Good morning yotetrapper30,
Couple of clarifications if I may on your comments which I take to heart but also wonder about.
I don't attack danny. He and I know each other and we know that we're ok going back and forth. I dismiss his Christian views because Scripture tells us to be dismissive. Not me saying it. God's Word. Paul said it to the Corinthians and to Timothy about Ephesians and much more. It's plain. Non-believers attack and discourage and there's a spiritual reason behind it. As you study the Word, it's part of God' story.
Also, you'd have to show me where I plain out attacked. Is typing a long answer an attack? Some think it is. Someone gives a short answer. Then someone gives a longer answer. The longer is deemed offensive. This is not how it's always been and in fact historically the short answer was deemed incomplete and the long responsive but in our modern era formal education is not appreciated because long answers are now lumped by societal pressures into "authority" and we see it everywhere in America now;
People despise authority.
They despise police.
They despise teachers.
They despise government.
They despise God.
Our churches are bleeding and America's hate for authority is a large reason.
We are a land of
my way or the highway as much as
my Jesus and
my favorite ice cream and
my opinion.
F bombs are in. Narcissism is in.
Morality is out. Good is out. Evil is ok. Sin can't be talked about because that's deemed judging but sinful lusts are a click away and one of the biggest businesses in 2021 so they are celebrated on bumperstickers.
The Triune God is out.
And called myth. By the person you say has good God comments on here. I don't agree because Scripture tells me not to. At all.
Time Magazine declared God dead in 1968. And celebrated it. Some on this forum celebrate it too.
Not me. I never liked Time magazine.
So this old coyote trapper is in fact studying God's Word deeply at age 63 when most of America is trying to pay a light bill or a medical bill or put kids through schools, so extend me grace on this forum if I answer deeply. I have learned deeply. From smart humble people. Yes, there can be such a thing yet in America.
Pauls' letters to Timothy were very long. Why?
To explain in all honesty.That's what some on here, me included, are doing.
Not to win. I'm too old and already minister to people who at the end of their lives have many questions unanswered and wish someone, anyone,
would quite the crap we see around us and simply explain spiritual stuff honestly and deeply with them as they leave this life. . It's not grey. It's as black and white when people are near death as this life gets.
So I try to assist anyone trying to learn as I am.
Onto these topics come the stone throwers.
They aren't trying to learn. They aim to burn.
They offer google comments cut and paste from sources no one uses at a deep level.
If you want to learn Christianity from an atheist or a Gnostic, you don't have to go far. They're everywhere. Ask them. It'd be like asking a non-trapper about trapping and expecting a truthful answer.
It's getting harder to be faithful in a non-Christian America for the reasons we see on this forum.
Those of us, and there are many on this site, who minister and teach and preach the Word with truth in our heart just have to accept that America is not the land of our fathers, but rather a new land of highly divided people.
I didn't aim to add to that but rather to bring what I pay quite a bit for in tuition to a forum I enjoy... free of charge.
My answers will always head this way.
Longer as explanitory not as bickering.
Hope this clarifies. Maybe not?
Oh and;
I enjoy James' questions
Blessings,
Mark