What is a Christian?

Don't you ever talk to your self?

How many people like to be proven wrong? There is nothing bad about being wrong but not many people appreciate being wrong, especially about something that forms the basis of there very being and there society. I think that they are all fighting to be the one that is right. "My god and Messiah is right and you better believe it or I will pound it into you," does this sound like the spanish inqusition to anyone else? Unfortunatly I don't beleive that there will ever be an end to the fighting because that would mean that someone has to be right and everyone else is wrong. There are to many close minded people that want to feed that fire for there own pride. Like Trench has in his tag line "The key to peace is understanding" How do you get people to understand who don't want to listen in the first place?

That is one problem wit the modern christian in my view, they mostly live sheltered lives as far as their beliefs go, and if they are ever introduced to someone that doesn't believe they go running for the hills. This, in effect, never makes them question their own beliefs and wonder how certain things that they believe work. Anyway...

My Jesus as a limited dimensional aspect of God also explains your question as well.

Trench wrote:

O.k just so you this is NOT Trench posting this. Rather his becoming partner, anyhoo.... I never did understand the holy trinity. I even asked a brain-washed from birh Catholic. She couldn't explain to me how Jesus was all of these things. My main problem is when Jesus is on the cross and he states, "My father, my father, why hast thou forsaken me?" So who exactly is he talking to if he is in fact the same person? Why would he talk to himself. Why would he look to the heavens for the answer?

[quote="BarristerBud"]That is one problem wit the modern christian in my view, they mostly live sheltered lives as far as their beliefs go, and if they are ever introduced to someone that doesn't believe they go running for the hills.

Not just christians...every religion is full of these people.

I think the big problem is the Exclusivity factor in many religions. People have to believe that Mine is the One and ONLY true faith.

What if they're all right? Jesus, Mohammed, Buddah, Hercules - what if their words were all true?

I believe that if we listen to what the "Big Guys" said, we'll see that it's all the same. It's what the followers come up with that causes the trouble!

Look, I am a son, brother, friend, granson, nephew, fathr, friend, grandfather, cousin, boss, consultant, and a lot of other titles, depending on who's talking about me. And each of those people has a different view of who I am. This entity we're discussing is the same. Whether you call It God, Mother Earth, Universal Wisdom, The Source, or the Fat Cockroach doesn't really matter. It is what It is, and it is everything!

imho

http://www.theharmonyinstitute.org/book/

The mention of Christ being 'just one of the guys' brings up an interesting question in my mind...

What if he -was- just one of the guys? Who's to say that before he went on a holy jaunt, Jesus wasn't perfectly happy to go drinking and visiting prostitutes or discreet lonely widows or what have you? What exactly happened in his life that isn't covered in that span twixt childhood and middle-age when the Bible picks back up?

tchivai wrote:

The mention of Christ being 'just one of the guys' brings up an interesting question in my mind...

What if he -was- just one of the guys? Who's to say that before he went on a holy jaunt, Jesus wasn't perfectly happy to go drinking and visiting prostitutes or discreet lonely widows or what have you? What exactly happened in his life that isn't covered in that span twixt childhood and middle-age when the Bible picks back up?

Careful...I've found that questions like this can bring out the ugly in most Christians....

As far as I'm concerned, it's irrelevant. Even the immaculate conception really doesn't have any bearing on what He did in his adult life.

He was a truly amazing individual, son of God, divine spirit, and ascended master.

That's it. The rest is just politics, which in my opinion is what "religion" is.

I think it does matter. Because, if he was just a common man before he ascended, then it could mean that anyone could accomplish similar goals. However, if he always lived a divine life, then it just shows how much greater he was than all other life.

I would think that it is more inspirational if he was a common man because it would mean that if you work hard and beleive hard that anyone can accomplish there goals. We all have it inside ourselves but you have to be able to bring it out.

Well exactly. I mean, love your neighbor and follow the commandments is all very well, but if the only real example we have is some cute unnaturally-born Jewish boy that stayed a virgin til the day he died, never overimbibed or even like... picked his nose in public, and only ever lost his temper Once...

I give up, right there. Now thankfully that whole seven deadly sins nonsense isn't scripture at all and I could -completely- ignore it if I felt like going back to church [though there is a degree of -sense- in some of them] but good lord.

Look at the controversy over the very idea that he COULD have loved an individual over all others enough to have married her and even potentially had kids. Made him too human and not their ideal image, right?

(I'm refering, of course, to the big stink over the Da Vinci Code.)

But taking the divinity away from Jesus takes the christ out of christianity. If he was just a prophet, his death would not have redeemed man. Believing that is the cornerstone of christian faith.

Not only that but jesus was the only person born without original sin, into a sinful nature. Sin was passed down through Adam, to his decendants, but since Jesus was the only person in existance that wasn't a son of Adam, he was born without original sin. Most theologians believe that original sin is passed down through man, and not women, because the points points out that even though Eve was the first to sin, Adam is the one that got them kicked out of the garden. so anyway, some b elieve that this is what makes Jesus both man, born of mary, and divine, without orginal sin, because God was his father, not Joseph.

So yeah, the concept of a sinful Jesus would contradict the foundational belief of christianity

BarristerBud wrote:

But taking the divinity away from Jesus takes the christ out of christianity. If he was just a prophet, his death would not have redeemed man. Believing that is the cornerstone of christian faith.

Maybe you could argue that his death redeemed man because it gave man an example by which to live? Or something like that. Like someone said up there...if Christ had a head start by being half-deity, then why on earth would we even presume that we could be christ-like? Why would we even try? (And then, if we can't aspire to be christ-like, that whole WWJD craze was a waste of our time, and I refuse to believe that so much of my time was used in vain! :-P)

I think that, if Jesus was a man like you and me, it makes what he did here SO much more relevant to me, and therefore SO much more important.

That sounds like what the Jews argue.

I am curious and since I don't have a bible handy to look it up could you tell me when and if Jesus states that he is without original sin?

In the Bible... God, don't you know anything?? Geeze...

So I got my books screwed up........Sorry.
Smartass. :-P