Can I answer these questions for me, from what I believe? And without anyone feeling like I'm pushing my beliefs on them? 'Cause I don't want to do that. I really like how civil this discussion has been so far, I hope we can keep it that way. I do not mean to offend anyone, or start some kind of war here. If you don't want to hear my answers, which are based on the Bible, then please skip my post.
How does the existence of a supreme being make everything we know meaningful?
Whatever.
I'm not trying to change any minds here at all. Doesn't matter to me what anyone believes or doesn't believe. I'm not even sure what I believe. Perhaps I'm just stupid. I'm certainly not smart enough to understand why people holding one belief often hold such malevolent contempt for those holding another belief. That coin has two sides of course. I'm an equal opportunity opponent of fanaticism.
That was a serious question. I'm not trying to change your mind either. I'm just wondering how the existence of a supreme being makes your own existence meaningful. You said it's depressing to think that life is meaningless if it simply occurred because of chance. If the supreme being created life, and you don't know his/her/its intentions, aren't you back to square one?
If there is a Supreme Being, no matter its intentions, there is meaning to our existence. Obviously this might be a meaning we cannot fathom.
But that still only answers the "how" and not the "why" of our existence. Also, what if the intentions of the supreme being are evil? If you don't know his/her/its intentions, you must consider evil intentions as a possibility. How, then, can that be comforting?
The existence of a Supreme Being - God - changes things because He's there. Genesis talks about God creating man in His image. There it also says that God had fellowship with man, a fellowship that was broken when man sinned. But from that can be taken that we were created for His pleasure. Throughout the New Testament it speaks of giving God the glory and His work for His good pleasure. So His creation is for His pleasure and for His glory as well. How does that add meaning? If you believe that you were created to bring pleasure to someone, and that Someone is God Himself, then it adds purpose and meaning. If you believe in God as the Bible speaks of Him, you know His intentions are to be good and of love, not of evil.
If there is not, if this is just a phenomenal roll of the dice, there can be no meaning. In a random collision of chance there is only a random collision of chance.
Even if a supreme being created life, your personal existence was still due to chance. If a different sperm cell penetrated the ovum in your mother's Fallopian tube, you wouldn't exist here today. Instead of being depressed that life could be meaningless because your existence is due to chance, you can just as well feel happy that luck shined on you however many years ago. You, in fact, got luckier than hitting lotto by your mere existence. So cheer up!
Ecclesiastes speaks of a purpose for everything. Everything has not exceptions. Thus, if you believe the Bible to be true, even your existence, has a purpose - even why you specifically were created.
Faith provides the answers. I'm not saying I have them. I'm not saying my faith isn't at preschool levels. I'm saying that if you have faith you find the answers that work for you. I envy many of those people to be honest. My wife is one of them. She's a very happy person.
Faith may provide answers, but it doesn't guarantee truth.
So right! But there is truth. Something among the others has to be right. "Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it." "There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death."
I believe the Bible to be true. So often I see debates on why someone believes that science contradicts the Bible or the Bible contradicts science; I hardly ever see where something in the Bible was proven to be true, but there are instances. The Bible, in the Old Testament, speaks of the world being a sphere, for so long scientists said the world was flat. Also, there are things that are said to contradict the Bible yet are still a theory.
I hope my answers have been clear for those who have read my post.
