True Follower's Of Christ

[Open_Minded]

Open Minded, do you believe heaven and hell are states of mind, or what?

 

Hello Amanda:

 

Yes, I do very much think heaven and hell are states of mind.

 

I do believe there is life beyond this life. I also believe that all of creation will be reconciled into the Sacred Oneness - ALL. So... to me... hell is not a concrete physical reality that some will experience after death.

 

I'm not sure what "physical reality" awaits us after this life, but I do believe there is something - that it is intimately connected with LOVE and WISDOM and PEACE. But... since no one of us can go to the other side of this life and come back to report on it ... then I also accept that my feelings about this are - well - just that, "my feelings".

 

These areas (what happens after this life) are so utterly subjective - I don't often find myself willing to discuss it. To me, if it can't be shown in a concrete way - then we can believe what we believe - but there it ends. Any further discussion is futile.

[notasheep]

Boy If I don't get off of this computer soon my sister is going to give me hell.

 

Would she really? Hypothetical situation:

 

Your sister notices you spending all this time on this forum, and gets curious. She starts reading, finds our thinking compelling, and deconverts. Fast forward to judgement day. Jesus decides to let you decide where your sister spends eternity. What's it going to be, heaven or hell?

 

If you choose heaven, please explain why you've chosen to ignore her lack of faith, knowing that Jesus would have sent her to hell.

If you choose hell, explain how you can claim to love her, knowing Jesus loves her more than you possibly could, but agrees with you.

[Ouroboros]

We see hell as unfair and unloving of God but we are not inside His thinking because our thinking is limitted. We don't understand why He would hate sin so much to punish it in such a way because we are not absolutely perfect.

 

I thought he hated sin so much and loved his creation so much he gave his only son to get rid of sin? If it's still around then the sacrifice didn't do diddly and it was pointless for Christ to die to begin with.

Christianity has a very strange theology indeed. God creates humans, he demands obedience, disobedience or "missing the mark" is a sin, he made a setup for A&E to fail, he then experiments with "law" and "saved by deeds" for thousands of years, even punishes the whole world at one point for not "acting" correctly. Then he finally gives the real answer, a salvation where someone else (himself) dies and takes the sin on him, afterwards only few followers believe, and someone else (Paul) takes on the burden of "understanding" and preaching the "true" gospel. Then God lets some second or third generation disciples write the "true" history of Jesus. Now 2000 years later, the majority of the world does not believe in Jesus or his salvation.

 

All of it reeks intentional framing everyone to fail, and his salvation (after he created the reason to fail), only proves a despot that have a Munchausen Syndrome By Proxy. (He causes pain and inflict suffering in others, and his motivation is that he want to be hailed as the Hero, and he fixes the situation where he will become the Hero. Like a firefighter saves the family in a burning house with the risk of his own life, and later it's discovered that he was the arsonist. The Jesus letting Lazarus be sick and die for days before he resurrect him, "to show the glory of God", is a typical example too.) It shows a God that is not sincere or honest with his creation, us.

[Amanda]

I deffinately believe Heaven is a real tangible place and not a state of mind.

 

Amy Marie, then what about this quote...

 

Lu 17:21

Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.

 

Open Minded... we're pretty much on the same page about heaven and hell. I know somewhat how you believe in the afterlife... I've been participating with you on that thread too. :wink:

 

What I have found very interesting in comparing your beliefs and mine, is that it seems, if I remember correctly... you came from a Buddhist background that led to a Christian one. I sense that I came from a Christian background that led to more Buddhist influence. Do you agree that there seems to be a lot of similarities in the core of these two teachings, as you understand them to be?

 

[Ouroboros]

And Amy, if sin is explained of whatever "God is not", that sin and evil by the Devil's making is because he's the opposite of God, or the "non-God" actions. If that explanation is used to say that God didn't create evil or sin, that means that evil and sin have existed as long as God has existed. He never created it, it is by definition everything he is not. If sin and evil is infinite, just like God, then what guarrantee is there that Heaven or the future would be absent of evil or sin? God failed several promises already by claiming the world good in Genesis, still humans sinned, he claimed the whole world saved in Jesus, still the majority is not, etc... in the end, we can't trust his words.

