I’m a bit bemused by the recent attempts by admitted atheists and a rather blatant heretic to lecture me on the tenets of my religious beliefs. I’m a Christian, and those critics seem to think that they can hold me to a non-Biblical standard of their imagined Jesus.
Let’s get one thing clear up front. Jesus is not a wuss. That bit about turning the other cheek is often taken out of context by people who’d rather not remember that Jesus took a whip to the money changers in the Temple. Twice. (John 2:17 and Matthew 21:12) Jesus is one of the Persons of the Trinity. He is God, the source of Truth and Justice.
Gentle Reader, do you believe that it is just to let someone cyberbully a grieving family that has just lost a child? Do believe that it just to allow a convicted violent felon to stalk a family? Or is it just to oppose those sorts of actions?
Jesus told a parable about a crime victim. A bunch of goody-two-shoes types looked the other way, but one guy helped the victim. Do you remember who in the story Jesus praised?
UPDATE—I seem to have stirred up a bit of a tempest in one tiny portion of teh Twitterz with this post. The Gentle Reader should note that I have not identified anyone by name. However, the following observations by Jesus and Paul may be useful in sorting out who’s who.
First, Jesus, from the Sermon on the Mount:
By their fruits you will know them. Do you gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree produces good fruit; but the corrupt tree produces evil fruit. A good tree can’t produce evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree produce good fruit. Every tree that doesn’t grow good fruit is cut down, and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.
Second, Paul, from his Epistle to the Galatians:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and lusts. If we live by the Spirit, let’s also walk by the Spirit. Let’s not become conceited, provoking one another, and envying one another.
… Don’t be deceived. God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption. But he who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. Let us not be weary in doing good, for we will reap in due season, if we don’t give up.
Of course, Christians are not perfect. We are still works in process. If God were finished with us at this point, he would not have taught us to pray “… and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.”
UPDATE 2— Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control …
The Samaritan – the lowest of the lowly despised class.
This is my problem with my church – they lecture against self-defense, and are all about being pussies. They then act offended when I point out that that is a loser’s strategy.
Where are the warrior monks of old, dammit? Christianity ain’t what it used to be…
Ah, I walk my own path…
don’t give in to the dark side Obijohn Jah’oge
and don’t give in to these scum – they will be judged soon
Amen.
As for Leroy’s comment, I, too, have experienced moments of frustration. One day, during a moment of prayer in church, I realized that I was there for God, and if I expected perfection from human beings in order to justify the magnificence of my presence in a particular faith, I would never attend and evil would win.
Upon further reflection, I must add that I love the title of this post, and I am going to appropriate it for use in future conversations.
I have long believed that Jesus was an imposing, strong man, The fact that he took a whip to the money changers is one example. Another is the fact that as a carpenter, he did not have the luxury of popping down to the local Home Depot to get his wood, he had to go and cut it himself and haul it himself. I picture him looking more like a lumberjack rather than some sissy Italian prince of the renaissance. Also just think about how he survived the thirty nine lashes, then carried his cross out to the edge of town and still was strong enough to hang on for those hours on the cross. That surely was no “wuss”.
Righteousness in God’s Word is not for the faint of heart, it requires a daily examination of one’s soul, strict adherence to His Word and the gift of His grace. Christianity is action and belief not just amorphous feelings and existence.
1000x THIS, Paul.
Perfectly stated, my friend.
Hmm. Judging by his current rants on Twitter, it seems like BS identifies with the moniker, “jackass.”
Look, dumbasses gotta dumbass; jackasses gotta jackass.
However, good Sir Hoge, please do not paint all atheists with the same broad brush. TK may be atheists, but worse, they have no moral code. That is what makes them despicable.
Where did our Gentle Host “paint all atheists with the same broad brush?” (*psst* He didn’t.) 😉
With that said, when I take into account my vast, online interactions with atheists… doing as much is very tempting.
If I had a nickel for every time some bloviating blowhard of an atheist jumped my Twitter timeline to “school” me on the tenets of my Christian faith, lecture me on how Christians *should* behave and react, and incorrectly quote scripture in an attempt to boost their false narratives and misguided agenda… I’d be wealthier than those eeevil KOOOOOOCH brothers.
