Other theological issues:
Let me briefly go over a few more significant theological issues that I studied between the ages of 23 and 25 which changed when I allowed myself to honestly seek the truth.
Tongues: While I doubted tongues at an early age, I believed that perhaps it was real for some people just not a gift for me. However, upon thorough observation of the inconsistencies already mentioned and satisfactory explanations given for other interpretations, I rejected tongues all together. In short, Biblical references to tongues was simply the ability or gift of speaking another language. God had indeed gifted some people with that ability, I was not one of them. Random languages spoken as a private or public communication with God was not readily deduced from the Bible.
The trinity: This idea is claimed to be essential to Christian doctrine. God the Father is one with his Son Jesus and with the Spirit. They are 3 persons but still only one God. This doctrine is never mentioned in the Bible. Ever. It is perhaps alluded to but not clear. Historically it was not officially accepted by the church until nearly 400 AD (see this article from a Christian perspective http://www.ucg.org/bible-study-tools/booklets/is-god-a-trinity/the-surprising-origins-of-the-trinity-doctrine).
Logically the trinity is impossible. For example if Jesus was one with God (therefore fully God) He could not have been (by definition) fully man. Similarly there was just as much reason to believe that the spirit of God was his nature or ideals (as the spirit of a man would be considered) as there was that the spirit was a separate person. Why this doctrine is considered so essential to Christianity, I am not fully sure. However, at some point while still considering myself a believer in God’s salvation, I rejected this idea.
Jesus was God: essentially all Christians believe that Jesus was God. However, the actual evidence is slim. “I and the Father are One” is often used as proof. However, this is essentially the same as two people agreeing as if they are one on an issue. If you attack the ambassador of the United States, you are in essence attack the United States. If you as an individual represent a corporation as a whole, than you are in essence one with that corporations ideals and goals. There is much more to this argument, but suffice to say there is good reason to doubt this theological view point.
Once again, rejecting that Jesus was God didn’t change salvation at all. God is in control. He determined that a sacrifice needed to be made to pay for our sins. He didn’t have to do this but chose to. Once again, he chose the type of sacrifice he wanted. He wanted a perfect person. He could have just as easily created a perfect man (Jesus) as he could have somehow sent himself as a sacrifice to himself. In fact, creating the perfect man makes more sense. How does one sacrifice himself to himself to satisfy himself that people he himself created could be forgiven for things he could have prevented in the first place?
thelovemanifesto 
I’m with you on the first issue.
The trinity is perhaps best explained simply, as you put it. The importance is in Christ being God having come down to us as a man, to live as we live only without sin, to die for our sins, the just for the unjust. It seems impossible, but that’s why He’s God! He does miracles. The incarnation shows God’s humility in contrast to man’s pride, and God’s love for us.
“His name shall be Emanuel, meaning God with us.” “Jesus said, before Abraham was,I AM.” “Philip said to Jesus, show us the Father and it will satisfy us. Jesus said, Have I been with you so long and you have not known me? He who has seem me has seen the Father.”
There are forty verses and passages that speak of Christ being God. I just gave you three.
None of those 3 give any proof that Jesus is god. #1) easily could mean that Jesus was the representation of God with us as a human. This is a common way of speaking. “I’m sorry I can’t make it home for Christmas but here’s a letter and a picture so that I can be with you in spirit”. #2) easily explained and just as logical to be allegorical. Jesus was conceived in thought or in concept before Abraham. God who knows everything had always conceived of the plan of jesus. Therefore he always existed. #3) once again jesus was representing god and it is just as reasonable to think he meant that he was a perfect earthy representation of what God was like without ever needing to assume he WAS god
Mankind Was Created by Jesus -The Word Made Flesh, and With His Words,
and the Result is That We Have Words at Our Core.
Jesus is God incarnate.
Yes, He is the Word made flesh that dwelt among us as John’s Gospel tells us in chapter 1 ,”all things were created by Him”.
This ,”Word”, coincides with Genesis in the Bible where God “said, let us create man in our image”.
I’m saying that DNA is literally a detailed account of what God said when He created man.
