Re: How do you pick and choose which verses of the bible to follow?

MrCooties,
this is how i see it...the Bible is the Word of God- all of it! i don't believe that you can pick and choose. that would make absolutely no sense- you would be making up your own beliefs. the only way to believe is to fully believe everything that is written(, or not). some parts are confusing, and some don't seem to make sense- at first, but if you diligently read and study the Bible (asking God to provide insight helps), the things that didn't make sense before all of a sudden do.

as for the topic of sin: we tend to think of sin as a list of the things that we are not allowed to do, all of the "forbidden", often fun, stuff. something like God gets His jollies by telling us what we can and can't do, making life difficult and boring. think of it this way instead- God is our Father, an all-knowing, good father. he gives us rules for our own good. some of it we don't understand now, but if we obey we'll be much better off. don't eat shellfish! that seems weird and random at first glance, especially when it tastes so good, but shellfish are the "cleaners" of the waterworld filtering all of the bad stuff out of the water. i just read somewhere about scallops and how quickly they can filter the nasty stuff out of water to make it clean. if you then eat them, you are ingesting all that they ate. pork? same idea, they taste awful good! but they are scavengers as well... homosexuality? i don't know. popular wisdom says that certain individuals are born gay and it would be wrong to try to change them. i would start with what the Bible says... God doesn't approve of it and calls it sin. people swear that it is not a choice and so how can anyone say that it is wrong. i don't know, since i don't feel those urges, but i do know that each one of us has to deal with certain predispositions. my family seems to have a problem with anger and yelling. i can choose whether or not to give in to those angry urges. too simple? alcoholism? now it is called a disease and have they found certain genes that tend toward alcohol abuse? regardless, alcoholics can fight their urges and should. if they don't, we often hold them responsible for their actions.