[OnYourKnees]

Originally Posted by Ohnn

umm, may you please explain what you mean by "created it"?

I believe the two of you had a misunderstanding. A "thread" is this individual conversation. The "forum" is the collection of conversations that makes up landoverbaptist.net.

Since you started this thread, it does not make sense for you to say you discovered it. I believe you meant that you discovered this forum, and find it very interesting.

statues are used to tell stories ... we dont worship statues. in fact, there are several different kinds of buddhism.

i am a theravada buddhist (from the southeast asian region - this is important), which means that Buddha (the enlightened one) is the one we revere the most. no, we do not see him as a god. we see him as the ultimate sage (not a saint, there is a difference) and we revere him for that for showing us the way to "salvation" (** i put the apostrophes to suggest there's an ultimate resting place, sort of like what you call heaven. however there are ,any who dont reach that goal, so they are reborn countless times. each time, carrying over their sins in an attempt for them to repent... or something like that.. -.-'' )

Thank you for this brief introduction to your understanding of Buddhism.

however, im still a child, so im under the jurisdiction of my parents who are buddhists (that means i cant convert on my own free will); however, since my dad was brought here by a christian church (im sorry, but they were methodists) he grew up influenced by christianity. my grandma was baptised, dad makes us celebrate christian holidays.. heck, he even bought me a bible as a present. i highly doubt that he'd rot in hell. the only reason he didnt convert was becasue he wanted to maintan our roots. which is basically what everyone is doing.

Understanding and following all of the Bible is how one avoids rotting in hell. Keeping a few traditions means little to God without faith to back them up.

Do people vote in your country? In the United States, to pick our leaders we go into a private booth and make our selections. Outside the booth, we may profess support for any candidate we want, but when we're alone, in the booth, making our private selection, that's what counts.

Keeping traditions is like going around wearing a button for a particular candidate. Everybody sees the button on my shirt, and says, "Oh, he supports Candidate X." But when I go to vote, I may vote for Candidate Z. I can keep Christian traditions -- going to church every week, for example -- but not believe in Jesus or follow God's Word. My going to church won't matter when God is deciding my eternal fate, if I didn't actually believe!

Meanwhile, not converting when you do believe -- that is, denying God -- for the sake of keeping your family's traditions is insulting to God and a surefire way to Hell. God is very jealous, and doesn't want you worshipping any other gods.

correct me if im wrong, but i think, correct me if i am wrong, it is true with christians too. they want to remember that they were all created by god (even though you believe some people arent equal to others) and that jesus is the son of god. in sure i at least got that correct...

Yes, you got that part right. The universe was created by God. God made laws for people to follow. The first time people didn't follow the laws, He sent a great flood and drowned all of them.

Later, God realized that no amount of punishing of living people would straighten them out, so rather than just deciding that He would lighten up on the laws, He impregnated a virgin woman with Himself so He could be born as Jesus and sacrificed Himself.

So now, we're expected to obey the Word of God, but if we mess up, we can ask Jesus to forgive us and He will. But if we don't do our very best to follow every bit of God's Word (as in the King James version of the Bible), and we don't ask Jesus to forgive all our sins, we will be cast into eternal torment after we die.

God has decided humans deserve infinite punishment for finite sin.

so what im trying to say is that im not putting him down nor am i brushing him off just because im not a christian, but that doesnt mean i wont convert to it later on when im older... but i doubt i will because i truly believe in treating other with kindness and respect (which, in my opinion, is so rare these days).

We treat others with exactly the degree of kindness and respect the Bible tells us to use. That is, we judge and condemn those who sin in the eyes of God.

You say that you're still a child? How old?

I suggest that you read the Bible with your parents, that they may help you understand who God is, who Jesus is, and what following God's Word really means. You should read ALL parts of it, not just the happy parts, and not just the parts some lying preachers say are the parts that matter. It ALL matters.

Also, you seem to only have a very basic grasp of your own religion. I suggest you also study and more fully understand your own religion, that you may see where it falls short of Christianity once you fully understand both religions.