A poster on the closed thread claims my belief that God created us all, and therefore, we will continue living "saved" in heaven, is not reason. The poster claims that our creation is independent of our being saved in heaven. Such an idea is based on theologians that teach us to reason this irrational way about God. My assumption is reasonable. God creates us for a purpose, and that purpose is not to eternally die.

The assumptions of theologians are not reasonable. Why did God created mortality if we are all going to live forever in heaven without pain or judgment of each other. That is the correct question to ask to believe the most "reasonable" purpose of mortality, and not the questions and answers of Joseph Smith or the theologians. That is the key question to answer for all philosophers.

The answer to this question, if rational, leads us into the rational conclusion that God saves everyone, even Lucifer, because He is His creation.

I am responding to the claim my reasoning skills are lacking, but I didn't plan to write pages and pages of ideas to justify my beliefs. I don't believe it is appropriate in here to "prove" I am right. No one can prove an idea about God. Only God can prove He/She is God. So arguing about God is useless, because I am not God, and I hate quoting the Bible to prove anything. I like to look at ideas and how reasonable they are.

Therefore, my belief is God wants to save anything He/She loves, and if I assume He loves all of us, He will save all of us in heaven. He wants to keep us around in heaven. Those are reasonable assumptions and theories.

I did not intent to go into this long explanation, but the poster attack my reasoning skills. It is not cool to attack anyone's logic, because we are created to be logical. It is the assumptions that are good or bad, not the logic of the human mind, unless we are taught to believe dumb ideas that are irrational. Reason can fix it.

But we as children and young adults believe a leader in power, such as Joseph Smith, and then we believe irrational ideas, based on irrational assumptions, which are beliefs, such as God's physical body creating spirits. How stupid can anyone be? It is an irrational idea. A physical body would create a physical body. The trouble is believing the irrational leader and not reason. The leaders lie to gain power and control, clogging up our minds with irrational garbage. We are supposed to use reason to take out the garbage and use the most reasonable assumptions.

My opinion is we grow when we believe something, whatever it is, based on facts and reason. I don't believe in agnosticism for that reason.

"Therefore, my belief is God wants to save anything He/She loves, and if I assume He loves all of us, He will save all of us in heaven. He wants to keep us around in heaven. Those are reasonable assumptions and theories."

That God who drowned all but eight of his own children, taught us that human sacrifice was necessary for our salvation and requires us to participate in ritual cannibalism, eating his flesh and drinking his blood? Is that love? No thanks.

Thank for the reply. I believe in the Bible, but I don't believe in Mormonism, Christianity,Judaism, Islam, or any theologians. Their views are irrational, and you are presenting a view of the Bible that is false, so you don't believe it. Jesus didn't die for our sins. That idea was promoted after the 16th century. I believe the Bible agrees with my views, but I don't want to write 15 books to explain my views from the Bible and history and be kicked of the board. My assumptions are reasonable. That is what matters to me. I am not going to quote the Bible to prove my reasoning and assumptions. Jesus did not die on the cross for our sins. That is why I reject Christianity. The idea is totally irrational. He died for a different reason.

"Their views are irrational, and you are presenting a view of the Bible that is false, so you don't believe it. Jesus didn't die for our sins."

Who the hell are you to say that my view is false? And what makes you think you can preach to me that Jesus didn't die for our sins? I have no interest in your different gospel. I have no need for any god and I reject all bronze age goat herder fairy tales, which includes nephilim.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/12/2018 05:07AM by mikemitchell.

I don't want to quote the Bible. Why did you bring it up? You brought up the Bible, not me. I believe in the ransom view of Christ of the first century. If you don't know the history, I can't help that. These are historical facts, not my opinion.

I am not trying to be a butthead, but you have never been taught that the original view of Christ was not dying for our sins in our place on the cross. That is why the "ransom view"is called the "classical" view of the atonement. This is in all the history books. You are saying what you don't believe in, and I am *agreeing* with you. I don't believe it either. Look it up. You don't need to believe it, but at least you will know what the Christians did believe in the first century that is different than today. The problem is this post is answering a question buried into the first thread that is closed.

"but you have never been taught that the original view of Christ was not dying for our sins in our place on the cross."

Just who the hell are you to tell me what I have never been taught? You have no clue who I am or what I have learned. And what makes you think you are in a position to be my teacher?

