orbiting the sun?

That analogy does not fly because humans providing evidence to another human is not the same as God providing evidence to a human since God is not a human. The analogy also does not fly because worldly knowledge is not the same as knowledge of God. Anyone can get the SAME evidence another human has of what is known to exist by doing their own research. The salient difference is that you would not be making me understand something I could not understand by doing my own thinking and research.

And if I provide you with all of the evidence for my claim that has been collected over time, am I giving you a 'free-ride' because I didn't force you to gather all of the evidence that's been gathered over time all by yourself? Is your understanding any less valid or correct?

Leave the free will out of this. If you give me evidence I could get on my own then you are doing my work for me so I won’t have to do it and that is the free ride.

And then we have this idea about interfering with free will. By providing proof that the Earth orbits the sun have I interfered with your free will? I suppose it can be argued that if critical thinking skills are important to you that by providing proof I've somehow deprived you of the free will to delude yourself into thinking that the Sun orbits the Earth. Heck, there are people who have been provided with endless evidence that the Earth is a sphere, yet being given that evidence hasn't stop them from freely and willfully ignoring it.

That won’t fly as an analogy because anyone can find out that the earth orbits the sun by doing their own research so you providing me with proof of what has already been proven does not interfere with my free will to choose to believe it.

So on that basis I guess you COULD say that god revealing himself to me would deprive me of my free will to delude myself into believing he doesn't, all because verifiable evidence and critical thinking skills are important to me.

What you apparently do not understand is that God does not CARE what is important to you, because God is the one who runs the show since God is omnipotent. Moreover God is the one who is holding all the high cards so you play by His rules or you lose the game.

Yes, if God revealed Himself to you that would deprive you of your free will to delude yourself into believing God doesn't exist because if God revealed Himself to you, you would have no choice but to believe God exists, so essentially that would take away your ABILITY to choose.

Though in such a case is it really god reveling himself that interfered with my free will or is it my insistence on accepting verifiable evidence that has deprived me of the ability to freely will myself to ignore the evidence and not believe?

Sorry, now you lost me.

Furthermore, the bible itself indicates that being given knowledge that god exists doesn't eliminate an individual's ability to exercise free will. Paul was provided with evidence that god exists on the road to Damascus, but I have no reason to believe that afterward he lost his ability to exercise his free will. And then of course there's Lucifer who unquestionably had god's existence revealed to him; yet he freely chose to defy that same god.

On what are you basing this notion that god revealing himself eliminates free will? Is it because it's the only explanation you can come up with for why this omnipotent god refuses to reveal himself?

I do not believe in Lucifer, I am a Baha’i. God did not reveal himself to Paul, Jesus did, and that gave Paul the faith necessary to complete his mission and spread the gospel message far and wide.

Free will is not the ONLY reason God does not reveal Himself. The other reason is that God does not choose to and another reason is what would happen if He did. God is so powerful we would all be reduced to utter nothingness.

“Were the Eternal Essence to manifest all that is latent within Him, were He to shine in the plentitude of His glory, none would be found to question His power or repudiate His truth. Nay, all created things would be so dazzled and thunderstruck by the evidences of His light as to be reduced to utter nothingness. How, then, can the godly be differentiated under such circumstances from the froward?” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 71-72

But before that everyone would KNOW God exists and thus can the godly could not be differentiated from the ungodly as everyone would be the same. If you cannot understand why that is problematic I do not know what to say.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Suppose God may provide you some solid evidence/proof about his existence.

Thereafter, will that make any kind of difference in your daily life style, or NOT ? If yes, then what ?

That would depend entirely on which god it is.
So you're going to have to be more specific.

 

[chinu]

That would depend entirely on which god it is.
So you're going to have to be more specific.

Which God you think is the real God ?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Which God you think is the real God ?

I'm an atheist. I don't believe any gods to be real.
It's your thread and your question. So you should be the one specifying it.

At this point, with the limited information you have given me, I can only say that I would acknowledge: "ha, look at that... a god exists. cool", after which I would carry on as always.
I'ld still come to this place and have pretty much the same debates, except I'ld be a deist instead of an atheist.

Nothing would change concerning my opinions of the many theistic religions, morality, etc.

 

[chinu]

I'm an atheist. I don't believe any gods to be real.
It's your thread and your question. So you should be the one specifying it.

At this point, with the limited information you have given me, I can only say that I would acknowledge: "ha, look at that... a god exists. cool", after which I would carry on as always.

Don't worry, I also don't want you to convert to any false religion. It is better to have NO religion instead.

I'ld still come to this place and have pretty much the same debates, except I'ld be a deist instead of an atheist. Nothing would change concerning my opinions of the many theistic religions, morality, etc.

You are always welcome with debates.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Don't worry, I also don't want you to convert to any false religion. It is better to have NO religion instead.

I'm not worried in the slightest. Just trying to figure out what you are actually asking in the OP and requesting you to clarify. But obviously, you don't feel like doing that...

 

[chinu]

I'm not worried in the slightest. Just trying to figure out what you are actually asking in the OP and requesting you to clarify. But obviously, you don't feel like doing that...

I have a very simple definition for God and that is.. God means reunion with from where we all started the journey of life in the beginning. Its true and complete. Nothing more to add.

I don't know why people want complex definitions.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I God means reunion with from where we all started the journey of life in the beginning

So my mom's uterus is god?

I don't know why people want complex definitions.

I don't have any such requirement. Instead, I just want definitions that actually make sense.
Yours doesn't, just to be clear.

And some definitions simply are complex. It is what it is.