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JAH ________ spirit or man?

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Messenger: NegusNegas Sent: 2/19/2005 6:01:32 PM
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Anthropomorphism -- What's That?

Look at history. Long centuries of man's conflicting ideas
of "God" have demonstrated that each nation gives its god its
peculiar characteristics, and every individual gives his god his
personal peculiarities. One observer noted: "Each nation has
created a god, and the god has always resembled his creators. He
hated and loved what they hated and loved, and he was invariably
found on the side of those in power. Every god was intensely
patriotic, and detested all nations but his own ...."
Think! How can different people possibly avoid having
totally different ideas of God -- unless they use a common
source? How can OUR ideas of God be anything but OUR personal
human ideas -- unless we all know where to go to find the real
answer?
The Greek philosopher Xenophanes (540 B.C.) observed that
men of different races picture their gods like themselves. The
Thracians picture them as fair and red-haired. And the
Ethiopians, he said, see their gods as black.
Consider -- why is it that many modern critics and free
thinkers have stated that God is merely an illusory projection of
human self? Why did, for example, Ludwig Feuerbach state that man
creates God in man's own image?
BECAUSE MAN HAS DONE JUST THAT!
These men looked at a long history of gods who were
revengeful, savage, lustful, and ignorant -- who were partial to
the people who created them, and who showed that partiality by
assisting those people to rob and destroy others.
They therefore concluded that there is no God.
That was an error of reasoning on their part. What they
should have done was to look past these false gods that man
created. They should have turned to their merciful, living
Creator! Instead, they were so totally "turned off" by man's gods
that they rejected the real God altogether.
Scholars have coined a word that they apply to any religious
statement that depicts God in the bodily form of a man, or that
shows God as having qualities of thought, will, or feeling like
those experienced by man. That word is "anthropomorphism."
Anthropomorphism is technically defined as the attribution
of a human body or human qualities to God. Philosophers and
theologians coined the word because they believe man has a
natural tendency -- or necessity -- to conceive of God by analogy
with man himself.


Is God Like Man?

Let's understand how God is, and is not, like man. IT'S THE
CRUCIAL KEY FOR DETERMINING IF YOU HAVE CREATED YOUR "GOD" -- TO
SHOW IF INDEED YOUR "GOD" IS GOD!
The Bible makes many statements about God's personal
characteristics. God WALKED in the garden (Gen. 3:8). He ATE with
Abraham (Gen. 18:8). He wrote with His own HAND upon the tables
of stone (Ex. 31:18). God has EARS (Isa. 59:1). He has a MOUTH
(Isa. 58:14). The Scriptures abound with similar references.
Man is created in the shape and form of the real, living
Creator God. Notice it in Genesis 1:26-27: "And God said, Let us
make man in our image, after our likeness .... So God created man
in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and
female created he them."
This was for a great purpose. Because man's destiny is to be
born as God -- to "be like him" (I John 3:2; Ps. 17:15). God from
eternity has possessed hands, ears, eyes, arms -- and feelings,
emotions (?), reason, will. Therefore God, when He began His plan
of reproducing Himself, created Adam and Eve with HIS body shape,
and with a mind capable of creative thought like God's!
Of course, man is now physical while God is Spirit. And
man's mind, unlike God's, is limited in power. However, man is
wrong in ascribing his wrong motivations to God! "For my thoughts
are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the
LORD. FOR AS THE HEAVENS ARE HIGHER THAN THE EARTH, SO ARE MY WAYS
HIGHER THAN YOUR WAYS, AND MY THOUGHTS THAN YOUR THOUGHTS" (Isa.
55:8-9).
God has feelings and emotions -- man has feelings and
emotions. But the characteristics of God's mind are love, joy,
peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
temperance (Gal. 5:22, 23).
But the characteristics of a natural human mind -- the
works of the flesh -- are adultery, fornication, uncleanness,
lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance,
emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings,
murders, drunkenness, revelings, and similar things (Gal.
5:19-21).
In the Dark Ages, man's gods which he called "God" -- were
the impetus for covering the earth with blood. Instruments of
torture were invented for service to this "God." This "God" had
great churches built for Himself and dungeons for men. He had the
clouds peopled with angels and the earth with slaves. The Bible
shows that this "God" was purely a creation of the evil mind of
man!
No wonder many people have been taken aback, appalled by the
image of "God" as an infinite fiend! These gods were not God at
all, but were purely man's creations. God is a God of love.
People used to believe the world was flat. This was declared
to be true by the authority of "God." Many similar wrong and
false ideas have been propagated IN THE NAME of God. Why?
Simply because MEN created such gods (they called each one
"God"), and put into the mouths of their gods all THEIR mistakes
in astronomy, in geography, in philosophy, in morality. The god
was never wiser or better than his creators. If they believed in
slavery, so did he. If they believed in a cruel hell fire or
eternal torment, so did he. If they wanted to go to war, so did
he.
Religious zeal for such gods was usually utterly
incompatible with peace. Those who loved the gods most were apt
to love man the least. By contrast, the true God had always said,
"Love your neighbor" (Lev. 19:18) and "If a man say, I love God,
and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his
brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not
seen?" (I John 4:20.)


