They will be forced to listen to quotes from Witnesses until they capitulate, or suffer the consequences apparently.

I was just wondering if it was true that everyone who isn't a Jehovah's Witness will be made permanently dead when the end times arrive rather than sent to hell. Seems like a good deal to me.

I'd rather follow my Christian beliefs that if I believe in the Jesus Christ as my Saviour I can go to heaven with no limit on numbers of people who can go.

If you are asking about God’s coming war of Armageddon, only those who are obedient to God and Christ Jesus’ will survive that war.

A most important word in the above sentence being the word ‘obedient.’

There are billions of people not paying a bit of attention to Jehovah God and Christ Jesus, let alone being obedient to their commands. There are even billions that profess to be Christians who don’t obey their commands. I'll give you ‘one’ example of their disobedience.

At Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus says to his disciples, “All authority has been given me in heaven and on the earth. 19Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, 20teaching them to observe all the things I have commanded YOU.

Jesus first makes the statement he has been given all authority. Following right after that statement he gives a command, “Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations.” Thus this isn’t an option for those who wish to become Christians. It’s just as much a commandment for Christians as the Ten Commandments were to Moses and the Israelites.

In the last part of verse 20 Jesus instructs his disciples to teach the new disciples “to observe all the things I have commanded YOU.”

Teaching the new disciples everything would include the new disciples being taught to make more disciples. And then those new disciples would have to go and make even more new disciples, etc. This means all who profess to be Christians are commanded to go and make more Christians.

How did Jesus’ disciples “go and make more disciples?” The Bible shows Jesus sent his disciples out to preach house to house.

(Mark 6:7,10-11) Now he (Jesus) summoned the twelve, and he initiated sending them out two by two . . . 10 Further, he said to them: “Wherever YOU enter into a home, stay there until YOU go out of that place. 11 And wherever a place will not receive YOU nor hear YOU, on going out from there shake off the dirt that is beneath YOUR feet for a witness to them.”

(Acts 5:42) And every day in the temple and from house to house they continued without letup teaching and declaring the good news about the Christ, Jesus.

Jehovah’s Witnesses are well known for going from house to house and teaching people, however how many other denominations that profess themselves to be Christian obey Jesus’ command to “go and make more disciples, and do it house to house?”

Yes Mormons do this, but only the males, and only for two years. However Jesus command was for all his disciples to make more disciples, and that includes women. Also as Acts 5:42 above says, his disciples did this everyday without letup not just for two years.

So what happens to professed Christians that aren’t obeying Christ’s commands?

Jesus says at Matthew 7:21-23, “Not everyone saying to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of the heavens, but the one doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens will. 22 Many will say to me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and expel demons in your name, and perform many powerful works in your name?’ 23 And yet then I will confess to them: I never knew YOU! Get away from me, YOU workers of lawlessness.”

(Luke 6:46-49) 46 “Why, then, do YOU call me ‘Lord! Lord!’ but do not do the things I say? 47 Everyone that comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show YOU whom he is like: 48 He is like a man building a house, who dug and went down deep and laid a foundation upon the rock-mass. Consequently, when a flood arose, the river dashed against that house, but was not strong enough to shake it, because of its being well built. 49 On the other hand, he who hears and does not do, is like a man who built a house upon the ground without a foundation. Against it the river dashed, and immediately it collapsed, and the ruin of that house became great.”

Notice that not everyone saying “Lord, Lord,” to Jesus is approved by him even though they do powerful works in his name. Those calling him ‘Lord’ would be those thinking they are Christians. However, he asks them, “Why, then, do YOU call me ‘Lord! Lord!’ but do not do the things I say?” Then he concludes saying, “I never knew YOU! Get away from me, YOU workers of lawlessness.”

The Bible thus shows those not doing what Jesus commanded are looked at just like lawless people. And all lawless people will die at Armageddon.

James 1:22 warns Christians, “However, become doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves with false reasoning.”

Back to your question,

I’ve answered what will happen to disobedient people at Armageddon. (That would of course include Jehovah’s Witnesses that prove disobedient at that time.)

However it’s not just Jehovah’s Witnesses that will have the opportunity to live forever. For example there are people that have lived and died and never even heard of Jehovah God or his son Christ Jesus. Such ones never had an opportunity to prove they would be obedient. These too will be given the opportunity to live forever.

At John 5:26-29, Jesus says, 26For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted also to the Son to have life in himself. 27And he has given him authority to do judging, because Son of man he is. 28Do not marvel at this, because the hour is coming in which all those in the memorial tombs will hear his voice 29and come out, those who did good things to a resurrection of life, those who practiced vile things to a resurrection of judgment.

Here we see that Jesus has been given authority to resurrect those in the memorial tombs. As verse 29 says, those who did good things to a resurrection of life, those who practiced vile things to a resurrection of judgment.

What does a resurrection to Judgement mean? It means those who formally practiced vile things will be resurrected to the earth and given instructions on what is required of them to be obedient. Then they will be judged on their obedience just as people today are being judged.

The Bible shows that everyone will be given the chance to be obedient to God and his son as thus have the chance to live forever.

As 1 John 2:17 says, “Furthermore, the world is passing away and so is its desire, but he that does the will of God remains forever.”

There are lots of ways of proclaiming the gospel, not just going from house to house, knocking on doors. I prefer to evangelise by helping/leading at a children's Holiday Bible Club, helping with Easter and Christmas presentations at church to the local school children and helping with LifePath (guiding a group of children around different workshops). LifePath looks at well-known Christians, usually dead, learning how God worked in their lives and how the children can relate the LifePath of the Christian to their own lives. In the UK, where I live these happen all over the country. I help at Olney, looking at John Newton's story and Elstow, near Bedford, looking at John Bunyan, the author of Pilgrim's Progress.

At the church I attend we have recently had an influx of young families. We're not door-knocking so we must be doing something right for God.

@ Will Galen: Not feeling like getting into a debate about JW theology. What you've said isn't jiving with what I've read over the years...but then I haven't read in a long time. Mostly because I really don't care anymore. So maybe things in JW Land have changed. But I will say that I find it difficult to respect a system of beliefs that has to change, fundamentally, because it's been proven wrong all the time. Like, how many times has the Watchtower said "Hey, Armageddon will happen on such-and-such a date!"? And how many times have they been right?

Uh-huh. If they can't get simple dates right, then frankly, I'm not going to worry about the other numbers that they focus on, either, much less anything else that they proclaim to be "The Truth." Particularly not when they base it so much on Revelations, which is pretty much all one person's vision, possibly prophetic...or possibly simply delirious.

So, all I will say beyond that is that many of the beefs I have against JW-ism are exactly the same as those that I have against "standard" Christianity: Too many people dictating the "Truth," not enough addressing and listening to God. Too much hierarchy putting out publications and proclamations that people happily swallow, not enough self-motivation to learn the real Truth for oneself. Too much reading of Bibles, not enough listening to God. For the JW's, it's Elders and the Watchtower and the NWT, all of them people or the product of people. Flawed, agenda-filled people. Sorry, not interested. Not in JW-ism...and not in "standard" Christianity, either.

For the record, as a Christian (albeit a heretical one, obviously), I believe that the Bible -- any Bible, whatever translation you happen to cling to for whatever reason -- is fatally flawed. And it's not because of translation, but simply because of the FACT that it was written and then compiled and edited by a committee of human beings. And that committee had an agenda. So from the outset, PEOPLE decided what would be in the Bible and what wouldn't be. Any books that said something that didn't agree with the agenda became either heretical or apocryphal, completely at the discretion of the committee of, I repeat, flawed, fallible humans.