NOT all, but most of the atheists I’ve ran across in my lifetime are terribly dishonest in their interactions — with a heaping helping of cruel and disgusting insults and judgments.
Whatever helps ’em sleep at night, I suppose. *sigh*
As Heinlein distinguished between “small mouthed” and “large mouthed” anarchists, let me distinguish between “small mouthed” and “large mouthed” atheists. The “large mouthed” are the ones who are frankly fanatics for a religion they’re not honest enough to admit is a religion. They are often driven to punish Christians because they were once wronged by a Christian, and cannot/will not distinguish between individuals of the faith.
The “small mouthed” versions don’t care what anyone else thinks, so long as they are left to their own beliefs, and are likely to acknowledge that Christianity has been a net good for humanity, morally and intellectually.
The “large mouthed” also tend to try to hold people to standards of the wrong faith, revealing their ignorance.
I am an admitted atheist; I come by this choice honestly, and I do not expect others to “convert”, renounce their faith, or proselytize me.
My choice was informed by my parents at an early age, when my non-practicing Jewish mother and my lapsed RC father made me go to our local Dutch Reformed church; when I was 13, they gave me the “choice” of whether to go through the process of confirmation. It seems I “chose poorly” in that I decided that it was not for me. Their opinion seemed to count more and I was confirmed. Once I went to college, I stopped going to church, and have not missed it.
But, to each his own. I was the only one supportive of my sister in her decision to go to Seminary and later obtain her PhD in Anglican Studies. My father actually tried to “forbid” her to go.
So, if I had a nickel for every time some bloviating blowhard of a born again whatever tried to correct me of my ways, I would be even wealthier than you would be if you had a nickel for every time someone tried to point out the error of your ways.
The difference between folks like me and TK is that they have no moral code. When I lived in China for a year, many of my Chinese friends asked me if I was a believer because I was not like many expats (looking to take advantage of the women).
So let’s stipulate that there are sucmbags on both sides of the equation – atheists and believers who don’t practice what they preach.
As my pastor often says, being a Christian & forgiving others, doesn’t mean you have to be a doormat. In fact, we are expected to protect and come to the aid of our brothers & sisters.
They also forget or ignore that just because we may be supposed to do our best to forgive a criminal, no matter how vile his crime, that forgiveness is more for our benefit than the criminals and most emphatically does NOT mean not expecting, nay, requiring, the criminal to pay for his/her misdeeds.
Yep. Thus sayeth an admitted criminal.
No one with any experience in dealing with your adversaries would believe they had the slightest clue about being Christ-like.
Schmalfeldt often mocks Christ. He uses Him as a bludgeon to true believers. He often mocks Christians and Christ, Himself.
Bill will be judged. By THE judge. He may have already been judged and the punishment of his everyday life is only a precursor to what awaits him.
He is now claiming that he is only mocking us “right wingnuts” perceptions of Christ, saying that we are too stupid to understand him.
One of the most interesting sermons I ever heard discussed Jesus’ statement that those who sinned against him would be forgiven, but sinning against the Holy Spirit would never be forgiven. The argument that the priest gave was that sinning against the Holy Spirit was basically the sin of pride, and the reason Jesus said it would never be forgiven because due to his/her pride the sinner would never ask for (or even admit to needing) that forgiveness.
Bill mocks our host and us lackwits as suffering from Hubris. I would humbly suggest that he needs to do something about the beam in his own damn eye before he goes screeching about the motes in ours.
Romans 3:22-24 This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
We are all imperfect. We are all fallen. None of us is worthy of Heaven. If we were truly to be judged according to God’s standard of perfection Jesus Christ, We. Are. All. Going. To. Hell.
But that same standard of perfection made the perfect sacrifice for us. He has paid for our sins; He has borne the punishment, now and for all time until he returns. Our end of the bargain? Accept it, believe it, embrace it, declare it.
That’s all.
Our sins are paid for, even those we haven’t committed yet. The all-knowing God knows all our sins, and He loves us in spite of that. What we do on this earth is of no consequence, and the judgment of the powers of this universe is of even less.
