re: Has anyone considered that this execution debacle could be God's will?

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I'm not surprised that you don't understand what it means that those are blessed who believe and do not see, but that doesn't mean there is no evidence whatsoever. The Spirit's testimony to the believer is evidence

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No, that’s the story, the myth. I can simply allege “FooLaneCraig fricked a sheep.” That is the story, it isn’t the evidence. For anyone to believe it, I’d have to produce evidence to support my claim, perhaps unless you are a habitual sheep fricker. See how that works? The Bible is just the story, but it’s not the evidence that the story is true.

John 20:29 - “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” - is precisely where the concept of “blind faith” comes from. You as a believer must believe without any physical evidence. You must take it on faith that the story is true. You must believe blindly. That is the message.

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One scientific evidence is the beginning of the universe. It is understood that the universe had a beginning

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No legit scientist who studies astronomy or the early universe says the universe began to exist. You are mistaken. Scientists understand matter cannot be created nor destroyed. The universe began to rapidly expand but none believe it popped into existence or was created.

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which points to God. Further philosophical evidence can narrow that down to the Christian God.

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No it doesn’t, and your arguments are baseless assertions, not evidence.

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One more is the complex information found in DNA. DNA information works just like information of any kind, which implies a personal encoder/designer.

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No, DNA is one of the best body of evidence against a designer. It is undesigned. It’s the opposite of your assertion. Humans (and Neanderthals and Denisovans) have a fused great ape set of chromosomes, that correspond to two chromosomes in chimps and gorillas, and in humans they have telomeres in the middle of the chromosome as evidence of historic fusing. Humans share ancient viral insertions where cats and dogs and whales are missing them, but yet share even more ancient viral DNA insertions with all of them. And DNA randomly mutates. That’s not coding. There is no designer. You know nothing of natural selection or genetic drift or anything in genetics. You’re a fool.

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It's not murder (you need to learn what that word means, apparently).

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The Canaanites probably thought it was murder to be murdered. Good thing that shite never actually happened!

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It's also not stealing to make them wives.

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Taking what didn’t belong to them is not stealing, nor is it slavery nor human trafficking, right Foo? When you slaughter all the men, they no longer are in possession of their wives! Problem solved!

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I have not claimed that torturing babies is OK

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You have come out and said that babies deserve to be tortured for eternity. You’re a moral monster, and it’s because of your fundamentalism.

Maybe it's God saying, "ya'll need to do better in executing these murderers!"

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No, that’s the story, the myth. I can simply allege “FooLaneCraig fricked a sheep.” That is the story, it isn’t the evidence. For anyone to believe it, I’d have to produce evidence to support my claim, perhaps unless you are a habitual sheep fricker. See how that works? The Bible is just the story, but it’s not the evidence that the story is true.

John 20:29 - “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” - is precisely where the concept of “blind faith” comes from. You as a believer must believe without any physical evidence. You must take it on faith that the story is true. You must believe blindly. That is the message.

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I repeat, you have no idea what you're talking about.

Jesus was not referring to blind belief. He was referring to believing the message given to Thomas. The testimony is evidence, but Jesus was actually referring back to His own words and teachings, where He had predicted His own death and resurrection and yet Thomas didn't believe Him. Jesus still showed Thomas physical evidence (His wounds), but He was gently rebuking Thomas by calling out His lack of faith in the message, itself.

And I'm sure you recall, immediately following, John writes that the purpose of the book was to provide a testimony so people would believe in Jesus for eternal life. The gospel account, itself, is evidence.

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No legit scientist who studies astronomy or the early universe says the universe began to exist. You are mistaken. Scientists understand matter cannot be created nor destroyed. The universe began to rapidly expand but none believe it popped into existence or was created.

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No "legit" scientist, eh? That's your escape hatch, isn't it? Anyone you disagree with is not "legit". How convenient

Robert Jastrow was an agnostic astronomer who claimed the evidence pointed to a beginning. Alexander Vilenkin has also stated that he believes the evidence supports a beginning.

But it doesn't matter who says what. You are already unwilling to see evidence for what it is. You just dismiss everything as baseless. Speaking of which...

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No it doesn’t, and your arguments are baseless assertions, not evidence.

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Yes it does, and your ignorance of philosophy only demonstrates that you can't really know if my claims are baseless or not. It seems like you don't even know what I'm talking about.

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No, DNA is one of the best body of evidence against a designer. It is undesigned. It’s the opposite of your assertion. Humans (and Neanderthals and Denisovans) have a fused great ape set of chromosomes, that correspond to two chromosomes in chimps and gorillas, and in humans they have telomeres in the middle of the chromosome as evidence of historic fusing. Humans share ancient viral insertions where cats and dogs and whales are missing them, but yet share even more ancient viral DNA insertions with all of them. And DNA randomly mutates. That’s not coding. There is no designer. You know nothing of natural selection or genetic drift or anything in genetics. You’re a fool.

