The end times again

[Wertbag]

Speaking to a guy online, i pointed out there have been hundreds of end of the world prophecies and every single one passed without anything interesting happening. 

"Oh no" he said "This time its different.  You see Jerusalem was never internationally known as Israel's capital but Trump recognised it as such. And now we have 5 red cows delivered to be sacrificed, which is fulfilment!  Think thats not enough? Well the Pope is having meetings with religious heads to form the world religion that is prophesied. Only a fool could put so much down to coincidence!"

 

Has there every been a generation of Christians who didn’t think they were living in the end times?

With such vague language as "wars and rumours of wars", earthquakes, disease and natural disasters are constants but are still assigned significance in spite of their regular occurrence. 

Living through the plague, WW1 or 2, mongol invasions or the end of the ice age where the whole planet was changed, i can see why people thought things were as bad as it could get...  but now?  

[Casualfanboy16]

Honestly though, time and time again this seems to happen. It's almost as if they latch onto any war going on or any natural disaster or disease to signify the end times. I especially see it in my family. My Mom watches TV preachers like Dr. David Jeremiah and Charles Stanley. Some of their sermons that I've sort of tuned into talk about the end times. My parents are convinced that we're in the end times because of them. I say it's ridiculous. You can pretty much pick whatever event's going on in the world and slap the end times label on it. It's been the "end times" for a loooong while now. It's like Christians just want the world to end so badly.

[◊ Weezer ◊]

My grandfather who was born in 1899 said he had heard end of time predictions all his life.  

17 minutes ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

 

 It's like Christians just want the world to end so badly.

 

Seems that way.

[Casualfanboy16]

1 minute ago, Weezer said:

My grandfather who was born in 1899 said he had heard end of time predictions all his life.  

 

Seems that way.

I'm honestly confused as to why they seem to want the world to end so badly when isn't it the goal of Christianity to like get as many people into the loving arms of the Lord as possible or some shit? Like, why do these people want the world to end, but at the same time want to lead people to Christ before it's too late? You can't lead people to Christ when y'all get raptured. It's almost like they're only concerned with getting into the Pearly Gates sooner at that point while the rest of us heathens get all that Revelations shit to deal with lmao.

[Wertbag]

This guy I'm talking to is a real gem.  When I asked why God had to kill everyone in a flood, including babies he said:

 

"It achieved the preventing of the human race from being phased out of existence by a plan of Satan to replace the human race with a hybrid race of his own through the mating of fallen angels with human females.

Noah and his family were one of the few remaining pure blooded humans at the time that were NOT worshipping Satan and the fallen angels and giving their daughters up to fallen angels to be their wives which was just going along with Satan's plan to phase out the human race from existence.

God did what needed to be done in order to save the human race from extinction.

The majority of babies being born during the time of Noah were NOT even fully human they were the hybrid offspring of fallen angels and human females."

 

Just Wow.  But he wasn't done, apparently the Covid vaccine is a gene test run by Satan as a test for the Mark of the Beast:

 

"The events surrounding Covid-19 and its vaccine parallel many things that will end up coinciding with the Mark Of The Beast system that will take place during the Tribulation Period, it's a precursor to the entire Mark Of The Beast system. Covid-19 was a test to see how many people would just trust the government and take something without even thinking twice about it. The vaccine wasn't even a vaccine it was a gene therapy experiment, how could it NOT have been when RNA was being used in the so called vaccine? The RNA in the vaccine can alter the DNA of a person, scientists in Sweden proved such a thing to be a fact because the vaccine altered the DNA of a human liver cell."

 

When you think being Christian is crazy, then take a step further with fundamentalism, then dive off the high board into the sea of conspiracy theories on top.  What scares me is that I have no idea if a full conspiracy nut like this is a small minority, or if the fundamentalist churches are churning out people with these beliefs on a regular basis.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

3 hours ago, Wertbag said:

a plan of Satan to replace the human race with a hybrid race of his own through the mating of fallen angels with human females.

