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Had an epiphany this morning in church
General Boards - Religion & Philosophy
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Had an epiphany this morning in church

3

Nov 9, 2025, 1:48 PM
Reply

Some might say an obvious one.

The pastor said “I believe Jesus is coming back because the Bible says so”.

Fair enough.

I realized that no one actually has faith in god, but rather the humans beings who wrote about their belief in god.

A person of faith is putting their trust not in the founder of their religion, but rather the people who wrote about them, and then all the people who translated and copied in the years that followed.

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I had that one a good while back (years).

2

Nov 9, 2025, 2:41 PM
Reply

People are "worshipping" (I don't get that either) a concept/idea based on the writings of other men, and their belief and faith is in those writings first and foremost.

https://youtube.com/shorts/eVLHet9oGBo?si=qa-731fBlMNxE00t

2025 orange level memberbadge-donor-20yr.jpg flag link military_tech thumb_downthumb_up

Above all else, love and forgive. Understand that people who disagree with you are not necessarily idiots or your enemies. Respect the wisdom of the founding fathers and individual rights and freedoms. Always see the beauty and humor in life.


Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 9, 2025, 6:14 PM
Reply

Have no idea why you even bother going .

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 9, 2025, 8:18 PM
Reply

Because I acknowledge reality I shouldn’t go?

Am I wrong in what I observed in the OP?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 9, 2025, 6:20 PM
Reply

I don't guess I can give you too much of a hard time. My wife told me I slept through most of this sermon. I told her "I don't doubt it. It was boring.".

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 9, 2025, 6:30 PM
Reply

A while back you posted about how you thought it was wrong for people to expose children to the concept of hell. I ask you why you take your kids to church every Sunday.

Maybe I missed your reply.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 9, 2025, 8:19 PM
Reply

Do you think we should teach kids other things that there is no hard evidence for?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 10, 2025, 5:40 AM
Reply

You brought up hell, and you're entitled to think kids shouldn't be taught that. My question remains, why then do you take your children to church every Sunday to be taught something you find offensive and harmful to them?

I suspect the truth is that you don't really take issue with this. If you did, you would not continue to dodge the question. If you did, you wouldn't take your kids to church.

You decided to create a post condemning parents who expose their kids to religion without thinking it through, "it" being the fact that you expose your children to this very teaching on a weekly basis. Your compulsion to take shots at religion on TNET blinded you from the hypocrisy of your position.

Or maybe you actually believe what you posted and have a rational answer for why you expose you kids to this type of mistreatment.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

1

Nov 10, 2025, 8:29 AM
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This is a different thread and I’m pretty sure I answered that question in the other one…that I believe there is good that comes from gathering together around a message of love and compassion. It’s people like you I guess who skew the message with doctrines and theology that are not founded in reality.

It seems people like you and reynolds357 are missing the mark if you think everybody who doesn’t go along with every little stitch of modern American evangelical Christianity which has become a religion itself should just stay home.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 10, 2025, 7:16 PM
Reply

“Every little stitch”? You deny the entire foundation of The Church.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 10, 2025, 7:39 PM
Reply

What is the foundation of the church?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 10, 2025, 7:57 PM
Reply

Bible. Deity of Christ. Virgin Birth. Death and resurrection. Triune Godhead.
What denomination are you? I can tell you more what your churches foundational beliefs are from that info.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

1

Nov 11, 2025, 7:43 AM
Reply

Bible- the Bible did not exist when Jesus walked the earth and he never endorsed or even mentioned it.

Deity of Christ- hotly debated amongst the early church on what exactly this meant.

Virgin birth- hardly foundational. Only mentioned by two gospel writers.

Death and resurrection- this is probably the one and only thing that early Christians agreed on.

Triune godhead- another hotly debated topic that an attempt to confirm was added to the biblical text.

