This may be true but I hope not. I guess the Jews are special (separate contract), but if I had to think all other religions (the majority) were bad, then I wouldn't want to be associating with them in public or business, I don't think. I don't know why Chrisrianity was started in only the middle east by Christ, and has been spread somewhat to other areas, since there are always people every where who want something different. The key here is "I don't know." I can say my faith is good enough, but I am pretty dumb. Maybe the Moslems, Hindus, Buddahists, Jews, Confucians, and a thousand sects think the same thing, only in different terms. I realize we Americans in particular like everything clear and unconfused and do not want to let others choose. Anyway the Reverend got what he wanted, attention.

The issue is not being different, but being right.

Susan's and your comments are based on human logic and feelings. Moreso here her's and yours.

You don't turn to human wants and desires to find out what God wants. You turn to God.

And to find his scriptures one must seek and test under his guidance.

In doing that you find only the Bible has historical and other testable claims the show God's hands are involved. You cannot find such for any other religion.

In Islam, non-muslims were to be converted, suppressed or killed under Mohammed. Mohammed did not ride out spreading Islam by persuation. He did so at the head of an army who conquered and then laid dictates on the people.

At best, those who did not convert were denied legal status as citizens or even humans. Jews and Christians had to wear scarfs showing their non person status.

The End Times Prophecies of Islam, as that nut case in Iran is trying to bring about, is looking forward to the Muslims exterminating all non-Muslims. This leaves a planet finally at peace with all the non-Muslims properly judged, condemned and dealt with by Allah.

Salvation is arbitrary and strictly earned by works. There is no compatibility in their teachings with Christianity.

In Mormonism, Jehovah was a man, born of a mother and father, on another planet, who worked his way up to godhood. He and his wives populated the earth via all his spirit children.

They believe in salvation by works granted by grace and progression up to godhood. No actual Hell with them.

Although many call them Christians they are not compatible with Christian teachings, at all.

There is one God in Christianity, but untold numbers in Mormonism.

Hindus do not believe in a single God. They have thousands. And they do not believe in Heaven or Hell, but reincarnation and nirvana (oblivious absorbtion back into the divine ultimate upon reaching enlightment}.

There is not even an inkling of comparison with Christianity.

No God at all in Buddhism.

And on and on.

Now, a simple exercise in logic and deductive reasoning tells you these groups are totally incompatible. They do not share the same god, because if the did, it would be a totally schizoid god.

Do your own research. There is only one religion in the world, when tested, shows you any evidence or proofs. That is Biblical Christianity.

Not Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox or others that import their legalisms, tradictions and such, but the Bible.

Others have historical figures for founders and such. But you have nothing to back them but their claims.

Hoping it ain't true is just that. Hope. But a false hope, because it is true.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

Now you mindless christians have provoked me. There is a God figure in Buddhism in the form of the Dali Lama. The Buddist religion actually follows the same 10 commandments that you christians do. In fact they are word for word the same, that is when I started believing in Buddhism. The only difference I have found so far is that Buddhist people believe that they have to walk the walk...not just talk the talk like other religions.

I have never heard that claimed before. Meaning any Buddhists believe in a Supreme Being or Principle.

http://www.buddhistinformation.com/buddhist_attitude_to_god.htm
The standpoint adopted here is primarily that of Theravada Buddhism. But most of what is said will be applicable to most other Buddhist traditions. The Theravada tradition, also called the Southern school of Buddhism, is based on texts maintained in the Pali language, which are the oldest of the existing Canons of Buddhism and reputed to be the closest to the teaching of the Buddha himself.

There is no place for God in the Mahayana traditions of Buddhism as well, and indeed some of the early Indian Mahayana philosophers have denounced god-worship in terms which are even stronger than those expressed in the Theravada literature. Some later Mahayana schools, which flourished outside India, ascribed some degree of divinity to a transcendent Buddha, considering living Buddhas to be a manifestation of this âdhi-buddha. But even here it cannot be said that the Buddha was converted into a Divinity comparable to the God of the monotheistic religions.

Just as Buddhism rejects the notion of a Supreme God it also rejects the notion of an abstract God-principle operating in the universe.

The Dali Lama is god? He is the supposed to be the reincarantion of Buddha. The supreme spiritual leader, not a god.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

The Dali Lama is a reincarnation of Buddha. Buddha is a supreme spiritual leader... just like your Jesus. You call your god what you want to...and believe what you want. The fruit of any religion is how the people that practice that religion act when they are not around their pious friends.

