In regards to salvation
Yes; once we receive Jesus we are saved.
No we don't lose this privilage. But it is not that if we sin we don''t lose salvation, it is that if you commit a crime then you never really accepted Christ and the only one that knows that is God who sees what is in our heart
How nice. I notice you state this without an "I think" or "I believe" in front of it, as if it were a fact. Am I to accept this on your authority, or on someone else's? If some other authority, then who would that be? Who decided that this odd collection of absurd writings was the "word of god"? Do you know? It was a bunch of superstitious, anonymous men (Roman Catholics) in the 4th century. They took a vote. It is freely acknowledged by Christian scholars that the voting was filled with political interests (rather than a "seeking after God's guidance.")
Some of the books they voted in have since been rejected by everyone but the Catholic church. So, most Christians would say that these men made mistakes in their all-important decision: they judged some books to be "God's word" which were not "God's word" at all. If they were wrong about this, then how could it be that "God's spirit" was directing them? If they were wrong about these books, how can we be so sure that they weren't wrong about the rest of them? Why would I trust the judgment of some anonymous 4th century Catholics whom all other Christians admit made mistakes in this very judgment?
After that very shaky foundation for "God's Word" we find the Roman Catholic Church gaining secular power, and thereby enforcing its beliefs via torture, excommunication, burning at the stake, and all those other wonderful things that their belief in the Bible encouraged them to commit. That is how the belief that the Bible was something special was spread and maintained.
After that, it had become entrenched in Western culture, and to question it was to beat one's head against centuries of tradition and vested interests. Today, many people are still reluctant to read the Bible for themselves and make up their own mind about its significance. I think most of them are unaware of its origins and what it actually says. In my own small way I have attempted to rectify this situation.
Now, about morality.
This is something we receive from a divine being, clearly not ourselves, which would be God or any God as to our knowledge allows.
If morals can only come from God, then how is it that atheists are moral? Does God impart morals to them in spite of their disbelief? If so, this "fact" does not lead to the conclusion that one should believe in God. It also does not explain how there ever could be immorality. Most Christians believe that humans are capable of both good and evil, and that God has granted them free will to do either. This would indicate that morals do not "come only from God".
Of course the believer will say that everything comes from God, so why even mention morals as if they were a special case?
I have witnessed Christians who have sincerely prayed for God's spirit and guidance, and then went off and did things which were immoral. Yet they regarded these things as morally okay based on the Bible (and, in fact, according to the Bible, they are okay).
If you take your god to be the creator, then what sort of moral lessons do we learn from his creation? Nature is red in tooth and claw. Why did he create carnivores, parasites, and viruses? What sort of morals would I have if I chose pain and death for others, when I could have spared them?
The Bible is certainly not a moral book on the whole. It promotes slavery, injustice, extortion, the killing of innocent animals just so a god can smell their burning flesh, the subservience of women, racial hatred, genocide, unquestioning obedience to authority…
The bible is meant to compile historical events, teachings, revelations, and inspire mankind to goodness.
It has inspired some (as have most books), but on the whole it has caused more than its share of wars, witch burnings, heretic burnings, loss of life through refusal of life-saving medical procedures, anti-Semitism, mind-control of the gullible, and on and on…
If, as a book, it contains tremendous violence it is only because mankind has been violent since Cain.
Yes, but few books are audacious enough to glory in the violence and justify it by saying god told them to do such things as: rip open pregnant women and drive swords through babies, and kill all the men, women, children, and animals while saving the virgins for themselves (see Numbers 31:15-18 and most of the rest of the Old Testament). If you can read such accounts and still call this a moral book, then please don't write to me ever again, as I don't want anything to do with such a person.
where do you think mankind derived from or was created?
Haven't you heard?
There was this god, walking about in his garden on earth for some reason... And instead of doing something useful like planting brussel sprouts, he started playing in the dirt. So, he took some dirt and blew on it, and it became a man, just like that!
That was only about noon, so he decided to have a little fun with this new man, and so he created all the animals and brought them all to the man (in that same day!) to see if he would mate with any of them. (God did not know what any modern-day anti-evolutionist Christian could've told him: that species only propagate with their own kind.) Well, luckily for women, it turned out that the man didn't go for that kinky sort of stuff. So, that same day, this god made the man go to sleep, and then he ripped out one of his ribs and made a woman out of it!
Then, well -- you know, they figured out the mating thing -- they had a couple of sons, and eventually some daughters, and then a whole lot of incest occurred...and there you have it: humankind! Any sensible person knows that.
Or, then again, maybe we evolved.
:-)
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