ARE YOU KIDDING ME LUCAS? 

I thought you were smarter than that.  You just lost alot of brownie points with me over spreading lies here.  Didn't I tell you no to do that and we'd be fine? 

This isn't true.  You had to go to some Falwell bashing site to prove your point?  This never happened.  This is trash. 

Show me something that is verifiable....you can't believe everything out there on the net...or didn't you know this? 

He was scandal free and still is. There's nothing out there on him.    Show me something with substance Lucas.  Don't give me trash. 

Even Larry Flynt wouldn't buy what you just put here.  He came out with nothing but praise for Jerry after Jerry died even though they were bitter enemies for a time.  The reason?  Because Larry made a very vulgar sexual comment about Jerry and his own mother in one of his porn magazines.  Falwell sued. 

Actually, there could be; Human imagination is a fascinating and powerful thing, just take a look at the things people come up with.

I guess I should have clarified the post or at least made sure it was all there before I hurried off for lunch. Mm, well, you live and learn. My bad KFC. As far as I know he looks damn near perfect, almost jesus like, but I highly doubt it just because no one can be perfect. While I disagreed with him to a large extent, he did seem to be a good man.

Again, sorry for the haste and mistake.

Be well, ~Alderic

I understand but that's not what we're dealing with here.  We're dealing with 40 diff men who wrote over a period of 1500 years all from diff walks of life.  They were not in cahoots and most didn't know each other.  A few were contemporaries but that was here and there.  When the bible all got put together, as we know it now, much later it fit perfectly.  Just like a glove.  It all meshed.  How can that be? 

 You know as well as I that if we had even 10 JU'sers getting together on any one issue we'd have 11 diff opinions.  That's not the case here at all.  The 40 diff writers of the scriptures were in complete harmony on all the issues.  Many times the  writers of the OT had no idea exactly what they were writing because it didn't pertain to their time but later, even centuries later,  it made perfect sense when it came true.   It all fell together. 

ok, live and learn. 

Well he wasn't perfect, but he tried his best not to give his enemies any fire to play with.  He tried really hard because he knew he had the spotlight on him.  He took the brunt for the whole Christian community because he had wide broad shoulders.  He tried his best to be the Godly man he was. 

Much the same way the media is going after Palin is the same way they went after Jerry.  When you put yourself out there in the forefront it comes with the territory I guess.  He wasn't afraid to speak up.  He was brash, outspoken and blunt at times giving the media lots of soundbites.   Sometimes he did apologize for speaking before thinking. 

Mmm, not all issues if I remember correct. Even then, you have the clarency edits. I just can't fathom that this all happene; I'm trying, but im not getting anywhere.

Indeed.

Well not exactly.  Salvation has nothing to do with works.  That's what this blog is about.   We can not earn our way into heaven.  Eph 2:8-9 is pretty clear  so that no one can boast. 

But AFTER salvation works are very important when it comes to the reaping of rewards.  That's another issue.  The bible speaks of earning five diff crowns.  It's like being able to bring something substantial to God when we see him face to face instead of standing there empty handed. 

Our works will be tried to see what they are made of.  Did we do our good deeds for ourselves, to make us look good or did we do these works to give God the glory and make him look good? 

There was a joke going around for a while that went like this:

A rich man went to heaven and met St. Peter at the Gate.  He was happy to have made it that far because Jesus said it would be hard for a rich man to enter heaven.  Peter gave him the heavenly tour showing him all the lovely mansions bigger than he ever dreamed on earth. He was quite happy to be in heaven.   As Peter kept walking with him along the road the rich man noticed the homes weren't quite so big.  They were continuously getting smaller.  

The further they walked the smaller the homes got.  Then they took a turn and went down a street that had only tar paper shacks.  When they stood in front of one of them, Peter said:

"Here you go.  This is your new heavenly home." 

"But, but..." the rich man replied.  "What about those lovely mansions I saw when I first entered the gate?  Can't I have one of those?" 

"Sorry," said Peter.  "This is the best we could do with what you sent us." 

This goes with the reward system.  Jesus said for us not to lay our treasures up here on earth where moth does destroy but to lay our treasures in heaven which will be eternal. 

PS.  Tithing was commanded for the servant under the OT law.  The child of God under grace in the NT chooses to give out of the abundance of his heart.  Tithing limits the believer where choosing to give places no limits on the believer. 

I understand but you have to read it and spend time in it to get it.  You just can't will this to happen.  So it makes sense that you're not getting anywhere. 

They way you word it, it still reeks of buying your way into heaven, just with brown-nosing instead of money.

Oh I know, and like I've mentioned - I've read the bible and still read it. Not as in depth as I once did, but I read it. I also tend to read other religious texts. They can be, from a literature and anthropological point of view, fascinating things.

well maybe I'm not being clear.  This has nothing to do with money at all.   You do nothing to earn your way into heaven.  Let me quote Eph 2:8-9 because I'm thinking you didn't look it up. 

"For by grace are you saved thru faith and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; NOT OF WORKS lest any man should boast." 

Does that make it clearer?   Is throwing in the reward system messing you up?  Grace is unmerited favor.  We do nothing to desrve it but he gives us grace anyway. 

You're fooling yourself here.  When you do something for someone out of empathy are you telling me it doesn't make you feel good to do goodwill for another?  You just do it with no feeling at all? 

No, I think you're being plenty clear, being good won't get you into heaven. Apparently, we're all miserable, horrible little beings undeserving of any mercy our theoretical creator might have; but if we just believe he exists, he'll give us the mercy we so dreadfully don't deserve. We can't "buy" or "brown nose" our way into heaven, but it might get us a better spot to watch all the unbelievers burn.

I've often thought this myself.  Left to ourselves, we will always make a choice that is selfishly motivated.

Even if the choice is to purposely do the selfless thing, it ultimately has a selfish motive: we want to feel good about ourselves.

I disagree.

ok good.  But it goes against what just about every religion known to man teaches.  They all seem to be teaching a works based religion and from a biblical POV that's just not true. 

well that's a pretty dismal way of looking at things.  Who said anything about watching unbelievers burn?  I don't think that's going to happen.  In fact, I'm sure of it. 

What you're not understanding in all this is how holy God is.  And how unholy we are.  To reconcile the two something needs to happen.  It's like light and darkness.  There is no relationship with light and darkness.  One has to overpower the other.  They can't co-exist.

That's where the belief comes in.  Belief in the fact that he made the reconciliation for us.  So it's a matter of belief and acceptance of what he did for us out of a great love God has for mankind.