Thus, you lose, say, the story of Lilith, Adam's first wife who was replaced by the far more docile Eve. That deletion helped to keep women confined to a lesser status than men -- which I'm sure was intentional because that story fit with what the committee already thought of women. And thus, the New Testament becomes All About Paul the Ex-Pharisee. Yay. :/ So, really, translational errors are but a drop in the bucket, and I frankly don't care how good the NWT's translators were at Greek or how good (or bad) any Biblical translator was at any particular language. It doesn't matter because the whole thing as it was originally put together is...Yeah.

"Word of God?" Not. SO not.

In short, if you want to know God, it's very simple: Open your mind and talk to Him, and He WILL instruct you. You don't need a Bible. You don't need a Watchtower. You don't even need a "church." You don't even need the ability to read, for heaven's sake. You don't need ANYTHING but so-called "ears to hear" and a heart and mind open and willing to being changed. It's very, very simple.

On the other hand, if you don't want to know God, then simply go about your merry way and do whatever it is you do. Get involved in whatever religion (or un-religion) you like. Nothing that you will consider awful will happen to you.

As for evangelizing: Like karen_lorraine said, there are many ways to do it. Knocking on doors tends to antagonize more than anything, but if that's what you want...Hey, go for it. I simply prefer to live my life, and when people ask me why I'm, for instance, so content and so dang happy and not-angry all the time...I tell them. Works for me. Works for the members of my "church," which isn't a church so much as a travelling home fellowship, pretty much all of us having been burned by various more fundamental churches because we simply found that we didn't agree with the BS they were spewing and ended up being ostracized and sometimes publically shamed. (Like, with anti-gay graffiti painted all over one's house, since many of our group are gay.) We've got a few ex-JWs in our group sprinkled amongst the ex-Pentecostals, the ex-Baptists, the ex-nondenoms, a few ex-Catholics, etc.

Is what you are stating really a good deal?

Let’s look into what the scripture say about death.

Genesis 2:7 says, “And Jehovah God proceeded to form the man out of dust from the ground and to blow into his nostrils the breath of life, (spirit) and the man came to be a living soul.”

After Adam disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit, God told Adam, “In the sweat of your face you will eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken. For dust you are and to dust you will return.” (Genesis 3:19)

Here we see that God created Adam from dust. Then after Adam disobeyed God he was told he would return there.

Another scripture Ecclesiastes 12:7 adds more information, saying of mankind, “Then the dust returns to the earth just as it happened to be and the spirit returns to the true God who gave it.”

So the Bible shows that mankind is made up of two things. A body that is formed from the dust of the ground. And a spirit that God gives us that upon our death returns to him. So in effect, when we die we go back to the same condition we were in before we were born.

Other scriptures say much the same thing, Ecclesiastes 9:5 says, For the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all . . .”
How plain is that? The Bible is quite clear that the dead, “are conscious of nothing at all.” In other words the Bible is again indicating that the dead are in same condition they were in before they were born.

Psalm 146:3, 4 says, Do not put YOUR trust in nobles, Nor in the son of earthling man, to whom no salvation belongs. 4 His spirit goes out, he goes back to his ground; In that day his thoughts do perish.

Here again we see that when a person’s spirit leaves him, his thoughts perish. So, over and over the Bible shows that death is the opposite of life. Again, the Bible says a dead person goes back to the ground and their thoughts perish, they are conscious of nothing at all, and their spirit goes back to God.

Question. Since our body’s return to the dust, and our spirit returns to God, how can we then be thrown into a hell fire of eternal torment like a lot of people believe?

Could it be that a person’s soul is what is eternally tormented? The answer to that is no.

Remember Genesis 2:7 above says, “And Jehovah God proceeded to form the man out of dust from the ground and to blow into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man came to be a living soul.”

That scripture shows the soul is made up of two things. Dust from the ground and the breath of live, meaning the spirit God gives. This is shown clearly by the Amplified Bible which puts Genesis 2:7 this way, “Then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath or spirit of life, and man became a living being.”

In the Bible, the words translated “spirit” basically mean “breath.” But this implies much more than the act of breathing. The Bible writer James, for example, states: “The body without spirit is dead.” (James 2:26) Hence, spirit is that which animates the body.

So to summerize, the Bible shows that our souls are made up of body and spirit.
At death our bodies return to dust, and our spirit returns to God. We are no longer conscious of anything, being in the same conscious state we were in before we were born.

We can see from what the Bible says about death that a hell fire as taught by many religions would be irrelevant. There’s nothing that survives at a persons death that could be thrown into a fiery hell to be eternally tortured. That’s if their were a fiery hell, there’s not.

If there were a hell fire God would have had to create it. But what was God’s view when the Israelites, following the example of peoples who lived nearby, began to burn their children in fire? He explains in his Word: “They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, in order to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, a thing that I had not commanded and that had not come up into my heart.” — Jeremiah 7:31.
Think about this. The Bible says, “God is love.” (1John 4:8) Would a loving God really torment people forever? Would you do so? If the idea of roasting people in fire had never come into God’s heart, does it seem reasonable that he created a fiery hell to make people suffer forever?

The hell fire that many believe in is not taught in the Bible. If you want to know more of what the Bible says about Hell, go to Jehovah’s Witnesses official web site. There’s several articles about hell on the page I directed you to.
http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/s/r1/lp-e?q=what+is+hell&p=par

Back to your question.



Hell as correctly translated and used in the Bible is another term for the place of the dead. The Bible shows that good people as well as bad go there. For example consider the case of Jonah. When God had a big fish swallow Jonah to save him from drowning, Jonah prayed from the fish’s belly: “Out of my distress I called out to Jehovah, and he proceeded to answer me. Out of the belly of Sheol [hell, King James Version and Douay Version (2:3)] I cried for help. You heard my voice.”— Jonah 2:2.
What did Jonah mean by “out of the belly of hell” Well, that fish’s belly was surely not a place of fiery torment. But it could have become Jonah’s grave. In fact, Jesus Christ said regarding himself: “Just as Jonah was in the belly of the huge fish three days and three nights, so the Son of man will be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights.”—Matthew 12:40.
Jesus was dead and in his grave for three days. But the Bible reports: “His soul was not left in hell . . . This Jesus hath God raised up.” (Acts 2:31, 32, King James Version)

Similarly, by God’s direction Jonah was raised from hell, that is, from what would have been his grave. This happened when the fish vomited him out onto dry land. Yes, people can get out of hell! In fact, the heartwarming promise is that hell is to be emptied of all its dead. This can be seen by reading Revelation 20:13, which says: “The sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.” — King James Version.

We see from the Bible that hell will give up the dead in it, so hell is just a place of the dead. Knowing that hell is just a place of the dead, and that you can get out of hell. It would be much preferable to be sent to hell than to be made permanently dead.

However, everyone that dies in God’s War of Armageddon will remain dead. This is so because God’s War of Armageddon is to get rid of everyone that doesn’t put faith in him and obey him.

So, does it still seem like a good deal to die at Armageddon and never live again? Or would it be a far better deal to live forever as billions of your fellow mankind are destined to do?

Everyone does have that choice, however they have to obey God and his son Christ Jesus and follow their instructions. Jesus said at John 17:3 . . .”This means everlasting life, their taking in knowledge of you, the only true God, and of the one whom you sent forth, Jesus Christ.”

Of course after we get that knowledge we have to apply it to our lives and share what we learn with others. The reason God wants us to share this knowledge is because he does not desire any to be destroyed.

2 Peter 3:9,10 says, . . .However, let this one fact not be escaping YOUR notice, beloved ones, . . . 9Jehovah is not slow respecting his promise, as some people consider slowness, but he is patient with YOU because he does not desire any to be destroyed but desires all to attain to repentance. 10 Yet Jehovah’ s day will come . . .”

What you are doing is very good. Helping others is part of being a good Christian. However, notice what the dictionary says about evangelizing.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/evangelise
evangelize [ih-van-juh-lahyz]
1. to preach the gospel to.
2. to convert to Christianity.
3. to preach the gospel; act as an evangelist.

