# A Paragraph



## lumino (Sep 18, 2018)

> None have ever lived on earth whose life was free of sin, but one who lived 2,000 years ago, namely Jesus Christ the Lord, who is the Son of God. And thus were all appointed to perish, to ever suffer the wrath of God, for the sins which they committed in their lives, because the sins which they committed were against a holy God. But God, being full of love and willing to save us all, sent His Son Christ Jesus into the world, who, born of a virgin, grew up and preached among His people, and healed many afflicted by any disease. And they scorned Him and put Him to death on a cross, but as He died thereon, He suffered the wrath of God for every man, and the blood that He shed atoned for the sins of all who did or ever would live. And in a tomb, they buried His body, but three days later He rose again. And He gives salvation to every man who puts their trust in Him, believing that He died, was buried, and revived, and that He died to pay the price for all their sins.



Revision:


> Every man has sinned against God, who is a holy God, and thus were appointed to suffer eternal wrath. But God, being full of love, wanted to save us all, so He sent His Son Christ Jesus into the world. He was born of a virgin and lived among men, preaching and healing many diseased. But the world did scorn Him and put Him to death on a cross. But as He died upon that cross, He suffered God’s wrath for every man, atoning with His own blood for the sins of them all. And in a tomb, they buried His body, but three days later He rose again. And He gives salvation to every man who puts their trust in Him, who believes that He died, was buried, and revived; who believes that He died to pay for all their sins.


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## H.Brown (Sep 18, 2018)

Lumino is this part of a bigger piece? I ask becaue right now it seems to be a very small piece of informative writing, which to me is just a retelling of the story of christ not an original piece of nonfictional writing on the religious subject.


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## lumino (Sep 18, 2018)

H.Brown said:


> Lumino is this part of a bigger piece? I ask becaue right now it seems to be a very small piece of informative writing, which to me is just a retelling of the story of christ not an original piece of nonfictional writing on the religious subject.



It's just a small piece, not part of a bigger one. I wouldn't consider it fiction.


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## moderan (Sep 18, 2018)

I would.


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## Plasticweld (Sep 18, 2018)

Moderan has given you the perfect platform to work from.  To make a point or to share a philosophy you have to be able to teach the context and history behind your points. To make blanket statements without the history, is meaningless.  

Your audience is not going to be persuaded because you said so. 

Christ spoke in parables to clarify the points he was making and in words that every man of the time understood.  Look at any of his lessons and realize that he was teaching a new generation the experiences and teachings of those from many hundreds of years to his current audience     For you to make the same pointa you must also speak in today's language, using examples that anyone "today" can relate to.   Teaching any philosophy is the ability to touch an inner truth that somehow strikes a cord with your listeners.  

When someone says I think this is fiction, it is up to you to be able to logically explain what you are claiming.  Does he deny Christ existed or that he is son of God? Both can be answered.  

From someone who used to be involved in  ministry, I can only tell you that it is your responsibility cast the net not fill it.  At the same time there is a responsibility to  have enough back ground and knowledge to speak effectively. 


It would have been better to put out the story and what brought you there. You posted the conclusion without the story, to the casual reader they would have tuned you out before your third sentence.  Become the master of the story, it will hold those who listen and more importantly they will be primed to hear, not reject the message.   


This is a site of storytellers and it is the perfect place to learn the art of the story and hooking the reader or the listener.  Good ministers and good writers all have one thing in common, they are good story tellers.  For those the ministry the task is even more difficult because you are retelling a story that already most have heard. 

Welcome to forum...Bob


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## H.Brown (Sep 19, 2018)

Lumino I didn't say that it was fiction. This is however a retelling of the bible just in a simplified form. Which is why I questioned if it was part of something bigger, for example the introduction to a non-fiction essay on reglion, or theintroduction to a non-fictional essay on religion. 

At the moment you retell events from the bible, but you don't put your own information or spin on what you are saying. I failed to find the point to this writing, which lead me to question if non-fiction is the correct place for this paragraph. Can you please explain what you wished to achieve with this paragraph?


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## Ralph Rotten (Sep 19, 2018)

Actually it's more Christian dogma than anything else. The concept of the holy trinity was a marketing term coined by early Catholics, and all that stuff about Christ dying to pay for our original sins is pure dogma. The consumption of the apple was never a sin; it was a test, a metaphoric symbol of humanity's choice to go to the next level. Twas theologians who made it a sin as a justification to require observance of the faith. Later Catholics built a whole slew of services around it (communion, confirmation, etc.)

sincerely
a Catholic refugee.


