From: mlee@post.RoyalRoads.ca (Malcolm Lee)
Subject: Re: THE MIND OF THE BIBLE BELIEVER
Organization: Royal Roads Military College, Victoria, B.C.
Distribution: world,public
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 17:59:54 GMT


In article <98c=p8_@engin.umich.edu>, ingles@engin.umich.edu (Ray Ingles) writes:
|> In article <1993Jan5.223146.29327@ra.royalroads.ca> mlee@post.RoyalRoads.ca (Malcolm Lee) writes:
|> >
|> >But we can have eternal life and the knowledge of good and evil.
|> 
|>  Sure, god has done it for all time. So why not make more gods? But
|> anyway...
|> 
|> >Sure, when God placed the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil in the Garden, HE
|> >knew that the people would partake of it and be condemned to death as well as 
|> >all the generations that followed them.  GOD knew this!  
|> 
|>  So God took responsibility for the pain and suffering involved, right?
|> 
|> >   That is why He provided a plan for salvation through His one and only Son,
|> 
|>  (Say, why *is* there "one and only" one Son? Why not a couple of Daughters?
|> Maybe a Nephew or two? What I'm jocularly getting at is the "Why not make
|> lots of perfect beings from the start?" question posed above.)
|> 
|> >Jesus Christ.  We are living in the age of grace whereby we may be saved IF we
|> >choose to follow Jesus.  There's nothing more to it than that.  
|> >    Maybe I'm being too simplistic.  I don't post too often but I am a firm
|> >believer and I just couldn't stand by silent in admidst this debate.  I don't
|> >mean to flame anyone.  After all, Jesus came into this world to save not to
|> >condemn.  And in His likeness, I would not do the same.
|> >    I welcome your response.
|> 
|>  Here's my problem with the whole idea. Let's assume that eating fruit will
|> corrupt people, or at least doing it against orders will. (Yes, I know this
|> may not be *literally* eating fruit, but hey..)
|>  Now...
|>  1) *I* didn't eat any "fruit of knowledge of good and evil." I just had a
|> banana, but I don't think that counts. Am I being held responsible for
|> something I didn't do? What about Deuteronomy 24:16... "Fathers shall 
|> not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for
|> their fathers; each is to die for his own sin." I refuse to take
|> responsibility for an action that I could not prevent.
|>  2) Okay, maybe the act of eating the fruit, through some kind of "spiritual
|> genetics," made the decendants corrupt, too. But... god must have set up
|> the laws regarding that. Why make a whole *race* fallen if one falls?
|> How about starting off each kid from scratch? It happened in the cases of
|> Adam, Eve, and maybe even Mary if certain circles are given credence.
|> Why not do it for everyone and give each person the choice about rebelling
|> or not?
|> 
|> 
|> Sincerely,
|> 
|> Ray Ingles                  || The above opinions are probably
|>                             || not those of the University of
|> ingles@engin.umich.edu      || Michigan. Yet.

Okay.
I'll try to explain this as best I understand it.  Only He knows for sure.
When A&E ate the fruit from the Tree, the entire human race became aware of good
and evil.  But we are not born into this world with sin, but it is inevitable
that we will sin.  It is a part of our nature.  When a baby comes into this
world, he is without sin.  But, the moment he sins, he becomes a sinner.  And he
will sin because it is part of his inherent human nature.  So, in a sense, each
kid does start off with a clean slate but it will eventually become tainted by
sin.  

The only kid who made it to adulthood WITHOUT sinning is Jesus Christ, the one and
only Son.  The reason that there is only one truly begotten Son of God is because
He is God.  I'm not going to get into arguements about the Trinity because that
is a separate, very involved topic of its own accord.  No one fully understands
the true nature of God and it is not our purpose to do so anyways.  Who cares
how many angels can dance on the head of pin?  Is Jesus Christ your personal Lord
and Saviour?  That is what really matters.

God loves, Man kills.
Newsgroups: alt.atheism,talk.religion.misc