Ask a Christian

[PlasmaHam]

An Ask-Me-Anything based around my Christian beliefs. For some info I am of a conservative Baptist background, so I am by all means not intending to represent all those to claim to be Christians. I have some extra time because of the virus so I will be available over the next few weeks to answer any questions yall may have. So ask away!

Oh and if you are also a Christian feel free to answer some questions with your perspective. It would be nice to get multiple viewpoints on some matters.

[Falcons_11]

Question. If God is so good and merciful, why would he allow evil to exist?

[SouthernDude]

Question. If God is so good and merciful, why would he allow evil to exist?

I would say he allows evil to exist because of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Eve listened to the serpent to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Now, if you want to know why the tree existed in the first place, I believe it was a way for Adam and Eve to obey and respect God. That's why we exist in the first place.

[Falcons_11]

I would say he allows evil to exist because of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Eve listened to the serpent to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Now, if you want to know why the tree existed in the first place, I believe it was a way for Adam and Eve to obey and respect God. That's why we exist in the first place.

I would tend to agree with you that Adam & Eve in a way does illustrate the question of why God allows evil to exist. My reasoning is that when God created humans he gave them the gift of free will. That gift separates us from the other creatures that God created. This is shown in the Garden of Eden when Eve had a choice between obeying God's command not to eat the fruit of the Tree or defy God's commandment and eat it anyway. Eve was tempted by the serpent and she chose to obey to the serpent rather than God. Then Adam listened to Eve, knowing full well the consequence of disobeying God (Loss of Paradise). By God giving us the power of free will he dignified us with the power to make our own decisions (choosing good or evil) without having him or fate predetermine what we decide. It's one of the greatest gifts from God besides the gift of life. Many discount that the Adam & Eve story as real. Some will say it allegorically. Whatever you believe doesn't change the fact that the gift of free will and the ability to choose between good or evil comes directly from God.

[Uniquemind]

The problem I have with the “free will” argument as described above, are multiple, but they are problems of conventional understanding of the word of god, not that the word itself is wrong.

The rationale clashes with modern day understanding of animal behavior and cognition. Free will is a sort of cognitive awareness, the fact that one can do if-this-then-that cognitive thinking. Which animals can do, to act or not to act, to cause desired outcome.

I don’t believe that “free will” sets apart humans from the other creatures, I actually believe that the entire universe operates on the principle of free will, down to the smallest bits of it.


It is also very interesting to note that the tree had the name of “Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” and that once bitten, God didn’t undo the effects of the tree, he kind of raised the expectations of what he now expected from Adam and Eve, cursed as they were, but also knowing from the Foundation of the Universe, that they would do what they did.


Why is the serpent’s punishment to crawl on it’s belly, when that’s what it does and the creature of the snake in the animal kingdom, doesn’t seem worse or harmed by it’s function in the animal kingdom, so that’s a punishment?

Genesis 3:22

“and the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:”


And this is interesting because what happens in Genesis parallels what Revelation talks about, in so far that at no point is mankind’s ability to distinguish Good and Evil, taken away, in fact you could argue that God presses the importance of understanding this as a part of morality and worth, and embracing that dichotomy, but also understanding the nature of forgiveness as well.

One could say that God’s curse, was also a gift, at that moment, something that had to be chastised, but also begin the process of gaining understanding and wisdom from such an experience of being deceived.

Christian, also means “Christ-like” so in a way God-like, yet not God.

[HeyCameron]

Why is the serpent’s punishment to crawl on it’s belly, when that’s what it does and the creature of the snake in the animal kingdom, doesn’t seem worse or harmed by it’s function in the animal kingdom, so that’s a punishment?


I know you said a lot more than just this passage, but I think it's interesting because it parallels a lot of mythological stories that seem to suppose this "pre-state" before things are the way they are (i.e. that snakes once had limbs but lost them as a punishment) in order to explain how they came to be. (cf. Greek story of Narcissus and Echo explaining the origin of the daffodil flower or the story of Arachne explaining why spiders weave). Other reptiles have limbs, so it must be that snakes had them too but lost them somehow (ironically this is actually evolutionary thinking--basal snakes have vestigial limbs).

The free will argument is necessary to explain God's benevolence: there has to be a choice because otherwise God is blamed for someone doing evil and being damned, but if God is benevolent then He ultimately wants everyone to choose good and be saved. If they don't, it's on no one but them. In the Bible, especially, free will is significant as the freedom to obey, the freedom from sin--yielding to God's grace or resisting.

