Advice please

pic related OP. If you are considering becoming christian you should first get a good grasp on the OT so you aren't uninformed. this is a Jewish publication but it doesn't engage in Jewish apologetics. it will give you the traditional jewish perspectives across different time periods along with giving you background in scholarly perspectives on passages. I also like it because it usually refrains from replacing YHWH, El Shaddai, etc with an english translation.

Shit. I have dreams about burning in hell for my sins all the goddamn time. I feel the pain of the fire in my dreams and demons shoving spikes into my crotch is the worst.

That said, I follow my own version of Christianity which I have a feeling that most modern Churches are corrupt and man made.

I mean Abraham and Moses didn't even have a codified Bible and they found god on their own.

Also I have a gut feeling that Jack Chick is going to burn in hell come judgement day and will be complaining all the way down in the pit.

I'm vaguely familiar with annihilationism. I've listened to one or two podcasts and read about it briefly in articles. Some aspects of it seem to make Sense, like the explanation surrounding the difference between eternal life and eternal death. As of now I haven't really found any good explanations surround the wheeping and gnashing of teeth. Could you like me to any good reading on the topic ?

I've struggled finding a decent church, I don't view myself as a Christian at this point but I've always imagined if I do follow that path my conversion will be infinitely more persanol, reading scripture and interpreting on my own time etc.

All rational people when considering any possibility that they will end up in a dark lake of fire forever being tormented where the fire never dies and you don't either, should experience a crippling fear.

Knowing real hell is worse than that is even more awful.

The only thing that drives out fear is Love, and God is Love. If you want that fear gone, his name is Jesus, he is God, and he rose from the dead.

You can choose to be one of his, a child of God, not appointed to wrath, who will never experience hellfire.

Jack Chick tracts are God Tier.

desu, just stay away from christianity. its not really true anyway. in all likelihood. if you were going to reasonably way up the evidence then most would come up to the conclusion that christianity is not true.

your mental health is more important.

Here is a suggestion. Just read the Bible.

Maybe start out with King James first as much as its biased since its old English its more poetic, but its a start.

But, if you get to hard mode, look up Bible verses in their original meaning. I'll be damned if I will ever understand ancient Greek but its useful to know.

Like when Jesus said "and upon this rock I will build my church"

Well Peter in Greek means rock. Its things like that you don't get form the translations.

OP, take some time to really look at every religion you can. It's fine if this takes a while. It's meant to. If no one really syncs with you, take what works and leave the rest. As long as what's left over in the end is a consistent morality that you can honestly say is the best way for you personally, you've succeeded.

Only join up with organized religion if one of them matches entirely with your morality. It just works out better.

Always self-analyze your beliefs and the way your brain works. Are you following the tenets you've chosen to follow? Is this belief or that belief rational? Irrational? Is this aspect of you or your spirituality born of fear? Hatred? Love?

Know yourself, OP. Understand how YOU work and what works for YOU. Read everything, listen to others, but trust in your own judgement once all the facts are in.

Wherever your journey takes you, Godspeed.

Both Abraham and Moses met and talked to God face to face.

If you want to talk to God face to face, that will most certainly happen, one way or the other.

I suggest the way God wants, which is for you to accept the sacrifice he made on your behalf, confessing out loud Jesus is Lord, and believing in your heart God raised him from the dead.

That's the core of Christianity, and that's how a man is born again in the Spirit.

It's a modern heresy that contradicts what Jesus himself said about hell; that it is eternal punishment.

It plays on the word "death", which people take to mean "cessation of life", but which in context to God means "being separated from God forever". So the second death, being cast into a lake of fire, is being separated from God forever.

The nonsense that this body cannot withstand such a lake of fire, and therefore people are annihilated, denies that both Daniel and John wrote there are two resurrections, not one. One to shame and disgrace in an eternal lake of fire, and one to glory in the kingdom of the living God.