It’s all between me and the Lord.
If you are trying to use Christianity as a cudgel to beat up the faithful for their shortcomings, you have failed already because you fundamentally misunderstand the situation to start, and only compound your error from there.
Amen.
BRAVO and AMEN!
I am reminded of the story of Thomas, also known as Didymus (John 20:24-29), he who doubted. When Christ appeared before the Apostles in the locked room and Thomas was not among them, he doubted the stories of the Apostles. When Christ appeared to the Apostles a second time, again in a locked room and Thomas was among them, he marveled! Christ bade him to place his fingers in the nail holes in the hands and to place his hand into the side of His glorified body. Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
The cogent question to ask is: “Why, if Christ is in His glorified (risen) body, which we have been taught is perfect and blemish free, do the wounds of His crucifixion still exist?”. The simple answer is that those wounds exist because our unbelief and sinfulness still exist. They are the outward expression of His continuing sacrifice for us and at the last day, when He appears before us, those wounds will be gone for all sinfulness will have ceased and judgement is nigh.
Showing even more misunderstanding of his supposed faith, Bill is now claiming that Christians should not believe anything St. Paul tells us, simply because Paul wasn’t one of Jesus disciples and never met him personally. Though it should probably be argued that that is not true; he simply didn’t meet our Lord in the flesh.
https://twitter.com/RadioWiseguy/status/462622523557822464
Actually, he did meet the resurrected Christ in the flesh. That is why he converted to Christianity. That is why he is considered to be an Apostle, although not one of the original 12.
Thank you, my memory is really lousy before the caffeine has kicked in, and to be honest, raised as a just-post-Vatican-II Catholic, I didn’t get much actual biblical teaching of either testament, a failure that I am trying to remedy. I was just remembering that he had only met him after the cruxifiction.
That’s OK, it surprises a lot of people. I was raised in a rather interesting way – Catholic church on Sunday, Baptist private school during the week where we had Bible study every day. One of the weaknesses in Catholic religious education is a need for more Bible study, not just cathechism. I am shocked at how little the kids in CCD know their Bible, and by no means do I consider myself to be an expert.
HERETIC!!!
Where’s my comfy chair?
A Reader, that is so true. I tend to joke that being raised as a Catholic until I was 17, including the last two years at a school run by nuns, left me a very good Jewish Protestant. I didn’t hear the word transubstantiation (never mind learn what it was) until I was up at university. Never had the Feast of the Immaculate Conception explained, leaving me to wonder why the annunciation was the requisite 9 months before the birth but the conception was either less than a month or over a year before. In college I discovered that what I had come up with (having been left to figure out on my own) about communion matched Lutheran doctrine perfectly. At the end of my next to last year of secondary school, the nuns asked if we had any suggestions for what we felt would be good for catechism/religious ed the next year. I suggested reading the bible, and they looked at me like a total heretic.
Since I now consider myself an Episcopalian/Anglican, maybe they were right. 🙂
At least 400 people are able to claim the title of apostle (by one gospel account).
Saul of Tarsus ceased to exist on the road to Damascus. In Christ he was reborn as Paul of Christ.
According to the Acts of the Apostles:
“Acts 9:3-19
New International Version (NIV)
3 As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
5 “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.
“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. 6 “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
7 The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. 8 Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. 9 For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.
10 In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, “Ananias!”
“Yes, Lord,” he answered.
11 The Lord told him, “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying. 12 In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight.”
13 “Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. 14 And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.”
15 But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel. 16 I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.”
17 Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, 19 and after taking some food, he regained his strength.”
Thus we see that St. Paul did indeed meet Christ.
A key indicator that someone who is arguing that your behavior is not Christian, yadda, yadda, yadda, is when they reveal that their premise is that you would not be sinning if you were really a Christian.
HELLO?! “When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Mark 2:17.
Yep. Tis why I rarely engage such individuals to much of any degree. They are not interested in His Truth. They are solely interested in bashing Christians and Christianity. Pearls before swine and all.