We see the dictionary says an evangelist is someone who preaches and converts others to Christianity.

Matthew 28:18-20 shows this is what all of Jesus’ disciples are required to do. In verse 18, Jesus says to his disciples, “All authority has been given me in heaven and on the earth. Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, teaching them to observe all the things I have commanded YOU.

Jesus having all authority and giving the command, “Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations,” isn’t something we can decide we don’t want to do in favor of doing something else.

For example, say when you were 18 you wanted to make $100. The man across the street hears about it and says.”I have a shed that needs painting. I’ll give you $100 to paint it.” So you agree to do it the next Saturday.

That Saturday you go across the street bright and early and the man has the paint sitting on his back porch. He hands you a brush and then takes you to the shed he wants painted. He then leaves.

You carry the paint over to the shed and prepare to go to work. However there’s a shed next to it is in much worse condition so you decide to paint it instead.

When the man comes home, you tell him, “I painted the other shed because it needed paint more than the shed you showed me.”

The man is very unhappy with you. He says, “Why didn’t you do what I told you to do? The shed you painted is in such bad condition I plan on tearing it down. I’m not giving you a $100 for doing something I didn’t want or need done. You’ve wasted my paint and your time.”

Likewise Jesus says at Luke 6:46, “Why, then, do YOU call me ‘Lord! Lord!’ but do not do the things I say?

And at Matthew 7:21-23, he says, “Not everyone saying to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of the heavens, but the one doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens will. 22 Many will say to me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and expel demons in your name, and perform many powerful works in your name?’ 23 And yet then I will confess to them: I never knew YOU! Get away from me, YOU workers of lawlessness.”

According to the above scriptures someone who doesn’t obey Jesus’ commands isn’t even a true Christian. He doesn’t claim them as his followers, instead he says he never knew the ones not obeying him, and calls them ‘workers of lawlessness.’



(Mark 6:7,10) Now he (Jesus) summoned the twelve, and he initiated sending them out two by two . . .”

(Acts 5:42) And every day in the temple and from house to house they continued without letup teaching and declaring the good news about the Christ, Jesus.

As shown by the scriptures, Jesus sent his disciples out to do house to house evangelizing, and later he commanded them to make more disciples and teach them everything he had taught them. Thus evangelizing isn't optional, it's a necessity for those who call themselves Christians.

James 1:22, (NOG) 22 Do what God’s word says. Don’t merely listen to it, or you will fool yourselves.

I think I prefer sowing seeds that reap harvest in the future, to putting people off by evangelising in the way you (Will Galen) are suggesting, door knocking house to house. There is a place for this type of evangelism, but also a place to show people the love of God by the way in which you behave and what you do.

This is going to be my last point on this subject as I refuse to argue with a Jehovah's Witness. I don't argue on the doorstep either, I simply state my beliefs and say goodbye politely.

Okay then, a last point. Nowhere did I suggest door knocking house to house as you put it.

Christ Jesus is the one that said to go 'house to house' which is what I pointed out.

If you don't want to do it you should pray to God and complain to him that his son is commanding you to evangelize in a way that you prefer not to do.

I always find it a little provoking when people say they "follow god's words to do good" or some such. I always find myself wondering if these people really aren't capable of thinking for themselves. Are they not capable of doing good things without someone telling them how to do it? Do they really need some imaginary god to do the thinking for them?

As for myself I don't listen to imaginary voices, but I do know that a smile and a "thank you" works whether or not you insist there's some one who tells you to be nice or not. It is MY choice to do good things. Not a god's choice. The only voice I listen to is my own conscience, and I don't pretend there's anyone else than me and myself and the environment and my upbringing behind that "voice". I have learned what is right and wrong through upbringing and experience. Sure, I don't always do the right things, but I don't pretend someone took the punishments for my own wrongdoings some 2000 years ago, nor do I think someone will do it. That's a lame excuse for doing bad things. Everyone do bad things once in a while, but everyone is capable of doing good things. Everyone!

If the reward of doing good things is getting to Heaven, then isn't doing good things is the most selfish thing you can do? Just a thought...

In any case, doing good is one part caring for one's conscience, and one part caring for one's self-preservation (and a little to preserve humans as a species). It also makes you feel good. If you do bad things it tends to damage one of these things, doesn't it? If you do something wrong, you usually either hurt the conscience to some degree, or you hurt the self-preservation. Avoiding doing bad things is the same. You don't get into fights because it can get you hurt. You don't steal from a shop because it can land you in jail. You follow traffic rules to avoid getting hurt but also to not end up in jail. Doing good things is the same. You hold open a door or smile to someone or say thank you because it makes you feel good. You give away money or items to poor people because it makes you feel good. It also helps preserve humans as a race, and give hopes that someone will help you one day if you are in the same situation, adding in self-preservation. Being nice and helping other people is a self-preservation technique humans have sort of mastered. Having a god in the picture isn't really necessary - and to be quite frank, it's even harmful. There would quite likely have been a lot fewer wars if religion didn't exist. Wars over resources and territories are understandable (animal survival instinct), but over religion? No. They only cause more misery.

Besides, I think it's a whole lot more powerful to be able to be nice if you don't insist there is a god behind you. If you pretend someone else tell you what to do all the time, it's not really you who are being nice, is it? It's technically not your action. And if it's not your action, you become some sort of a puppet. The bad thing is, that the puppeteer is not really God, but a regular human with various intentions that can be both good and bad. The "word of God" was written down by humans, with their own intentions and their own views on the world, and this colored their writing.

The so-called "word of God" is a collection of wars, God doing bad things and showing wrath, among other things making a man believe he has to kill his son to prove his loyality, and so on and so on. God even created sin, according to the Adam and Eve story. And then he let someone kill "his" son so that voila! Anyone who is a so-called sinner is forgiven! Tadah! There's so many things wrong with Christianity and Judaism and the rest of the religions, and even more wrong things with the Bible (and its companions in various other God-believing religions). Whether you take the writings in the books literally or as an unliteral "book of morality", it has been twisted so many times over the past few thousand years that I'm pretty sure it's hardly the same as the first draft.

As for door knocking, there's no point coming to my door. I get my fantasy books elsewhere, thank you very much. Besides. "everyone" has now heard of Christianity or , so evangelizing is no longer really needed.

Why do people have to knock on doors to evangelize in the first place? Why don't "God" find a better way to tell people "his word"? If I was a divine being I'd popped down for a visit in person, so 1: everyone would know I existed, 2: People would not be in doubt I existed, 3: everyone would finally have the same religion, so no more stupid wars over imaginary gods, and 4: Tell people how to share the the resources on the planet I'd made for them, because they were obviously too stupid to figure out how to do it on their own, and 5: pop down for occasional visits, so they wouldn't start doubting. If I insisted on evangelizing it through books, I'd rely the information to one single trusted scribe, oversee translations somehow, and update the whole thing at least every 50 or so years. I would also tell them to use their logical sense, and go about self-preservation a little better than now. And if people chose to not believe in me (even with the absolute poof), I'd not bother too much unless they were actually delusional.

Oh, and finally, I don't often quote books in everything I say (unlike many religious followers) because I prefer to use my own words, but when I do it's because the quotes make sense, and because I actually understand what they mean.

(and I really should stop trying to reason with very religious people, because I know my words usually just bounce off them like a ping-pong ball on an umbrella - but sometimes it's just too tempting. If this god of yours really did create free will for every person on Earth, I'm using my share of free will for everything it is worth!).

Will Galen, I have a hypothetical situation for you.