So let me rephrase the question a different way…

What specifically must one believe to be considered a “Christian”?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 12, 2025, 4:01 PM
Reply

What does the church you attend believe? What denomination are you?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

1

Nov 12, 2025, 5:46 PM
Reply

Southern baptist. Bible is literal inerrant word of god. Hell is real. Only way is heaven is through Jesus. Basic American evangelical christianity.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 13, 2025, 3:16 PM
Reply

Southern Baptist. I thought so from what you have posted in past. I am SBC as well. Your church affirms the “2000 Baptist faith and message”. If you pretty much 100 percent agree with that (which you do), how can you in good conscience be a part of that fellowship while secretly denying their statement of faith?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 13, 2025, 3:53 PM
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I meant 100 percent disagree.

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Re: The One Holy Apostolic Catholic Church


Nov 11, 2025, 4:08 PM [ in reply to Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church ]
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Is the correct answer here.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church


Nov 11, 2025, 5:45 AM [ in reply to Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church ]
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"Every little stitch of modern American evangelical Christianity"? Would you relate better with a more Puritan approach to Christianity?

Your issues are not with a "little stitch" of Christianity. You can't get to TNET fast enough to complain about your pastor's sermons. You frequently post how "all" the Christians you know are not living as the Bible tells them they ought to live. You protest children being taught the doctrine of hell. You reject Jesus as messiah. You seem to find virtually everything in the bible objectionable. Even this post, "skew the messages with doctrines and theology that are not founded in reality." What is skewed? How do you know it isn't based in reality? Because you don't want it to be real or it doesn't comport with your idea of compassion and love?

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

1

Nov 11, 2025, 7:46 AM
Reply

I just don’t understand why yall get so hot and bothered over somebody making an honest assessment of something.

This is a forum for discussing religion and that’s what we are doing here when we bring up these topics.

If it bothers you to see the Bible and Christianity critiqued honestly that’s your problem.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

3

Nov 10, 2025, 7:32 AM
Reply

So far as I can tell, we only have three means of understanding God

1.Personal experience (if one has had such experience, and it can be trusted by one’s self)

2. Reason and senses

3. One and Two, as communicated by others (Paul, Muhammad, Buddha, local country preacher, etc.)

So yes, an awful lot of faith depends on believing what “that guy said”, whoever that guy may be. And then of course, one has to reconcile any differences in personal experience with what others may have experienced. Because who says God, if any, comes to all of us in the same way?

It may be that God is like a dog whistle. Some beings can hear it, others simply cannot. They just don’t have the tools.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

2

Nov 10, 2025, 9:24 AM
Reply

billy graham said he didnt understand it all, but tnet wants us to prove God everyday lol

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

2

Nov 10, 2025, 9:31 AM
Reply

That makes me wonder how someone can so vehemently support something that they claim they don’t understand.

Shouldn’t we be sure before proclaiming something as absolute truth?

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Wouldn't you be relying upon


Nov 10, 2025, 5:21 PM
Reply

what someone else teaches/writes/explains/pontificates/etc... to believe in anything?

Just wondering why one should take your word over someone who teaches the Bible - concerning spiritual matters?


Message was edited by: HuntClub®


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John 3:16; 14:1-6


Re: Wouldn't you be relying upon

1

Nov 10, 2025, 5:38 PM
Reply

“ what someone else teaches/writes/explains/pontificates/etc... to believe in anything?”

Absolutely! I take the doctors word every time I go in when I’m sick, but there is evidence to back up that whatever he prescribes will help.

“ Just wondering why one should take your word over someone who teaches the Bible - concerning spiritual matters?”

I’m not giving my word. I’m simply making an observation.

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Re: Wouldn't you be relying upon


Nov 10, 2025, 5:59 PM
Reply

whatever... you do you realize they say doctors are 'practicing" medicine, right?

have a good night


Message was edited by: HuntClub®


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John 3:16; 14:1-6


Re: Wouldn't you be relying upon

1

Nov 10, 2025, 7:46 PM
Reply

Always a pleasure!

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That's just it . . .