Christians don't seem to agree on the exact nature of free will. The way Catholics view it is different from how Protestants often do and in a few verses of Paul's letters, he seems to discuss predestination. (Ephesians 1:5, Romans 8:29-30).

[Uniquemind]

I know you said a lot more than just this passage, but I think it's interesting because it parallels a lot of mythological stories that seem to suppose this "pre-state" before things are the way they are (i.e. that snakes once had limbs but lost them as a punishment) in order to explain how they came to be. (cf. Greek story of Narcissus and Echo explaining the origin of the daffodil flower or the story of Arachne explaining why spiders weave). Other reptiles have limbs, so it must be that snakes had them too but lost them somehow (ironically this is actually evolutionary thinking--basal snakes have vestigial limbs).

The free will argument is necessary to explain God's benevolence: there has to be a choice because otherwise God is blamed for someone doing evil and being damned, but if God is benevolent then He ultimately wants everyone to choose good and be saved. If they don't, it's on no one but them. In the Bible, especially, free will is significant as the freedom to obey, the freedom from sin--yielding to God's grace or resisting.

Christians don't seem to agree on the exact nature of free will. The way Catholics view it is different from how Protestants often do and in a few verses of Paul's letters, he seems to discuss predestination. (Ephesians 1:5, Romans 8:29-30).

Yup. But other scriptures and historical references, the very fact the Catholic/Christian faith fractured, is NOT something God desired, that in fact there should be a unification of how to view the scriptures.

The tone of a lot of the Bible as well, refers to bodies as temples, or entities that are filled with a type of spirit as well, which is in of itself very otherworldly a concept, probably closer to what we call consciousness in modern day. If one’s spirit is sick, spiritually attacked, then that’s their few of the origin of illness. The inverse when it comes to healings.

And with medical science having noted instances inconsistently where one gets “healed” or even via placebo effects, have kept the claim alive (at least on a small scale today), but unfortunately it’s also given rise to cults and serious fake news and money scams as well. For me I think the jury is still out on it, but I do believe miracles do happen.


But going back to with regard to the “snake” was and who is responsible for their actions, the Snake had higher-awareness about reality/creation and how it worked than Adam and Eve did, so even then it’s always puzzled me why human society would then personify accountability to “the snake” as if he were a human doing errors/bad deceitful things. Isn’t the claim much different, that a non-human entity set these chains of events off, and not God setting it off? The fact that society thinks in black/white, is an issue no? Later on the Pharisees were rebuked for being just that...too legalistic in regard to “the law”, whereas in the OT “the Gentiles” were lawless. Again another parallelism of black/white thinking.


The concept of money systems, of self-worth, a constant theme in BOTH the new and old testaments....dogmatic black and white, refered as mammon, something that if served, damns you to hell. A true meaning of the mark of the beast perhaps?

To bring it to the covid19 crisis, we are certainly seeing many companies threaten their employees to work, or face firing, cut pay, etc....


To branch out to other faiths criticisms of Catholic/Christianity, it’s one of the core debate points for why Islam promotes itself the way it does. But i don’t want to get into that at this time, it’s too complicated.

[Snowfox]

An Ask-Me-Anything based around my Christian beliefs. For some info I am of a conservative Baptist background, so I am by all means not intending to represent all those to claim to be Christians. I have some extra time because of the virus so I will be available over the next few weeks to answer any questions yall may have. So ask away!

Oh and if you are also a Christian feel free to answer some questions with your perspective. It would be nice to get multiple viewpoints on some matters.

I am a christian but from different sect.
What you think of these.

1: Our priest told us that vaccinations are satans plans and government installs microchips to us when we get vaccinated. To counter that priest wipes our body from head to toe while we lay naked with strong magnets to destroy those chips. Sounds mildly disturbing i know.

2: Priest teaches us to use guns and explosives so we could be better warriors of god. Other members share teaching responsibility as well including me.

3: Muslims worship god of this world and god of this world is Satan so they worship Satan. Satan lives inside of that black rock they worship that is in Mecca. Or if thats not so It represents Satan.

4: Abortion is murder.

5: Birth Control is not murder

6: Everything we do in our life is a sin. Every breath we take is a sin. Living is a sin dying is a sin.

7: God hates sin and sinners that are us

8: God is above moral. So what ever god does is something we cant judge. From our perspective gods actions me be moral or immoral or odd but god being above all morality will decide himself which he does. God being source of morality.

oh well those are biggest guestions i have so far. How other Christians see these things

[PlasmaHam]

[QUOTE]1: Our priest told us that vaccinations are satans plans and government installs microchips to us when we get vaccinated. To counter that priest wipes our body from head to toe while we lay naked with strong magnets to destroy those chips. Sounds mildly disturbing i know.
A little cultist sounding not going to lie. I'm not a huge fan of vaccines, but in my mind the government is too incompetent to do something like that.

