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Originally Posted by arloiginla
You are basing that on human equality. If you created everything in the world including the girl, that would be completely acceptable, especially if the girl was perfect when you created her but defied you purposely and rejected you.
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What, just because I created something that means I can do things that would be completely immoral if I hadn't created it?
So I can lock my kids in the basement if they defy and reject me? This line of reasoning is probably where the whole idea of stoning disobedient children comes from.
When my son defies me, I don't damn him and all his children and grandchildren to a lifetime of hardship and an eternity of suffering if they don't happen to make the right choice thousands of years later.
Let me ask this, if you had been in the garden, would you have partaken of the apple?
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Originally Posted by arloiginla
Completely true. I have no doubt whatsoever that those who have never heard of Jesus or Christianity, or salvation, will be judged on what they do know and not what they don't. The God I believe in would do no such thing, because it would be contrary to His just nature.
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Judged on what they know? What knowledge are they judged on? Like a game of trivial pursuit?
I hope it's science or computers, cause then I'll get in for sure.
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Originally Posted by arloiginla
Wrong. It has nothing to do with a soft or hard sell. Those who are offered God's gift of salvation and do not accept it, will face eternal punishment apart from God, since they chose to be apart from Him during life.
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This is presuming that a person has knowledge of what they are choosing, but they don't. Lots of gods offer salvation according to their followers.
You are offered salvation from Allah, you choose not to accept it and face eternal punishment.
In order to make an informed decision, you have to be informed. Someone telling someone else that they have to accept their god or face eternal punishment isn't being informed, that's just a assertion with nothing to substantiate it.
A just god would allow for informed decisions.
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Originally Posted by arloiginla
I didn't judge one doctrine and say that those who believe in the "old" way of thinking (you're going to hell! stop being gay!) aren't really Christians. I think it is personal - each of us will be accountable to God Himself and it won't matter what doctrine we held, it will only matter whether or not we accepted His gift of salvation and strove to follow His will in our lives.
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Well even the nature of salvation is in itself doctrine, the view of how to attain it according to the author of Matthew is very different than the author of John.
But I see what you mean. And this would more closely fit the early church I think. The problem is it didn't work out, it couldn't be sustained. The wide proliferation of doctrines and views in the early church combined with the lack of an "in your lifetime" return by Christ eventually resulted in 300 years of wrangling to establish correct doctrine, to separate orthodoxy from heresy.
If it shouldn't matter what doctrine is held, there can't be exceptions to that.. "It doesn't matter what doctrine you hold except you have to believe X" will just result in differences in what X should be. The writings that became the Bible have varying views on something as basic as the nature of Jesus.. Resulting in many different groups in early Christianity: Man but not god, god but not man, both man and god in varying percentages, man but infilled by the Christ spirit right before crucifixion, etc.
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Originally Posted by arloiginla
I wasn't judging which doctrine turns people on and off being right or wrong. Rather, I simply said that one doctrine is more likely to win over unbelievers and therefore acting in love in todays society, than the other, which seems to be doing more harm than good.
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Fair enough, I just wanted to point out that there are Christians that would disagree with that.