As far as I know, Witnesses believe that blood transfusions are forbidden according to Genesis 9:4, Leviticus 17:10, and Acts 15:29 and the Watchtower. Now, suppose you had crash-landed on a deserted island with two survivors: yourself and an agnostic. You are unharmed, but the agnostic has lost a lot of blood from injuries. The medical equipment surviving the crash includes sutures, so you're able to stop the bleeding. After the bleeding stops, you start witnessing to the agnostic, who seems interested in what you have to say, but is still unconvinced. You believe that with some more time, you can get a conversion. However, the agnostic is suffering the consequences of blood loss and is starting to lose lucidity. Rescue will not happen in time and your blood type is compatible with the agnostic's. The only way to save them is with a blood transfusion and there is some surviving equipment that will allow you to transfer your blood. If you do it, the agnostic will live and could become a Witness. If not, then the agnostic will die an unbeliever.

So, in this situation, your choice is to save a life or stick to your beliefs and let them die. Which do you think your god would consider more moral?

(And, to forestall complaints that this is unrealistic and clearly designed to force you into two options; most Christians agree that their god will put them in difficult situations to test their faith, so it's not unrealistic that you could be put in a similar situation if your views are correct.)

^ adding to that, doesn't one of the commandments say that you should not kill (is that even in the Jewish book? I don't know)?
Knowingly letting someone die if you can save them and if they would accept help is technically to kill them, or in best case it still is immoral, so either way you'd be screwed if you didn't do anything...

For health-care professionals this is one of the dilemmas they're sometimes forced into - having to watch and do nothing while someone who could have been easily saved dies because they refuse treatment, even something as simple as giving them blood. All because of religion. Their job is to save lives, but these people choose to die instead. Of course, they have a right to refuse treatment, but still... They are causing more harm than they probably realize. And here I was thinking suicide was also considered immoral in most religions. But eh. Logic flew out the window thousands of years ago.

And yet they still call it a miracle when someone survives thanks to medical treatment, because their god supposedly had a hand in it (if he really did he would have prevented it from happening in the first place, but screw logic, right?). Religious people never cease to surprise me in their lack of logical sense...

The ten commandments came from the Hebrew scriptures or the Old Testement.

Imaginary God?

I’m always in wonderment that there are people that don’t believe in God because there’s more than an abundance of evidence showing there is.

The Bible says of God. “His invisible qualities are clearly seen from the world’s creation onward, because they are perceived by the things made.” (Romans 1:20)

Taking the Bibles advice and looking at creation, what do we see? We see organization and design everywhere, the obvious product of a supreme intelligence.

As an example, no matter how much time passes, you will never see an automobile appear by chance. That’s because an automobile is so complicated it obviously has had to be designed and constructed. Likewise, it’s obvious life has been designed and created because it is even more complicated than things like automobiles.

Take the Seagull as just one example out of millions.

Aircraft wings already mimic the shape of birds’ wings. However, engineers have recently taken this mimicry to new heights. “Researchers at the University of Florida,” reports New Scientist, “have built a prototype remote-controlled drone with a seagull’s ability to hover, dive and climb rapidly.”

Seagulls perform their remarkable aerobatic maneuvers by flexing their wings at the elbow and shoulder joints. Copying this flexible wing design, “the 24-inch prototype drone uses a small motor to control a series of metal rods that move the wings,” says the magazine. These cleverly engineered wings enable the small aircraft to hover and dive between tall buildings. Some military personnel are keen to develop such a highly maneuverable craft for use in searching for chemical or biological weapons in big cities. -New Scientist, Technology, “Is It a Bird, Is It a Plane?. . . ,” September 3, 2005, p. 21.-

There’s more. A seagull does not freeze, even while standing on ice. How does this creature conserve its body heat? Part of the secret is in a fascinating design feature found in a number of animals that dwell in cold regions. It is called the countercurrent heat exchanger.

What is a countercurrent heat exchanger? To understand it, picture two water pipes strapped closely together. Hot water flows in one pipe, and cold, in the other. If both the hot water and the cold water flow down the pipes in the same direction, about half of the heat from the hot water will transfer to the cold. However, if the hot water and the cold water flow in opposite directions, nearly all the heat will transfer from the hot water to the cold.

When a seagull stands on ice, the heat exchangers in its legs warm the blood as it returns from the bird’s cold feet. The heat exchangers conserve heat in the bird’s body and prevent heat loss from its feet. Arthur P. Fraas, a mechanical and aeronautical engineer, described this design as “one of the world’s most effective regenerative heat exchangers.” This design is so ingenious that human engineers have copied it. -Heat Exchanger Design, Second Edition, by Arthur P. Fraas, 1989, p.2.-

Meanwhile, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration is developing a multilegged robot that walks like a scorpion, and engineers in Finland have already developed a six-legged tractor that can climb over obstacles the way a giant insect would. Other researchers have designed fabric with small flaps that imitate the way pinecones open and close. Such fabric adjusts to the body temperature of the wearer. A car manufacturer is developing a vehicle that imitates the surprisingly low-drag design of the boxfish. And other researchers are probing the shock-absorbing properties of abalone shells, with the intention of making lighter, stronger body armor.

So many good ideas have come from nature that researchers have established a database that already catalogs thousands of different biological systems. Scientists can search this database to find “natural solutions to their design problems,” says The Economist. The natural systems held in this database are known as biological patents. Normally, a patent holder is a person or a company that legally registers a new idea or machine. Discussing this biological patent database, The Economist says: “By calling biomimetic tricks ‘biological patents’, the researchers are just emphasizing that nature is, in effect, the patent holder.” -The Economist Technology Quarterly, Report, “Technology That Imitates Nature,” June 11, 2005, pp. 18-22.-

The above is just a thimble full of evidence from an ocean full of it.

As reasoning creatures, we are capable of seeing this evidence, thus the Bible's reason for saying that it's 'inexcusable' to not believe. (Romans 1:20)



Actually the reward for doing good things is everlasting life in heaven, or everlasting life on the earth. Since God offers everlasting life to everyone, it obviously wouldn’t be selfish to take advantage of the offer, it would be dumb not to.


This is a debate thread. The Debate Room Rules & Guidelines says, ‘Provide Evidence! A debate doesn't go very far if everyone just posts "well that's how I feel" with nothing to back it up - that's not a debate, it's a statement.’

This is also a religious thread on Christianity. Wikipedia says there are upwards of 41,000 denominations calling themselves Christian. Being a Christian debate forum this forum is different from most in as much as everyone is basically using the same book. Thus with so many different viewpoints coming from the same book you need to provide lots of evidence of what you say. Quoting the Bible provides that evidence.

Also, since this is a Christian debate forum, quoting the Bible gives your words some believability with those believing it’s the word of God. Using your own words to express your opinion with no evidence backing the words up comes across as what it is, one persons opinion.

So, are you going to answer my hypothetical situation?



Yes, it is.



Right. Like parasitoid wasps. They take a large insect, like a caterpillar (a baby butterfly) and they burrow into its body. Then, they lay eggs into the caterpillar's body and then take control of its mind before leaving. The slave caterpillar is then forced to eat everything it can find as the larvae wasps eat it alive from the inside out.

Clearly, through this example, we can see the invisible qualities of an all-loving god.



You'd think that if someone designed us on purpose, they wouldn't have put the retina on backwards. Or they would have found a way to make us capable of speech without also giving us Sudden Infant Death Syndrome and choking to death. Or wouldn't have put wisdom teeth in jaws too small for them, causing incredible pain.

Either we didn't have a designer, or we didn't have a good one.



Mechanics do not have self-replicating parts. DNA, on the other hand, is self-replicating and capable of mutation through which variety can arise. Biology and mechanics are not comparable in this case.



And what did that prove? We build things to look like what we know. Bird wings are obvious to copy, since they're the only things that fly with a significant mass.



So, which creature did this come from?

You seem to think that efficiency implies a designer. Here's an analogy.