You are right, I do not know you. Your post leads me to make assumptions that you don't believe in the Bible and you haven't studied the ideas of the 1st Century. Most Christians and Mormons don't know what the first century Christian believed. They lived with all things in common, which is impossible to live today, so why try?

Reading the Bible makes it worse because the theologians create the big-picture paradigms that are irrational. Then once we believe the ideas, it is very difficult to change the mind. It creates trauma. Perhaps it is good recovering Mormons are not "triggered" by talking about God and the Bible. I can see that now. Perhaps atheism has a purpose. I don't know. You tell me.

Whether the ransom was paid to Lucifer or to God, how does that make any difference? Either way, there was a human sacrifice for the salvation of everyone else.

And your claim that "Jesus didn't die for our sins" isn't supported by the ransom theory. Shifting who the ransom was paid to doesn't do anything to change that is was about sin.

And your claim contradicts 1 Corinthians 15:3 "Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures".

"You brought up the Bible, not me."

BS. You mentioned it first with "I believe in the Bible, but I don't believe in..."

You said "Jesus didn't die for our sins." and you said "I believe in the ransom view of Christ of the first century. If you don't know the history, I can't help that. These are historical facts, not my opinion."

Buddy, I don't think your cornbread is quite done in the middle. 1 Corinthians 15:3 clearly states "Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures".

Just to help you understand where I am coming from, I was born in a church that taught me that all other Christian churches were wrong. I was taught that God the Father and His son Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith and told him to join no church -

"that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: “they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.”

This exmormon forum helped me when Mormons themselves were confusing me, Mormon apologist were telling me that I was wrong about what I had been taught and that they (apologists) had the answers. Mopoligist claims were in contradiction to not only the LDS curriculum manuals and words of living Mormon apostles and prophets, those apologists even disregarded the words of Joseph Smith, Mormonism's founder.

So I hope you can understand that I'm not amused or even interested in anyone trying to tell me that 1 Corinthians 15:3 is wrong, that "If you don't know the history, I can't help that. These are historical facts, not my opinion."

I understand very clearly what the Bible says, what Mormonism teaches and what Mainstream Christianity believes. And I'm quite suspicious of an anonymous poster titling his or her posts with "I returned as promised". I hope you don't think you are Jesus returned.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 09/12/2018 06:23AM by mikemitchell.

I did not say the Bible was wrong, I said the 16th century view of the Bible was that Jesus died in our place on cross. In theological terms, they call it "penal substitution". The power of the cross is the power over death and life and is a ransom payment to Lucifer and not God. Brass was the money supply in Rome, so the brass serpent is spiritual money power. Who has the spiritual money power, so to speak. That is the classical view. But I don't want to say too much and be banned. You can read it yourself by a couple of queries on the internet. You can check out the brass/bronze money supply of Rome they used in Jerusalem. The payment is to Lucifer not God. It is a snake. I quit looking for a Church a long time ago. I am interested in rational ideas. I have my family. That is enough for me.

I feel like I'm in a discussion with a Mormon apologist. OK, so let's get this cleared up. Whether the ransom was paid to Lucifer or to God, how does that make any difference? Either way, there was a human sacrifice for the salvation of everyone else.

And your claim that "Jesus didn't die for our sins" isn't supported by the ransom theory. Shifting who the ransom was paid to doesn't do anything to change that is was about sin. Mainstream Christianity teaches of course of the original sin of Adam being passed on to everyone, Mormonism taught me that men are punished for their own sins and not for Adam's transgression. Either way it is about sin.

And your claim contradicts 1 Corinthians 15:3 "Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures".

Yes, I said I believe in the Bible, but I don't want to quote it lest I be banned. I don't go to any church because my views of the Bible are incompatible. I developed many of my beliefs from atheists who made me think and reason, and I turned away from all churches and theologians because the views are irrational. I was able to develop a reasonable view of the Bible, but it has evolved into a very deep theology that I keep to myself.

You said to me "you are presenting a view of the Bible that is false". No, the view I presented is in step with Christianity from its earliest years.

Now you tell me "I was able to develop a reasonable view of the Bible, but it has evolved into a very deep theology that I keep to myself."

You told me I was wrong based on voices inside your own head that nobody else can hear. Nice. So are you the Jesus that promised to return?

Anon the Gripe wrote:

>>I turned away from all churches and theologians because the views are irrational.