[nick5]

Christ knew( according to scripture) that He was to die, in crucifixation.

Well yeah, because (according to scripture) he planned it himself with his bro judas. Doh!!

 

My signature picture is my own art work.

Pretty sweet, here's mine

 

[Antlerman]

Well I started off sketching pictures of Davy Jones of the Monkees. Imagine going from Davy to Jesus? Ye Haa!!!

 

Thanks so much for the comments. I won't forget you when I become rich and famous.

 

You think I should post some of my art work here? Like on my own thread, "Amy's Art." ?

That's ironic. I was just out this afternoon looking through some used LP's at a bookstore and was looking at some of the Monkees albums and how young Davy Jones looked in them (no I didn't buy one - I wouldn't be able to listen to more than a few songs of theirs).

 

Rich and famous People used to say that about me with my music, "when you're rich and famous...", but I found myself more content just doing my art for myself and sharing with a few others rather than the whole money making aspect of it. It's just a vehicle for personal/spiritual expression and sometimes having commercial expectations of it can make it not that anymore. Bottom line, it's an extension of yourself and if other's experience anything through it, then you get to experience a larger piece of life in being part of other's lives in that way.

 

There is a place on the forum for creative works, and you may want to consider that, but... my only fear is how some might take it. I was a little surprised by the pounding you received when you came in. I know people like Amanda and OM are well accepted around here, but I think they had to overcome some of this too? I'm kind of sorry to have seen you get pounded as hard as you did. So, it's a possibility, but it'll be up to you. (I don't have any of my works there, but I should see about it maybe - only a few members in these forums have heard my music).

[Ouroboros]

Yup. Amanda and OM went through the initiation ritual, trial by fire.

 

 

(edit, fixed my Yoda speek.)

[Antlerman]

Yup. Amanda and OM went through the ritual initiation, trial by fire.

Yeah, I was trying to remember. I was never mean to either of them .... although......... there was that very first post of mine to OM I seem to remember ...... http://www.ex-christian.net/index.php?s=&s...ndpost&p=117166

[KT45]

Here's another one of mine:

 

Why do you only draw Jesus as a white man and not other races?

 

I thought true followers of Christ weren't allowed to make graven images of Christ. Something about idol worship or something. Please enlighten

[KT45]

"Thou shalt not make graven images..." was a commandment given at a time when there was idol worship, stone figures, etc.

 

Are you saying there is no idol worship and what you are doing isn't idol worship. When people created idols back then and today they made images of what they felt a deity looked like. This is what you are doing. I'd go even further and say the cross is an idol too but lets just consider the painting of Jesus.

 

The God I try to serve is mysterious. Sometimes I can't make sense of Him either. But one look into His suffering Face and my doubts fade.

 

Okay so now your linking a image of Jesus to the real thing and showing emotion towards it and reverence for your image of him. Showing reverence for a false representation (or real representation) of a deity is Idol worship.

 

if you don't consider what your doing idol worship then please explain what idol worship is? At what point is a christian an idol worshipper?

[♦ nivek ♦]

amy,

 

I won't bother to try and change your opinion of "Christ". It is yours, and someday whilst you explore and read here you will find why reasonable people have stopped using his visage and ghost as some form of support.

 

When we grow up we stop needing things to make all our boo-boo's and owies all better by a Majik Kiss from the gods.

 

You'll find more folks here with reasoning contra to your established religious preferences, as in "Can't get a word in edgewise from all the responses given".

 

Will suggest that you look around, dig into the volumes of information here and find why the spectre of the xtian god is no longer haunting the assembled.

 

I quit arguing the tit-for-tat scriptural things years ago. You won't get a ton of snide shit piled on from me. However I do tend to be right direct and plainly spoken.