A manufacturer is making a line of lightbulbs. Every once in a while, the machines making them malfunction and produce a mutant lightbulb. Most of the time, the mutations are bad and need to be thrown out. However, one mutant lightbulb comes through and it actually functions better. The manufacturer will then most likely create a new line based on the mutant, because it would be more likely to sell.

Obviously, this isn't a perfect analogy because it implies that someone guides evolution. But the effect is the same. Every once in a while, a creature produces a mutant. Let's take fish. They also have countercurrent heating, as do humans. One day, a fish is born (or hatched) with a mutation. Until now, fish have been forced to stay in one layer of the ocean because they don't have efficient enough heating to survive in colder layers. But this fish has countercurrent heating, due to a blip in DNA transfer. So it loses less heat than the rest of the fish do and it can go further down into the water without freezing. This provides it with an advantage, since it doesn't need to fight the other fish for food; it can just go down further into the ocean and have anything it wants. Now, since this fish is happy and well-fed, it can produce as many offspring as it wants. Some of the offspring will have the same mutation and have the same advantages as its parents. They will also be happy and well fed, and keep breeding. Eventually, there will be a lot of fish with countercurrent heating.

It doesn't take a designer. It just takes one small mutation which makes the veins run the other way and you're going to have it spread all over the place. For that matter, how else are the veins supposed to work? The arteries bring the blood to the feet, how else is the blood in the veins supposed to come back besides running the opposite direction of the arteries?

Also, don't copy and paste your arguments from the Watchtower. That's just irritating.



As reasoning creatures, we are also capable of seeing a knocked-over vase without anyone else around without immediately concluding that a leprechaun knocked it over.



The point is, you're not doing good things for the sake of doing good things. You're doing them for cookies.



I love that cookie and care not of relevancy to the discussion.

If you're doing something good for the sake of doing good, then I would argue that it makes you a better person than someone doing good for the sake of a reward. The net result is the same, but would the latter person do good if a reward isn't at stake?

Would you still do good if there weren't a reward at stake?



This is a debate thread about Christianity. What evidence? There's as much evidence for the Christian god as there is for the Ramayana.



In the same way that quoting from the Harry Potter books provides evidence that wizards and witches exist.



Isn't that the entire reason for the different denominations? That people are reading the bible differently? You can quote as many verses as you want, but you're not going to convince someone who believes this verse:

Isaiah 40:28: Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable.

by quoting this:

Exodus 31:17 It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day He ceased from labor, and was refreshed.

With the implication that a god who doesn't get tired doesn't need to get refreshed. The bible has too many interpretations for any two people to read it the exact same way.

Paul's argument from incredulity made about 2,000 years ago when the world was not as well-understood as it is now is not evidence that God exists. Yes, I look at the universe around me and see God's hand in it, but that is not actual evidence that God exists. Neither is anything in the Bible. Really, the Bible is Christianity's new idol, especially Protestant Christianity's. Just like the Golden Calf. My belief in the existence of God has nothing to do with evidence that a non-believer would accept as such and certainly not evidence that a scientist would accept as such. And you know what? I'm not worried about convincing other people to believe in God. They will believe as they will and if they choose not to believe, they will simply continue to be separated from God, which is exactly how they've chosen to exist. And nothing horrible will happen to them because of that, particularly because they're perfectly happy to live apart from God, aren't they?

Have you forgotten that you're supposed to believe on faith, not on what any book tells you? And certainly not on what people (like the Watchtower) tell you?



I see a lot of piss-poor design, personally, particularly of the human body, which speaks to me more of billions of years of a slow and conservative and entirely natural process, not the work of a being who is described as all-knowing, all-seeing, blah, blah. I could have done better, if I had the resources to design a species from scratch.

I know, I know: "It's 'cuz of The Fall, part of The Curse!" But if that's so, then Adam and Eve were not human as we would recognize one. Plain and simple. And Paul? Paul was full o' BS. As for the other creationist stuff? More BS.



No. Wrong. The "reward," if you believe there is one, comes from belief in Jesus as savior. Nothing more. The good you do is a result of your changed heart, a reflection of the change. You do good because you want to, not to earn brownie points. (And, by the way, going door to door doesn't earn you brownie points, either.)



No, it doesn't. There is no evidence that God exists, and there's a reason for that. Like I said, you are supposed to believe on faith. If you can't, if someone will only be convinced by "evidence," then that does not bode well for their Christian walk. And you, as the evangelical, are setting them up for apostasy from the get-go. Go you.

Look, the Bible is a tool. I'm not saying it's not without merit. It is a very rich resource -- for believers -- that allows us to see how God worked in a handful of people's lives. We can learn lessons from those people, mostly from the mistakes that they made in their lives. It is NOT a science book. Although it contains history, its purpose is NOT to be a history book. And it MOST CERTAINLY is NOT a book of prophesy. That's where the Witnesses have it all wrong. Armegeddon? Come and gone, baby. Just as Jesus said, really. It just wasn't nearly as dramatic as Revelation would have you believe. John (or whoever actually wrote it) certainly had a flair for the dramatic, didn't he? I want some of what he was smoking.

IMO, you're waiting around for nothing, wandering door to door preaching false prophesy, when you should be working on your own heart and having a dialogue with God, learning what your path really is and what you're supposed to be doing, what your purpose is in this lifetime. Once you learn that, you get your butt out there and do it. But the Bible will not tell you what your purpose is. The Watchtower will not tell you what your purpose is, aside from using you to further their agenda. (All churches have them; I'm not singling out the Watchtower for criticism.) But God will tell you exactly what you're supposed to be doing, if you get your face out of your Bible and just ask Him.



When it comes to religious "debate," opinion is all it can be. There's no evidence of anything. And, like I said, Scripture is not evidence. Then again, evidence should be irrelevant for a Christian. The problem is that, these days, people will demand evidence before they will believe something. I can't give them any, and I won't grab at straws trying to do so. I answer questions, about the Bible or whatever, if they are put to me. And I tell people the truth, if they ask. Just as I've told you the truth above.

According to the original language the Ten Commandments were written in, the commandment was, “You must not murder.”

For those interested, the Ten Commandments are found in Exodus chapter Five, and repeated in Deuteronomy the 20th chapter.




Why should I play games with you and reply to a hypothetical situation? You've made your disdain of all things Christian obvious.

My plan on dealing with someone so obviously hostile is to not waste my time and only answer you when my answer might possibly benefit another reader.

That said . . .



Yes, when you read what God has said about blood it’s obvious what his viewpoint is on the matter.

After the flood God told Noah and his Family,
“Every moving animal that is alive may serve as food for you. As in the case of green vegetation, I do give it all to you. Only flesh with its soul— its blood —you must not eat.” (Genesis 9:3,4)

Later God repeated his command on not eating blood to the Israelites, but this time he also told them why they were not to eat blood.

“For the soul of the flesh is in the blood, and I myself have put it upon the altar for YOU to make atonement for YOUR souls, because it is the blood that makes atonement by the soul [in it]. 12That is why I have said to the sons of Israel: “No soul of YOU must eat blood and no alien resident who is residing as an alien in YOUR midst should eat blood.” (Leviticus 17:11, 12)

After Jesus died people of other nations started becoming Christians and some Jews thought they should be circumcised like Jews were. So Jesus’ principle disciples met and prayed about the matter and decided what was required of all Christians. “For the holy spirit and we ourselves have favored adding no further burden to YOU, except these necessary things, to keep abstaining from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication.” . . . (Acts 15:28, 29)

Now some of you will say these scriptures don’t apply to blood transfusions. Your reasoning will be. [1]That eating blood is not the same as a transfusion, and that Christians were to abstain from blood, nothing was said about not eating it.

