[thechat] Mythology was comics

Ben Dyer ben_dyer at imaginuity.com
Thu May 24 10:22:40 CDT 2001


Wow, this is great.  I love it.  I get into work and have a billion e-mails 
on this thread.  Fascinating.

Some comments.  Bear with me.

Q1
The question has come up about faith considerably.  How can you put faith 
in something you've never seen?  How do you know you're not blindly 
following a man?

A1
To someone who is not a practicing Christian, this is an obvious point, but 
you are really only seeing half of the story.  There is an inexplicable, 
indescribable feeling of the presence of God, especially when you really 
think you're screwed, and then to trust God and watch him come 
through.  I'll give you an example.  Back in the early days of our company 
(when we were really, really small), we had a major accounting error.  We 
were short about $10,000 in the morning and we had bills to pay by 
noon.  We prayed about the problem knowing that there was really nothing 
*we* could do about it.  That morning, a $12,000 job came in (it found 
us).  The bills were payed on time.  This is a small example, yes, but I've 
found that it's usually the smallest things that reinforce my belief in God.

Really, the biggest problem is that we, as humans, like proof.  We hate 
gaps, we want evidence.  That's what makes Christianity so hard.  But God 
has a way of filling in the gaps for us.

The second part, how do you know you're not blindly following a man (if you 
consider Jesus to be just a man, or priests, the Pope, etc.).  Well, first 
off, the Pope, priests, etc., all of man are sinners so they are 
fallible.  These people are really just the front men for God.  So we look 
to them for guidance, counsel, direction, and when they screw up we really 
blame God.  "Oh great, if God is really there, he would put people in 
charge down here that were perfect." or something to that effect.  But you 
really have to look beyond pastors, preachers and look to Jesus as the 
ultimate example because all humans screw up (Romans 3:23: "For all have 
sinned and fall short of the glory of God").  Now, how do you know Jesus 
wasn't just a man?  Well, this comes down to trust.  The Bible of course 
teaches about God sending his only son (John 3:16), and Jesus had the same 
problems that man does (tempted by sin - he was tempted by the devil 
himself, got hungry - both in Matthew 4, etc.), but he was able to resist 
temptation because he was the Son of God.  But it really comes down to 
faith.  I believe that he was indeed the Son of God coming to earth as 
prophesied in the Old Testament.

Q2
Explain the Theory of Evolution/Big Bang vs. Creation.

A2
Oh boy.  It comes down to this: we weren't around for either (whichever it 
may be), so you don't know for sure and I don't know for sure.  I believe 
in Creation.  I believe God has the power to make a rock appear to be 3 
billion years old.  Maybe carbon dating doesn't work that far back (I don't 
know the science behind it, so I'm merely speculating).  Again, none of us 
was around 6,000 or 3-6 billion years ago, so we don't know for sure who 
would be correct.

Q3
If Christianity is so great, why are "Christians" such jerks?

A3
I won't speak for everyone else.  And I hate to think that people who 
aren't in the Church perceive every Christian to be Reverend Lovejoy or Ned 
Flanders because we aren't.  (Shamless plug time again)  It's a shame that 
the Church can't/won't reach the younger generation who are basically 
turned off by everything the Church really stands for right now.  In fact, 
I agree that Church is boring, boorish, money-grubbing, intolerant and 
against the younger generation.  I work with some other of the younger 
people and we developed Spirit Groove (http://www.spiritgroove.com) which 
addresses these issues.  We meet in a club in Dallas, it's free (well, more 
like donate if you want to, we barely even mention it), it's fun, always 
great music, it's just a great way to be in "Church" without being in a church.

Q4
Okay, but what about the Crusades/Balkans/WWII/Segregationist South and the 
other awful things that Christians did/do?

A4
Do you like being judged on the sins of others in your 
religious/ethnic/cultural group?  Neither do I.  Don't write off an entire 
group because of some of its members.

Q5
Use of icons in the Church and its relationship to idolatry.

A5
Yes, the 10 Commandments include graven images of God outside of what was 
God-ordained (the Ark of the Covenant had two cherubim on top).  One of the 
ways archaeologists identify archaeological frescoes in the Middle East is 
by their use of human images.  Romans/others used them constantly while 
Jews had ornate designs with no human images.  (If I remember correctly).

Whew.  I'd spend some more time on this, but I have some work to do.  Maybe 
I'll address some more points later. :)

--Ben


<!-----------------------
Ben Dyer
Senior Internet Developer
Imaginuity Interactive
http://www.imaginuity.com
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