 

Do believe that folks who hold onto the christ_myth are in need of a brainial_flushing and reset of the preferences they hold dear.

 

This could be the first, and very scarey, to mental and physical Freedom for you.

 

I invite you to come along and see past the guilded fence of the comfortable paddocks.

 

TANSTAAFL

 

kevinL

[♦ nivek ♦]

amy doth sayeth:

Also consider those people who have had visions of Christ.

 

amy...

 

After two plus decades in the rural reaches of EMS, I've hauled every God, Goddess, Jesus, Vishnu, etc, so on, etc, etc, in the back of my Bambulance.

 

Which one of those *visionaries* sees the right one?

 

I can recall at least three DOZEN folks so afflicted right off my head, with clarity, on those runs where we were authorized to line up and shoot thorazine to calm our patients..

 

"Visions" are simply that, things folks make up in their heads and think they see with their eyes.

 

Not indicative of any reality as we can gauge and understand it.

 

kL

[KT45]

When I say "see the pain in His Face," it is with the eyes of my soul or spirit.

 

Also consider those people who have had visions of Christ.

Ahhh.... It's amazing how what you see in the "eyes of your soul or spirit" looks very strongly like other images the catholic church has when picturing Jesus. Showing that your image of what Jesus looked like didn't come from your heart or soul but what the church showed you he looked like. Do you think he would look the way you drew him if you never ever saw a painting of Jesus?

 

Also you say many have had visions of Jesus. Their visions were merely reproductions of what we see all the time in churches of what Jesus looks like. The church tells them what Jesus looks like, that's what they picture in their mind, and that's what they worship, an image.

 

Your article spoke nothing about idol worship neither did you address my questions.

 

if you don't consider what your doing idol worship then please explain what idol worship is? At what point is a christian an idol worshipper?

 

Oh and your a good artist by the way. I was just looking at it and these questions popped in my head so I had to ask them. I have another question to ask you later about your art though.

[Open_Minded]

Well. Jesus is the one Person who did come back from the dead and has a lot to say about Heaven and Hell.

 

First Amy, let us distinguish between the actual words of Jesus and words attributed to Jesus by his followers. There is a difference. Not to get into a long New Testament literary analysis .... but dating the gospels is dicey business.

 

The earliest gospel is Mark - dated between 60-80 AD. If we go with 60 (and many scholars have good reason to date it this early) that's still 30 years after the death of Christ. The writer, if an eye-witness to the events in the life of Jesus, would have been 30 years removed from what he was writing about.

 

Matthew and Luke share a common source, Q, that may predate Mark. But that can only be applied to material which is common to both Matthew and Luke - but not found in Mark. So the playing field between words "attributed" to Jesus and words Jesus actually spoke is narrowed even more.

 

Pile on top of all that that any language of the gospels was penned in a different time and culture than the one you and I live in. Well - then - not only does one have to take into account which words of Jesus were actually spoken by him, then one has to have a better grip on the culture, world view of that time and place to even begin to search out a meaning to the text.

 

Now... Amy I do not generally get into a tit-for-tat discussion on Bible verses. I think it's pointless, for the most part, because two people can go round and round until the cows come home and still not resolve their differences. But, I would suggest that you do some research and reading about how the gospels were written. This may give you some insight as to why many Christians understand Jesus and the Kingdom of Heaven - and so many other things - in a different way than you are accustomed to hearing about.

 

What do you think about near death experiences? You know, people who have visions after they die but are told to return to their body?

 

Well, a long time ago, I knew a 5 year old who almost drowned and had a near-death experience. It's harder for 5 year olds to interject social conditioning into these things - for that reason I find her experience interesting. Her family is devout Christian - one would expect her to see Jesus the way she'd been taught to think of him. Much like Nivek says happens to patients in an ambulance.

 

But, since she was only 5 her experience was less a social conditioning. She told us (I was there - it happened at a pool birthday party my daughter had been invited to - I was there to help the Mom of this little girl. The girl's father was/is a police officer and I was there as he performed CPR. Actually I called 911. I was also there as she came to and I listened as she talked to her parents about the experience).

