I fail to see how this is off-topic. The topic of the article is religious faith among young people, and the person I replied to expressed a want to find Christian faith. So how is it off topic? At least admit you're being a tad-bit dishonest.
You link the guidelines but I haven't broken a single one in this thread lmao. I admit some other times I've brought up faith may have been off-topic as it relates to the OP, but on topic as it relates to my reply.
All people will be punished by eternal hell if they do not accept Jesus Christ. The default state of man is death and hell since the fall of Adam, but we can reconcile our sin with God through Jesus, who is called "the true and better Adam".
"Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." - Romans 5:18
When we trust in Jesus Christ our sin no longer defines us, and no longer has any power over us, because we've accepted Jesus Christ's atonement for those sins, and all of the sins of our life. We can never defeat sin on this earth, for as long as we have the flesh it has some power over us, and that is the struggle of the Christian life.
I've been fearful, I've been a liar, I sometimes still fear and still lie. But I trust in Jesus, that since through his power he defeated sin and death, and was resurrected, that he can do the same for me. So though I've lied, I'm no longer a liar, though I've feared, I'm no longer fearful. Until you are reconciled to God by belief in Jesus Christ, you are defined by your sin, and punished for your sin after death.
"Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:" - John 11:25
I was exactly where you are for a majority of my life, my brother passed away when I was 14 and it didn't lead me anywhere good, only further from God. I was saved when I was 19 by accepting those steps outlined in faith, and praying that prayer. I didn't intellectually accept them as you suggest, I didn't say "that makes sense to me", I just simply took it on faith, and prayed that prayer to Jesus, asking to be saved.
"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths." - Proverbs 3:5-6
By praying that prayer earnestly in your heart you commit your soul to Jesus, it's just like the thief next to Jesus on the cross:
"And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise." - Luke 23:42-43 KJV
And I know it's hard to recognize your sin, and believe in the penalty for sin, without first believing in Jesus. Maybe I shouldn't put them into steps, because it's something that happens all at once. By accepting Jesus you accept the truth of God's word in the Bible, because Jesus is "the word made flesh".
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." - John 1:1
I can tell from your paragraph that you are not incapable of believing, so I will pray earnestly for your salvation.
You can live a good life, but if you've transgressed the law at any point you're guilty of it all. Jesus himself said if you even look at a woman with lust your heart is guilty of adultery, or if you're angry at your brother your heart is guilty of murder.
"For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.” - James 2:10
"But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death." - Revelation 21:8
"The thought of foolishness is sin: And the scorner is an abomination to men." - Proverbs 24:9
"But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away." - Isaiah 64:6
I don't know about you, but I've BEEN unbelieving in my past, I've lied and sometimes still do, and I've thought foolishness and still do. So I've transgressed God's law, but it has been forgiven of me because I accepted God's plan of salvation, which is faith in Jesus Christ through His substitutionary death on the cross and bodily resurrection.
If you never broke God's law, you'd never die and you would completely earn your salvation. It's impossible for us, but it was possible for Jesus because he was God and born to a virgin, therefore he was fully man and fully God. His work on the cross makes it possible to be born again in this life, with his same duality (having our flesh and our spirit), and the promise that we will one day receive a new body without sin.
The point is, God is so entirely holy that we cannot be reconciled by anything that we do with our bodies, or "works". Faith is required to receive the gift Jesus Christ paid for, which is not something we do with our body, it's a spiritual transaction.
"For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." - 2 Corinthians 5:21
“Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.” - 1 Peter 2:24
Actually it might be, but we shouldn't give it the negative connotation "coping mechanism". That suggests that there's no inner change and that it's just a coat of paint in someone's life. God helps us cope because His promises are tangible, true, and good. It's a lot deeper than a "mechanism", it's a change of heart.
"The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart" - Psalm 34:18 KJV
Seeking God is not a coping mechanism. Terrible things in our lives simply open up our hearts to God's word, and help us recognize our sin nature and seek God. Then when you realize it's as simple as believing in Jesus Christ's substitutionary death, and you can defeat death and sin as well, then of course it would seem like a no brainer, because it is! It's the greatest news ever, that we can be reconciled to God and have a direct relationship with the creator of everything.
