Religion

[poptart]

Religion is something man created -- and it will not have a person meet God.

Men do not come to God.
Man is a creation of God, and God comes to men -- by His Word.

As soon as man became separated from God, God came to man.
"Adam, where art thou?" Genesis 3:9.
And He brought us the Gospel. Genesis 3:15.

We left the ease of God's grace (Genesis 1:27-28) and immediately attempted to manage our own lives. Genesis 3:7.
We set up our own standard of goodness and attempted to meet God on our terms, and by a standard of goodness we decided was appropriate.

-- ye shall become like gods --


Cain created his own religious action -- deciding he would meet God that way.
He put forth his effort and diligence and showed God that he was good enough. Genesis 4:3.
But it was not the blood.

His religious action only made things worse for him.
Religion is actually a very harmful thing.
And so it goes up until this very day.


God -----> comes to men, by faith in the blood sacrifice.


Romans 3:25
(Christ) Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;

[poptart]

As far as taking it literally, I really just take it as it is written.
Some parts are clear allegory -- and those parts are generally very obvious.


Why give the Bible credence?

There are many reasons, but I will just give three important ones.

1) We see phenomenal and overwhelming fulfillment of prophecy.

Independent people (we can call them prophets) wrote about what they "saw" about a coming future Messiah.
These independent writings were made hundreds, up to over a thousand, of years before Jesus Christ was born.

This person, Jesus, uniquely, phenomenally, and overwhelmingly fulfilled these writings that independent people had made.
Just one example, the exact family line in which this coming Messiah was said to be coming through was given by a number these independent writers, and Jesus came exactly through that line.
See (2) Messianic Lineage in the link, if you care to. http://thedevineevidence.com/prophecy_jesus.html


2) Jesus Christ rose from the dead.
http://www.leaderu.com/everystudent/eas ... josh2.html


3) The behavior of the apostles.
They cowered in fear at the death of Jesus.
Later, and independent of each other, they all willingly went to gruesome deaths rather than deny Jesus Christ.
People sometimes die for what they believe in, but if Jesus was a fake, these people knew it -- and they all willingly and independently went to these gruesome deaths for that they knew to be... a lie.

No.
He had appeared to them and they knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that He was the real deal.

[poptart]

All-powerful?

So say the Scriptures, and I believe them.

Matthew 28:18
(Jesus speaking) All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.


All-knowing?

So say the Scriptures, and I believe them.

Job 37:16
...the wondrous works of him which is perfect in knowledge?


All-loving?

God is love.
1 John 4:8

[poptart]

If you want to live in a world with no evil, you could look forward to an eternal heaven.
This current life we live is a mere blip compared to that.