lol you dont know enough about homosexuality? what is there to know , other than that its 2 men rather than a man and a woman?

You must be right about the relationships you had, god was there for the god ones, and not there for the bad ones. but were the bad ones bad because god wasnt there, or was god not there because they were bad? How about it being more likely that he was there for 1) all of them, or 2) none of them?

as a non-believer... this is the part that shows all kinds of issues. To me, it sounds like you had an emotional experience of some sort and you want to believe so you're equating this emotional experience as a reason to believe.

Specifically, #3.... You are starting with an assumption that there is a God and you trust him. There is nothing rational about this.

You invited negative responses so I just offer that nothing you've posted yet sounds at all like anything that should lead to someone believing in Jesus. More importantly, as KB Coolman mentioned above, your experience sounds no different then what people of other faiths experience that they use to convince themselve that their faiths are correct.

I always find it odd how believers don't find it bothersome that what they're experiencing that justifies their belief is no different then what others describe for justifying completely different beliefs. Rationally... one would realize that either ALL the Gods are correct (and this experience proves they are all correct) or the experience you describe does not indicate what you want it to.

On the one hand, royce has been a believer for two weeks. And all us jokers are asking a wide spectrum of questions to him. It's sort of like asking a new recruit to explain everything about the army after 3 days of basic training. We can probably cut him some slack.

On the other hand, royce would be wise to say "I don't know" alot more.

If one has an answer and opinion on everything already, there's no need for truth, as you already have all your answers. "I don't know" opens space for truth to be revealed.

you realize this is a contradictory mess...

If he did say, I dont know, Id have a lot more respect. So far, it seems like he has dodged the questions that he could answer honestly ( eg what was the revelation , explaining how he was messed up before, etc), and then made up answers to the ones he doesnt know, mostly, it seems, to try and fit his revelation into a nice neat "christianity of the bible" slot.

I'm a little confused by his statements. His writings seem to indicate he already believed in God. He also seems to have had some sort of religious upbringing.

I think it is the other way around. Christians who believe the scriptures are divinely inspired word of God will eventually run into many problems with their faith--or at least they should.

So I will ask you the same question that I asked Royce. How do you explain the terrible things in the bible--the killing of homosexuals and disobedient children, the genocide, it's view on slavery, and its sexist views on gender roles?

If you truly believe that the bible in the inerrant word of God then you have a lot of explaining to do if you are going to convince anyone that this God is benevolent.

I can't. That's why I don't believe that they were instructions given to man by God. The God that I know isn't evil like that.

How would you know that?

But the whole Jesus person is based on the old testament, he clearly knew what the old testament laws were since he himself given them to the Jews before(if he was GOD). Don't you think that if Jesus was against what was written in the OT because it wasn't his laws but only changed around laws by people he would have pointed it out, clearly stating to stop twisting his words around? Instead he did not say anything about these OT laws given to Moses, even better he claimed these laws are everlasting(don't pass)...

So i find it rather silly when people claim to believe in Jesus but don't accept the bible claiming that the text has been twisted around and does not really represent true words of GOD/JESUS.

I guess I don't; at least not in a way that would satisfy you.

Neither should it satisfy you...

Gskowal, I don't believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God, so I don't have to justify anything.

So you don't believe in anything that was written in the bible about GOD and JESUS?

My view is that if God is malevolent then we are all ****ed and there isn't anything we can do about it. So I don't worry about it or give it any consideration.