We sometimes have this idea that we should be able to perceive the things of God with our senses. People will sometimes say things like, I won't believe it unless I can see it. But as far as the spiritual world is concerned that is like saying, I won't believe in the perfume of roses unless I can see it. Or, I won't believe in the taste of cinnamon unless I can touch it. You should no more expect to see the things of God with your eyes than you should expect to see the taste of chocolate with your eyes. 

The same is true for hearing God. If you are trying to hear God with your physical ears you will, at the least, be very dissappointed, you must learn to hear God with your spiritual "ears."

Now, your next question should be, If I really have spiritual ears why can't I hear God? Well if you really have a physical nose why aren't you smelling roses right now? Most of us spend very little time listening for God and as a result we don't hear him very often.

Also, it is possible to hear God and not recognize His voice. Imagine you were in a large auditorium or stadium. A huge  crowd is milling about and talking. Someone you don't know very well is trying to get your attention but his voice doesn't stand out from the background of all the voices around you so you don't hear him. Now imagine your mom is in that crowd and she's trying to get your attention. Don't you think you're more likely to notice your mom's voice above the roar of the crowd? Why? Because you know your mom. You've spent years hearing her. You not only recognize her voice but you know what she's likely to say in a given circumstance.

We are surrounded by a multitude of voices in life. If we are to pick out God's voice from all the noise around us we're going to need to spend some time getting to know Him. And if you want to get to know God then it would be helpful to spend time with other people who know Him better than you do. That's one way you can think of the Bible, as a book written by people who knew the voice of God better than you do. That's one way you can think of Church, as the club for people who want to learn to recognize the voice of God.

Greg Marquez

goyomarquez@earthlink.net 

We sometimes have this idea that we should be able to perceive the things of God with our senses. People will sometimes say things like, I won't believe it unless I can see it. But as far as the spiritual world is concerned that is like saying, I won't believe in the perfume of roses unless I can see it. Or, I won't believe in the taste of cinnamon unless I can touch it. You should no more expect to see the things of God with your eyes than you should expect to see the taste of chocolate with your eyes. 

The same is true for hearing God. If you are trying to hear God with your physical ears you will, at the least, be very dissappointed, you must learn to hear God with your spiritual "ears."

Now, your next question should be, If I really have spiritual ears why can't I hear God? Well if you really have a physical nose why aren't you smelling roses right now? Most of us spend very little time listening for God and as a result we don't hear him very often.

Also, it is possible to hear God and not recognize His voice. Imagine you were in a large auditorium or stadium. A huge  crowd is milling about and talking. Someone you don't know very well is trying to get your attention but his voice doesn't stand out from the background of all the voices around you so you don't hear him. Now imagine your mom is in that crowd and she's trying to get your attention. Don't you think you're more likely to notice your mom's voice above the roar of the crowd? Why? Because you know your mom. You've spent years hearing her. You not only recognize her voice but you know what she's likely to say in a given circumstance.

We are surrounded by a multitude of voices in life. If we are to pick out God's voice from all the noise around us we're going to need to spend some time getting to know Him. And if you want to get to know God then it would be helpful to spend time with other people who know Him better than you do. That's one way you can think of the Bible, as a book written by people who knew the voice of God better than you do. That's one way you can think of Church, as the club for people who want to learn to recognize the voice of God.

Greg Marquez

goyomarquez@earthlink.net 

If God created man, does that says that there is no evolution? What if God created man exsactly at the moment when an ape became human? That is a question of chicken and egg. When a mutation happens? Does it happen when chicken is grown up or when is created. I'd say, mutation happens in grown chicken's chromosom while creating an egg. So egg allready consist of new mutated gene that tells it how to grow up, so egg was first. Especially since eggs existed in reptiles long before they evolved even close to birds. But replace this case with human and it says that evolved ape gave birth to a baby with human gene (soul).

Since this does not focus on Islam alone, will the end of free speech be nigh?

I've wondered for a while about the natural order of our world.  How I know it to come to be, and how everyone is the perfect card to be played into a new hand.  If you imagine a three dimensional pie chart (Like in Excel or something), imagine the world in the beginning based on how many choices graphically represented as slices to that pie chart.  Each time someone makes a decision, the pies divide by how many possible outcomes of that decision there could be.  Moreover, these choices can be represented factually by unnatural interactions within nature, as in some form of proof that sentient life was aware of something, and interacted with nature accordingly.  Inside each of those pies, you can see a world in action, constantly dividing on itself in a purely imaginative way.

Now, if I may dissect that bit of information to properly convey a question, let's go over a few things that modify this model to extreme hell.  First, one has to assume that everything began from one root standpoint, and whatever you see in that beginning you understand completely how any one difference between "slices of pie", per se, is made and why.  That concept proves our sense of logic, or at least mine.  

Now on to interactions.  One can safely assume that there's not just 2 different outcomes to each interaction, as is the case with making a yes or no decision.  While many interactions can be broken to multiple yes or no things, the outcome is the most important, and outcomes in that manner can be ranged in hundreds to trillions, all from one interaction.  I'll get to this part in a minute,  but what if the simple action of stepping, or breathing at the right time causes a catastrophic event?  Some threshold is crossed and chaos erupts, creating numerous possibilities.  Point being, our environment relies heavily on what came before the first interaction, and is molded by each different occurrence.

Now, to boggle the mind even more, what if there are multiple starting points?  How can that possibly have anything to do with anything, right?  Well, take it this way:  If a group of people, just for shits and giggles, created a theory about the beginning of a fictional universe, they could draw an infinite number of universes just by themselves.  We could learn SO much just from doing that about ourselves.  THAT, my friends, is true knowledge, no matter what frame of reference you create to do it.

So if the starting point I'm thinking of is true, then that means all we have done, experienced, learned about, generally interacted with is pure natural selection.  And what we believe in is entirely natural, and not without logical purpose.  I can already see many people saying "OH I DON'T GET IT, WTF MAN?!  THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH RELIGION!", so here's the kicker;

Using this logical method, what can we assume about the antichrist?

This is quite a disturbing phenomenon. Deliberately induced hysteria is a common tool of fanatical religious groups but this speaking in tongues has  become so commonplace that many individuals seem to have little problem turning it on casually with no embarrassment (even in the UK).

Once Christian missionaries from supposedly developed countries systematically stripped native cultures of such rituals, developed to free group consciousness. It seems as if the US evangelicals have now decided to emulate what was once derided.

My hope is that eventually entire services will be conducted in completely unintelligible gibberish.