Two points to make about the passage in Genesis chapter 6.  Firstly, the bible does not describe these beings as "fallen angels" or anything else nefarious like that.  It describes them as "the sons of god."  Presumably, this would include jesus.  So christians have to claim that the phrase "the sons of god" means anything else besides what it literally says.  The "sons of god" were nephilim, fallen angels, sons of Seth... anything but literal sons of the literal god.  Yet, the bible also claims that jesus is god's only son.  This passage not only calls that claim itself into question, given that god also had other "sons"; but it also calls into question the meaning of jesus being the son of god.  Because if the bible doesn't mean "sons of god" when it literally says "sons of god" how can we be sure that the bible means that jesus was "the son of god"?

 

Secondly, this passage demonstrates how far back into antiquity there were claims that a woman was impregnated by a god, angel, or other celestial entity.  Here, the world was supposedly only a few hundred years old, and already young maidens were running around with their bellies tucked under their chins claiming that "god did it."  It was not an uncommon claim back then (it still isn't, though it is much less common).  So why should we believe the virgin Mary's claim was any different from any of the others?

[walterpthefirst]

12 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

Two points to make about the passage in Genesis chapter 6.  Firstly, the bible does not describe these beings as "fallen angels" or anything else nefarious like that.  It describes them as "the sons of god."  Presumably, this would include jesus.  So christians have to claim that the phrase "the sons of god" means anything else besides what it literally says.  The "sons of god" were nephilim, fallen angels, sons of Seth... anything but literal sons of the literal god.  Yet, the bible also claims that jesus is god's only son.  This passage not only calls that claim itself into question, given that god also had other "sons"; but it also calls into question the meaning of jesus being the son of god.  Because if the bible doesn't mean "sons of god" when it literally says "sons of god" how can we be sure that the bible means that jesus was "the son of god"?

 

Secondly, this passage demonstrates how far back into antiquity there were claims that a woman was impregnated by a god, angel, or other celestial entity.  Here, the world was supposedly only a few hundred years old, and already young maidens were running around with their bellies tucked under their chins claiming that "god did it."  It was not an uncommon claim back then (it still isn't, though it is much less common).  So why should we believe the virgin Mary's claim was any different from any of the others?

 

The usual Christian apologetic justification for saying that these beings were fallen angels comes from Revelation 12 : 1 - 9, Prof.

 

 

1 A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 

2 She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 

3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 

4 Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. 

5 She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron sceptre.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. 

6 The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days.

7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 

8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 

9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.

 

 

But, as you point out, the Genesis passage calls them 'sons of god' and not fallen angels or demons or anything else.  So this is just another case of Christians retrofitting the NT into the OT to justify their beliefs.

 

However, it was well within god's power to keep Satan and his cohorts safely away from earth and to let us all live in peace, free from Satanic temptation, demonic possession and the impregnation of women by these 'sons of god'.  The bible (once again!) says so.

 

Jude 6

And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their proper dwelling—these he has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great Day.

 

2 Peter 2 : 4

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment; 

 

See?  It would have been easy, just a trivial thing for god to keep all of the fallen angels imprisoned until judgement day.  But he didn't do it.  He only imprisoned some of them.  But he left Satan free to tempt Adam and Eve (look how well that turned out!) and other demons free to roam the earth and cause suffering and misery.

 

And I can even tell you WHY god did this exceptionally wicked and hateful thing, Prof.

 

Because god wanted to glorify himself when he was Jesus, showing the disciples and other people that he had power over demons and unclean spirits.  That's the real bottom line here.  God never really does anything purely out of love for us.  There's always a deeper, more narcissistic agenda to his actions.  He always wants the glory for himself - only himself.  

 

Me!   ME!   ME!   ME!    ME!

 

 

What a scumbag!   

 

 

Walter.

 

 

 

[Casualfanboy16]

53 minutes ago, walterpthefirst said:

Because god wanted to glorify himself when he was Jesus, showing the disciples and other people that he had power over demons and unclean spirits.  That's the real bottom line here.  God never really does anything purely out of love for us.  There's always a deeper, more narcissistic agenda to his actions.  He always wants the glory for himself - only himself.  

 

Me!   ME!   ME!   ME!    ME!

 

 

What a scumbag!   

 

 

Walter.