I do tend to have a ginormous sense of sadness fall over me, however. Those who have eyes yet refuse to see…
This is why CBBS is so pitiful- he could be spending his dwindling days happily hanging out with his wife and spending time with folks from church. Instead he spends his time raging away on Twitter. Life is too short to spend it filled with hate. Every child of God can live the peace of salvation, but the cost is giving up selfish desires. Hoge has every right to defend himself, but it seems to me he’s at peace, merely responding to provocations, and feels no small amount of joy in the rest of his life (could certainly be wrong about this, but it’s a sense I get.) Poor Bill is just thrashing about in hate, and he’s has little room left for God. He’s really missing out, and it’s sad.
https://twitter.com/RadioWiseguy/status/462622523557822464
Your Jovial Host @RadioWiseguy 2h
It amuses me how sinners justify their sins against other people using the words of Saul of Tarsus, who never met Jesus.
Uh, no:
For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
Can’t wait for Willy to call Paul a liar.
Shorter BS = Jesus made a mistake.
Those are not the beliefs of a Christian.
As I have stated on other threads, a heretic.
Forgot to add, since Willy will have no clue:
-1 Corinthians 15:3-8
That didn’t take long:
https://twitter.com/PatOmbudsman/status/462656944038510593
Didn’t Willy tell us he was a Christian?
And you are not Hoge.
That tweet of Bill’s makes no sense.
He has a habit of calling people named Paul liars …
It appears perhaps Inspector Jiggles is saying his last goodbyes.
I pray it isn’t wishful thinking on my part.
I’m not done with him yet.
Again? Let’s keep count this month!
He’s made some startling admissions in the past few days. Even he has to realize how badly he’s screwed up. So look for another twitter-flush in the near future.
He’s already at the “Can’t you see I’m dying!?” stage, so it most likely won’t be long.
He’s lying again in his tweets. Some verses sprung to mind:
John 8:44 ESV
You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.
Revelation 21:8 ESV
But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
And it looks like Mr. Puzio might have contacted Willy, because he isn’t making that mistake anymore.
Good move Willy.
Just to note that “Hellfire and Brimstone Bill” has reverted to “Desperate Dealmaker Bill.”
http://wp.me/p4z3WM-I
Good to know. 4 and 5 are particularly insightful.
I have been observing Bill from a distance for quite some time and have never chosen to engage him nor his gutter dwelling neurosis.
I prefer our host, after making this absolutely true observation of Mr. Schmalfeldt, now continue n his path of defeating the vexatious miscreant in a court of law.
And now they start lecturing people on religion.
Irony can be so ironic sometimes…
Bill’s telling us all how’s he’s enjoyed exposing us. I’m not what he’s exposed about me. Nothing that anyone else with his extremely basic google-fu wouldn’t have come up with (accurate or otherwise). So why is he adding me to the list he’s crowing about?
Can he explain what posting on his poorly read blog and twitter feed some people’s real or allegedly real names are does for anyone, especially him? I’m not some great crime lord, or Karl Rove wanna-be. He’s never explained what Robin Causey has done to deserve being treated like one of America’s most wanted by him. Nor has he ever given a valid reason for spending years doxing everyone and sundry to try to find Jerry Fletcher. For giggles, imagine he’s right about Chris Heather being Fletcher. Now what? Everyone’s lives, including Chris’ go one just like usual, with no changes whatsoever. So what does he get out of exposing people like me except for the personal satisfaction of thinking he’s made someone’s life difficult? Where is the benefit to the world?
He will never tell, because there is none. His exposés never have been beneficial except to his own sense of angry self-important spite, and they never will be. Today he’s trying to claim that going after OBN and Lee Stranahan was about protecting people. But he can’t point out a single police report of his which has led to any real actions, other than wasting scarce police resources and stressing out the subjects of the investigation, none of whom were found to have been guilty of any of the crimes Bill alleged. With such a great batting average, don’t you think he might, just might, start wondering about whether his investigative skills are as sharp as he thinks they are? Or will he just admit that the only reason he does it is the same reason his friend, BK sues people, to cause them financial and psychological stress, simply because he’s decided he doesn’t like them?
And then can he tell us how that is Christian?
Everyone’s life but his goes on as usual.
He has a peace order with extension and a restraining order.
He has been promoted from adjudicated harasser to SERIAL adjudicated harasser.