 

1. I do not fear death after listening to her - something let's go when a person comes that close. I don't know what it is and I can't define it. But every adult in that situation was terribly upset, not her - she truly was peaceful and not upset in the least. She was 5 at the time (it was her 5th birthday) so she had no comprehension of what almost happened. Maybe it's different for adults - I don't know - Nivek could answer that better than I.

 

2. She did have a near death experience - but she did not experience Jesus - the way you and I would think. (although she'd been in church every Sunday since the week she was born).

 

3. She did experience her grandmother - who died when she was only a few months old. At the time - right after she came to - when she was telling her mom that she'd met grandma - I didn't think much about it. It was only later when the mother was telling me that the child's grandmother had died when the little girl was only a few months old - that I was struck by the experience. They have pictures of the girl's grandmother in their home - so any visions this girl had could be attributed to that. But, the girl had communications with her grandmother.

 

According to this child's mother -some of the things this child said her grandmother talked to her about were things a 5 year old would have no way of knowing. They were things that predated this child's birth and they were things of the adult world. I don't know - there is always the chance the subconsciously this child absorbed conversations her parents had about family and such. But, personally I don't think that explains it all.

 

I know what I saw. What I saw was a very peaceful child - who had just come back from a near death experience. What I saw was a very innocent and honest relaying of a meeting this child had with a grandmother she never knew. The meeting she had was not physical in the sense that we think of meeting. She didn't talk about her grandmother's physical attributes. She talked about her grandmother's love, about being safe with grandma. She told her father (the grandmother's son) some things that she would have no way of knowing as these family events preceded her own birth. Her father had lost a brother when he was a little boy, the grandmother wanted the little girl to tell her father that his brother was there two. The parents truly don't remember ever mentioning this brother to the child. He died when he was a baby. But, somehow she knew.

 

So... yes... I do believe there is something. Call it heaven if you will, I believe there is awareness beyond this life.

 

_________________________-

 

And Amy, if Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, then there truly is no separation from Christ. There may be perceived separation - in the form of believing in a dualistic reality - that there is ultimate good and ultimate evil - but in reality if there is only ONE than there can BE no separation.

[Lycorth]

Also consider those people who have had visions of Christ.

 

Good points, nivek - who has seen the right one? It seems all of these visions just support one sect or another. I thought Jeezus™ wasn't in the business of playing favorites with his sects?

 

Consider this, amy - and I asked this in another thread, I know. Perhaps Jeezus™ is real, but not as you think. Perhaps there is a malevolent noncorporeal lifeform out there that isn't all that powerful mind you, but just likes to fuck with innocent people's minds. As an Odinist, I believe there are such evil beings in the world, and I call them "Aetins" (eaters/devourers). They basically are a bunch of nasty little fucks that like to play with people's heads.

 

Why should I not believe your Jeezus™ isn't an Aetin? Playing with your head, getting you to believe in fairy tales, tricking people into buying into a dangerous cult that only causes mischief at best and tragedies at worst? If there really is a being named Jeezus™, then why should I not believe he is an Aetin? With all the horrors and evils that Xianity has caused in the world, I think the Aetin theory holds more water, if Jeezus™ isn't just an ugly fabrication period.

[Antlerman]

Ahhh.... It's amazing how what you see in the "eyes of your soul or spirit" looks very strongly like other images the catholic church has when picturing Jesus. Showing that your image of what Jesus looked like didn't come from your heart or soul but what the church showed you he looked like. Do you think he would look the way you drew him if you never ever saw a painting of Jesus?

 

Also you say many have had visions of Jesus. Their visions were merely reproductions of what we see all the time in churches of what Jesus looks like. The church tells them what Jesus looks like, that's what they picture in their mind, and that's what they worship, an image.