That's what a lot of his actions in both the Old, and New Testaments boil down to- just good ol' straight-up narcissism. He made us pretty much dependent on him from the very start with Adam and Eve. He wanted us to come to him and glorify him because he's sO wOndErfUL, so we have to get on our knees and lick his boots. He put us into this mess, blamed us for something he set up, then proceeded to make himself the only way to salvation. He's literally a textbook narcissist and Christians glorify him. It makes no sense to me. Don't even get me started on his twisted version of "love". That's a whole nother can of worms.

 

This is the guy Christians want us to give glory to? It makes me sick to my stomach.

 

Also unrelated, but how did you get the text a different color like that? Just curious.

[◊ Weezer ◊]

6 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

 

 this passage demonstrates how far back into antiquity there were claims that a woman was impregnated by a god, angel, or other celestial entity.  

 

And ancient Sumerian writings say the sons of the gods (plural) were marrying the daughters of men.  In this story they were improving the evolution of humans.

[walterpthefirst]

1 hour ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

 

 

Also unrelated, but how did you get the text a different color like that? Just curious.

 

Hello  Casualfanboy16!  

 

 

You can colour up the text when you write a post.

 

Once you open the Reply box you should see a row of icons above where you want to write your words.

 

From left to right, it starts off like this..

 

B    I     U     S  

 

...then there are the Link, Quote, Code and Emoji icons.

 

What you are looking for comes further to the right, just before the Size icon.

 

There's an underlined and bold capital A with a tiny, downward pointing arrow just above and to the right of it.

 

Highlight the text you want to colour and then click on this tiny arrow.

 

A drop down box of 30 colour options will appear (plus the automatic text colour of black).

 

Select which colour you want and your highlighted block of text, or highlighted individual letter, should change accordingly.

 

In that box you also have the option of selecting More Colours...

 

 

I hope that's all ok for you.  

 

 

Thanks,

 

Walter.

 

 

[Casualfanboy16]

2 minutes ago, walterpthefirst said:

 

Hello  Casualfanboy16!  

 

 

You can colour up the text when you write a post.

 

Once you open the Reply box you should see a row of icons above where you want to write your words.

 

From left to right, it starts off like this..

 

B    I     U     S  

 

...then there are the Link, Quote, Code and Emoji icons.

 

What you are looking for comes further to the right, just before the Size icon.

 

There's an underlined and bold capital A with a tiny, downward pointing arrow just above and to the right of it.

 

Highlight the text you want to colour and then click on this tiny arrow.

 

A drop down box of 30 colour options will appear (plus the automatic text colour of black).

 

Select which colour you want and your highlighted block of text, or highlighted individual letter, should change accordingly.

 

In that box you also have the option of selecting More Colours...

 

 

I hope that's all ok for you.  

 

 

Thanks,

 

Walter.

 

 

I wonder if certain features are absent on mobile. I don't have that option. No strike through or color options. If I rotate it horizontally I get additional ones, but no colors or anything.

[◊ Weezer ◊]

1 minute ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

I wonder if certain features are absent on mobile. I don't have that option. No strike through or color options. If I rotate it horizontally I get additional ones, but no colors or anything.

Same on my Iphone.  There seem to be features you get on a computer you don't get on a phone.

[Casualfanboy16]

3 minutes ago, Weezer said:

Same on my Iphone.  There seem to be features you get on a computer you don't get on a phone.

Nooooo!! Gosh darn it. I wanted to make funky text. I only have bold, italicize, and underline.

 

And additional options like quoting text and making a numbered or bullet point list if I turn it horizontally.

[mwc]

On 9/29/2023 at 12:01 AM, Wertbag said:

"It achieved the preventing of the human race from being phased out of existence by a plan of Satan to replace the human race with a hybrid race of his own through the mating of fallen angels with human females.

Noah and his family were one of the few remaining pure blooded humans at the time that were NOT worshipping Satan and the fallen angels and giving their daughters up to fallen angels to be their wives which was just going along with Satan's plan to phase out the human race from existence.

God did what needed to be done in order to save the human race from extinction.

The majority of babies being born during the time of Noah were NOT even fully human they were the hybrid offspring of fallen angels and human females."

     It's a nice case of othering to justify a genocide.  If they're not human then who really cares?

 

     But, assuming he's right, and the whole flood was to wipe out the Nephilim, then why are they still around in Numbers 13 when Moses sends spies ahead to check out the land of Canaan?  Is this just another case of god dealing in partial measures instead of full measures?

