Is The Physical Realm Analogous To A Simulated Reality?

[VladtheDestroyer]

This has been a delightful conversation, Vlad. Just wanted get that out there.

I think so also. Thank you.

I don't think we understand what the nonphysical part of man really is.

Well sure! Sometimes we have to use our imagination and then test it with the scriptures to see whether our idea is consistent with what the Bible teaches. I hope I wasn't giving the impression that I am trying to do somethings else besides that. Or that I have a perfect understanding of all of these things or that it would be impossible for me to be wrong about something I have said.

I agree that its is unlikely that DNA is going to contain that information, else identical twins would have identical souls/spirits. But I don't think the spirit needs to be the entity sans body. Rather the body cannot function without God's spirit, which can be thought of as a life-giving force (not necessarily the same as God's Holy Spirit).

You'll have to elaborate on that, as I don't understand your gripe.

I think creationists focus too much on the physical part of us. If we focused our arguments more on the mind and our non-physical selves, I feel our arguments would be more intuitive.

I don't see that 'acceptance' as a one-time act, but more as a change in attitude that persists forever, even into the next realm. But yes, the start of that is the most important thing.

That's a good way to put. I agree.

 

[VladtheDestroyer]

You don't think Peter was saying that David, being a prophet, was not talking about himself, but about Christ? And the evidence he presents is that David (not just his body, but David the person) is still dead and buried?Therefore the passage couldn't be about David, since it talks of not being left to corruption (turning back to dust) and not being left in sheol/hades (the grave). And David was still in the corrupted and grave-bound condition.

I agree that the point of Peter's message here is that David is dead, so David surely wasn't talking about himself. He was talking about the coming Messiah. I don't see how this precludes the idea that our spirits go to the Lord when we die. I don't think Peter is saying "Jesus is the Messiah David wrote about + BTW our spirits go to the grave when we die"
Though by now we are probably speaking past each other a bit. By grave I mean soul sleep.

 

[Idolater]

I think it means that we are dead to the wages of sin (it no longer has any effect on us in some way, probably in the fear it produces, since He gives us perfect peace). If we have died (in Christ), then we can't die again. But it's looking forward to a future reality when we will be resurrected never to die again, so we still have to work to not sin in this current reality, which is the mortification of our flesh, or the old man, as you say.

In your view, I'm not seeing why we would need to mortify the flesh, metaphysically speaking (to use a fake and gay word). Just because you're bored? nothing else to do? I can't find the motive in your view, for resisting temptation—again, metaphysically speaking. Is it just what Catholics would call a devotion for you? meaning not a duty, but just voluntary? Or what I've heard @Nick M mention, that it's profitable?

$$ Tit 3:8
[This is] a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable unto men.

$$ 1Ti 4:7
But refuse profane and old wives' fables, and exercise thyself [rather] unto godliness.
$$ 1Ti 4:8
For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

But mainly, this whole notion of us dying in anything other than a metaphorical sense, is like a camel versus a gnat, or a plank versus a speck. Because when we see a faithful and morally disciplined Christian 'fall off the wagon' into some habitual grave sin (or sins), that seems much more to us like a death in a metaphorical sense. What has died is the Christian, in some sense. The man we once knew, but know no longer. I mean if our brother or sister is earning the wages of sin (death), it's almost like they are really dead right before our eyes, though they do continue to physically live and breathe.