...if I was a perfect Christian, I would throw caution and finances to the wind and just spend 24/7 trying to teach others. I'm not though.
What concerns me is when people recite this often-used acknowledgement of "I am not a perfect [human, Christian, friend, parent, etc.]" as a
moral excuse to keep committing even more imperfections. Since we cannot be entirely perfect, any shortcoming we have is just as fine as any other shortcoming we have, amirite? (No.) Even though you will not succeed in reaching the landmark of being a perfect Christian, that is still the direction that you should be aiming for. That in itself should compel you to quit your job and spend every single ounce of time, energy, and other resources to trying to be as close to a perfect Christian as you possibly can. The Christian God is omnipotent and could take care of your material needs if it wanted to.
Again, imagine yourself at some intersection where you see a car with an inattentive driver about to hit an inattentive pedestrian. Would you do something to try to prevent it, or would you copout by saying "Well, I am not a perfectly ethical person so I will allow this catastrophe to occur <shrug shoulders>" and just be on your way to work? Would you feel at least a little remorse for not doing more, when you could have?
From my perspective, I think that the Bible is telling us to go beyond our own logic, and to just have faith. Maybe that's why God doesn't just send down the DVD - he wants people who can just trust. Jesus said blessed are those who believe without seeing. I know that goes against daily logic - we all want proof of everything before we sign on the dotted line, but in this case, we are asked to sign up just on belief. Crazy eh.
Not just crazy. Also lazy, irresponsible, morally reprehensible, intellectually cruel.
If a person is presented with 20 different stories of various gods, each of which demands complete obedience to themselves, and says that they will reward everyone who falls in line with that request and will torture everyone who does not---how should a person best decide which of those gods is actually a legitimate reality, if any? (Setting aside here the atrocious conduct of this god making such requests in the first place). We have this tool of logic and reason that allows us to make rational judgments, to have the best chance of determining what is true or false. That is how we filter out junk beliefs from sound beliefs. So how/why should a person give particular favor to the claims of the Christian version of god over the other 19 descriptions of god?
If they should not use reason, but use faith instead, wouldn't it be just as valid to use faith to live in accordance with Zeus, or Allah, or such? How should we determine which of the 20 gods we should have faith in? Whomever promises us the most? Whomever threatens us the most? Whomever is the most likely to actually be real? Something else?
Here's an analogy that comes to my mind. Say your wife went out somewhere and came home and you said where have you been and she said - out with my friend, Susan. Would you ask her to prove it? Could you just trust that what she says is true, or would you need proof. I think a husband who loves his wife would take her word for it. I also think that she would be offended if you demanded proof. Maybe it's kind of similar to what God wants from us. Now, if you just can't believe it without proof - then maybe that's your problem and not God's.
That analogy has some very serious problems though. Just a couple:
1. It would not be in doubt that my wife exists in the first place. If instead I was hearing from some woman, Susan, that she was just having dinner with my wife, and I do not recall ever getting married in the first place and never consented to that kind of arrangement, then I would have reasonable grounds to suspect that something was wrong with Susan's story. It would be reasonable for me to ask for better evidence from Susan that she knew someone who I was married to, and she was speaking on her behalf, all the while my (supposed) wife was entirely silent about the whole matter.
2. There is a very important concept to remember, summed up in the phrase "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." If my wife Megan, who I believe to be an honest person based on past observations, merely told me that she had lunch with a friend and I had no particular reason to be suspect about that claim, then it would be reasonable to believe it. It is a very mundane, very weak claim. If instead Megan, who again I think is an honest person, said that she just got back from traveling to the planet Looptor in the Andromeda galaxy where she had lunch with some alien life forms, and she was completely serious (not joking) about this claim, then I would have stronger grounds for skepticism. It is such an unusual and extraordinary claim that runs against so much other knowledge we have obtained of how the universe works, that we would need something more than just Susan's say-so that it happened, to believe that it really did happen. The chances are higher that Megan is simply wrong about what happened to her, even if I thought she was sincere.
The thing is, he can't force you to believe. It's up to you. So just do it. Put down your logic and just except it. Some things, especially when it comes to God, are beyond our limited comprehension.
If another person told you those exact same things, except were referencing a different set of beliefs---say beliefs in Norse mythology, would you do exactly that and then convert to believing in the Norse god(s)? We need some way to determine what is most likely to be true or false. We have that tool, it is reason. The amount of trust or confidence we grant to some set of claims should be proportionate to the amount of evidence we have to do so. Proponents of those beliefs simply telling us to trust them, even when they have not given any valid reason to do so, does not pass the smell test, especially when they employ intimidation tactics (i.e. hell).
Here's another analogy: Just like when a parent tells a child something they don't understand, it is important that the child listen to the parent and do what they say, even though they don't understand. Otherwise, the child, leaning fully on his own knowledge, would be drinking bleach and eating Tide pods.
What if the parents actually wanted the child to drink bleach and eat Tide pods? That was their intention, to abuse their child. Would you consider those parents to be bad stewards of the child, and so the child would actually be better off not listening to their parents and disobeying them? So the child would be taken from the home and put into a foster home temporarily. What if God is an abuser? We would be better off ourselves, and acting more morally than God, if we did not simply obey whatever God tells us to do.
The reason I don't believe in hell (at least not for the garden variety non-believer) because then that would make God a tyrant, torturing people endlessly.
That is good that you are willing to acknowledge that. You are making a moral evaluation of God by doing so, keep in mind. You are implicitly acknowledging that there is some other standard of goodness or badness, independent of God, that God is in or out of accordance with. So when we say "God is good" it is because God is in general accordance to those independent rules. When we say "God is bad" it is because God is in general discordance with those same rules. The mere fact that God says something is good or bad does not in itself mean that it is good or bad though. What is good or bad is determined by something else besides God.
...I believe more along those lines than the hell scenerio. Basically, it says that everyone who dies will get the full story, and THEN, if they still don't believe and continue to tell Jesus to F-off, then they get the hell treatment.
Wouldn't that be cruel and unusual punishment still? The punishment is worse than the crime? Whenever someone says that they will not worship and obey me, I do not threaten them back with everlasting torture. I suspect you would not do the same either. You would probably frown on any person who did such things to anyone else. So why would you find it acceptable and even appropriate for a god to do so to anybody?
I remind you, that I would not be the one knocking on your door step and trying to force my beliefs on you,...
Knocking on the door and seeking to have a conversation does not amount to forcing your beliefs. However, if your beliefs also influence your views on other components of your general worldview, such as your ethical views, your political views, your scientific views, if you indoctrinate your children, etc. then that may very well amount to you forcing your beliefs on us or others, even if you are not trying to do so. It is important to recognize the ways that your religious views impact you in other ways too.
