Me & Peter J Deer

This section is for me and PeterJDeer to discuss some of the topics that are tossed around at
YouTube . However it's not limited to our discussions, you may all feel free to post your comments into it.

For Atheists

To all my atheists brothers and sisters please read the following conversation between a professor of philosophy and a student:

An atheist professor of philosophy speaks to his class on the problem science has with God, The Almighty.
He asks one of his new students to stand and .....
Prof: So you believe in God?
Student: Absolutely, sir.

Prof: Is God good?
Student: Sure.

Prof: Is God all-powerful?
Student: Yes.

Prof: My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to God to heal him. Most of us would attempt to
help others who are ill. But God didn't. How is this God good then? Hmm? (Student is silent.)

Prof: You can't answer, can you? Let's start again, young fellow. Is God good?
Student: Yes.

Prof: Is Satan good?
Student: No.

Prof: Where does Satan come from?
Student: From...God...

Prof: That's right. Tell me son, is there evil in this
world?
Student: Yes.

Prof: Evil is everywhere, isn't it? And God did make everything. Correct?
Student: Yes.

Prof: So who created evil?
Student does not answer.

Prof: Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don't
they?
Student: Yes, sir.

Prof: So, who created them?
Student has no answer.

Prof: Science says you have 5 senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Tell me,
son...Have you ever seen God?
Student: No, sir.

Prof: Tell us if you have ever heard your God?
Student: No, sir.

Prof: Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God, smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory
perception of God for that matter?
Student: No, sir. I'm afraid I haven't.

Prof: Yet you still believe in Him?
Student: Yes.

Prof: According to empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol, science says your GOD doesn't exist. What
do you say to that, son?
Student: Nothing. I only have my faith.

Prof: Yes. Faith. And that is the problem science has.
Student: Professor, is there such a thing as heat?
Prof: Yes.

Student: And is there such a thing as cold?
Prof: Yes.
Student: No sir. There isn't.

(The lecture theatre becomes very quiet with this turn
of events.)

Student: Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little
heat or no heat. But we don't have anything called cold. We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no
heat, but we can't go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold. Cold is only a word we
use to describe the absence of heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy. Cold is not the
opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.

(There is pin-drop silence in the lecture theatre.)

Student: What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?
Prof: Yes. What is night if there isn't darkness?

Student: You're wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have low light,
normal light, bright light, flashing light....But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and
it's called darkness, isn't it? In reality, darkness isn't. If it were you would be able to make
darkness darker, wouldn't you?
Prof: So what is the point you are making, young man?

Student: Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.
Prof: Flawed? Can you explain how?

Student: Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is
death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can
measure. Sir, science can't even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never
seen, much less fully understood either one.

To view death as the opposite of life is t o be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it.

Now tell me, Professor. Do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?
Prof: If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.

Student: Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir? (The Professor shakes his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument is going.)

Student: Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this
process is an on-going endeavor, are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you not a scientist
but a preacher? (The class is in uproar.)

Student: Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor's brain?
(The class breaks out into laughter.)

Student: Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor's brain, felt it, touched or smelt it?
No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established rules of empirical, stable,
demonstrable protocol, science says that you have no brain, sir.

With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir?

(The room is silent. The professor stares at the student, his face unfathomable.)

Prof: I guess you'll have to take them on faith, son.
Student: That is it sir... The link between man & god is FAITH. That is all that keeps things moving & alive.

Pictures speak a thousand words

Christians Persecuted in India

Pictures of violence against Christians at Christmas time in Orissa, South East India There will now be endeavors underway by CNI Churches and other organizations to help rebuild the lives of thousands of Christians who lost a lot; Churches, Homes, Vehicles, Livestock etc..some even lost their near and dear ones in the violence. Please uphold the victims in prayers, and for peace to prevail among the estranged communities.

Comments from Coroven

Hello and I apologize for this late reply. Thanks for replying to my message and I must admit, I’m completely lost when it comes to the trinity. I don’t know much about it beyond ‘Jesus is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit’, even then I don’t understand the point of describing God in that way. I mean, why not say Jesus is God, God is one, and be done with it? Why split God into three stages or manifestations? If for example, a Christian disregards the concept of the trinity but still believes in Jesus as his savior/ messiah/ God, is that considered blasphemy? Did Jesus himself specifically tell his followers to see him as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit? Most importantly, what is the significance of the trinity? These are some of the things that I have no understanding on so I hope you can clear these up for me.


Looking back at the verses Surah 4:172 Surah 19:33, and a few others, nowhere in the Qur’an did it say that Jesus is God or anything along those lines nor was it being contradicting about the nature of Jesus.

