Is Satan Real

January 18th, 2015 at 4:00:36 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Okay maybe it would help to do a brief review. Lucifer is one of God's angels to whom the plan is revealed concerning human beings; a unique and special creation precious and dear to God who is not just spirit, but flesh and soul. The plan is to lovingly serve them and invite them to share in the glorious and eternal life of heaven. Lucifer refuses out of pride and uses as his mantra, "I will not serve". He is cast out of Heaven and Hell is created for him as eternal separation from God. He is constantly at war with the plan of God and wants nothing more than to take with him God's precious humans and separate them forever from God.

Satan is hatred and selfishness through and through. He tempts humanity to go away from God to be like himself. He convinces us that our happiness is found in pretending to be god, to worship ourselves and to use others only for our gain or enjoyment. All the time that is exactly what he is doing with sinners. He enjoys using them, giving them brief moments of false and fleeting joy, giving them a sense of power, or most especially filling them with pride. They turn away from God and then he rejoices in their suffering for all eternity where they are separated from all love and now serve, but serve the evil one. He is not God's prison warden, hell was not even created for human beings and dare we hope in God's mercy no human being ever goes there? He is not doing God's work and the only way you could have that ludicrous thought is if you think God wants to punish sinners. God wants to correct sinners and change their hearts. Satan wants to nurture sinners and corrupt their hearts.

They have exactly opposite goals - one to damn humanity the other to save humanity. I understand if you don't believe these things, but for the life of me I can't understand why you don't see the logic of it.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
January 18th, 2015 at 5:01:21 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
I understand if you don't believe these things, but for the life of me I can't understand why you don't see the logic of it.


Because it isn't logical, that's why. Lets say
there's a huge company in town and they
employ everybody. I want to steal the best
ones away to work for me. So I make them
good offers and when they come over I
treat them like gold so they won't go back
to their old company.

That's only logical. In your story their is no
reward for going over, there is no incentive.
It's illogical. And convoluted.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
January 18th, 2015 at 5:25:54 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Satan does make good sounding offers and incentives, they are all lies and deceptions, but he quite literally and figuratively will promise you the world if you come to work for him. See I knew you got it, we just were talking around each other for a moment.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
January 18th, 2015 at 5:34:30 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
See I knew you got it, we just were talking around each other for a moment.


I don't get any of it. It's the reverse of any
logic I ever heard. If Satan was true, and
people went to hell if they didn't take Jesus
as their savior, who in their right mind
wouldn't do it? Going to Satan's side is
a lose-lose proposition. The only way
it makes sense is if Satan rewarded you
for it, and he punishes you for all
eternity instead. I don't recall any of these
'good sounding offers' he makes for the
afterlife, tell me some of them.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
January 19th, 2015 at 12:11:59 AM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
I don't get any of it. It's the reverse of any
logic I ever heard. If Satan was true, and
people went to hell if they didn't take Jesus
as their savior, who in their right mind
wouldn't do it? Going to Satan's side is
a lose-lose proposition. The only way
it makes sense is if Satan rewarded you
for it, and he punishes you for all
eternity instead.


You my good sir have discovered the mystery of sin and the very cunning of the devil.

He has nothing to offer except snow to eskimos and yet we gobble it up. Why do we do the things we know we shouldn't and not do the things we know we should? This unfortunatly common experience for all mankind is explained by the great tempter's work. Lying, cheating, killing, gluttony; we all know it is a lose-lose proposition and yet open the paper and you will see these acts committed over and over again.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
January 19th, 2015 at 11:16:38 AM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: FrGamble
You my good sir have discovered the mystery of sin and the very cunning of the devil.


Sin is not a mystery. You can't invent something
out of whole cloth and then dub it a 'mystery'.
Sin, the devil, the cunning great tempter, are all
ways superstitious and ignorant people dealt
with human psychological states that were the
real mystery to them. Instead of internalizing them
for self examination, they externalized them onto
a made up entity and put the blame on him.

The devil is outdated in modern times and no longer
needed, just like all other silly superstitions. Surely
you see that..
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
January 19th, 2015 at 3:54:25 PM permalink
Nareed
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 346
Posts: 12545
Quote: FrGamble
Lucifer refuses out of pride and uses as his mantra, "I will not serve". He is cast out of Heaven and Hell is created for him as eternal separation from God. He is constantly at war with the plan of God and wants nothing more than to take with him God's precious humans and separate them forever from God.


Given the view of humanity espoused by most Christian philosophers (the words "bespotted and ulcerous" come to mind), can you blame him?

Quote:
He enjoys using them, giving them brief moments of false and fleeting joy, giving them a sense of power, or most especially filling them with pride.


Alas, all my pride is self-grown.

Quote:
They turn away from God and then he rejoices in their suffering for all eternity where they are separated from all love and now serve, but serve the evil one.


This is the "one glaring weakness" school of writing. No matter how powerful the adversary, he has one glaring weakness the other side can use to defeat him. In this case the weakness is so glaring it might as well be a super-nova fueled high-intensity light amplification device; i.e. Satan is too stupid to live.

But then this comes from the same deity who fears a bunch of primitives may build a tower high enough to reach heaven, which is utterly ridiculous, and who demonstrates his omniscience by requiring ram's blood to be splashed on doorways.