For all intents and purposes they are the same though. For example, if your doctor told you to abstain from, or quit drinking alcohol, would it be okay to be hooked up to an IV and take in the alcohol that way? To Jehovah’s Witnesses a blood transfusion is the same thing as eating blood, something expressly forbidden by God.

Another argument is, surely God wouldn’t expect people to forgo a life saving blood transfusion when it could save them. However the answer to that is God has reasons for his rules and he doesn’t bend his rules. The Bible is full of situations where people died for not obeying gods rules.

I also might point out here that there’s no guarantee a blood transfusion will save a person, it also has a chance of killing them too. Personal experience has shown me that.

Simply put, if you lose your life obeying God, he will give it back to you. If you lose your life doing something he has forbidden, in most cases it’s likely you will stay dead.



First, since It’s your hypothetical situation I’m not going to straighten any of it out for you by making it more realistic. It gets answered as is.

You said your hypothetical situation isn’t unrealistic because Christians know their God will put them in difficult situations to test their faith.

However, it is unrealistic because you didn’t say the situation happened by chance, you say I was ‘put’ in the situation.” Thus I see you blaming God for the situation. However, Christians know God wouldn’t cause a plane crash and kill people just to test someone’s faith.

It’s also unrealistic because you are assuming what I will do right after I’ve been in a plane crash. You really think I would start witnessing to a man that’s bleeding to death?
Witnessing is not going to help a dying man, it’s to late for that. I’m going to be to busy praying for him as I try to help him.

More unrealistic points. You are assuming I know my blood type and his. Why are you assuming I know his blood type? I would only know his blood type if I had already decided to give him a blood transfusion, because there’s no other reason to know his blood type in such a situation.

And why would I give a man a transfusion of my blood if I don’t know if our blood is compatible?

And since I’ve stopped his bleeding how do I know a rescue won’t happen in time? Also it’s unrealistic to say a blood transfusion is the only thing that will save him. I’m not a doctor, how would I know that?

Your hypothetical situation is full of unrealistic assumptions.

But wait . . . while praying my attention was drawn to a box with the words blood substitute on it. So I gave him a transfusion of that, and he lived. I then Witnessed to him and he became a Witness . . . And low and behold, it was you!

My hypothetical ending shows I can make unrealistic assumptions too. (Grin)

I don't have a problem with all things Christian. I'm fine with iCad, who admits that her faith isn't based on the external world or anything that would convince a non-believer. When you start pulling out Intelligent Design, copying and pasting arguments without citation, and claiming that the bible is proof of a god's existence, that's when I start getting annoyed.



Hey, did you know that all served meat has blood in it? That's what the 'juices' are. Not even koshering can get all the blood out, since it only dries up the fluids and leaves the components inside, so every time you eat meat you're eating blood. Even jerky has trace amounts. Sinner!



Leviticus also says that haircuts are sinful. So, how long is your hair?

And does this mean I lose my soul every time I menstruate? Or am I atoning for something every time I menstruate? And do I need to stop licking my fingers clean when I'm changing my menstrual cup?



But with transfusions, you don't get that delightful coppery taste.

If you want to play with metaphors, your doctor can also tell you to abstain from drinking water for a specific period of time, but hooking yourself up to an IV with water and other fluids in it is fine, because there's a reason behind telling you not to drink that an IV won't ruin. Additionally, your doctor probably wouldn't blame you for drinking alcohol - even after telling you not to - if it were necessary to save your life. Yes, alcohol can save your life. It works as a blood thinner. If your blood pressure is dangerously high, then drinking alcohol can quickly bring it down.



So, arbitrary rules are more important than peoples' lives. You might argue that they'll go to heaven. And they might also leave behind kids and spouses who don't have any means of living beyond what the dying person provided. Or the mom dies and the kids don't have anyone to watch them while their dad is working.



So can blood substitute. I'm allergic to it.



If that's how it works, then a non-believer has nothing to lose by not following the rules, since we'll already "stay dead".



No. In this situation, I'm putting you in the situation because I am your god. I control the horizontal and the vertical. So I'm the one to blame in that situation.
And I added that in to keep you from complaining. However, as you are a Jehovah's Witness, I should have known better.
I also said most Christians. Maybe it's just a way of rationalizing about how bad things happen to them, but quite a few of them agree that he does in fact do bad things to test peoples' faith.

But if what you're saying is true, you might want to tell that to everyone on Facebook who keeps forwarding those annoying "God spared one baby in a plane crash!" messages. Or the guy who did that insidious "Christmas Shoes" song. "This kid's mom is going to die! God must have made her die so that I can buy shoes for the kid and learn the true meaning of Christmas!" I'm sure you can agree how awful that is.

Wait...he wouldn't kill people to test someone's faith? Ever heard of a guy named Job? (No, the devil did not do that. "Satan" is the Hebrew word for "the Opposer" and reading it in the original context makes it clear that it refers to a position, not a being. The one doing it was probably Michael, according to most scholars.) So, it's okay for people to die to test someone's faith if it's not your god who's doing the actual killing?



Yes.

Besides, I specified in the situation that you'd already helped him, but that he'd already lost too much blood even after suturing everything.



There are plenty of reasons someone would tell you their blood type if they were heavily bleeding.
Some airlines carry packets of blood in case something happens and they aren't able to get the person to a hospital in time. He might have been hoping that a compatible type survived the crash in that situation.



Originally, the other person in the situation was a doctor and would be able to tell you what was happening. I cut it out because the sentences weren't flowing properly with the extra syllables.



Nope. 1. I'm not a guy, 2. I'm not an agnostic, and 3. I'm allergic to blood substitute. If it were me, then you would have given me an even more painful death. Congratulations!
Kudos, though. That's the second most literal Deus Ex Machina I've ever seen.

But, you know, if you're just too scared to actually tell us what your decision would be, then fine.

If not, then it comes down to this. If you were in a situation where the ONLY choice - no third options, no poking holes in the scenario, no Deus Ex Machina - was to break a rule or save a life, which would your god prefer?

So if I'm understanding you correctly, we'll all get a second chance before (during?) Armageddon to repent. So I can understand if JW's want to evangelize, but since I'm going to get another chance, it seems like it would only be necessary to go to my house once. And if I say I'm not interested, I could be put on the 'waiting to actually see Armageddon before repenting' list or whatever. Maybe you could suggest it. Because I don't enjoy being rude to people, especially people who think they're helping me, but JWs are driving me crazy.

Play with semantics all you want. The truth of the matter is that I'm pretty sure that God would see it as murder if anyone were to stand there and do nothing and let another person die when they could have done something to save them or prevent them from being killed. Even something that breaks the rules. Certainly a court of law would consider you an accessory to murder/manslaughter in that sort of situation.

Have you never read any of the passages in the Bible about Jesus breaking Sabbath rules left and right? Like, telling people to rescue other people or animals who fall down wells on the Sabbath? (It's in Luke 14, I think. Maybe there are other versions in the other Gospels; I don't remember and I don't feel like looking it up.) Anyway, big no-no according to Leviticus because that would be doing work on the Sabbath. Yet Jesus basically said that you're out of your ever-loving mind if you don't get your butt in gear and rescue people who fall down wells, even if they go and do it on the Sabbath. Somehow I don't think God would have a problem with saving anyone's life via a blood transfusion AND I have a feeling he'd be mighty displeased with someone who let someone die because of any Levitical law. I know I wouldn't be here without having had a transfusion many years ago. Am I going to hell for that? (Answer: No.)

And besides all of that, don't you know that the Mosaic Covenant is null and void for any Christian? Or are JWs still not down with calling yourselves Christians? (They weren't for a long while, I know.) Anyway, I will never understand Christians who use Leviticus or any other book in the Pentateuch to dictate their behavior. Or to justify their sanctimony, for that matter. It's ridiculous.