Dearest Little PTC Guy:

Your insistence that your religious faith is favored by God above all others---i.e. Muslim, Taoist, or even Christians who understand that God loves and invites all to His worship---is reminiscent of the little boy, Johnny, who is so insecurely self-centered that he does not know how to share precious love with others.

Little Johnny insists to his older sister that their mother loves him most of all others.

His sister, understanding what the great bounty of love is, gives him a hug and affectionately kisses him on the head and says, “Yes Johnny, mother loves you the most.”

PTC Guy, God loves you most.

I agree. If it makes him happy. Why did his god let these other "religions" even start much less flourish? He's been pretty quick in the past to smite & deluge. I would hope that a true caring, loving god would appreciate any life well lived.

My God allowed them to be invented because of freewill. Without freewill there can be no love, justice, happiness or any other such good thing.

Who defines a life well lived? You, Islewood or God? I know I do not.

But, at least, you admitted there are different gods, not making them all true. Something Islewood and the PC, grey and murky, believing in no such thing as true/false, right/wrong and so on. They believe in situational ethics and shades of gray.

But, seriously, from what you said, I guess you reject the Bible. In the Bible God commanded the desruction of the cruel pagans in the Promised Land, caused the Great Flood when the world turned from him into their own gods and human driven ways, destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and will pass judgement and condemnation on those who go with the Anti-Christ instead of him.

God does not change. He is still the God that did the 'smite and deluge,' as you called them.

But he was not, as you phrased it, quick in the past to do so. Nor is he quick, now, to carry out the promises of Revelation and other prophecies about the what humanity is quickly descending to becoming.

Every human who has ever lived that achieved that acheived knowing right from wrong has had the opportunity to accept or reject God and his teachings, be they the simplistic Law of Conscious or the greater revelations in the Bible.

We all have the right to believe as we will. But that does not mean God will bless it or not judge and condemn it in eternity. Nor does it mean societies can tolerate an anything goes way of life without suffering very negative consequences.

Kind of sounds like you are a Deist. Meaning God created it, set it motion, then step backed as an uncaring observer. Making our hopes for eternity unknown or no hope at all since he gave us no expections and no promises.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

So now freewill was God’s great mistake?

The only definition of a life well lived that will much matter is the one we each define for ourselves.

As for any supposed clear look at ultimate reality, aside from LOVE, gray and murky is about as good as it is going to get. Folks down through time who were armed with TRUTH have done some really nasty things to some of God’s children.

As for the Great Flood, maybe that is what made some folks all wet.

As for change, even the desired for change that mankind holds to be progress (a 19th Century conception of Western man) would have little to do with that which is infinite. Divide infinity by a millisecond or by a millennium or by eons and you will still get the same answer you would if you divided it by zero. Thinking of our Infinite God as being static or dynamic informs us of little.

I pray to God, but my prayers are only words of thanksgiving, infrequent cries of anguish, utterances of amazement, and expressions of love. God need not do or answer to anything---He, She and It has already given me more than I can ever want.

As for the Bible, I worship God and refuse to have any graven images before me, a book with a black cover included.

As for you saying that I sounding like a Deist, some folks might say that you sound like a Fascist. I would think it kinder to think of you as Little Johnny that God loves most of all.

Freewill is not a mistake. It is a blessing or curse depending on how one uses it.

And life well lived is defined by us? Gray and murky is as best it gets? You don't need more from God because you got it under control? And you call yourself a Christian? No, you are your own god.

And of course you reject the written Bible, you are your own Bible.

And read better, I never said you were a deist. I was responding to someone else, not you.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

TCP Guy,

Aside from saying that I do not take Scripture lightly, given my previous post, I will refrain from further comment.

In Christ I am and we all are,

Islewood

I saw you posted this on another topic.

I did not reply because I had already stated the illogic and irrationality of your claims and that to get into depth on this was inappropriate on a News Forum.

Here is what Islewood is saying about God and religion, in a simple example, for those unaware of what is going on:

1. Joe is a 50 year old white man.
2. Joe is a 30 year old black man.
3. Joe is a 20 year old black female.
4. Joe is a 12 year old white female.
5. Joe is one person and all of the above at the same time.

Islewood is saying such as Buddhism, as shown here, believes in the same God as Christianity and all other religions and God embraces and accepts Buddhists into Heaven and salvation the same as all other relgions.

Just believe firmly and it is good enough for God.

