{"id":62,"date":"2011-07-13T19:15:00","date_gmt":"2011-07-13T19:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2011\/07\/turing-christian-answer-11\/"},"modified":"2012-10-26T15:31:50","modified_gmt":"2012-10-26T19:31:50","slug":"turing-christian-answer-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2011\/07\/turing-christian-answer-11.html","title":{"rendered":"[Turing] Christian Answer 11"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><div class=\"separator\" style=\"clear: both; text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-I_O3eLd6qcc\/Thps9t8iwDI\/AAAAAAAABgU\/ULhOPu61KT8\/s1600\/turing+mask+christian.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-I_O3eLd6qcc\/Thps9t8iwDI\/AAAAAAAABgU\/ULhOPu61KT8\/s320\/turing+mask+christian.jpg\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" width=\"320\" height=\"300\"><\/a><\/div>\n<p><em>This post is part of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/ideological-turing-test-contest\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\">Ideological Turing Test Challenge<\/a>. Go to the tab above for an overview and remind yourself of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.unequally-yoked.com\/2011\/07\/turing-test-begins.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">voting<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.unequally-yoked.com\/2011\/07\/turing-comment-policy-reminder.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">commenting guidelines<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\">What is your best reason for being a Christian?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>My best reason for being (or should I say staying) a Christian is the changes I see in my life as a result of it. I know what kind of person I can be, I\u2019m self absorbed, judgmental, vain, lazy, indifferent, amongst other things. But when I turn my sights away from myself and focus it on Jesus Christ, I change. Lots of people get it confused, they think that Christianity is a bunch of rules you\u2019re supposed to follow and that they will somehow magically lead you to happiness, but that\u2019s absolutely not what it\u2019s about. It\u2019s about forming a relationship with Christ and letting him change you into who you were meant to be. As that happens, your character changes, you find happiness, and you no longer have to \u201ctry\u201d to follow any rules, you just start living that way. In my case, I find myself less and less self-absorbed, judgmental, etc, and more patient, loving, kind, etc. The change in my life that Christ makes is my best reason for being a Christian.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\">What evidence or experience (if any) would cause you to stop believing in God?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Nothing. Call it a \u201clogical blind spot\u201d if you will, but when you think about Christianity, the story is not supposed to be logical. What\u2019s \u201clogical\u201d about the creator of the universe becoming human and dying a criminal\u2019s death so humans, who turned away from Him in the first place, could spend eternity with Him? Nothing. There is absolutely nothing logical about that. But God does not operate based on human logic, He operates based on love. And I will choose God\u2019s love in my life over human logic everyday of the week.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\">Why do you believe Christianity has a stronger claim to truth than other religions\/On what basis do you reject the truth claims of other traditions and denominations but accept your own?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Look around. Look at the world we live in. I am sure everyone reading has at some point come to the realization that this isn\u2019t how it\u2019s supposed to be. Where Christianity deviates is that we accept that we have contributed to the state of the world and can\u2019t fix it. Heck, we can\u2019t even fix ourselves. Instead we turn to God, who willingly stoops down to lift us up to Him. It\u2019s not about being perfect, it\u2019s about admitting we aren\u2019t perfect and can\u2019t do it on our own, but God, out of His unending love for us, has come down to help us. For me, that truth is what sets the Christian God apart from all others. As for other denominations, I don\u2019t think there is one particular one that is \u201cright\u201d and all the others are \u201cwrong\u201d, I think different denominations within the Christian faith exist to suit different types of people and different purposes. The Bible says is Church is a body, each composing different parts of it. They are supposed to be different to a certain degree, just like the members inside of it. I think everyone of them can bring something important to the table and to the Body of Christ.<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\">How do you read the Bible?  Do you study the history of its translations?  How do you decide which translations\/versions\/books are the true Bible?  How does it guide you if you have a moral or theological dilemma?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I usually try and read the Bible with a study guide to give me a historical background so I have greater understanding of what I\u2019m reading and how it is supposed to be read. Usually the study guide will reference the original language so it comes pretty close to conveying the correct meaning of the passage. Considering how different out culture is from the original audience of the intended books or letters, I think this is an integral part of learning the Bible. Most of my questions are more theological than moral for me, and I would start by looking up passages relevant to my question, and understanding as well the context in which those passages were written. Anyone can whip a verse of of the Bible and use to \u201cprove\u201d their \u201cpoint\u201d, but there\u2019s a lot more to understanding a passage than that. Not every answer I have considering certain passages and their understandings have been answered, and that\u2019s okay. For me, wondering what Paul meant when he wrote Romans 2 or whether someone who turned away from Christ was ever a \u201ctrue\u201d Christian in the first place, just simply aren\u2019t big enough  questions for me to turn way from my belief in Jesus Christ. It doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019ll stop searching for the answers, it just means they are in no way an impediment to the gospel for me.<\/p>\n<p><em>Voting opens Friday afternoon<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"blogger-post-footer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/4256452356987023523-538030499752639157?l=www.unequally-yoked.com\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\"><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post is part of the Ideological Turing Test Challenge. Go to the tab above for an overview and remind yourself of the voting and commenting guidelines. What is your best reason for being a Christian? My best reason for being (or should I say staying) a Christian is the changes I see in my [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[169,168],"class_list":["post-62","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ideologicalturingtest","tag-christian-turing-answers-2011","tag-turing-answers-2011"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>[Turing] Christian Answer 11<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This post is part of the Ideological Turing Test Challenge. 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