We have evidence that God exists in ourselves.
In DNA we are witnessing through science the transcending of the natural realm into physical evidence for the miraculous.
Read this excerpt from a book written by the world’s foremost Geneticist Francis Collins –
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“As the leader of the international Human Genome Project, which had labored mightily over more than a decade to reveal this DNA sequence, I stood beside President Bill Clinton in the East Room of the White House…”
“Clinton’s speech began by comparing this human sequence map to the map that Meriwether Lewis had unfolded in front of President Thomas Jefferson in that very room nearly two hundred years earlier.”
“Clinton said, “Without a doubt, this is the most important, most wondrous map ever produced by humankind.”
But the part of his speech that most attracted public attention jumped from the scientific perspective to the spiritual. “Today,” he said, “we are learning the language in which God created life.
We are gaining ever more awe for the complexity, the beauty, and the wonder of God’s most divine and sacred gift.”
“I had worked closely with the president’s speechwriter in the frantic days just prior to this announcement, and had strongly endorsed the inclusion of this paragraph.”
“When it came time for me to add a few words of my own, I echoed this sentiment:
“It’s a happy day for the world.
It is humbling for me, and awe-inspiring, to realize that we have caught the first glimpse of our own instruction book, previously known only to God.”
“Why would a president and a scientist, charged with announcing a milestone in biology and medicine, feel compelled to invoke a connection with God? Aren’t the scientific and antithetical?….
for me the experience of sequencing the human genome, and uncovering this most remarkable of all texts, was both a stunning scientific achievement and an occasion of worship.”
~Francis S. Collins, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief~
appeal to authority fallacy spotted
Opinions are not science.
The Trinity is firmly established even in OT times. https://youtu.be/Hz8J4DTIkEg
I personally might have to speak according to what I have known as a former Christian myself, but what I do know about the Christian god is that most of the principle of the trinity is actually borrowed from Paganism where the trinity between the godhead and the person that represent it and his spirit is nothing different from how our personal relationship with the divine and what is within us that is fully displayed to the public to the point that people just start seeing it as one. What I do know when i left Christianity, in order for a man to be fully divine (which is to authentically live his life in according to the laws of nature), he must learn to live his profane life fully also in order to understand it. Thus, when a man live his life and understanding it fully while rejoicing over the fact that suffering is there to teach us rather than to hurt us, it is then that we ascend to the next level. I believe that up to this point, religion is no longer needed because they all reflect first our limited perception of the divine and second reflects our lack of self-admiration to the point that we do not believe that the divine is our inherent right.
Yeah I’ve heard that about the trinity being borrowed from pagan religion which makes perfect sense. Most things in Christianity are borrowed from pagan religion, Jewish faith, and Greek and Roman mythology.
And here is the problem, the Catholic Church and other Christian church that succeeds it all borrowed it blindly to the point that they have no idea what it actually means and sometimes they outrightly reject the notion that the divine is within the person because they fear that doing so will prevent the individual from seeking salvation from the Church and therefore, they lose power and control over people. Try to look at why the Bible was written the way it was written and why the Church fathers in the Council of Nicea chose the book they chose (or even the arguments made by authors from Soul Theft and many others just like him) and you will see a consistent pattern in the Church’s perspective and logical argument: they are all showing first the faulty nature of their argument and second the manipulation of the divine in ways that lead to people living in confusion rather than in enlightenment (which is what the Church actually wants).
I’m reading two books on the historicity of Jesus right now. One called On the Historicity of Jesus: Why We Might Have Reason for Doubt by Richard Carrier and the other Did Jesus Exist? by Bart D. Ehrman. Both are written by non-religious authors arguing the two sides of the debate whether Jesus did or did not exist. The majority of scholars believe he did. But whats most interesting about both books is how much of the early church writings were made up and embellished to fit the goals of the church (whether or not Jesus existed). The Christian religion most certainly borrowed from earlier traditions of both Jewish and pagan religions. Thanks for your input.
How about doing the job yo;8Ùure hired for, and when you do it right you act like it’s a normal thing instead of celebrating. After all, you were hired to do the job and preferrably excell at it.