Therefore, there cannot be a Hell. Therefore Islewood is a Universal Salvationist. All are going to Heaven and God will fix it all there. Make it all right.

Want to go deeper, Islewood? Then click Christian Talk Zone . Bring all the friends and supporters you want to prove your case.

But I am not debating your illogical claims here.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

Your illustration is apt, I think.

There are actually two distinct issues that need to be kept apart:

(1) Is any one religion exclusively true?

(2) Is any one religion the exclusive means to salvation?

It is possible to answer yes to (1) but no to (2).

Clearly, it is impossible that all of the conflicting doctrines of the worlds religions are true, as they are mutually contradictory.
As you have ably pointed out, perhaps all of them are false, but they cannot all be true. (At this, Islewood, in a characteristic non-sequiter, replied, "Then yours must be false.")

But the answer to (2) depends upon further considerations. Suppose that it is in fact true that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. Then, of course, any religious belief that denies this is simply mistaken. But the further question is whether BELIEVING the core propositions of Christianity is requisite for salvation. Might one have mistaken religious beliefs but nevertheless be the beneficiary of God's grace? Universalists believe that God will eventually save everyone. Inclusivists believe that, though the work of Christ was a necessary condition for anyone's salvation, there are ways of appropriating the benefits of that work without explicit faith in Christ. Exclusivists (in this sense) believe that explcit faith in Christ is a necessary condition of salvation.

But, as you have noted over and over again, this is just not the place for this sort of discussion.

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"The philosophical case against theism is rather easily dealt with. There is no philosophical case against theism."
--G.K. Chesterton

People are usually more firmly convinced that their opinions are precious than that they are true.
--George Santayana

We have actually discussed this issue.

To keep it brief, and restate I see no need to retype here what has already been laid out more extensively there and that this is not a theology forum, I will limit my reply.

No. Islam and such do not in any way accomodate acceptance by God by their believers. One cannot find the Biblical Christ and stay in these other religions. They are simply too alien.

To come to God, without any knowledge of the Bible, is and has happened in lands dominated by false relgions. it can be found laid out in Romans. But it always included a non participation in the false religion by the person. Again, too alien to be compatible.

But, in Christian Cults and false doctrines, it is possible to find the true Christ while remaining conflicted and immature spiritually.
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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

PTC Guy: you seem to profess to know much about all other faiths in God. So maybe you do not know much about your own? Can you explain anything about it in more than an epitaphic expression?

I do wonder how much you know about Islam---probably not much when it comes to texts of their faith. Maybe you did not know that Jesus is also in their most holy text.

Of your sacred writing dates from the one true interpretation (I think you said it was the NIV). Also, your take on Gandhi was interesting. Care to give us your sources for it---the internet maybe?

People dismiss or do not even consider the power of conviction of the Holy Spirit and God's implanted Law of Conscience. Nor the work of angels.

There is interesting history of missionaries finding the realties of this simple reality in the 'outsiders' of new cultures that recognized Christ and God when preached to and whose convictions would not allow them to be part of their cultures religions.

Secular thinking sees all in the light of culture, society, science and such narrow human thinking. Neither God nor those versed in his teachings recognize such limits.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

PTC Guy:

Sorry to tell you, but you ain't the Holy Spirit.

Never said I was.

But your shutting him out in favor of human philosophy is not going to get you anywhere.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

TCP Guy,

In my faith that would be impossible, however given my previous post, I will refrain from further comment.

May God be with you and of course He already is,

Islewood

Thank God for all you motor mouths who have tried to impress us with your "knowledge" and/or "copy/paste" abilities. You have given Dunn, Johnson and Jordan and much needed rest.

Susieq, if this type conversaton offends you, do yourself a favor and stop reading.

But consider this, if it stings that much then there are some truths in it that touch a nerve in you, then maybe some self examination is in order.

Motor mouth? Oh, you taking yours out for a Sunday cruise?

We are not going to agree, it appears. And we are starting to repeat.

Time to agree to disagree and move on. I am quite sure all know our relative positions.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

TCP Guy:

I agree with you. If I thought that I had posted anything that had shaken your faith, I would feel very guilty. However, I know that I have not.

What with both of us being Christians, we likely agree in faith far more than we disagree---this is not to minimize any difference that you find significant.

I have enjoyed our exchanges. I add you to the long list of people that have helped better grasp more fully some of the far edges of my faith in God.

God bless and of course God already has,

Islewood