 

     Should I really worry about a god that half-asses it at every turn?  I'm thinking that when "everyone" is dealt with in these supposed end times that means a few people might be dealt with and the rest will just sort of be left wander off to do whatever like they have since day one.

 

          mwc

 

[♦ Fuego ♦]

On 9/28/2023 at 7:56 PM, Casualfanboy16 said:

It's like Christians just want the world to end so badly.

 

They want to finally "win" and have all their beliefs justified with a big payout of eternal bliss. But I'd bet that none of them would enjoy a dictator king, particularly a psychotic one that wants blood as payment for forgiveness, even if they imagine they would. The never ending programming of listening to preachers and Christian music and going to church and reading only Christian materials is what keeps them in the cult and insulates their emotions from giving them reality-checks. Most cults operate that way.

 

[Casualfanboy16]

50 minutes ago, Fuego said:

 

They want to finally "win" and have all their beliefs justified with a big payout of eternal bliss. But I'd bet that none of them would enjoy a dictator king, particularly a psychotic one that wants blood as payment for forgiveness, even if they imagine they would. The never ending programming of listening to preachers and Christian music and going to church and reading only Christian materials is what keeps them in the cult and insulates their emotions from giving them reality-checks. Most cults operate that way.

 

Honestly, I don't find the idea of eternal bliss appealing. Don't get me wrong- the idea of eternal damnation obviously doesn't appeal to me either, but how can god keep eternity in Heaven satisfying enough for us to stay there forever and ever? My pastor explained it one time that essentially he thinks that Heaven is going to be like, in a way, how kids can do something over and over again and never get bored of doing it. Doesn't exactly make sense to me because kids get bored?? Like, sure they probably have more energy and stuff, but even kids can't do the same thing over and over again without it eventually getting boring, right. As @Weezer once told me: "As the saying goes: insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result". I think of Heaven that way. Because eventually, with our eternal lifespan, how long will it take for things to start getting monotonous, repetitive, etc. Sure, there'll be new things to do, but eventually the novelty surely would wear off, right?

 

Unless God does something to our minds when we step through the Pearly Gates, how're we going to be kept entertained for all eternity? According to God (and many Christian songs) we don't really deserve this gift we're getting because we're all born into sin anyway. We're all dirty, shameful sinners who must come to him in order to be saved... even though he set us up from the start to be pretty much codependent on him and to give him glory that he really doesn't need or deserve. That's certainly not the sign of a narcissistic abuser! Nope! No red flags here!

[TheRedneckProfessor]

I'd imagine an eternal damnation would probably also get boring after a while.  Sure, the torment of hellfire and brimstone, the stench of burning flesh and rotting entrails, might seem exquisitely horrifying for the first few decades.  But, honestly, how many times can a person be flayed alive before it becomes old hat?  Even the whole "separation from the presence of god" would likely get pretty stagnant once the novelty wore off.

[Casualfanboy16]

44 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

I'd imagine an eternal damnation would probably also get boring after a while.  Sure, the torment of hellfire and brimstone, the stench of burning flesh and rotting entrails, might seem exquisitely horrifying for the first few decades.  But, honestly, how many times can a person be flayed alive before it becomes old hat?  Even the whole "separation from the presence of god" would likely get pretty stagnant once the novelty wore off.

The only thing I can think of is that god would somehow remove the ability for someone to get bored for Heaven; or for Hell, somehow make it so that the torture/eternal isolation never stops making you suffer no matter how old it gets. Even when the novelty wears off, I feel like somehow that god would do something to us in both scenarios to make eternity be exactly how he wants it to be.

 

This begs the question though... if we're going by the eternal separation from god version of Hell rather than the fire and brimstone version, what would that look like? I assume it's separation from all of god's creation and everything good, I suppose. Would it be infinite pain without all the fire and brimstone mumbo jumbo, or would it just be endless nothing? I don't think anyone can really know, but "eternal separation from God" is a bit of a vague scenario, and therefore more difficult version of Hell for me to imagine compared to the usual fire and brimstone torture, gnashing of teeth shit I heard about pretty much all my life.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

1 hour ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

but "eternal separation from God" is a bit of a vague scenario, and therefore more difficult version of Hell for me to imagine

From a technical/logical perspective, eternal separation from god is impossible because of his omnipresence.  There is no place that is outside of his presence, thus "hell" must exist somewhere in the presence of god.  If he withdraws his presence, as his omnipotence would certainly allow, then he would no longer be omnipresent; but that also means he can't do it, and so he's not omnipotent.  I guess he's just mysterious and shit. 