Taylork, I hope you don't mind my jumping in on this but I have a perspective to share that actually supports Amy. As an artist myself (musician), the act of creating art is an expression of personal impressions of feelings and ideas. They are uniquely that individual’s creation. However, we all filter our surrounding culture through ourselves into our art, just as people do their value systems. My music does not sound Eastern. I "think" (artistically) in Western forms of music, which is the culture that infuses my way of relating to the world through that form of language.

 

Art, language and everything evolves from other forms related to it. That Amy's art is reflective of images of the Catholic Church, why not? It still is uniquely her own expression. She's in it as well as her culture. Of course she's drawing from other forms of art in her expression. I do.

 

When people have visions, they will always draw from their culture in what they "see". In the same way we produce art through the filter of our culture. I believe the visions do happen, and there are natural explanations for why. I'm not quite getting the impression from Amy that she is claiming these are accurate representations of an actual person? My bet is that if I saw a picture of Amy herself, I would see some of herself in those images. This is how art works.

 

(just wanted to get to the real art of the matter there.... )

[KT45]

Taylork, I hope you don't mind my jumping in on this but I have a perspective to share that actually supports Amy. As an artist myself (musician), the act of creating art is an expression of personal impressions of feelings and ideas. They are uniquely that individual’s creation. However, we all filter our surrounding culture through ourselves into our art, just as people do their value systems. My music does not sound Eastern. I "think" (artistically) in Western forms of music, which is the culture that infuses my way of relating to the world through that form of language.

 

Art, language and everything evolves from other forms related to it. That Amy's art is reflective of images of the Catholic Church, why not? It still is uniquely her own expression. She's in it as well as her culture. Of course she's drawing from other forms of art in her expression. I do.

 

When people have visions, they will always draw from their culture in what they "see". In the same way we produce art through the filter of our culture. I believe the visions do happen, and there are natural explanations for why. I'm not quite getting the impression from Amy that she is claiming these are accurate representations of an actual person? My bet is that if I saw a picture of Amy herself, I would see some of herself in those images. This is how art works.

 

(just wanted to get to the real art of the matter there.... )

 

From your post I guess your saying that images in all forms of art is influenced by our culture. Right I agree, all portions of our life is somewhat influenced by our culture and the things we see. I was just trying to say that the Jesus she see's, the one she loves and admires, is really all in her head hence not real. Just a product of social programming into her. Antlerman maybe you can tell me where we disagree.

[Ouroboros]

You know that I don't believe the Gospels were written by second or third generation disciples.

And how do you know that? Consider that the gospels were written after 70 AD, which means practically all of the disciples were either killed in the persecution by Nero or killed when Jerusalem was destroyed. But put that aside, there are many very compelling arguments to why the writers of the Gospels were not eyewitnesses, for instance factual errors about places, times and other living people when the events supposedly occurred etc.

 

 

Yes. The God I try to serve is mysterious. Sometimes I can't make sense of Him either. But one look into His suffering Face and my doubts fade.

How do you see his face?

[Ouroboros]

Art is a very powerful medium and when used to portray any aspect of Jesus, whether this be through music, writing, drama, painting, it is meant to inspire the soul toward Him. When I "paint" Jesus I do try to make Him look semetic. BUT I'm not saying this is an acurrate, 100% picture of what He looks like. No, it's a way to portray His emotions and heart. One of the ways people usually see emotions is through facial expressions. My pictures are portraits of His heart.

You're touching the core of what the Gospels and all religious writings are about. You see, they portray a story, a picture, of a deeper meaning and idea. You should watch Joseph Campbell talk about this.

 

Like you said, your picture is not a true rendering of the "real" Jesus, but how you imagine him, and that you want to bring out a message, and idea, a feeling that you have for Jesus. The image doesn't tell the story about the true Jesus, in the sense of historical accurate Jesus, but the "true" Jesus as how you "feel" him to be.

