a lot to ask

[Corbs]

hey yall. got a few questions for you. im 19 years old grew up a baptist all my l life. not really a huge christian family but we do believe in god and wat not. in the past year or so i've kinda questioned things. how do we know god is real? i mean jesus wants us all to go to heaven right? so why doesnt he show himself? are we not special enough? he used to walk among people years ago but not now? why god? how did he get his special powers to make earth and space and stuff. who made god? did he just appear? i mean jesus came from god and mary so where did god come from?

[Churchwork]

Nobody in my family is a Christian at all.

Jesus existed before Mary because Jesus is uncreated in the Triune Godhead along with the Father and the Spirit, and you know the uncreated must exist because nature can't cause itself.

Never in the Bible do we define ourselves by a denomination. That is why the Bible says don't say I of Cephas or I of Apollos. Besides baptists are wrong to my knowledge on at least four fronts: 1) demanding baptism is with water only instead of with or without water, 2) contradicting itself by being part calvinist and part arminian, 3) holding an incorrect premillennial view (usually posttrib onlyism), and 4) improper ecclesiology, that is, not accepting Biblical locality.

Jesus will return when man is about to destroy Himself, not before, to prove He is God of all the nations. He takes pleasure in man coming to the realization He is God and need for dependence on Him, rather than it being forced upon us.

We know Jesus is God by the proof of His resurrection which we may call the Minimal Facts Approach (http://biblocality.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2256).

[Corbs]

do you believe that Christianity is the only religion? cuz that was another thing i did not like at church. i think its wrong to say buhdists and mormoms and hindus are wrong. my old youth group leader said he was dating a girl for the longest time. he was in love with her. but he found out she was jewish and broke up with her cuz her religion is wrong and she is going to hell....

[Churchwork]

By comparison you can prove Christianity is the only correct religion/world-view.

If buddhists, mormons or hindus are wrong and it can be shown, then you should have no problem in saying so if you stand for the truth.

Buddhism and hinduism are wrong because you are not going to come back as a chicken if you sin too much. You get this one life to be saved. Nirvana is wrong because it is not God's will for you to go into an altered state. You have millions of nerve cells in your body for the purpose of pleasure so Nirvana is wrong to shut off those senses. The god of hinduism is said to be amoral so if we are an extension of that then we are amoral beings, but we all know we all have a moral conscience (some more than others). Mormons are wrong because Jesus was uncreated, not a created being. You can't have a created being atone for sins. Joseph Smith toyed with the Word of God to create his religion. Jesus explained in many ways how He is uncreated.

You don't want to be unequally yoked with non-believers, but I am sure there are some exceptions for a Christian to be married with someone of another faith. Just realize you have a lot of additional problems that arise when you marry an atheist or a buddhist or a hindu or a muslim, etc.

When you think about the answers in this way, it is really quite simple. The reason people hold to other beliefs and other faiths is because it allows them to stay in their sin nature. For example, if you know you have many more changes and chances to come back to try again, you will be less inclined to get it right this time. But by the time you leave this body of flesh and blood it will be too late, according to God's Word. Which is the higher standard accurately representing spiritual reality?