Possibly you should answer Hugbug's question because it was a good one? Whether or not she has disdain, it's still a good question, and you should answer it. I'd like to know the answer, too: If put into a situation where you have to break a cherished rule in order to save a life, what would you do?

I know what I'd do, and I'd do it in a heartbeat, without having to think about it for a nanosecond. I'd sacrifice any rule you like in order to save a life, even if it meant damnation for me. (Which it never, ever would, mind you, because God isn't an idiot. But if it did mean damnation for me, I still would not hesitate.)



No, because it would be unutterably stupid to put into your bloodstream something that doesn't belong there. Alcohol not processed through the digestive tract does not belong in blood vessels. But blood does. Your analogy is fatally flawed.



Why? No seriously, why? Don't give me more Scripture; I know it all. Instead, give me logic, in your own words. Here's mine:

There is a HUGE difference between eating blood and taking it intravenously. If you eat it, it goes through the digestive process. Essentially, its component nutrients are used by your body in some way, either to derive energy or to incorporate the blood's structural elements into your own body, so that it essentially becomes a part of your own physical structure on the cellular level. Some might consider this icky. Others won't give a flying fig. And like Hugbug said, blood is in all meat, no matter what you do, so unless you're a vegetarian or a vegan...

Anyway, that doesn't happen with a transfusion. You're borrowing cells that are never actually incorporated into your own flesh. They'll scoot around your circulatory system for a little while, doing their thing, and then they'll die and your liver will filter them out and dump them combined with a few enzymes into your intestines where they will eventually emerge in your poop. What's the big deal?

Oh, wait! You're following Bronze Age superstition when they didn't know diddly about blood! All they knew was that if someone bled enough, they died. Thus, Blood = Magic. Forgot that.



Bull. Jesus bent the rules all the time. Oh, wait! For JWs, God is God and Jesus is "just" a god. How is that not polytheism again?



Except that there are more instances of people NOT dying for disobeying rules. King David ring any bells? He blew away some big rules, you know. Totally disobeyed. Like murder, for one. Adultery, for another. Not to mention a possible dalliance with his buddy Jonathan. And wouldn't you know it? David's an ancestor of Jesus. And he wrote a lot of the Psalms. Goshdarnit!

Seriously, with tongue removed from cheek, it's really not about disobeying or obeying rules. It's about where your heart is. Slavishly obeying rules (and letting people die while you're busy obeying) just because you're afraid of some sort of punishment isn't going to score you points. Like I said, God is not an idiot. Look to your heart. THAT is what God judges, you know. NOT your actions.




It has an itty-bitty, very minute chance of killing them due to crossmatch fail, which doesn't really happen anymore, or because of graft-vs-host disease which carries an extremely negligible risk. There's a slightly higher chance of transfusion making the recipient ill either because of allergic reactions or because transfusions will temporarily "dilute" the immune system because whole blood is rarely given. The patient gets a ton of plasma and red blood cells, sometimes platelets, but hardly ever white cells. It takes time for the body to regenerate the latter, and thus the person is more vulnerable to illness/infection for a while after transfusion. There is also a slight chance of a transfusion recipient becoming infected with a nasty disease like HIV or various types of hepatitis. We're talking a 1 in 250,000 chance here, nowadays. Very extremely tiny.

Whereas if someone needs a transfusion and doesn't get one, especially in cases of trauma with massive blood loss, there is often a 100% chance that they will die. I know that was the case for me. Personal experience, like you said.

As for letting people die when they could be saved because, hey, God will give them their life back, isn't that cool?...See the thing about murder above. Frankly, if I felt I had to pick a rule to break, I'd definitely put aside the blood stuff and concentrate on not murdering someone. You know? But hey! I'm a heretic. What do I know?

You misunderstood me. Everyone won’t get a second chance. As I explained in my last post everyone that dies in God’s War of Armageddon will remain dead, they have already undergone judicial punishment from God.

I think the misunderstanding occurred when I quoted Revelation 20:13 from the King James Bible to show that Hell wasn’t a place of fiery torment because it gives up the dead in it. Here’s the quote again. Revelation 20:13, (KJV) says: “The sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.”

Now I can see where you would get the idea from reading Rev. 20:13 that ‘everyone’ would get a second chance . . . IF . . . you just went by what this one scripture said. But other scriptures have to be taken into account.

For example, when you first started school and received a math book. Did you know everything about math after studying the first chapter? Of course not. Likewise just reading one scripture on a subject doesn’t mean your understanding of the subject is complete.

Your posts show you are an inquisitive thinking person. You say Jehovah’s Witnesses keep coming to your door. What you need to do is ask for a Bible study, it won’t cost anything except time.

Why do this? When you converse verbally, misunderstandings can be addressed at the time they crop up. For example in my showing that hell gives up it’s dead, you formed the opinion that everyone would have a second chance. That misunderstanding could have been addressed at the time you conceived it if you would have been talking face to face.

Back to the subject as to getting a second chance.

The Bible shows there are an unknown number who will not be resurrected. Among them for example would be Adam and Eve, those killed in the flood, those killed at Armageddon, and those killed when God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. All have already undergone judicial punishment from God.

So, Rev. 20:13 contradicts other scripture. There's not much to misinterpret about that verse.

Hey, doesn't Revelation - and the rest of the bible - also state that the end of days should have happened 2,000 years ago? Like when it says that there will be chariots, a bunch of extinct cultures, and women grinding corn in the fields?



Absolutely right. In fact, when I got my first grade math textbook, I didn't know that negative numbers existed. Probably because the first page flat-out stated that they didn't exist. Generally, it helps when a subject doesn't contradict itself.



So then why are you evangelizing in a medium that isn't very conducive to verbal communication?



Huh. Usually, you have a bible quote for everything.

If you find your "proof" in the bible (or any other scripture), you're looking in the wrong place. It's like reading a fairytale book to find proofs of fairies. Sorry, but to me that's not enough. Find me proof elsewhere than in your precious bible/religious text of choice, and I might take a look. Other than that, I'm not interested.

Besides, a lot of the things in these scriptures have not happened. They have no historical proofs other than in these religious texts. Hence: It probably did not happen. And thereby it's just made up lies. And if it is... Doesn't that break one of the commandments? Hmm...



Where you see "intelligent design", I see random design. No two fingerprints are the same. No two people are the same (not even identical twins). It's because of difference in gene structure. Genes are like puzzles that go together in various ways while at the same time only having one "correct" way of putting two pieces together.

Why are there genetic diseases if this God of yours had a hand in it? Why are some humans flawed from their birth, destined to be born with a "faulty design" of some sort? Is this really intelligent design? Because then I say this so-called intelligent design is flawed. And what is flawed can not be perfect. Is your god perfect? If you say no, there is doubt in your mind. If you say yes, you probably have some bizarre explanation including "god works in mysterious ways". I call it randomness.

As for cars, we know they are designed. A human designed it. Most humans like things that are beautiful and flawless. We form our design after nature, because nature usually works. That's no evidence of a god. That's just evidence of the fact that designs can be inspired by nature.

Everything in nature is kill or be killed. Strive to live, or die. Animals don't seem to have gods. Only humans have gods, because we wanted to understand the world around us tens of thousands of years ago, when we had not discovered a word for gravity or saw things we could not explain. In our minds, everything must have an explanation. That we still have not gotten over the "god-phase" when we now know that about 99% of all the things we could not explain actually have a reasonable explanation beside "god did it" still strikes me as a bit stupid...



About seagulls and any other animal, they have evolved to make the best out of their preferred climate. It's not design, if not design by "fur is good, no fur is not good, non-furred animals die and their genetic coding dies with them" in a cold climate.
The story about the black and white moths is good enough explanation to me.