And it looks like his sister is trying to join the fun, what with her tweet this morning about having to deal with a bunch of upset wives.
That is actually The Bobber.
Post-Op.
She better watch it. People who scrape a meager living in the pet care business, who work for businesses with a reputation to defend, might want to stp yuk ing it up over bestiality jokes with their mentally ill brother. People might get the idea she likes that sort of thing.
Absolutely, tried “dox”‘ing me twice with total failure both times.
He’s an archer that draws a target wherever his arrows hit.
But even his succesful doxes serve absolutely no use except for him to say “Aha! I got you!”. It’s not like he’s outing master criminals for LE. He’s shrieking normal, everyday, nothing special except to their immediate circle, people for the joy he takes in making them worry about what false reports he’s going to file against them, or whether he’s going to start phoning them every five minutes, or tweeting tons of disgusting or libelous tweets, because Bill just likes being nasty to make himself feel important. He has just enough conscience that he has to call it “investigating” to justify it to himself, but he just likes hurting people as the only thing that proves he to him that he has some power.
“He’s an archer that draws a target wherever his arrows hit.”
The most accurate description of Inspector Jiggles to date.
I will post this everywhere.
“He’s an archer that draws a target wherever his arrows hit.” Brilliant!
Maybe he’s a little know superhero, “The Brown Arrow”.
Hoge is absolutely correct in his original post. We are not called to be silent in the face of cruel acts by the likes of Mr. Schmalfeldt. The Stranahan family did not deserve his harrassment, and Schmalfeldt’s shuttuppery in defense of Kimberlin is just wrong.
Tough as nails Bill Schmalfeldt!
https://twitter.com/PatOmbudsman/status/462723388302430210
I’ll remember that the next time you’re whining incessantly about your “declining health”.
You want to live the life you are living, you have to deal with the consequences. Keep that pair on your chin nice and clean.
As an agnostic, let me reiterate that it never makes sense for either an atheist or an agnostic to appeal to Christian ethics or morality: after all, by definition, an atheist or agnostic accords no belief to Christian ethics and morality as divine commandment. An atheist or agnostic may subscribe in whole or in part to Christian ethics and morality, but not because they are Christian.
The only honest argument in ethics and morality available to an atheist or agnostic is to appeal
to personal beliefs in what is universally moral and ethical. Whenever I hear an atheist or agnostic calling on someone to act like a Christian, I hear a liar holding others to a standard that he or she is unwilling to accept (and usually an ignorant liar to boot because most atheists and agnostics at most read the Classic Comics version of the Bible: if Christians see but through a glass darkly, atheists and agnostics admit that they do not see anything at all).
As an agnostic, please don’t group me in or compare me with atheists. True agnostics are nothing like them. We accept that we cannot know either way. Atheists are like Christians. They believe. They have absolute “faith” that God does not exist. And it is FAITH. Because it would take a leap of faith to believe something that required all the past and future knowledge in all the universe to be certain of.
And an agnostic knows that’s impossible. We simply don’t possess the “faith” of atheists and deists. Perhaps we are more rational. Perhaps we are less brave. But one thing we are not, is a softer version of an atheist.
Off topic, but interesting development:
https://twitter.com/BullyVille/status/462741923631861760
Wait a minute!
https://twitter.com/RadioWiseguy/status/462739908436963329
Is this true Hoge? Is Johnny Atsign really fake?
My God, is NOTHING sacred anymore?
ANNOUNCER: Johnny Atsign is a work of fiction. If anyone thinks it’s about him, he should read Proverbs 28:1. This is LBS, the Lickspittle Broadcasting System.
My life is over. How could anyone do this to me?
I knew what that verse would say the first time I saw you post it. Apropos, how apropos.
On a mildly serious note, I do love how Willy felt it important to point out that Johnny Atsign is actually fake.
Like it’s something he just figured out.
He spends his life creating fictions and deliberately confusing them with reality, a behavior that, if indulged too often, makes what is obvious to most an epiphany. It may have taken him this long to twig that Johnny Atsign does not exist in the real world.
“Reap the ****ing whirlwind”
And this has been your Moment of Zen.