Does the thought of Hell ever scare an atheist?

[dwr]

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kurto...read u're reply.

then looked at u're post count, 666(4). loc: in your heart.

coming from someone who did a lot of psychedelics, i see less coincidences and more meanings.

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LOL. Please do even a little bit of research on the 'number of the beast'.

[Splendour]

Quote : why would god care what you believe or if you worship him


How do we know this isn't part of some higher purpose that we're not privy to. We can't know the mind of God. Maybe God is testing us as worthy vessels. We can't have any cracks and lack of acknowledgment is a crack. A lack of acknowledgment could mean you worship someone else or hold yourself above God. It essentially means you have not declared your loyalty to God and don't recognize his preeminence. You have to wear God's uniform to be on his team. You don't play for the Yankees or the Cubs and say you're not a part of their organization or refuse to wear their uniform. If you're a Cub you say you're a Cub. If you're a beleiver of Christ you say you're a Christian.


In 1 John 5:18 the children of god are given this protection:

The Reality, Not the Illusion
13-15My purpose in writing is simply this: that you who believe in God's Son will know beyond the shadow of a doubt that you have eternal life, the reality and not the illusion. And how bold and free we then become in his presence, freely asking according to his will, sure that he's listening. And if we're confident that he's listening, we know that what we've asked for is as good as ours.
16-17For instance, if we see a Christian believer sinning (clearly I'm not talking about those who make a practice of sin in a way that is "fatal," leading to eternal death), we ask for God's help and he gladly gives it, gives life to the sinner whose sin is not fatal. There is such a thing as a fatal sin, and I'm not urging you to pray about that. Everything we do wrong is sin, but not all sin is fatal.

18-21We know that none of the God-begotten makes a practice of sin—fatal sin. The God-begotten are also the God-protected. The Evil One can't lay a hand on them. We know that we are held firm by God; it's only the people of the world who continue in the grip of the Evil One. And we know that the Son of God came so we could recognize and understand the truth of God—what a gift!—and we are living in the Truth itself, in God's Son, Jesus Christ. This Jesus is both True God and Real Life. Dear children, be on guard against all clever facsimiles.

[tame_deuces]

I like Voodoo. They essentially say there is an all powerful deity, but his power means he is too distant from what he created. So there is lesser beings human can turn to for their everyday needs. They don't have this good/evil crap either, but hold that beings can go both ways.

I don't get the idea of this almighty being pouring people into eternal hell because they did the almighty sin of never having the opportunity to hear about him.

[Splendour]

quote: I don't get the idea of this almighty being pouring people into eternal hell because they did the almighty sin of never having the opportunity to hear about him

You must have missed my 2 posts showing that in the absence of Jesus you're judged on your deeds.

The God of Christians is a forgiving God if you approach him the right way. I doubt he'll tolerate deceit though since he can read human motives.

Look at how he handled this evil King:

2 Chronicles 33 (The Message)
The Message (MSG)
Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson



2 Chronicles 33
King Manasseh
1-6Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king. He ruled for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. In God's opinion he was a bad king—an evil king. He reintroduced all the moral rot and spiritual corruption that had been scoured from the country when God dispossessed the pagan nations in favor of the children of Israel. He rebuilt the sex-and-religion shrines that his father Hezekiah had torn down, he built altars and phallic images for the sex god Baal and the sex goddess Asherah and worshiped the cosmic powers, taking orders from the constellations. He built shrines to the cosmic powers and placed them in both courtyards of The Temple of God, the very Jerusalem Temple dedicated exclusively by God's decree to God's Name ("in Jerusalem I place my Name"). He burned his own sons in a sacrificial rite in the Valley of Ben Hinnom. He practiced witchcraft and fortunetelling. He held séances and consulted spirits from the underworld. Much evil—in God's view a career in evil. And God was angry.
7-8 As a last straw he placed a carved image of the sex goddess Asherah that he had commissioned in The Temple of God, a flagrant and provocative violation of God's well-known command to both David and Solomon, "In this Temple and in this city Jerusalem, my choice out of all the tribes of Israel, I place my Name—exclusively and forever." He had promised, "Never again will I let my people Israel wander off from this land I've given to their ancestors. But on this condition, that they keep everything I've commanded in the instructions my servant Moses passed on to them."

9-10 But Manasseh led Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem off the beaten path into practices of evil exceeding even the evil of the pagan nations that God had earlier destroyed. When God spoke to Manasseh and his people about this, they ignored him.

11-13 Then God directed the leaders of the troops of the king of Assyria to come after Manasseh. They put a hook in his nose, shackles on his feet, and took him off to Babylon. Now that he was in trouble, he went to his knees in prayer asking for help—total repentance before the God of his ancestors. As he prayed, God was touched; God listened and brought him back to Jerusalem as king. That convinced Manasseh that God was in control.

14-17 After that Manasseh rebuilt the outside defensive wall of the City of David to the west of the Gihon spring in the valley. It went from the Fish Gate and around the hill of Ophel. He also increased its height. He tightened up the defense system by posting army captains in all the fortress cities of Judah. He also did a good spring cleaning on The Temple, carting out the pagan idols and the goddess statue. He took all the altars he had set up on The Temple hill and throughout Jerusalem and dumped them outside the city. He put the Altar of God back in working order and restored worship, sacrificing Peace-Offerings and Thank-Offerings. He issued orders to the people: "You shall serve and worship God, the God of Israel." But the people didn't take him seriously—they used the name "God" but kept on going to the old pagan neighborhood shrines and doing the same old things.

18-19 The rest of the history of Manasseh—his prayer to his God, and the sermons the prophets personally delivered by authority of God, the God of Israel—this is all written in The Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. His prayer and how God was touched by his prayer, a list of all his sins and the things he did wrong, the actual places where he built the pagan shrines, the installation of the sex-goddess Asherah sites, and the idolatrous images that he worshiped previous to his conversion—this is all described in the records of the prophets.

20 When Manasseh died, they buried him in the palace garden. His son Amon was the next king.

[twonine29]

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LOL. Please do even a little bit of research on the 'number of the beast'.

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when i'm entrapped in sin, i see the #666 constantly. could just be a psychological thing where i'm keenly aware of it/looking for it...but it's definitly there.

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Doesn't that slight chance you are wrong worry you, just a little??

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yes

[Hopey]

Oh good, Splendour is quoting scripture again.

[Bakes]

But isn't that from the Old Testament? I thought that was before the New Covenant when everything got switched up....before Jesus the path to salvation was different. Are there any passages about Jesus talking about heaven/hell, people who haven't heard the word, and how they will be judged?

[madnak]

No, those are from the New Testament. Mark, Matthew, and Luke - maybe you've heard of them? Most of them are Jesus talking.

[tame_deuces]

Yep, the old testament is closer to classic Judaist beliefs, and in those hell isn't eternal. Actually in those hell isn't mentioned much at all. So basically Christianity wants us to believe it is when God becomes all-loving he starts sending people to eternal torment.

[Bakes]

I'm talking about the Chronicles verses cited two posts up. I'm also debating calling you a [censored] mongoloid for your condescending tone.