Reminds me of that guy Joseph Smith, seriously. See "First Vision"

(personally I think someone in ADMIN decided we need a you-know-what to "play" with)

Kind of fits the pattern, doesn't it? He has a secret religion that he keeps to himself, claims he has the real truth and feels some kind of entitlement to tell others they are wrong but he won't explain his statement that contradicts the Bible except to try to use the worn out ransom theory, which doesn't cover the issue of Jesus not dying for our sins. What's next for him, adultery and child brides?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/12/2018 11:55AM by mikemitchell.

I don't think you're helping anyone recover from Mormonism here...

If that is true, then I should leave? I am answering the questions or assumptions made by others about me. I am sorry, if I am causing any harm. I was looking for Greg Olson, and I was pretty clear about that, and then I was attacked. I guess I am triggering some bad feelings, but that is not my intention. If someone accuses me of something that is not true about what I believe, shouldn't I tell them? Maybe not. Someone is going to have to help me here. I do not know what's going on.

Does it specifically have to be Greg Olsen, or will any clueless bone head do? Claiming a connection between Nephi and Nephilim is a total nonstarter. If that’s his limit of critical thinking, why are you looking for him? It’s good to be open minded, but not so open minded that the wind whistles through your ears.

If you came here to tidy up your critical thinking, you came to the right place. Does critical thinking conflict with grace or is it a path to it? You need critical thinking to advance the world forward.

He grew in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and Man. That is powerful imagery. More power than rationalism, which hasn’t actually been around that long but it’s our world now. If Jesus were around today, or Thor or who ever, he would engage in critical thinking because that’s how the world operates now. But back to the Bible, it’s the imagery. It’s like a dream put to paper. You can’t take it literally because it wasn’t meant for that way of thinking. It’s a mashup of fictional literature. But it’s not BS. It’s deeply archetypal. Your application of rational thinking to an irrational document makes as much sense as Nephi/Nephilim or saying Star Wars actually happened.

The Bible is an irrational document. The BoM is a cheap knockoff. But irrational is also transcendent. That’s the baby in the bath water. The archetypes help us navigate the world. Those exact same archetypes are presented by Marvel and DC comics these days, so it doesn’t matter that the Bible is falling by the wayside. In biblical language, God created the Marvel Universe. Well yeah, but that’s not a useful way to put it. That’s a put down of culture. Maybe culture deserves to be put down since it’s the detritus of being, but to everything there is a season.

Your argument supposes there is a god first you need to provide evidence for a god before you can claim anything else about it.So if you could demonstrate a god that still wouldn't necessarily mean your assumptions are correct
"The assumptions of theologians are not reasonable". Correct they provide no evidence and neither do you, your assumptions are just that an opinion nothing more.If your argument are not supported by evidence they are not logical and belief in them is irrational.

If I rationally define God as a Spirit, then by logic, I cannot prove it. I have a body and cannot see Him/Her by His design. If I also define God is in everything, I can't see that either. To expect me to prove it violate the definition of God. In other words, you are asking me not to define God rationally. You are asking me to define God in a way He can be proven, when it can't be done the way you expect it to be. These are your assumptions, but not mine.

Criticism of your lack of reasoning may be due to your posts reading like the hand-wavings of a passionate person trying to express a coherent thought out of thin air.

A nod to a notion followed by a gesture to a gist with nothing to tie them together but a proximity in prose.

Things are not necessarily related just because you want or believe them to be. You cannot build solid, rational arguments upon unsubstantiated conjectures. You may believe the Bible is the word of God, but you have nothing to base that upon but the word of the people who wrote the Bible.

There may be valuable lessons to be gleaned from the Bible, but that doesn't necessarily make it true. I may have my own fanciful notions and pet theories of the nature of the universe and how it came to be, and they may shift from day to day and according to whether something I ate agrees with me, but I recognize that they are nothing but casual speculation to be bantered about with friends over a beer or two.

Are you bantering? If so, I'll be happy to provide the beer.

Just to clarify, RfM is supposed to be about transcending the resentment of being damaged by Mormonism. The longer you’re out, the more damage you discover. It’s a long process. Imagine if someone threw acid on you and you were scarred for life. But you couldn’t see it in the mirror because the mirror had filters on it. Having filters fall away would tend to piss you off. Lots of people in that situation would be “don’t tell me about God”.

Then it becomes an exercise in not harboring resentment. So eliminating all talk of God becomes counterproductive. You can’t treat people like cream puffs. If you get deleted, tone it down and try again.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/12/2018 12:41PM by babyloncansuckit.