The True Christian Approach

Man's approach has always been either to impute his evil
nature to God, or to interpret God in terms of himself.
But the teaching of the Bible is that a man must seek to
acquire God's nature -- and give up his own nature. That is man's
purpose in living! The Apostle Peter states that we are to be
"partakers of the divine nature" (II Peter 1:4). The Apostle Paul
said, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus"
(Phil. 2:5).
God's mind comes by the gift of God's Holy Spirit! God's
Spirit comes through repentance and baptism (Acts 2:38).
Because human ideas are not the same as God's ideas --
because man's thoughts -- are not God's thoughts then our ideas
of what God loves or hates, what God will do or won't do, are
utterly invalid unless backed by God's Word, the Bible!
Otherwise, we are as guilty of creating God in our image as any
pagan idol maker.
The Bible shows that Christ was the stamped, impressed
character image of God, with the mind of God (II Cor. 4:4; Phil.
2:5-7; Heb. 1:3). He is our example (I Pet. 2:21). Any opinion of
the nature or character of God that conflicts with this example
is of our own creation!
Some people have made their god responsible for human
affairs now which makes their god the god of pollution, war,
crime, disease, famine. But the True God says He is not the god
of this world -- rather Satan is (II Cor. 4:4; Eph. 2:2; Rev.
12:9). The real God teaches concern for the environment, tells
men to live at peace and to love their neighbor. He says He will
heal our diseases and give us prosperity if we obey Him.
Some have created a "Christ" who is weak and sanctimonious.
Others have created a "Christ" who was a notorious leader of an
underground liberation movement. Both have created these
"Christ's" out of their own imaginations.
You create God in your own image when YOU SAY something is
"God's will," and the BIBLE DOESN'T say it is God's will. If the
Bible doesn't support it, then it is YOUR will. People do this
when they group together God, the Bible, and the goals of a
certain political party or when they declare a certain war is
"God's will."
People create God in their own image when they say God has
given exclusive privileges to their class, their race, their
color, their ethnic group.
Paul said, "For though there be that are called gods,
whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords
many,) but to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are
all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are
all things, and we by him" (I Cor. 8:5, 6).
Remember that ancient Israel decided that God, which brought
them out of Egypt, looked like a golden calf. They sadly settled
for a concept of God resembling a dumb ox.
They failed to perceive the glory of the true God, "The
Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and
abundant in goodness and truth" (Ex. 34:6). They settled for an
inferior product.
What about your "God"? Is he the true God?
Search the scriptures and see.


Messenger: Ark I Sent: 2/21/2005 12:06:49 AM
Reply

Ye are Gods and all of ye are children of the Most High, but ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes.

Different men in the past have risen and joined with Jah to be One. So the people around them saw the manifestation of Jah from their own people.

In this time, people from many different nations see God Almighty Jah RasTafarI.

Read the links below, and form whatever opinion you wish, but I won't spend much time on this subject anymore. All who are children of Jah RasTafarI will recognize Haile Selassie I, so I don't need to prove this to anybody.

ONE

Ocean

Who is RasTafarI



Ark I
RasTafarI
Haile Selassie I


Messenger: Ras Bredren Nicholas Sent: 7/13/2007 12:48:50 PM
Reply

Blessed Love all I bredren an sistren

I had to Bring this forward for everyI else to go over Igain.


I have a suggestion also, read all of it; the links within the reasoning as well as the reasonings themselves.



Faith is Knowledge, Knowledge is Power. Jah Bless the I Faith.

RasTafarI, Haile I Selassie


Messenger: Ras power Sent: 7/14/2007 7:29:27 PM
Reply

Man who live spiritual not i through emotions as man, feelings.


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