Surah 4:171,172
O people of the Book! commit no excesses in your religion: nor say of Allah aught but truth. Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (no more than) an Apostle of Allah and His Word which He bestowed on Mary and a Spirit proceeding from Him: so believe in Allah and His Apostles. Say not "Trinity": desist: it will be better for you: for Allah is One Allah: glory be to him: (for Exalted is He) above having a son. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. And enough is Allah as a Disposer of affairs. Christ disdaineth not to serve and worship Allah nor do the angels those nearest (to Allah): those who disdain His worship and are arrogant He will gather them all together unto himself to (answer).

Surah 19:30-34
He said: "I am indeed a servant of Allah: He hath given me revelation and made me a prophet; "And He hath made me Blessed wheresoever I be and hath enjoined on me Prayer and Charity as long as I live; "(He) hath made me kind to my mother and not overbearing or miserable; "So Peace is on me the day I was born the day that I die and the Day that I shall be raised up to life (again)"! Such (was) Jesus the son of Mary: (it is) a statement of truth about which they (vainly) dispute.

It was repeated over and over again that Jesus was the savior for the Jews and to guide them back to the teachings of Moses, but yet we are constantly reminded that Jesus was just a human messenger. Granted, he was no ordinary human because he had the power of miracles, but then, so did Elijah, Moses and even Muhammad.

I read an article on how Jesus Christ died, and at the last paragraph it stated “Jesus remained in this agony and shame, not because he was powerless, but because of his incredible love for humanity. He suffered to provide the needed way of salvation for you and me.” My question is why? Why suffer for the sins of humanity? He is God; he is the Creator of everything, then why should he suffer for the things he created? Isn’t God omniscient? Dying on the cross for his followers to me, is a bit like admitting that he made a mistake or something. With that in mind, who is the servant of whom, really?

At least with Islam, I can accept the crucifixion, partly because that Jesus was human and mostly because the Qur’an has a different view on the crucifixion.

Surah 4:157, 158
That they said (in boast) "We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary the Apostle of Allah"; but they killed him not nor crucified him but so it was made to appear to them and those who differ therein are full of doubts with no (certain) knowledge but only conjecture to follow for of a surety they killed him not. Nay Allah raised him up unto Himself; and Allah is Exalted in Power Wise.

This account makes much more sense because it states that Jesus didn’t die; he was raised to God and in his place was a man that looked just like him. You could say that right now, Jesus is still alive and it certainly correlates with another verse about his return to the earth for one last time.

Even if Jesus did say that he is the Alpha and the Omega, it still doesn’t prove that he is God. To me, it actually proved the opposite. Saying that he is the beginning and the end means that he is finite. If he is the beginning then there must be a catalyst to that beginning; another god perhaps or a creator much superior to Jesus, and does God has an end? IMO, God has no beginning and no ending.

As He was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and knelt before Him, and asked Him, ‘Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.’" Mark 10:17-18

Again, if Jesus and God are one and the same, why did Jesus said ‘No one is good except God alone’? The words ‘No one’ and ‘except God alone’ I think, indicates that Jesus never called himself God. In the beginning at least. I might be taking this out of context though, so please correct me if I’m wrong.

Thank you very much for taking the time to read this. I’m not an expert in Christianity and most of what I write here are based on the little that I know on the religion, so I hope you don’t feel offended.

Thanks again and have a good day.

-Coroven

Kafir Dreams by Jamie Glazov

"A moderate Muslim follows Islamic ethics. Not only is the Koran a dualistic document, but also Islamic ethics are dualistic. Islam has one set of rules for Muslims and another set of rules for the kafirs. A Muslim does not lie, cheat, kill, or harm another Muslim. But, if it will advance Islam, a kafir may be cheated, deceived, murdered, tortured and raped. Or a Muslim may treat a kafir like a brother.

It is the dualism of Islam that gives it such power. It has the entire good cop/bad cop psychology built into its very DNA. There have been other groups with dualistic ethics, the KKK for instance. But a member of the KKK hates all blacks all the time. There is a certain bald-faced honesty in the hatred of the KKK. But Islam has the good cop face to the world most of the time. The bad cop is held in reserve the same way that a police detective carries a hidden weapon.

The ethical dualism means that Islam does not take part in the shared reciprocity of altruism. As an example, Islam is very big on charity, but Islamic charity only goes to Muslims. When Saudi Arabia sent money to New Orleans after hurricane Katrina, the money only went to Muslims, not to suffering kafirs."

For more click here

Quran and Science

Click here to view the explanation provided by Answering Islam

No forceful conversions in Islam

Please read the following articles carefully:

Link 1

Link 2

Linke 3

Link 4

Link 5

Muslims now outnumber Catholics. Muslims make up 19.2 per cent of the world’s population, compared to Catholics who make up 17.2 per cent. This is mainly due to demographics: Muslims tend to still have large families, while Catholics are having much smaller families. Of course if all Christians are considered together, they make up 33 percent of the world’s population, or about 2 billion people. By contrast, there are around 1.3 billion Muslims in the world today.