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## Ralph Rotten (Sep 19, 2018)

As for the paragraph's writing, it was really a lotta run-on sentences.


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## lumino (Sep 19, 2018)

H.Brown, It's just a short presentation of the gospel, for the purpose of persuading people to trust in Christ.

Everyone, thanks for all the feedback. 

Plasticweld, I suppose it is necessary to lead the reader to the conclusion, rather than simply stating it.

Ralph Rotten, why do you say that some of my sentences are run-ons? As far as I know, a run-on is a sentence that combines multiple clauses without connecting them with a word such as a conjunction. A sentence that is simply long, as far as I know, is not a run-on. Also, I checked the paragraph in grammarly: it found a few errors but none of them had anything to do with sentences being run-ons.


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## moderan (Sep 19, 2018)

> None have ever lived on earth whose life was free of sin, but one who lived 2,000 years ago, namely Jesus Christ the Lord, who is the Son of God.



This is not a run-on, but it's awkward as hell. So are the rest of these sentences. It's awful writing, honestly, which one has to strain to understand. I too question the purpose of the posting. What exactly are you trying to accomplish?



> It's just a short presentation of the gospel, for the purpose of persuading people to trust in Christ.



Then it's evangelism, and I'm going to take it up with the management or go Dawkins on your ass.


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## lumino (Sep 19, 2018)

moderan said:


> This is not a run-on, but it's awkward as hell. So are the rest of these sentences. It's awful writing, honestly, which one has to strain to understand. I too question the purpose of the posting. What exactly are you trying to accomplish?


Yeah, I realized that. I didn't really see that because I am the one who wrote it and I already knew what I was trying to communicate to the reader. I have been struggling to write clearly a lot lately. 

When you say the sentences are awkward, I am not sure if you are referring to sound or readability or both. I have to admit, however, that I am a terrible writer. I think I was much better several years ago.

 As for what I was trying to accomplish, I was trying to communicate my thought with a certain sound. 



moderan said:


> Then it's evangelism, and I'm going to take it up with the management or go Dawkins on your ass.



Well, it's a work for critique. The evangelism part comes when the work is polished, not necessarily on this forum unless that is allowed. But I don't intend to use this short piece by itself anymore. I intend to eventually write something much longer and better, a work of apologetics.

Thanks for the feedback. Please give me some insight as to why my words were not clear. I tried to revise them to make them clearer but I probably failed to make them clear enough.


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## Ralph Rotten (Sep 19, 2018)

What he said.


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## moderan (Sep 19, 2018)

lumino said:


> Yeah, I realized that. I didn't really see that because I am the one who wrote it and I already knew what I was trying to communicate to the reader. I have been struggling to write clearly a lot lately.
> 
> When you say the sentences are awkward, I am not sure if you are referring to sound or readability or both. I have to admit, however, that I am a terrible writer. I think I was much better several years ago.
> 
> ...



You're trying too hard to emulate so-called 'beautiful writing'. What's coming out reads, like, William Shatner, could, have spoken, it, or like Stan Lee's version of archaicism, verily, by my trow. It looks and sounds artificial and pompous. It's anachronistic and hard to master.
If it's work for critique, it's in the wrong place.


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## JustRob (Sep 20, 2018)

lumino said:


> Every man has sinned against God,



I agree with others that as an initial premise this comes across as pure dogma. In his writings Kaoru Ishikawa, the renowned Japanese theorist on organisation and quality, stated that he contemplated whether eastern and western cultures differed fundamentally because eastern religions were based on the premise that mankind is normally good and sin is the exception while western religion has embraced the converse, that everyone is born in sin and must strive to redeem themselves. However, he went on to say that this view was itself too much of a generalisation for him to regard it as a principle. After WWII he was a strong influence in the reconstruction of Japanese culture and its trading position in the world. Hence in the wider context of the word he was an evangelist who used reasoning rather than dogma to put across his message.

Faith is a part of personal philosophy and we cannot simply impose it on others without it being seen as dogma. One must start with their existing philosophy and try to influence that through reasoning and example. Otherwise regardless of the potential truth in one's message one is just a voice crying in the wilderness.

Writing is the art of building ideas, images and stories within the minds of others through words, so it involves a good deal of psychology to be effective.


