Responding to "Gandalf's" Comments on "Debunking Christianity"

Recently I wrote a post about a post John Loftus wrote responding to a comments I left on Friday. You can read my comments on it here. One of the commentators that I have interacted with in the past has posted his own comments regarding me and my actions on the Debunking Christianity blog. His comments are in italics and mine are normal font.

Marcus McElhaney said..."Those "minister" and "prophets" who are doing that will face judgement."

Howdy Marcus.

This is something simply being assumed by you Marcus .You have no such proof to even suggest such a thing "will" happen.Its all about your faith, nothing more.
From the time that I have been reading comments by you, you have whined and cried about the abuses by Christianity and other religions. I still agree there has been much evil done in the name of God and attempts to use the Bible to legitimate those sins. My bone of contention is that it is unfair to blame the Bible for things that people do who are acting contrary to what it says. This underscores things that keep getting confused on the Debunking Christianity blog: The difference between the Bible's content a being true representation of reality and just understanding what the Bible says. How can you meaningfully understand if the Bible is true if you don't understand what it says?
I have already pointed out i dont feel any hate for you Marcus,and i was also being very honest.
But please try to understand pointing straight back to things written in faith books all the time, just isnt good enough for many folks around here, just because it happens to be your personal faith.And you tend to make many folks get a little or even sometimes a lot pissed off about it , when you keep on purposely doing it.
I'm convinced that the majority of the people I have interacted with on the Debunking Christianity blog don't understand what the Bible says, including Gandalf and John Loftus himself. They argue that they do but if they did they wouldn't mishandle and distort what the text says. Again you have to understand what the text is saying before you can evaluate if the text is true. I realize that they hate this point. Thinking that it's being argued that they are not intelligent enough to understand the Bible. I'm not arguing that at all. I'm saying that they are blatantly misunderstanding what the Bible says on many points and if there is disagreement on drawing out the meaning of passages from the Bible we should be able to discuss them and see what the Bible is really saying. Instead most of the time people on that blog just get angry and I get accused of trying to prove the Bible with the Bible.
They purposely point out to you that this is all you do , and even ask you for something better .But then most often all you simply do is exactly the same thing again and again and again , making discussion with you seem so circular and endless.
This statement shows me that Gandalf and perhaps most others don't really read what I write. More than once I have offered to go through scriptures that I know they are mishandling and I've challenged them to show me why my understanding is wrong. And yet very few have even tried to engaged such a thing. Most of the time they throw up their hands as if it would be pointless because I am closed-minded. It seems circular because they refuse to engage what the text is truly saying. For example many say they disagree with the Bible because it says the earth is 6000 years old and the Bible says no such thing.
Im only bothering to be saying what im saying here in this comment now,because i dont feel hatered towards you, and even realize yes your heart is most likely very much in the right place.And you most likely care about people.
Gandalf has most often been the most hate-filled person I've talked to Debunking Christianity. By that I mean he's been the meanest. To be fair he has already stated that his words and attitude has been born of frustration. That is a lack of maturity. You ought to be able to disagree with someone and articulate why without name-calling and arrogance. Passionate emotion is one thing. But we ought to be better than that. At one point Gandalf was doing nothing but calling me names everytime I wrote anything and I started ribbing him back. Since then he has stopped and so have I.
Im just trying to explain what it might be that helps get some peoples attempts at discussion with you, a little heated at times.And then you can choose to think about it a little or not.Specially if you like to believe you do honestly care about people!
I disagree that telling people that I think they are wrong in how they understand the Bible is not being unloving or uncaring. I do it because I do care. IT seems like to me like Gandalf and several other would rather just believe what they want to believe without being challenged. I expect it to get heated. The Bible says it is supposed to get heated. I am telling people what they don't want to hear. Duh!!!

Maybe you will be using your faith to translate these "heated comments" as maybe being forfilling of bible prophesy etc ,and yes it might even give you a bit of a faith buzz.
This statement shows exactly what I'm talking about it. Either Bible says that people are going to behave like these people are responding on Debunking Christianity or it doesn't. If it does...that's evidence of the Bible's truthfulness. They just confirm what the text says. I'm not saying that this is enough to prove everything in the Bible but I think it should be enought to make person dig further.

But the real truth is peoples comments only get heated towards you ,simply because its not really any honest discussion thats happening here at all.Its only blatant use of your faith indoctrination you attempt! time and time again ,over and over .Like its a stuck record.

The discussion is honest from my side. It's not my fault that people keep saying stuff that the Bible does not say and passign it off as if most scholars agree with them and none do.

And then thats what causes the heated comments !.And no! , we honestly dont need any ancient prophesy to be able to understand there is plenty of good natural reasons for that.No superstitious prophesys needed !!

The problem is that the Bible agrees with you as the reasons for the heated comments. You are fulfilling prophecy.

I simply dont really much enjoy seeing this keep happening to you Marcus.Yes i might be atheist, but that dont simply mean it make me not care about anybody.Just trying to point a few things out and explain how maybe? you might be bringing much of it on yourself. 