The only reason why humans don't die (we're some of the worst dressed "animals" in the world, with no practical fur, tendency to get incurable diseases, and whatnots) is that we've made ourselves able to survive in any climate and any environment (clothes, houses, electricity, ways of finding food, having a social environment and so on), and we make a porpose for ourselves and strive toward it. We don't let nature have its way, and preserve "bad" genes (which is a bad move, really, but we don't care because our social needs are usually stronger than our primal survival skills). Animals with "fatal flaws" or flaws that don't inspire mating just die without being able to carry on their genes. That is nature's way. We humans just love to contradict nature's ways. I still haven't decided if I think it is a good or a bad thing, however. Nothing is perfect, and I don't think it was ever supposed to be perfect. It simply was not designed.



Thumbs up to that!



What happened to the hundred or so select few Jews (or whatever that was about)? Contradictions, I say.

I'm not friendly and nice with other people for the hope of getting into heaven. I'm friendly and nice to people because it makes me feel good, and because it hopefully makes them feel good. I'll have my rewards in this life, thanks. Not in a "heaven" and an "everlasting life" I don't believe in. I know very well what happens to a body when it dies, and the only "everlasting life" it experiences is the chance of becoming a new tree or something such. I don't know what happens to the "soul" if it is something other than a collection of brain signals - but who knows? I'm in no hurry to find out, either.

I like cookies, by the way. Actual cookies. Not pretend cookies I'll get "sometime in the future for being nice now".



As I said before, quoting from religious texts is not exactly viewed as proof in any other environments than religious ones. Using my own words proves I'm able to use my brain to think and to form my own opinions. Quoting words from someone else with everything you say only proves you are able to read and write.

I form my views of the world on evidence and my own experience. I have not seen any evidence there is a god, nor have I ever experienced anything that could only have the explanation that "god did it". I'm generally skeptic to things, which is a life-preserving quality I wish a lot of other people were able to use. If things don't make sense, I'm not likely to believe it.

The thought of a god makes no sense what so ever to me. It's like a magic trick. If you can't explain it, say god did it, and we don't have to think more about it. Voila! Instant peace of mind. Just like a card trick that you don't have an instant explanation for. Others say magic (god!!!), but I look for the trick, "how did the magician do it" explanation, because from experience I know there is one.

Of course, there are some other things that I do think exist but that I can't really understand properly, such as atoms and gravity, and how bumblebees fly. But the avilable explanations for them make sense. And what is more, they are scientific theories. They are proven again and again to be likely explanations. Many people have come up with different theories, and they put them to the test. And if they discover something that goes against their theory or someone else's theory, that is usually a good thing. Facts are changed. "God" is responsible for less and less every day.

So here we are with the imaginary god again. Is god a figment of people's imaginations?

- No handfast proofs exist of any godly beings, angels, spirits or the like.
- No one has seen it (or at least, no one who can prove they weren't just hallucinating or dreaming)
- Intelligent design could just as well be that nature is not really intelligent, just copypasta with mutations going wrong here and there, plus the whole "live or die" business.
- Prayers don't work. People who pray to a picture of Bananas in Pajamas are equally likely to get their prayers "answered" as someone who pray to a god. It's 50/50. Yes or no. Either they are answered by a mere happenstance, or they don't get answered.
- god is so far just the "works for everything" explanation all the way until someone comes up with a more sensible theory.
- I have so far not been struck with lightning.
- That does not mean I go out in the rain when there's lots of lightning. I'm not stupid. I think evolution is the way of the world, and stupidity is the number one solution to figure out what exactly happens when you die.



^ Yep. It's obvious isn't it? This all-loving God loves creatures that specialize in killing other creatures. After all, pretty much every single being that has ever existed on this planet specializes in killing, from viruses to the blue whale. Yes, even those who are strict vegans, I dare say. Can't you hear the plants screaming?



Are all Jehova's witnesses vegans? No? Didn't think so. Who are we to judge whether a sheep has a soul? Maybe it has, maybe not. Who are we to judge that a plant does not have feelings? Maybe it does (but probably not). I'd say that with this reasoning it is much worse to kill and eat an animal than it is to get blood from a living person. After all, the other human still lifes after.

As Hugbug points out, blood replacements are an equally foreign material to the body as other people's blood. The potential for allergy, and for the fact that they're not really replacements for the red blood cells, but for the blood volume (the plasma). They keep the blood volume up (a loss of more than 40% is usually fatal because the heart starts having troubles), but they don't do a thing about the oxygen transfer.

Blood is made up by atoms, just like the rest of a human's body. Unlike most cells in the body, mature red blood cells can't even copy themselves, and don't contain DNA. Most cells can repair themselves, but red blood cells can't. They're made, they live a little, and then they're recycled. It takes a while for the body to replace lost red blood cells, especially where there is heavy blood loss. We simply can't live without them.

It's not the actual blood cells that kills, but the antibodies in it. If there is a mismatch they latch onto the blood cells and causes a reaction. In most cases the blood is filtered and separated to get rid of these antibodies. That's a somewhat new technique that was not around when they first started blood transfusion. It certainly was not around in the times the religious scripture was written, when "blood was magic".



There are no guarantees in life. But I'd rather have the chance to live than not.

I have a somewhat rare bloodtype (which is to say I'm by default a negative person, pun very much intended). If I was to get a transfusion with the opposite blood type (positive blood), it might kill me, because positive blood mixed into negative blood is very bad. But I'd much rather have a blood transfusion than to die from blood loss. I know about blood typing and all the safety measures that are taken before someone can even hang up a blood bag. I also know that I'm most likely to get the right blood type in an emergency setting, because it is the standard emergency blood type. Hence, I'm not scared. I'd much rather have a transfusion with an alright guarantee than try everything else and potentially die from blood loss.



The reason for not drinking is usually to keep the stomach or intestines empty, usually before a surgery. If stomach contents get into the airways (by throwing up when not fully conscious), it can cause aspiration pneumonia, which can be dangerous. There are some other reasons, too. But humans still need fluids and various molecules to function, hence why it is given directly into the blood. As for getting the blood pressure down, alcohol is probably not the safest way, and will often find a way to destroy your liver and brain while it is in your body.

By the way, why are there alcoholic beverages being handed out in church, anyway?
- it is the "unliteral" blood of Jesus (JWs: GASP!)
- alcohol befuddles the brain (I have my opinions of why THAT is needed...)
- if alcohol is considered to be bad by practicing Christians, why is it still considered good that Jesus could make water into wine? (Don't you just love the contradictions?). I might point out that there are several magicians in the modern world who can do the same. I also saw the magician Dynamo walk on water (which was filmed, by the way). I still think they were tricks. If they're not - congratulations, Christians: You (finally) found your New!Jesus - cheers!

As for me I can do without alcohol. Not for any religious reasons - but I like to keep my mind clear, thank you very much.



Difference of wording. Means the same, and I don't really bother. As a matter of fact, I happen to like George Carlin's commandments much better than any of the original ones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpL2m6XJhQw



Amen to that!

Actually as a practicing Christian I do drink alcohol, not to excess, but I like a social drink with friends. In our church we choose to use non-alcoholic communion wine because some people don't like to drink alcohol.

And I believe that the Bible is God-breathed. That the words came from God and were recorded by humans. The word 'faith' comes in here. You have to believe and have faith in what the Bible is teaching you. There are some people that become Christians purely by reading the Bible, Nicky Gumbel of 'Alpha' comes to mind - he read the New Testament before he went to church.

And by the way you are never gonna win an argument with a Jehovah's Witness, which is why I stopped commenting on this thread a little while ago, but I have been following it.

I know that I have a certainty of eternal life with my Father in heaven when I die, cos I have faith in my Lord Jesus Christ, who died to save me on the cross 2000 years ago.

quote (from memory): For God so loved the world that he gave his son Jesus Christ that whosoever believes in him may not die but have eternal life. John 3:16.