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## Ralph Rotten (Sep 20, 2018)

JustRob said:


> I agree with others that as an initial premise this comes across as pure dogma. In his writings Kaoru Ishikawa, the renowned Japanese theorist on organisation and quality, stated that he contemplated whether eastern and western cultures differed fundamentally because eastern religions were based on the premise that mankind is normally good and sin is the exception while western religion has embraced the converse, that everyone is born in sin and must strive to redeem themselves. However, he went on to say that this view was itself too much of a generalisation for him to regard it as a principle. After WWII he was a strong influence in the reconstruction of Japanese culture and its trading position in the world. Hence in the wider context of the word he was an evangelist who used reasoning rather than dogma to put across his message.
> 
> Faith is a part of personal philosophy and we cannot simply impose it on others without it being seen as dogma. One must start with their existing philosophy and try to influence that through reasoning and example. Otherwise regardless of the potential truth in one's message one is just a voice crying in the wilderness.
> 
> Writing is the art of building ideas, images and stories within the minds of others through words, so it involves a good deal of psychology to be effective.





Historically, in western culture religion has always been a social control tool.  Nowadays they are just big business.


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## JustRob (Sep 20, 2018)

Ralph Rotten said:


> Historically, in western culture religion has always been a social control tool.  Nowadays they are just big business.



Yes, that is a difficulty, that pure faith and social engineering often get wrapped up in a single package called a religion. Some people aren't willing to accept the social constraints just to demonstrate their faith and they expect others to take it on trust. Also religions tend not to become properly recognised until they are thousands of years old, by which time the social aspects are out of date. I did once ask a Muslim whether kangaroo meat was halal or haram and she laughed. Also Muslim astronauts had to get a ruling on how to conform to Ramadan. In fact even Muslims in Britain have a hard time then because of the length of daylight hours. 

Personally I prefer the Quaker perception of religion, that no man has the right to come between another and his god. That is why they described themselves simply as a Society of Friends. They do have social standards but these are distinct from their spiritual ones. The early Quakers were persecuted for their independent attitudes to society, not their faith, and in Britain were a strong influence in getting church and state separated as they now are.

A religion and a creed are different things and the paragraph as posted is little more than a restatement of the Christian creed.


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## Olly Buckle (Sep 21, 2018)

Recently finished Terry Jones, 'Who murdered Chaucer', yes religion was definitely a tool of social control in the hands of Thomas Arundel, and as a way of discrediting any critics; 'Confess your 'errors' very publicly or be burnt alive' was a very powerful argument. There was also the fact that amongst the ruling classes the elder son went into the army, the younger one into the church, so plenty of co-operation between the forces of might and religion.

Quakers started during Cromwell's time. People who lived up in the Yorkshire dales could not get down to a church in winter, so they would meet in someone's house and worship together without a priest, it is still a 'Quaker Meeting House', and it will get used for all sorts of activities as well as worship. Being without a priest to lead meant some interesting ways of doing things developed, for example, if someone wants to use the meeting house for something like a playgroup a business meeting (rather than a religious one) will discuss it while a secretary takes notes. The secretary will then prepare a document which is read back to the meeting and discussed, until agreement is reached on 'The sense of the meeting' and that document adopted. This takes time, but it has advantages, once people get going on a project they are all pulling in the same direction, rather than being continually herded into line by a leader as they try and take it in their own direction.
This is British Quakers I am talking about, I think the American variety may be a somewhat different animal, most members of the society I have met are in middle class professions like teachers or architects, not farmers without engines.

Sorry about the rant, Lumino, things can get a bit off subject by the bottom of page two 
If you want to turn this into something evangelistic, in the sense of taking your faith to those who do not share it, I would say you are going completely the wrong way about it because this is the language of those who already have religion, you need to talk to them in their own language. It should not be the language that is elevating and inspiring but the information it puts across, the language is the means of doing so and therefore adapted to the audience.


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## Olly Buckle (Sep 22, 2018)

An after thought, one of the tools which is useful in convincing people is rhetoric, that is what it was intended for. You can judge its efficacy in religious terms by the fact that one of the best, if not the best, web site for it is the creation of Brigham Young university, the Mormon university, and Mormonism is one of the fastest growing religions, it is called 'The forest of rhetoric'.


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## Plasticweld (Sep 22, 2018)

lumino said:


> Revision:



Your a teacher so I will give you some homework. 


You joined this site to become a better writer, so I will help you become a better writer. There are those here who would give you help, or grief about sentence structure, the finer points of puncutation or even word choice.  While that aspect of writing is important, it takes a back seat to having something to say. 


Fancy words often do not tell the story, feelings, emotion and experience are what translate into empathy from a reader. 

Your homework is to explain, at what point did these words, these passages in the Bible mean something to you? 

Where were you at in your life, what brought you to seek this out, what was the tipping point and what was it like when you first realized this to be true for you. 

How has it changed your life, why is it real to you. 

You will be graded on this :} Bob


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