 

Another note about god's (supposed) omnipresence:  Because god is holy, he cannot abide sin in his presence.  But all of humanity is sinful.  Even christians still have the nature of Original Sin.  And "sinners" are even more filled with sin.  So, how can god be present in a place where there is so much sin if his holiness cannot abide sin in his presence?  But, if he can't be present where there is sin, then he's not omnipresent, which also means he cannot be omnipotent.  Yeah, must just be mysterious and shit. 

[Casualfanboy16]

36 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

From a technical/logical perspective, eternal separation from god is impossible because of his omnipresence.  There is no place that is outside of his presence, thus "hell" must exist somewhere in the presence of god.  If he withdraws his presence, as his omnipotence would certainly allow, then he would no longer be omnipresent; but that also means he can't do it, and so he's not omnipotent.  I guess he's just mysterious and shit. 

 

Another note about god's (supposed) omnipresence:  Because god is holy, he cannot abide sin in his presence.  But all of humanity is sinful.  Even christians still have the nature of Original Sin.  And "sinners" are even more filled with sin.  So, how can god be present in a place where there is so much sin if his holiness cannot abide sin in his presence?  But, if he can't be present where there is sin, then he's not omnipresent, which also means he cannot be omnipotent.  Yeah, must just be mysterious and shit. 

Huh. Never thought about this. All very good points. And of course, more reasons as to why it's all bullshit lmao. My one pastor believes in the eternal separation of God version of Hell. That concept used to scare me, even more than fire and brimstone and torture. Being alone, separated from everything for all eternity. However, the more I think about it, the less it makes sense, especially with the stuff you brought up. I guess that's how it goes at this point lol.

[◊ Weezer ◊]

2 hours ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

 

 However, the more I think about it, the less it makes sense, especially with the stuff you brought up. I guess that's how it goes at this point lol.

 

And the older you get, the more ridicilous eternity in either place seems.  

[Casualfanboy16]

18 minutes ago, Weezer said:

 

And the older you get, the more ridicilous eternity in either place seems.  

I'm already finding eternity ridiculous in both places. I don't need to get too much older lmao.

[walterpthefirst]

9 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

From a technical/logical perspective, eternal separation from god is impossible because of his omnipresence.  There is no place that is outside of his presence, thus "hell" must exist somewhere in the presence of god.  If he withdraws his presence, as his omnipotence would certainly allow, then he would no longer be omnipresent; but that also means he can't do it, and so he's not omnipotent.  I guess he's just mysterious and shit. 

 

Another note about god's (supposed) omnipresence:  Because god is holy, he cannot abide sin in his presence.  But all of humanity is sinful.  Even christians still have the nature of Original Sin.  And "sinners" are even more filled with sin.  So, how can god be present in a place where there is so much sin if his holiness cannot abide sin in his presence?  But, if he can't be present where there is sin, then he's not omnipresent, which also means he cannot be omnipotent.  Yeah, must just be mysterious and shit. 

 

Sounds to me like god cannot abide logic in his presence.

 

It fucks up his omnipotence and omnipresence.

 

Making him not at all mysterious and just shit.

 

[freshstart]

13 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

Another note about god's (supposed) omnipresence:  Because god is holy, he cannot abide sin in his presence. 

Right, so how is that he was able to walk in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve sinned? And how is it that many people in the old testament "saw god," yet scrupture says to see god would result in death.

I love the mental gymnastics to explain these contradictions on various Christian websites.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

16 hours ago, Casualfanboy16 said:

The only thing I can think of is that god would somehow remove the ability for someone to get bored for Heaven

I don't know.  The most entertaining thing he's been able to do lately is appear in a grilled cheese sandwich or find some soccer mom Karen a parking spot at Bath and Body Works.  I mean, the guy can't even feed starving children for a few years until they're old enough to fend for themselves, what's he going to do with millions of people for all eternity?  Puppet shows?