Nov 11, 2025, 9:35 AM [ in reply to Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church ]
Reply

It's not those who believe or have faith, which I have no problem with, but it's those who claim to know, or even to be able to know, and therefore declare that those who disagree are wrong.

My position is this: There are things we know, things we can know, and things we don't/can't know.

Nobody knows if there is a god, or an afterlife in the spiritual realm. That doesn't mean there's not, or that there can't be. As it is, there is no way to know.

We can know, with as much certainty as we can know anything, that if God loves us, he would not create us knowing we would suffer eternal torture if he could help it.

2025 orange level memberbadge-donor-20yr.jpg flag link military_tech thumb_downthumb_up

Above all else, love and forgive. Understand that people who disagree with you are not necessarily idiots or your enemies. Respect the wisdom of the founding fathers and individual rights and freedoms. Always see the beauty and humor in life.


Re: That's just it . . .


Nov 11, 2025, 9:51 AM
Reply

I know there is a God and an afterlife - eternity. I know. Just as surely as you know there isn't... or that one can't know.

That is not something I am bound by in any way to prove to you, just as no one proved it to me. That is something which must prove "itself". Perhaps, one day, it will to you.

Have a good day.

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John 3:16; 14:1-6


I would laugh, but it's really sad.

1

Nov 11, 2025, 10:13 AM
Reply

No matter what you say, you don't know. You are desperate to know, and by convincing yourself that you know, you can better cope with the fear of death and all of the uncertainties that go along with being human. I'm sure you feel it deep in your bones and in your soul, and you believe it with all of your heart. You are simply confusing profound, sincere faith with knowledge.

I totally respect your beliefs and your faith as such. By no means does it make you a bad person, or a dumbas s. If it works for you, I support you in that and am sincerely happy for you.

That doesn't change two things we do know:

1. You don't know that your version of God exists.
2. If God loves us, he would not create us knowing that we would suffer eternal torture.

I hope you have a great day too.

2025 orange level memberbadge-donor-20yr.jpg flag link military_tech thumb_downthumb_up

Above all else, love and forgive. Understand that people who disagree with you are not necessarily idiots or your enemies. Respect the wisdom of the founding fathers and individual rights and freedoms. Always see the beauty and humor in life.


Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

1

Nov 11, 2025, 10:50 AM
Reply

"I realized that no one actually has faith in god, but rather the humans beings who wrote about their belief in god."

But isn't that true for everything where we are not actually present? The further back we go in history, the more we have to rely on an oral history. We were not there for the battle of Gettysburg. We piece together what happened from the documentation of others. The further back you go, the sketchier it becomes.

How did they spread the "Word" back in the first century? Not everyone could read or write. Truth was just as hard to come by back then as it is now. Especially when you're writings contradict beliefs that you had already formed. But to me, regardless if you believe these words are divine inspiration or just some guy writing, there's some pretty good words in there to live by.

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Re: Had an epiphany this morning in church

2

Nov 11, 2025, 1:03 PM
Reply

"But isn't that true for everything where we are not actually present? The further back we go in history, the more we have to rely on an oral history. We were not there for the battle of Gettysburg. We piece together what happened from the documentation of others. The further back you go, the sketchier it becomes."

100 percent, but I don't think that is any more reason to believe something. In fact I would say the opposite. What we know about history is probably not completely accurate, and just think of all things that happened that we don't know about. History is pieced together as best we can from the information we have.

"How did they spread the "Word" back in the first century? Not everyone could read or write. Truth was just as hard to come by back then as it is now. Especially when you're writings contradict beliefs that you had already formed. But to me, regardless if you believe these words are divine inspiration or just some guy writing, there's some pretty good words in there to live by."

Agree again, and that's why I attend church, because even though you have to wade through the religious dogma and legalism, at the core there is something special about the message. But there are good words to live by in a lot of books, not just the bible. Some want you to believe it's the only thing that contains truth though, which is sad and not realistic.

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