The Last Days Are Coming!, How to be saved.

at bible study the other night we were encouraged not to look at the past (a philosophy of "yesterday and tomorrow do not exist"). It's incredibly easy to become bogged down in the context of thinking "we're not worthy we're not worthy", but there are numerous explanations as to why I for one don't think in such a negative mindset.

andy, your posts are interesting, and good reads.

I definitely struggle with wording in the bible, but a lot of the time it can be read in different ways with different interpretations. For example, Genesis could be referring to giants as in the giants we know-- the dinosaurs.

And yes, I did laugh at Splashies lack of amens.

YASOMH - It is very very important to look at the past as a way of learning from our mistakes and moving on. In this age the leaders of our countries do not look at the lessons that could have been learnt from the past nearly enough... for all we know the next Chernobyl could be in Australia.

As for the personal effects of 'living in the past' that you are talking about such as feeling that we are not worthy or not good enough can (I believe) only be fixed by going back to the past and back to the instance that caused these feelings and acknowledging that it happened and move on... well actually this is just one of the ways but they all do involve the past.
The past is a very important thing, it is who we were and where we came from but I think you are saying that we need to be who we are now..

Now I realise that you are talking about the bible. Most, if not all denominations/forms of Christianity are OBVIOUSLY living in the past because they follow a manuscript that was written thousands of years ago, they deny modern scientific advances because they choose to follow this, they still follow very old fashioned ideals (you cannot deny this) by opposing things like womens right to choose, working women, gay rights, gay marriage etc etc the list goes on. If I could find ONE religion that did not discriminate and live in the past such as I have just explained I would respect the whole system a lot more.

I thought that bible folk deny the existance of dinosaurs?

wait! as to my last point/question they now have intelligent design do they not? which basically means any geologic history is not science at all because "god made it that way"...

I do commend you YASOMH because at least most of your arguments are slightly better than "god made it so"

hear, hear!

YASOMH, i don't for a minute think that you're one of those kind of people who espouts the logic that dinosaurs never existed, there bones were merely put there by God for us to find.

i agree with most of your criticisms of science.
science is a great tool for knowledge,
but many directions of science these days are theory balanced upon other unproven theories.

this is ok, if yr moving towards some provable/usefull end.
physics of late has entered a period of near stagnation over quantum mechanics that questions the logic of continuing research in this direction - particulary considering the more pressing issues of energy and water resources.

Don't even start me on Nietzsche..........
...poor bastard.
son of a preacher contracts brain addling vd in first sexual experience.
talk about a chip on one's shoulder............

thankyou both for your kind words, this has been a good opportunity for me to become closer in my own understanding of God and I also have enjoyed the debate (despite decreasing amount of available time)

co-incidently i was talking to an old friend who said that the people that made the intelligent design religion (slightly different to my denomination) really muffed it. Science can't include God, so by saying that God is the answer doesn't really work: like in the law of gravity. (Why did the apple fall on Newton's head? Because God made it happen.) hmmm
haha it is weird that this is what we were talking about two seconds ago.
As I said, I'm no longer "anti-evolutionist" or "creationist" since I was shown Genesis in a different light: "why", not how/what.
Remind me about the babylonian script story. I'll try and hunt it down.

Yes I agree, personal reflection is very important. This was however different to what I was thinking about. Living in the past, or thinking in a negative mind-set (e.g.-- because I made all those crap decisions I shouldn't make any more decisions) is certainly not what I'm about. Neither am I about not learning from decisions: as a professional I will certainly have to learn to reflect upon actions, lessons, units of work, etc. to improve.

it was in direct relation to this post from ashes. to counter the feeling of personal guilt/shame/doubt that we often get by looking back on our shortcomings, we don't get caught up in what happened in those places but remember that we are in full control of what we do in the present.

certainly an interesting concept. Pasts... i could speak about educational psychology and the affect it has on our schooling through our individual pasts for hours.

I mean, "who we are now" is reflected by our past anyway. But yeah this really isn't what I was talking about (what I was thinking is nearer the top of this post).

Not living in the past in the context I am talking about: like self-past. I hope you know what I mean.
to say "most, if not all denominations/forms of Christianity"..."deny modern scientific advances"..."follow old fashioned ideals"...."oppose womens right to choose"..."working women, gay rights, gay marriage" is wrong. It's what you were talking about before:

I could make deductions from your last few posts but I really don't want to put myself in that position. I respect your views as a person and hope that you respect mine as well. If you're serious about going to church sms me. That is all.

Well its been a while since i checked any boards. And when i did it was always the armchair club, and never here. im shocked to see people are still posting here (though not too recently i note)

And i must give you kudos YSOMH, i usually try to avoid talking religion with atheists at all costs. it has a kind of gazelle-amongst-lions feel to it.

lmao.

i don't believe you