Everyone will die; everyone will be resurrected; everyone will either be baptized in the Spirit, or in fire.

If it makes you feel better, use those OCD power and read about the history of hell. It wasn't always a part of Abramahic religion, and the version of of that Jack Chick talks about is a result of the middle ages.

Work on your vertical relationship with God and let the Holy Spirit guide you to a church, if he wants to. He may not want to. The prophecies of churches in the end times is not good.

Jesus is God.

Jesus rose from the dead.

Both are true, and both are the foundation of Christianity.

Thanks friend, responses are greatly appreciated.

In the Greek, Petros is not the petra.

I know you don't know what that means, because your church relies on "apostolic succession" to enslave you.

I've done that for a while not but I can't shake the fear that there's an argument I'm missing and I'll be sent to hell in my ignorance

Jack Chick confirmed for putting bible references for what he teaches in his tracts.

Including these, written in 97 AD, not "in the middle ages":

Revelation 19:20 Then the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who worked signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were cast alive into the lake of fire burning with brimstone.

Revelation 20:10 The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

Revelation 20:14 Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

Revelation 20:15 And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

There is no argument, only the truth:

"I am The Way, The Truth, and The Life; no man comes to the Father but by Me."

--Jesus of Nazareth

Your ignorance is not your problem; your problem is that like Adam and Eve after the Fall of Man, you are spiritually dead.

And there is no place in the Kingdom of God for the spiritually dead; they are sorted out with the dead, not the living.

If you seek Jesus with an open heart, you will find him.

He promises.

And he keeps all of his promises.

Doesn't peter mean small rock or something like that? The rock Jesus was refering is himself. There is other verses which sadly I don't remember right now, that compares and refers Jesus as a rock.

Christianity has many sects and ways of viewing the holy word, but personally I believe in quite a few different religions each having their own part to play in a greater scheme. I believe in one true god, but also believe that beings of higher power do exist. Finding the difference between "good" or "evil" thoughts and beliefs with OCD means a nightmarish internal debate, however (I know personally). You need a foundation to build up faith, and in the bible it talks of 5 crowns. I chose my basis of Righteousness, which is NOT the same as justice. To be righteous is to stand for an ideal you believe to be truly good. Shinto faith asks you to be respectful of all things, for everything is alive in it's own way. It's a philosophically sound idea, that I know doesn't compromise my christian beliefs, and that I've accepted isn't always possible. But my christian foundations of righteousness allow me to live in a way that I can care for animals, grow plants, and show general love for people weaker than me. So the two religions intersect here, you see?

>revelation

Read about the history of second temple judaism and learn what apocalyptic literature actually is. It was never meant to be taken literally.

Thinking that Christianity or any religion at all is true or not is entirely subjective to the person questioning

Why do you think that?

Not him but all the craziest asshole "Christians" are Protestant.

there really isn't one OP. let me go ahead and give you a quick proof that unquestionably proves it wrong in my opinion: my assumption: as God Jesus is all-knowing other than the date of Judgment Day, which he says only the Father knows. based on the gospels Jesus thinks that Moses wrote the Torah. but here's the thing: that's impossible and contradicts our current understanding of how the Torah was written. Moses would have had to write them in the 1400s BC but at this time Hebrew didn't exist as a language and the writing we have of the language that developed into Judaism, proto-sinatic, was quite different from biblical hebrew, especially the script. also, while there's a lot of debate on the specifics of this, but it's universally accepted among biblical scholars that the Torah doesn't have a single author and was edited and added to over several centuries. If Jesus knows less about the origins of the Torah than we do then he can't be all-knowing and therefore can't be anything more than a man limited to the knowledge of his time.

From what i've seen it's usually the Catholics that are more extreme

*developed into hebrew

Don't forget, you can never win in a fear of hell choice. Check out pascals super wager. Pic related.

That does seem to make sense. I've heard similar things before but haven't known what to make of them due to my limited knowledge of the time period.