Quote:
He is not God's prison warden, hell was not even created for human beings and dare we hope in God's mercy no human being ever goes there?


Is that the current line? I heard an old joke once about how a theologian was sure Hell was real and empty. The fact is lots of Christians of all stripes today are convinced people go to hell, and have little compunction in pointing it out to people they dislike. Let's not mention throughout history people were also convinced of this. The Catholic church splintered because of a German priest's feeling about the sale of indulgences. Dante's epic travelogue was not condemned by the church for giving God a bad image.

Quote:
He is not doing God's work and the only way you could have that ludicrous thought is if you think God wants to punish sinners. God wants to correct sinners and change their hearts. Satan wants to nurture sinners and corrupt their hearts.


They both go about it in strangely counterproductive ways.

There's a pair of books by Larry Niven and David Pournelle, "Inferno" and "Escape from Hell," which are kinds of re-tellings of Dante's Inferno, albeit simplified and adapted to modern times (BTW impressive how much change, social and otherwise, the authors experience between the 70s Inferno and the early 2000s sequel).

While I don't regard these books as representing Christian theology, the authors manage to put someone through Hell while rationalizing how God is justified in inflicting so much pain, torture and suffering on the souls of the damned. So if Christianity can be used to justify such utter depravity on the part of God, well, that tells me all I need to know about it. It's no different from God slaughtering innocent first-born Egyptian boys.
Donald Trump is a one-term LOSER
January 19th, 2015 at 5:25:30 PM permalink
Evenbob
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 146
Posts: 25010
Quote: Nareed
This is the "one glaring weakness" school of writing. No matter how powerful the adversary, he has one glaring weakness the other side can use to defeat him.


This is a common theme in mythology, where Satan
fits very well. They even carried it to comic books, where
the evil bad guy always has a weakness that will defeat
him. All mythical creatures must have this weakness
for the story to work.


Quote: Nareed
So if Christianity can be used to justify such utter depravity on the part of God, well, that tells me all I need to know about it. It's no different from God slaughtering innocent first-born Egyptian boys.


Nareed and I have the same 'problem' with the
Church. We see the current church thru the prism
of the past church. It's impossible to separate the
two because they claim it's all god's work. So to
me, and I think to Nareed, there is no difference
between 500 BC and 500 AD and and 2000 AD.

This is not what the Church likes to hear. They want
everybody to forget the past and move on. Not
gonna happen.
If you take a risk, you may lose. If you never take a risk, you will always lose.
January 19th, 2015 at 7:43:04 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Evenbob
Sin is not a mystery. You can't invent something
out of whole cloth and then dub it a 'mystery'.
Sin, the devil, the cunning great tempter, are all
ways superstitious and ignorant people dealt
with human psychological states that were the
real mystery to them. Instead of internalizing them
for self examination, they externalized them onto
a made up entity and put the blame on him.

The devil is outdated in modern times and no longer
needed, just like all other silly superstitions. Surely
you see that..


The problem is we are not talking about isolated cases or psychological states. We are talking about all of humanity. Our nature is fallen and we sin, all of us. How do you explain this?

Like you said sin is a lose-lose and yet making these lose-lose choices is common for even the best of us. The question is indeed a great mystery. Why do we do the things we know we shouldn't and not do the things we know we should? The devil is not outdated and is as valid or more so in these most bloody, violent, and selfish modern times than ever before.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (
January 19th, 2015 at 8:05:25 PM permalink
FrGamble
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 67
Posts: 7596
Quote: Nareed
Given the view of humanity espoused by most Christian philosophers (the words "bespotted and ulcerous" come to mind), can you blame him?


You must not be reading Christian philosophers for they would see humanity as made in the image and likeness of God and as His precious children. You must be reading some atheist worldview that sees everything and everyone as an absurd and meaningless accident.



Quote:
This is the "one glaring weakness" school of writing. No matter how powerful the adversary, he has one glaring weakness the other side can use to defeat him. In this case the weakness is so glaring it might as well be a super-nova fueled high-intensity light amplification device; i.e. Satan is too stupid to live.


Yet, sin thrives. I know you have blocked Evenbob (he really wants to make amends by the way) but he stumbled upon this point as well. How could Satan be so stupid? Well, sin is stupidity. The mystery though is why do we continue to make the same mistakes? We don't use our reason and we allow our emotions and desires and passions get the best of us and run rampant. We are prideful and think that we know better and no body is the boss of me. This leads us to hurting ourselves and others. It's an ancient mystery as to why we sin? Its ancient answer is the Devil. Before we call him too stupid to live we need to check ourselves before we wreck ourselves.



Quote:

Is that the current line? I heard an old joke once about how a theologian was sure Hell was real and empty. The fact is lots of Christians of all stripes today are convinced people go to hell, and have little compunction in pointing it out to people they dislike. Let's not mention throughout history people were also convinced of this.


I get the impression you think I am spouting new age theology stuff here. No way man, I'm conservative in my theological understandings. The Church has NEVER said anyone is in hell. The common theological phrase is, "Dare we hope?" As in dare we hope in the infinite mercy of God that all might be saved? However, even though this should be the hope of every Christian I can certainly imagine people who truly reject love and service of others. Who manipulate and use others without remorse and treat other human beings as objects for their own pleasure. These people without unknown mitigating circumstances I can see going to eternal punishment, but I still dare to hope.
“It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures.” (