 

The same goes for the Gospels. They tell a story, but the story is not historically true, but a personal rendering of the feelings and ideas about how the salvation for us all comes through our change of heart. That I should kill my own desires and sins on the cross and get resurrected to a new being, a new person. It has nothing to do with a real or historical Jesus, but about that You are Jesus. When you walk the path, not Jesus, but you personally walk the emotional path of giving up your own selfish needs and wants, that's when you can become a new person. The story isn't anything more than a portrait of an idea. The Gospels are written art, your picture is a painted art. Both are portraits, true as reflections, but not true as photographs or history. Do you understand?

 

The whole personification of Jesus was a misunderstanding. Jesus was never meant to be a real historical character, but he was to be the mythological hero that symbolizes your own path from what you were to what you are to become. The Hero's Journey.

[notasheep]

If you choose heaven, please explain why you've chosen to ignore her lack of faith, knowing that Jesus would have sent her to hell.

I haven't chosen to ignore her lack of faith notasheep. In fact she is no longer a Christian.

 

If Jesus let me make the choice as to where she would go, of course I would choose Heaven.

 

My believes about the judgement are in another post above.

 

Your previous comments on judgement were what prompted my question. They seem to indicate a certain cognitive dissonance, as they should. In your reply, you said both that you would allow your sister into heaven, and that you haven't chosen to ignore her lack of faith. But faith is required for salvation, so why are you willing to overlook her lack, when jesus isn't?

 

Oh, and I should say: I thought I was making up a hypothetical. Since it seems that your sister really is "unsaved", I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hit that close to home. For myself, I can perhaps justify turning in one of my brothers to the cops if they had committed a crime, to protect others and in the hopes that he would be "reformed". But they haven't done anything worthy of even earthly punishment, so the idea of sending them to eternal torment is just heinous.

[Ouroboros]

Your previous comments on judgement were what prompted my question. They seem to indicate a certain cognitive dissonance, as they should. In your reply, you said both that you would allow your sister into heaven, and that you haven't chosen to ignore her lack of faith. But faith is required for salvation, so why are you willing to overlook her lack, when jesus isn't?

I can explain that, if you allow me.

 

Amy have more love for her sister than Jesus. That's why Amy can overlook and forgive, while Jesus can't.

[nick5]

How very, very sad. That's how a lot of people feel about Him. Very sad.

Sad? No, I feel very happy every time someone looks at it on my DA website and tells me how good it is.

[Antlerman]

From your post I guess your saying that images in all forms of art is influenced by our culture. Right I agree, all portions of our life is somewhat influenced by our culture and the things we see. I was just trying to say that the Jesus she see's, the one she loves and admires, is really all in her head hence not real. Just a product of social programming into her. Antlerman maybe you can tell me where we disagree.

Maybe there's a communication gap? I had just read her explaining that she didn't think these were actually images of him, but artistic expressions of "his heart". That means her impression of what that is to her. It looked like your response was trying to get her acknowledge something she appears to have just stated: http://www.ex-christian.net/index.php?s=&s...ndpost&p=181427 I was thinking to help clarify what I heard from my perceptive understanding the nature of art. Maybe I misunderstood your response?

 

One note to point out about cultural influences though is that I wouldn't say we are "somewhat influenced" by our own cultures, but heavily influenced by it in ways we barely realize. It's always amazing me when I realize just how "not unique" I am, when to me I see myself as otherwise! It's really quite humbling in that way. That then leads into my whole line of discussion about notions of "truth", and pertinent to this conversation, "faces of God" in mythology, literature, and art.

 

It's funny really how in a sense it's the ideas that are a type of living, evolving, and transcendent sort of Being, being kept alive by being passed on our shoulders from person to person and generation to generation. We create it, feed it, keep it alive, and make it grow through art, literature, values, customs, etc. It serves us and we serve it. It's an interesting way of looking at "truth". BTW, it is in this sense I mean when I would say that God is real. It is also why fundamentalism is positioned to kill God - the only thing that halts evolution is death. But frankly, it's too huge for them to effectively do that.

[nick5]

Also consider those people who have had visions of Christ.

 

Ohhhh you're so right! Like when he told that woman to slice off her baby's arms. Loving god indeed!