Is there even a consensus on what the book of revelations is supposed to mean. I mean obviously it's describing the " end times ", but I've heard a million differant arguments as to whether or not it's literal, metaphorical, or the events described were a metaphor and have already taken place.

*?

In my experience Catholics are usually much less ferverent and over the top

I think it's half and half with being literal and metaphorical

Historically it's been the Catholics that were the "extremists" or whatever in Christianity. I personally am a Protestant, but I can see where you're coming from, especially in today's world

That's always seemed like a sensible prespective to me. What I fear is that the fire and brimstone preachers are correct and all philosophy and other religions are of the devil no matter if there teachings align with Christianity. It's likely the OCD working through me but it makes reading differant arguments difficult as of late

Wiccanism has the most 99s, so that mean it's the best choice? Am I reading this right?

it was a common style of religious writing among jews at the time

The fact that there is no argument is why I have a hard time accepting it. It just flat out doesn't make sense to me. I can't just accept something as integral to my life as faith without sound reason as to why I belive said things.

I don't think it's a universal thing amongst Protestants obviously, but I do belive that the popularity of that style has greatly contributed to the seemingly waning influence of Christianity in America

So I should consider it more of dramatization, or just a shot in the dark as to how the end times will play out ? Or just as a grain of salt in general ?

Martin Luther was pretty extreme sempai.

Yeah I get what you mean

In what sense

He led a revolt against the Church? He threw out a lot of doctrine and imposed his own views?

>wanting to reform the church by removing corruption and getting back to pure truth

>revolt

Pick one.

It's the Papacy that threw a hissy fit and got butthurt because people were reading the Bible for themselves and getting to know God instead of some child-fucking Latin priest telling you what the Bible says.

God the idea of Hell turns me on. Absolute agony, burning despair, with no hope of escape and nothing but to repent unheard. Fuck it makes me salivate. True, divine punishments of all kinds.

faggot. Go kill yourself.

Never take a stance solely because it opposes another.

Let me rephrase what I meant. I mean that Luther, by the very nature of his opposition to the established order, was an extremist of a sort. A radical. I didn't mean to pass any sort of judgement, just stating a fact.

I used to have dreams when I was a teen-ager if being tortured in hell by a demon guy. Like, as silly as it sounds, electrocuted and spanked. I always came in my pants while asleep too. It really fucked me up.

May as well write a book and market it as your prophetic vision

I don't think it would market well to Christians. Pretty inapporpriate content. Boy, if He'll is really like that though I"all take ten tickets.

They'll be cumming fire for all of eternity

For real I have a genuinely devil kink. If God really existed all it would take to get me on Lucifer's side is a a collar and some sweet words.

Shit user, if there is a god good luck explaining that one to him

Yeah, um, I'm hoping maybe god just leaves the deviants with the devil after judgement. To be fair, if angels offered the same thing I'd be down too. I just want to faithfully serve real power.

This is the most reasonable post in this thread.

>this anxiety is the Holy Spirit

Now this takes the cake for being the most ridiculous and cringeworthy shit I've ever read on this site.

i know but all these people are telling him to get into christianity and im thinking in all probability that will just make it worse. we are dealing with a mental illness and that should be treated psychiatrically and not religiously, especially if the religion is actually part of the issue.

It kinda exasterbates the problem in some ways. It's more or less the "You'rs gonna burn forever" types of responses that really fuck with me.

*You're

i feel ur fear of going to hell could easily be part of the ocd and wouldnt be as bad without it and i feel if thats the case then its not necessarily going to be easy to stop it through pure rationality alone.

do you actually believe in jesus btw?

Considering your age and current dilemma I would definitely say you are experiencing anxiety in general.