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here's another example of where you are more than happy to speak in spite of your ignorance. You don't even know what it is I'm arguing.

Read what I wrote again and give it another try.

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The Canaanites probably thought it was murder to be murdered. Good thing that shite never actually happened!

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Yeah, and people executed on death row for their crimes might think they are being murdered, too. What they thought doesn't matter.

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Taking what didn’t belong to them is not stealing, nor is it slavery nor human trafficking, right Foo? When you slaughter all the men, they no longer are in possession of their wives! Problem solved!

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Straw man.

I've said it many times in the past, but you must have forgotten. All things belong to God, including all people, who He made in His image. The reason murder is wrong is not because there is something inherently valuable in a human being outside of God, but precisely because God made them in His image. He assigns value and He determines limits to what humans can do to each other. Therefore, it isn't unlawful for God to command the destruction of any of His creations. Same goes for stealing. If God "owns" all people, then He can command or allow some of them to be wives rather than killed for their part in idolatry and rebellion against Him.

You keep focusing on the man-to-man side of this because you reject God, but if you're going to argue against the Bible, you need to account for its own viewpoint. Otherwise you are being intellectually dishonest.

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You have come out and said that babies deserve to be tortured for eternity. You’re a moral monster, and it’s because of your fundamentalism.

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You are trying to frame the issue in light of human-to-human behaviors without God involved. You want me to say "yeah, it's OK to torture and kill babies" so that you can claim some sort of moral points and try to discredit the biblical view, even though you have no rational basis for saying anything is really "immoral". I do not condone people torturing and killing children. No one has the authority in themselves to do that, and to do so is to sin against God, their creator, as a violation of the 6th commandment.

Your judgement that I'm a "moral monster" means nothing, because it can't mean anything. It's just your own personal opinion, but as I've demonstrated, you reject objective morality, so you actually have no leg to stand on to judge anything as "immoral". All you can possibly have in your worldview is your own subjective opinions.

Did you watch the Taco Talk shorts u posted? I think you would like them, but obviously for a different reason than I have for liking them.

You are not a pleasant person. Angry even.

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You are not a pleasant person. Angry even.

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Atheists are angry 24-7.

I work with one. That dude is going to blow a gasket one day.

It will be interesting to observe if it’s at work.

He's apparently a Calvinist. They believe that God wills everything, as though He can't know the end from the beginning without willing and forcing it to happen.

And it really boils down to their definition of sovereignty. In reality, the true definition of sovereignty means that you are in complete control to make your own rules/laws without any outside interference. If God is truly sovereign, and He certainly is, then He has just as much freedom to allow free will, as He does to restrict freedom. Sovereignty is not limited to only having the outcomes that you want; it means you have absolute authority to do as you please. And if it pleases God to allow people to make choices without being absolutely controlled, then God is exercising His Sovereign will to do so.

This does not mean that God does not accomplish His purposes and His will. Because God does know the end from the beginning, He has a perfect plan to use all things, all outcomes, to His will.

If everything I just said were incorrect, then Jesus would be a liar for saying that it is not God's will that any should perish, but that all would have eternal life. Not all will be saved, we know this, because not all people do/will believe. But it is God's will that all would believe and be saved. And it's why He sent His Son to die in our place, so that all who believe in Him would be saved.

God is not the author of sin. He did not make us sin and then punish us for it, as is the logical conclusion of Calvinist theology. He, in His OWN free will, because He is sovereign, chose to give us free will. And God is just. He does not allow sin to go unpunished, but He also loves us and knew that we could not justify ourselves. That is, again, why He sent His Son as the perfect sacrifice in our place. The Gospel and the overall coherency of God's word falls apart when you reinvent the definition of sovereignty and take verses out of context to try to prop up a theology, rather than understanding God's word in full context.

I love my Calvinist friends. But I firmly stand behind the position that they are wrong.

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Yeah, NOT SEEING, yet believing, is totally not blind faith.

You fricking idiot

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You are equivocating on the word "blind" here. You are jumping between any evidence whatsoever, and physical evidence that you can see with your eyes.

Christianity teaches that the Faith is reasonable and supported by actual evidence. The test is to trust God as revealed through the testimony of the Scriptures (recorded evidence). Even with the situation with Thomas, Jesus wasn't condemning his desire for physical evidence, but with him not listening to the apostolic testimony and witness. Jesus showed His hands and side to the other apostles without a problem when Thomas wasn't there, but Thomas refused to listen to the apostolic testimony, which was sure evidence of the truth.

Ordained by God? Yes. Willed by God? No. Big difference. Read your Bible. Let me know if you have any questions.

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Christianity teaches that the Faith is reasonable and supported by actual evidence

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It teaches the exact opposite. It says don’t be a doubting Thomas. He had to see and touch to believe. Blessed are those who don’t see yet believe. The moral of the Christian message is Christians need to believe without evidence.