AlmightyZenTaco Tries to Save The ShanMonster
This one's different from the others. This is the first time someone tried to save me via ICQ, although it's certainly not the first time I've had conversations with interesting people on ICQ. The conversation order is a bit munged-up, but that's what happens when two people are having multiple conversation threads concurrently. I'm sure you can figure it out. Enjoy!
AlmightyZenTaco: You might think this is weird, but I don't care. I beg you with all of my heart and soul, give your life to Jesus. He's the only way to be happy and make it out of here alive. Don't make the same mistake as I did. And don't think you're in too deep, he can forgive you still.
The ShanMonster: I already did, but I'm feeling better now.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, I'm not kidding. Don't take it lightly.
The ShanMonster: I'm not kidding either.
AlmightyZenTaco: You gave your life to Christ?
The ShanMonster: Sure. I wanted to be a missionary.
AlmightyZenTaco: That's good. I accidentilly kicked him out of my life. Don't ask how, it's a long story. But, I'm condemned to die without God. If you ever feel yourself slipping, get on your knees. That's all I can say.
The ShanMonster: I don't think it's much of a condemnation. Everyone dies.
AlmightyZenTaco: Yes. Everyone dies. But not like this.
The ShanMonster: Not everyone dies without God? Ok, presuming you're talking about the Biblical deity, most folks die without belief in him. After all, the majority of the world's population is neither Christian nor Jewish nor Muslim. There are an awful lot of Asians out there without the fear of YHWH, and something tells me the "Zen" part of your alias means you have at least a passing familiarity with this fact.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, forget all that hooplah. Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven. I've tasted both sides, and If I had a way to get back to him, I'd take it in a second.
And if someone truly seeks, He'll show them the way. why do you think their are christians even there? But anyway, I don't care to argue.
Just examine your heart and try not to make the mistake I have. Oh, and thanks for the laughs. You picked me up on a very bad day.
The ShanMonster: Glad to oblige, but I fear you're all worked up about nothing.
AlmightyZenTaco: If only I were. :)
The ShanMonster: I shave my legs with Occam's razor. The way I figure, neither the existence nor the nonexistence of a higher power is proveable, so it's not worth worrying about.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, how's this for proof. When I was a child, I fell down a flight of stairs. Right before my head hit split itself open on the floor, a dogfood bag flew fifteen feet by itself and stoped between my head and the floor. God saved my life. For what, I don't know.
Anyway, it's between you and God. I just wanted to let you know.
The ShanMonster: That's not proof of God's existence. How do you know it wasn't an itinerant demon out to save you for a life of evil-doing?
AlmightyZenTaco: Hehe. It very well could have been. It is proof that there is more to this world than meets the eye though. Just be sure you know what you're doing with your eternity. It never ends.
The ShanMonster: The way I figure, my eternity will be spent as various dissipated molecules.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, we can only hope.
The ShanMonster: I dunno. It doesn't sound terribly exciting, to me.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, it's gotta be better than the whole fire and brimstone bit.
The ShanMonster: I'm not sure what sounds worse: eternity on fire or eternity strumming a harp. I don't particularly like harps, so I'm fairly certain I would get bored of playing one after about a half hour.
I think I'll stick with dissipated atoms.
AlmightyZenTaco: Psh. Harps? Who told you that?
The ShanMonster: Harps are the heaven cliché. That and halos and cloud-sitting and white robes and itty bitty wings.
AlmightyZenTaco: The worst part about hell is that you're cut off from God eternally. That doesn't mean much to you realize God is everything that is good. Everything worthwhile you have ever experienced. And that means away from church. Like emotions, the closeness of a friend, your favorite song. Even your ability to feel . All a gift from God. No God, no nothing.
The ShanMonster: If someone ever came up to me and said, "Be my friend or I'll hit you," I would not want to be that person's friend. And, I certainly would not consider that person to be goodness embodied.
AlmightyZenTaco: Yeah. But that's a big load of crap. God is everything good. Not everything lame. Everything lame would be lumped in the non god section.
The ShanMonster: And where did everything lame originate?
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, it just is. Part of the curse of a sinful world I suppose. A corruption of good things.
The ShanMonster: And who corrupted it?
AlmightyZenTaco: Just look at it like this. Think of the deepest truest desire of your heart. The deep ones. Not the let's get rich and buy a porche desires. Those desires would be a good picture of God.
And we did. By sinning. God made the world, God made us, God gave the world to us, and we sinned, corrupting ourselves and the world.
The ShanMonster: How did we sin?
AlmightyZenTaco: Ever read Genesis? I know you know the story.
The ShanMonster: Yes, and it's illogical, although fascinating mythology.
AlmightyZenTaco: I see how you can say it's unlikely. But not illogical. If God exists, it's a perfectly viable explanation to how man fell and to why the world is the way it is.
The ShanMonster: Ok, here's my take on it. God created Eden and the tree of knowledge of good and bad. He plunked Adam and Eve in it, and said, "Don't eat from the tree of knowledge."
Since neither Adam nor Eve had knowledge of good or bad, how could they have known disobeying God was bad?
God set them up.