2: Priest teaches us to use guns and explosives so we could be better warriors of god. Other members share teaching responsibility as well including me.I don't think "warriors of god" necessitate physical warfare. The Bible largely talks about being soldiers in the metaphorical sense. There's nothing wrong about knowing how to fight and I believe war can be just, but it isn't a big theological issue for me.

3: Muslims worship god of this world and god of this world is Satan so they worship Satan. Satan lives inside of that black rock they worship that is in Mecca. Or if thats not so It represents Satan. Honestly, I'm not totally against such theories. After all the Bible does mention in Galatians 1:8 to avoid any angelic messagers presenting a gospel that goes against Christ's. Mohammed did just that, claiming to have received inspiration and revelation from the Angel Gabriel. Given that Satan is described as to be one of the most beautiful and powerful angels, its not outside the range of possibilities that Satan appeared and just pretended to be Gabriel. And if you look at Islamic end-time prophecies, you can see how it could relate to Biblical end times if the Muslims are following the anti-Christ.

4: Abortion is murder.
Yeah, I'll agree

5: Birth Control is not murder
This is a bit more controversial, but I'll generally agree. Non-fertilized eggs or sperm are not living things, using a condom or a birth control pill is not wrong. Now if you use those to justify sleeping around, that's sin, and if

6: Everything we do in our life is a sin. Every breath we take is a sin. Living is a sin dying is a sin.
We are all sinners, from the day we are born to the day we die. I've never quite heard that theology. I know the Bible talks about dying to sin daily, but I wouldn't consider our every action, down to our breathing, to be sin. I'll look into that a bit more

7: God hates sin and sinners that are us
God hates sin, but doesn't hate the sinner. After all if God hates us why does he care for us? A bit disappointed yes, but not hating.

8: God is above moral. So what ever god does is something we cant judge. From our perspective gods actions me be moral or immoral or odd but god being above all morality will decide himself which he does. God being source of morality. God is above human morality, yes. I know this sounds like a cop-out but a lot of things like why God allows sin to exist is something we can't explain. We are like amoebas compared to God, it is the height of hubris to think we can judge him.

[Oscar-V3.0]

An Ask-Me-Anything based around my Christian beliefs

What do you think happens after death ?

[Knightsleepy]

The thing I've never understood about following a specific religion is how do you believe in one religion and say other religions are wrong without any proof for any religion. because of no matter what religion it first passes through the filter of the time, place and whoever wrote the holy books of every religion

Sorry if that sounds disrespectful dont mean it to be

[Falcons_11]

Why do we pray? What do you think is the purpose of praying to God?

[SouthernDude]

Why do we pray? What do you think is the purpose of praying to God?

The purpose of praying is to have a direct contact with God. We can't exactly talk to God without praying. The Bible clearly lays out that God wants to talk to us and build relationships with us, and we do that through prayer

[jamie_n5]

The thing I've never understood about following a specific religion is how do you believe in one religion and say other religions are wrong without any proof for any religion. because of no matter what religion it first passes through the filter of the time, place and whoever wrote the holy books of every religion

Sorry if that sounds disrespectful dont mean it to be

I believe this. There is Christianity and then anything but. That's all there is to it. I don't care what sect of Christianity you come from you are Christian and then there are non - Christians.

[Spooky_Eli]

Why are you a Christian? No frills, just that. Why?

[SouthernDude]

Why are you a Christian? No frills, just that. Why?

I grew up with it, and don't see myself believing anything else.

[Spooky_Eli]

I grew up with it, and don't see myself believing anything else.

*blinks* So no objective reasons? And yeah, when you compare Christianiy to other beliefs it holds up the best, but belief isn't essential to sanity.

[SouthernDude]

*blinks* So no objective reasons? And yeah, when you compare Christianiy to other beliefs it holds up the best, but belief isn't essential to sanity.

Very true. I do have objective reasons, but I figured you just wanted a plain, straightforward answer.

[Spooky_Eli]

Very true. I do have objective reasons, but I figured you just wanted a plain, straightforward answer.

Fair enough. The first answer is usually the most relkvent🤷*♂️

[Oscar-V3.0]

What do you think happens after death ?
Do you believe in heaven and hell ?