That's the main point that keeps being made. No honest Christian thinks that all atheists are blood-thirsty, selfish, mean, stupid individuals - Stalins and Maos waiting to happen. Why should Gandalf think bad of all Christians? He has said that he blames all Christians for what his family did to him and for the evils of this world.

Gandalf also made a comment from antother comment made by keith (his words in bold.

keith said... "Gandolf.


Marcus likes to assert things that he has no proof for.

He actually asserted that 2nd Peter 3:8 has no precedent in Psalms 90:4.

He's funny that way..."

Hi Keith.

I have to say in my opinion i think underneath everything Marcus is very intelligent in many ways.But sadly devotion on things of charisma can make even the most intelligent of us humans, become a little thick about some things.

Its not our intelligence that causes this problem though , its more about the "charisma" and "devotion" that then simply tells parts of our brains to simply shut down.Parts of our brains that usually do deal with scepticism and making calculated decisions that have been properly thought through and so have taken account of matters from looking from "every single" angle.
It's real interesting that Gandalf thinks he can psychoanalyze me but then become offended when I merely point out what the Bible says about the conclusions he says he believes. Funny. It's alright to be skeptical about the Bible and Christianity but not okay to be skeptical about the conclusions Gandalf thinks. It's not offensive to think that Christians have a mental problem but offensive to suggest that many of the world's most famous atheists had horrible relationships with their fathers. Double-standard? You betcha!

While Marcus is very intelligent it seems he cant see its obvious the bible is honestly obviously a terrible manual ! if its supposed said to be devine manual to help us humans.And so Marcus cannot even allow himself to see scripture is obviously honestly not easy to understand at all.
Let's see. So is understanding the Bible like say understanding....Quantum Mechanics? No? Why? I know what Gandalf would say. It's apples and oranges because Quantum Mechanics is true. Well Einstein would have disagreed. He didn't think it was true. And I would say that we don't really understand Quantum Mechanics. Not fully. Not completely. Therefore, just becasue you don't understand something does not mean that it's not true. That is why I end up quoting scripture so much. We have to deal with Gandalf's misunderstanding of scripture before we can even begin to discuss if its true or not. I think a great deal of the Bible is clear. To be fair I've been studying it for years. It was written in a language you do not speak in a cultural and temporal context you can't possibly think you can identify with without putting some time in studying it.
Marcus may very well have some specialist type of magical translation of these scriptures, and even be able to connect them in some majical way , kind of like somebody having a go at deciphering the Da Vinci Code.
Again this why I have to spend the time on what the text says before we can discuss if it's true. Gandalf does not understand it. He just said so.

But then what Marcus fails to understand is this does little to help the average Joe blogs human do the same .Neither does it do much at all to help suggest maybe this bible manual honestly looks like its actually anything that can be said as so very devine.
I've offered to discuss that. And I've had very few takers. The fact that the Bible is of divine origin is testable. This is something we can examine. We can reason this out. Again the challenge is out there.

Because the fact still remains its been a curse on earth thats a right mess and has honestly been the cause of many problems and lots of extreme pain heartbreak and even lots of death.
Is that truly a fact of history? Gandalf and others often assert this idea but there is no proof. I'd be happy to look at the proof. A lot of passion. A lot of emotion, No proof. Give me some numbers and where you have found them.
And so even that fact alone! says this bible is not honestly so very devine , doesnt it Keith.

No it doesn't. Keith is another person that I don't think Keith understands what the Bible means. For example he made the following assertion (again in bold).

@Marcus. In another thread you said that a day to God is like 1000 years.

Isn't it true that God says no such thing anywhere in the bible?

Isn't it true that the quote from peter comes from a mis-interpretation of Psalms 90:4?

That verse reads...

Psa 90:4 For a thousand years in thy sight [are but] as yesterday when it is past, and [as] a watch in the night.

This in no way means that a day to God is 1000 years.

A watch in the night is a 3 hour period so why don't christians say that a day to God is 3 hrs?

I have to call bullshit on ya my dude...@ 

Notice Keith's logic. God didn't write the Bible therefore neither Psalms 90:4 and 2 Peter 3:7-9

7By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

8But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Look at the context. When I brought the scripture up, I could have been clearer and I did not think I would have to be this clear. Peter is making the point that God is not bound of time and that he is not bound to our timetable. "Soon" is relative. If God does not measure time as we do...and He does not...then it's a silly argument to assume you know what soom should be. If it takes 20,000 years for Jesus' return then that would still be soon relative to God. Keith then tries to say that Peter misunderstood Psalm 90:4

4 For a thousand years in your sight
are like a day that has just gone by,
or like a watch in the night.

I quoted the NIV. Keith quoted the KJV. While Peter is making ths same point as the Psalmist about God's timelessness. the conext is different. He accuses Peter of misunderstanding Psalms 90:4.However this shows that Keith understands neither passage.