And when you say "honest look" what do you mean exactly? The tenants of the Christian faith are pretty straightforward. And it is a faith. Not a source of empirical evidence. No hubble scan has ever seen anything that could be called heaven, or God, or the like.
A belief in Christianity is just that. A belief. You are welcome to believe it. You have that right, certainly. But if you are considering it because you are afraid of its version of hell then you won't be safe with Christianity. Most religions have some form of divine punishment as a part of their narrative.
After all what if Islam is correct? Then you burn in Islamic hell for choosing wrong. What if Hinduism is correct? You may reincarnate as a lower life form and live mere weeks before being devoured by a predator. And what about mythologies? They were devoutly believed at one point as well.
Personally I am an atheist (minus the Fedora). I am one simply because I don't buy into the idea of "belief". If something is true/real then there is evidence to support it. My beliefs on its existence are irrelevant. And if something lacks evidence proving its validity/existence then I will carry on with my life until such evidence becomes available.
I don't stress over variables and unknowns because there are too damn many of them. Neither should you. Life's too short for that.

No I don't belive in Jesus or a god. I'm quite confident it's the OCD, this is how it's acted my whole life but since it's something I have no control over I can't shake the feeling that I'm wrong.

By an honest look I mostly mean putting my preconceived notions surround Christianity away to try and re examine it. To tell you the truth I haven't come across any astounding arguments as to why I should belive that I haven't heard before. To tell you the truth the only reason I think about Christianity so much and not Islam is I'm surrounded by Chrisntisty.

well if you were, you would be in good company and the christians are probably wrong anyway.

>Martin Luther was pretty extreme sempai.

Do Catholicfags actually believe this? Not even a Protestant, but holy shit, this statement is completely wrong. Luther was extremely conservative, especially when compared to other radical reformers and contemporaries, such as the Zwickau prophets, Zyngli, Calvin, Severus, etc. etc.

All his life, the man was criticized for being too 'Catholic'. The church service he himself devised was nothing but a Catholic mass with a few superficial changes; and his views were not particularly radical.

Luther merely makes a good scapegoat, but by doing so, the person reveals their own ignorance of the Reformation. Luther was NOT a radical, or an extremist, by any stretch.

Yes exactly! and thats literally why many people on Veeky Forums are too. I really do think that it is actually very clear that christianity isn't true in terms of probabilities, evidence, reliability of the bible. Its just bullshit. Sure the morals or ethics can be good like in many other religions, but its statements about the world are prehistoric. i myself actually enjoy going to church and have tried to get into christianity in the past but i can't because whenever i try, i just realise that there really isn't a good reason to believe in jesus as the saviour of the world or god's existence.

I feel a little bit like a troll for posting this so I apologize and it's nothing personal but seriously do you guys listen to yourselves? Literally the Internet exists. You all have access to the knowledge of science. How can you take this crap seriously? No response needed.

>Ywn sit at Lucifer's throne, chained and exposed, his dark whore and minion in the eternal city of Dis

Modern day Internet allows you to carefully construct the echo chamber of you choice.

I didn't know Veeky Forums was so gay.

I'm okay with this.

we live in a post-fact society

so does the bible.

some of us.

Apocalyptic literature was a common genre among second temple jews and early christians. It had a set of rules for how it worked. The basic idea was using an account of the end times (framed as a divine revelation) as a metaphor to talk about a contemporary issue. To do this, heavy use of symbolism was employed (there were some rules for this, google is going to explain this better than I can in this post). There was never an intention that any piece of apocalyptic literature was to be taken seriously; people of the time knew the genre and would have understood the symbols used.

Revelation is a work telling its audience about the dangers of becoming hellenized or romanized.

It goes the other way too.
>ywn be brought before God, exposed body and soul to his divine warmth radiance, brought to tears by the crushing guilt of your sins, but filled with the indescribable forgiveness and love inside you, redeeming you

thought so. young creationist friend thinks otherwise though. "Babylons china, antichrist obama! irans going to destroy the israelites, prophecy fulfil blah blah!"

They just use the same deep symbols that was always used to speak about geopolitics in deep, but meaningful language,