1. Admit you are a sinner, because all have sinned and come short of the glory of God - Romans 3:23, Romans 3:10-12, 1 John 1:10, James 2:10
2. Realize the penalty for sin, which is death, hell, and eternal separation from God - Revelation 21:8, Romans 6:23, Galatians 5:19-21, 1 Corinthians 6:9, James 1:15
3. Believe that Jesus died, was buried, and rose again to pay for your sin - 1 John 2:2, Acts 16:30-31, Acts 3:19, Acts 10:43 Romans 5:8, 1 Timothy 3:16, 1 Peter 2:24, John 3:16, John 10:28, John 6:47, John 11:26, 1 Timothy 1:15, 2 Corinthians 5:21, 1 Corinthians 6:11
4. Trust Jesus Christ alone as your savior, nothing else - Ephesians 2:8-9, Acts 4:11-12, Romans 11:6, Matthew 7:13-14, Matthew 7:21-23
Pray this prayer:
"Dear Jesus Christ, I know that I am a sinner. I know that I deserve to go to hell, but I believe you died on the cross for me and rose again. Please save me right now and give me eternal life. I'm only trusting in you Jesus, Amen."
And if you believed this in your heart, you're now saved and have the Holy Spirit. First of all, rejoice because you've passed from death to life through the power of Jesus Christ and he will NEVER leave nor forsake you, no matter what. This is why "Gospel" means "good news". You have absolute freedom, and power over death through Jesus. The Holy Spirit will guide you into more understanding as you read the scripture, but you should first focus on knowing the person of Jesus. Jesus is also in the Old Testament symbolically and literally.
The important thing to note is that Christianity is not just doing good things, about turning your life around, etc. Christianity is first about believing the promise of God and His finished work on the cross, and then those good works can follow (but they don't have to, some are saved without works - Romans 4:5). We don't do work for Jesus or become obedient to him because we must to be saved, we do it out of love because we ARE saved.
And once you're saved, you're saved. There is no bad deed you could do to lose it, because there was no good deed you could do to earn it. Jesus says he will never leave nor forsake you, and he means it, and his promises are good forever and always.
Pretty much this, there have been times in my career when I was prepared to do everything the right way, but deadlines and unrealistic expectations from people who don't even know what JavaScript is forced my hand, so the product was less pretty internally but still functioning.
For most people software engineering is about driving results, not making everything beautiful under the hood. Although it's nice to do that when you have time.
There is justification before God and justification before men. To be justified before God requires faith alone, to be justified before men requires faith and works. Justification before God = entrance into heaven, however, so works don't matter for salvation.
If we want Christians fellowship on this Earth, and rewards in heaven, it is good to do work.
How much is it actually using the PDF and how much is just normal Chat GPT knowledge? I uploaded a KJV bible and it seems to be doing pretty good with theological issues, like it knows salvation is by grace through faith alone which is my litmus test for any theological program. However, it seems to be just as honed in as Chat GPT is without even uploading a PDF.
All the while housing, healthcare, education, and the things that matter once you've achieved food prosperity are disappearing at a rapid rate. This makes people turn to their baser needs more often, food and pornography and other stimulus.
Hello! Using this Google App Script code makes it possible to do file requests (even anonymous ones) using Google Drive. The implementation provided uses user input to create folders within a specified folder but you can remove that feature pretty easily for anonymous uploads.
I've limited it to 100MB transfers but you can also remove that and test the limits for yourself. I've successfully done up to 200MB at one time which is pretty huge for being absolutely free and customizable.
I think the fear should be less about AI taking 100% of jobs but it should be AI making a single programmer do the job of 5, which would wipe a majority of the market out and make it a non-viable career option for most.
Companies are already bloated, imagine when they realize one overworked highly paid senior can replace 10 juniors.
I've found it common that older people can often take things on an extremely personal level. It's like at some point they forget the people they're talking to don't know their complete life story, and yet they behave as if others have no life story at all.