AlmightyZenTaco: To be honest with you, I've thought the exact same thing. It does seem like a setup. But, regardless, it doesn't make it any less true.
The ShanMonster: No, it doesn't make it any less true, or any less false.
AlmightyZenTaco: But they knew that they shouldn't eat of it, or they would die. Maybe God just wanted to see who they would choose.
And, you have to admit. Even if he knew what they would choose, He still made a way for everyone to get out of it. Again, another way to let people choose.
The ShanMonster: No, they didn't know they shouldn't eat it. Without knowledge of badness, they couldn't be held any more accountable than a baby who shits its diapers.
AlmightyZenTaco: Not so. They knew they weren't supposed to eat of it. They didn't need to know it was evil. They just needed to know "Hey, God said not to do it, maybe we shouldn't"
What fun is it making creatures that are equal with you in the ability to choose, and then give them nothing to choose?
The ShanMonster: And why would they ever consider not doing it? If you tell a newborn baby not to do something, and it does it, are you going to ban that baby to hell? God did just that.
AlmightyZenTaco: Babies aren't post adolecent cognitive beings. They are the equivilant of a very complex human sponge. They just sit there and soak things up.
The ShanMonster: Sure, he made a way for people to get out of it. He caused a few disasters, terrorized his chosen people, turned those same people into marauders, and then had his son murdered needlessly.
AlmightyZenTaco: I don't see how having Jesus die is needless. That's kinda the whole point here. And, is the story is true, He and His Son are one and the same.
The ShanMonster: It seems like an awfully inefficient way to create a means for salvation. If that's the only way he could figure it out, he's either sadistic/masochistic or not very bright at all. An adult without knowledge of good or evil would be equivalent. Actually, I think they would be by nature sociopathic.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, what if God is? What if He is what He is, and that's all He can be? And He is perfect. And perfection demands blood for sin. If someone sins, they have to die. If that's the only way, it's the only way. Pretty or not.
The ShanMonster: Perfection demands blood? That's pretty twisted.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, if that's the actual cost of a deed, then that's the cost.
The ShanMonster: And who put the fruit there? Naughty God. Tsk tsk....
AlmightyZenTaco: You can't just go around ignoring what's real. If I go into space without a spacesuit the laws of physics are going to turn my intestines into a very nasty looking epidermus.
Once again, back to the point about wanting them to choose.
The ShanMonster: Admittedly, the biblical God has a total hard-on for blood. He dissed Cain because he offered veggies and chose Abel because he offered dead critters, and then he got Jepthah to sacrifice his daughter.
It seems to me there isn't much of a choice there. It would just be a matter of time before simple curiosity made them check out that tree.
AlmightyZenTaco: Jepthah? I've never heard of that story. Tell me about it.
And yes. I agree about the tree thing. Still, even if God is as you say, I'd prefer to be in His graces any day. He's responsible for a hell of a lot of good, I wouldn't want to pass up.
The ShanMonster: I don't think it's very good if it's "do what I say or I'll make sure you're tortured forever". That's evilness embodied.
It's basically the sad version of Abraham and Isaac. Jephthah--a single father of one daughter--said he would sacrifice the first living creature that came up to him upon his return home. Surprise, surprise, but it was his daughter. So he offed her for God, without divine intervention.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, alot of things happen without divine intervention. It's not God's world anymore. It's ours. And we sold it into death. God doesn't have to help. I'm not even sure if He can without the use of beings who have a right to be here. Aka angels and people.
The ShanMonster: What about divine intervention in order to kill? During one of the Israelites many peregrinations, the most holy of holies began to tip over. A nearby man reached to stabilize it, and was instantly zotted by God.
AlmightyZenTaco: It wasn't a judgement,. Again, it's a question of laws of reality. If a sinful creature can't get near God without dying. He touched it, He died.
The ShanMonster: Ok, so what about the time when all the Israelites had to eat was manna, and they were getting pretty tired of it, considering it was the only thing they'd eaten for forty years. God sent a flock of quail. Many people gave thanks to God, chowed down on the quail, and then died horribly. God had poisoned the quail because the people had had the temerity to complain about his cooking.
AlmightyZenTaco: Basically, in the old testament, you don't have any true forgiveness from sin. Everything God does apart from chopping you down where you stand can be costituted as mercy.
The ShanMonster: And that is why I cannot believe the biblical God is good.
AlmightyZenTaco: It's harsh. But He's God.
I know where this is going. I've thought all the same things as you. But isnt' there some part of you that just really can't shake it. So you try to argue it away? I know it was the same with me.
Well, Good or not, He gave you a way not to die. I recommend taking it.
The ShanMonster: Nope. Not at all. I did my research for many years, found the existence of deities to be unproveable, so considered it unworthy of serious thought. I don't believe God gave me a way not to die any more than Santa Claus did.
AlmightyZenTaco: Well, nothing in life is provable. Not even you're own existence. You just know what you know. Everything is on faith if you think about it.
The ShanMonster: Not really. Cogito ergo sum.
AlmightyZenTaco: If you say so.
Thaks for the conversation, it's been fun. :)
The ShanMonster: No problem!
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