In a recent article Andrew Walden offers some amazing statistics: “In every hour, 667 Muslims convert to Christianity. Every day, 16,000 Muslims convert to Christianity. Every year, 6 million Muslims convert to Christianity.” These are some remarkable figures indeed.

As already mentioned, the rise in numbers in Islam is mainly due to demographics, not conversions. “This is more than the normal flow between two large religious communities. Islam can point to little in the way of recent conversions. Its claim to be the world’s fastest-growing religion stems mostly from the high birth rate in Islamic countries, whose infant mortality rates have been cut by the introduction of Western medicine. Christian growth is based on adult conversion. As leading Christian evangelist Wolfgang Simpson writes, ‘More Muslims have come to Christ in the last two decades than in all of history’.”

Walden looks at a number of Muslim countries where significant conversion rates to Christianity are occurring. He also looks at Western nations where Muslims are leaving their faith: “Islam is also losing adherents in areas where Islamist harassment is heavy on the streets. The London Times estimates 15% of Muslims living in Western Europe have left Islam - 200,000 in the UK alone. Those who leave often face harassment, threats, and attack.”

In another recent article Joel Rosenberg also picks up on this issue, with what he calls the “untold story” of Muslims leaving the faith in droves. He says, “The God of the Bible is moving powerfully in the Middle East to draw men, women and children to His heart and adopt them into His family in record numbers. More Muslims have come to faith in Jesus Christ over the last thirty years - and specifically over the last seven to ten years - than at any other time in human history. There is a revival going on among the ancient Catholic, Coptic, and Chaldean churches. Today, the Church is being truly resurrected in the lands of its birth.”

He examines a number of Middle Eastern nations, and presents some encouraging figures. Consider some cases: “In Afghanistan , for example, there were only 17 known evangelical Christians in the country before al-Qaeda attacked the United States . Today, there are well over 10,000 Afghan followers of Christ and the number is growing steadily.”

In Uzbekistan there were no known Muslim converts to Christ in 1990, but now there are more than 30,000. In Egypt more “than 1 million Egyptians have trusted Christ over the past decade or so, report Egyptian church leaders. The Egyptian Bible Society told me they used to sell about 3,000 copies of the Jesus film a year in the early 1990s. But in 2005 they sold 600,000 copies, plus 750,000 copies of the Bible on tape (in Arabic) and about a half million copies of the Arabic New Testament.”

In Sudan, despite “a ferocious civil war, genocide and widespread religious persecution, particularly in the Darfur region - or perhaps because of such tragedies - church leaders there tell me that more than 1 million Sudanese have made decisions to follow Jesus Christ just since 2001. Since the early 1990s, more than 5 million Sudanese have become followers of Jesus. Seminary classes to train desperately-needed new pastors are held in mountain caves. Hundreds of churches have been planted, and thousands of small group Bible studies are being held in secret throughout the country.”

In Iran in”1979 when the Ayatollah Khomeini led the Islamic Revolution, there were only about 500 known Muslim converts to Christianity. Today, interviews with two dozen Iranian pastors and church leaders reveals that there are well over 1 million Shia Muslim converts to Christianity.”

How is this all happening? “One of the most dramatic developments is that many Muslims throughout the Middle East and even in the United States are seeing dreams and visions of Jesus. They are coming into churches explaining that they have already converted and now need a Bible and guidance on how to follow Jesus. This is in fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. The Hebrew Prophet Joel told us that ‘in the last days, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days….And everyone who calls on the name of the LORD will be saved.’ (Joel 2:28-32)”

Concludes Rosenberg, “Is life easy for these Muslim converts? By no means. They face ostracism from their families. They face persecution from their communities. They face being fired by their employers. They face imprisonment by their governments. They face torture and even death at the hands of Muslim extremists. But they are coming to Christ anyway. They are becoming convinced that Jesus is, in fact, the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and that no one comes to the Father in heaven except through faith in Jesus’ death on the cross and powerful resurrection from the dead.”

Muslims may be gaining numbers mainly because of larger families, but Christians are growing in number because of an actual encounter with the living Saviour who once was dead but now lives. These are exciting times, and in the midst of so much gloom and doom, we need to be aware of such good news stories. God is at work and is doing powerful things in the Muslim world. We need to keep praying, believing and acting to see more of this take place.

Islam the fastest growing religion?

Is Islam truly the fastest growing religion? If so what is the reason behind it? Is it because Muslims on average are having double the amount of kids then Christians? Or is it because Christians are leaving their religion in vast numbers and joining Islam. Most Muslims claim that many famous Christians are joining Islam, well to that I quote the Bible which couldn't have said it more clearer
Matthew 24 "For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect—if that were possible."

Wiki Islam

Check this web site.

http://www.wikiislam.com/wiki/Main_Page

Moderate Muslims

How does one differentiate between a Moderate or an Extremist Muslim?

How about if we ask them a series of questions? Like:

1) Violence: Do you condone or condemn the Palestinians, Chechens, and Kashmiris who give up their lives to kill enemy civilians? Will you condemn by name as terrorist groups such organizations as Abu Sayyaf, Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, Groupe Islamique Armée, Hamas, Harakat ul-Mujahidin, Hizbullah, Islamic Jihad, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, and al-Qaida?


2) Modernity: Should Muslim women have equal rights with men (for example, in inheritance shares or court testimony)? Is jihad, meaning a form of warfare, acceptable in today's world? Do you accept the validity of other religions? Do Muslims have anything to learn from the West?


3) Secularism: Should non-Muslims enjoy completely equal civil rights with Muslims? May Muslims convert to other religions? May Muslim women marry non-Muslim men? Do you accept the laws of a majority non-Muslim government and unreservedly pledge allegiance to that government? Should the state impose religious observance, such as banning food service during Ramadan? When Islamic customs conflict with secular laws (e.g., covering the face for drivers' license pictures), which should give way?


4) Islamic pluralism: Are Sufis and Shi'ites fully legitimate Muslims? Do you see Muslims who disagree with you as having fallen into unbelief? Is takfir (condemning fellow Muslims with whom one has disagreements as unbelievers) an acceptable practice?


5) Self-criticism: Do you accept the legitimacy of scholarly inquiry into the origins of Islam? Who was responsible for the 9/11 suicide hijackings?


6) Defense against militant Islam: Do you accept enhanced security measures to fight militant Islam, even if this means extra scrutiny of yourself (for example, at airline security)? Do you agree that institutions accused of funding terrorism should be shut down, or do you see this a symptom of bias?


7) Goals in the West: Do you accept that Western countries are majority-Christian and secular or do you seek to transform them into majority-Muslim countries ruled by Islamic law?


It is ideal if these questions are posed publicly - in the media or in front of an audience - thereby reducing the scope for dissimulation.

No single reply establishes a militant Islamic disposition (plenty of non-Muslim Europeans believe the Bush administration itself carried out the 9/11 attacks); and pretence is always a possibility, but these questions offer a good start to the vexing issue of separating enemy from friend.

What does it mean that Jesus is the son of David?

Seventeen verses in the New Testament describe Jesus as the "son of David." But the question arises, how could Jesus be the son of David if David lived approximately 1000 years before Jesus? The answer is that Christ (the Messiah) was the fulfillment of the prophecy of the seed of David (2 Samuel 7:14-16). Jesus was the promised Messiah, which meant He was of the seed of David. Matthew 1 gives the genealogical proof that Jesus, in His humanity, was a direct descendant of Abraham and David through Joseph, Jesus' legal father. The genealogy in Luke chapter 3 gives Jesus' lineage through His mother, Mary. Jesus is a descendant of David, by adoption through Joseph, and by blood through Mary. Primarily though, when Christ was referred to as the Son of David, it was meant to refer to His Messianic title as the Old Testament prophesied concerning Him.

Jesus was addressed as “Lord, thou son of David” several times by people who, by faith, were seeking mercy or healing. The woman whose daughter was being tormented by a demon (Matthew 15:22), the two blind men by the wayside (Matthew 20:30), and blind Bartimaeus (Mark 10:47), all cried out to the son of David for help. The titles of honor they gave Him declared their faith in Him. Calling Him Lord expressed their sense of His deity, dominion, and power, and by calling Him “son of David,” they were professing Him to be the Messiah.

The Pharisees, too, understood what was meant when they heard the people calling Jesus “son of David.” But unlike those who cried out in faith, they were so blinded by their own pride and lack of understanding of the Scriptures that they couldn’t see what the blind beggars could see – that here was the Messiah they had supposedly been waiting for all their lives. They hated Jesus because He wouldn’t give them the honor they thought they deserved, so when they heard the people hailing Jesus as the Savior, they became enraged (Matthew 21:15) and plotted to destroy Him (Luke 19:47).

Jesus further confounded the scribes and Pharisees by asking them to explain the meaning of this very title. How could it be that the Messiah is the son of David when David himself refers to Him as “my Lord” (Mark 12:35-37)? Of course the teachers of the law couldn’t answer the question. Jesus thereby exposed the Jewish spiritual leaders’ ineptitude as teachers and their ignorance of what the Old Testament taught as to the true nature of the Messiah, further alienating them from Him.

Jesus Christ, the only son of God and the only means of salvation for the world (Acts 4:12), is also the son of David, both in a physical sense and a spiritual sense.

118 questions for christians

I came across a site where a Muslim fellow has posted his so called 118 questions to throw off Christians.

Click here to go to the site. Let's try and answer them all! Hopefully I can post some answers here as well. But if you know them please feel free to take a stab at them.