You gave the false impression it was the Christian God. What you believed in was what you called God but certainly not God of the Bible whom is the only One True God. You could go further and admit you believed in Satan because he was not God of the Bible. You could still go further and say, you still believe in the Devil and bow to him, because you still reject God of the Bible.
We are obviously made in God's image since we are (a) quite unlike any other creature in the universe; (b) Jesus proved He is God by His resurrection; (c) He died to save us from our sins; (d) He testified to us that He was as our Creator, made in the image of God; and (e) He said we would be resurrected as He was.
Your thoughts can't exist by nature alone, for nature alone can't produce thoughts, sentience, life, will, feelings, intuition. You prove this because you can't empirically can't make your case.
That the trillions of causes are not God IS knowledge of Him, since this proves nature always needs a cause, yet you would have happened already. So nature can't always have exist but must have a cause outside of itself, outside of time and space. This is whom we call God. I, therefore, have knowledge of God, firstly, that He exists and secondly, that He created this universe. Hence, Romans 1.20.
The laws of thermodynamics tell us something can't come from nothing. Energy always has a source of energy. There is no energy in that which does not exist. A billion pound gorilla can't lift you upon onto a mountain because it has no energy and doesn't exist. Trillions of causes in nature additionally show causation is always necessary, so nothing always comes from nothing. Scientists have no evidence for anything spontaneous and causeless which is why you could only assert it, but were unable to show it. Just because you don't know the cause to something doesn't mean it is causeless. Presumptuous indeed! You're special pleading. Where's your humility? How do you overturn the trillions of causes in nature? You can't even come up with one artifact of evidence something comes from nothing. You sure like playing a losing game, possibly the worst lottery every known to man with odds against you more than a trillion to one.
Even if time breaks down at singularity, Hawking said it still needs a cause. Your always existing traversal dimension can't merely always have existed, for you would have happened already, having had an eternity to do so. If your mystery "traversal dimension" that can't be found on Google or Wiki, and always existed without end, then we would never have come into being since it would still exist and not lead to the universe. Since you admit time is "naturally eternal" you're admitting an infinite regress, yet you would not still be happening by now, having had an eternity to do so. Each theory you come up with fails because it is not grounded in reality of what we do have for evidence of trillions and trillions of causes in nature, and no hard evidence for something coming from nothing.
To try to thwart off the problem with infinite regress, you produce an always existing timeless state of pre-universe conditions. If it is always timeless then the universe would never have existed. Whereas God who is outside of time can bring the universe into being because He has a will. You're producing a timeless dimension in place of God. What I would suggest is that is effectively your mindless god or idol. So you have proven the uncreated Creator exists except you make him a timeless dimension. But for the Creator to create a mind, He must be a mind and not a dimension. Dimensions have no minds. The lesser can never produce the greater. It's never been see in history.
Since so many corroborating independent sources of apostles knowing apostles, disciples working with disciples, across different periods of time, and you have no evidence for your fictional theory, then your theory is false. The burden is on you to show a fictional theory could be true. Ancient critics tried to refute the resurrection, indicating it was historical.
The award winning The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus by Gary R. Habermas says it best I think. "If we look at the New Testament material on Jesus' resurrection, there are indicators that the accounts were meant to be understood as historical rather than mythical [or fictional]. Consider the two sermon summaries of Peter and Paul, recorded in Acts, that contrast King David's buried body with Jesus' resurrected body" (Acts 2.22-32; 13.34-37) (88-89).
They claimed that Jesus' body did not decay in the grave as David's did, but rather was raised by God. It is difficult to imagine how Peter and Paul could have been any clearer if they meant to communicate a literal, physical resurrection. If a mythical [or fictional] genre was being employed, Peter and Paul could have easily said, "David died, was buried, his body decayed, but his spirit ascended to be with God. Jesus likewise...."
On page 294-295, we read, "Also note that Peter's sermon as portrayed in Acts 10:40-41, he claimed that he and others "ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead." Luke seems to be intending to record historical events when in Luke 1.1-3, he writes,
"Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the world, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus; so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have taught."
New Testament critical scholar Bart Ehrman comments,
"There may indeed be fictional elements in the account, as we will see; but judging form the preface to volume one [i.e., Luke's gospel] from the subject matter of the narrative (the spread of the Christian church), and from the main characters themselves (who are, after all, historical persons), we can be more plausibly conclude that Luke meant to write a history of early Christianity, not a novel. Moreover, all of the ancient Christian authors who refer to the book appear to have understood it in this way." (Bart D. Erhman, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings, 2nd ed. [New York: Oxford University Press, 2000], 124)
See also A. N. Sherwin-White, Roman Society and Roman Law in the New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1963), 188-89. "The work of Luke cannot be evaluated properly if we group it with inferior contemporary literature that treats of heroes, thaumaturges and other popular characters. It is genuine history" (G. Kittel, G. W. Bromiley, and G. Friedrich, eds., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, 10 vols. [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1981], 3:395).
Some scholars have noted that the appearance language in the New Testament is the language of sight (Luke 24.34, Acts 10.40-41, 13.30-31, 1 Cor. 15.5-8). The writers did not use metaphorical language, so they at least thought God had acted literally upon them in the appearances of the risen Jesus.
Although 2 Peter cannot be part of the "minimal facts" argument because many scholars question its authorship by Peter, it still provides early testimony that at least some Christians within one hundred years after Jesus were interpreting events such as Jesus' transfiguration and resurrection as historical events.
In summary I would say, if the intent was to be historical and not mythical or fictional, I am not sure how they could be any more clear. And if they wanted to be mythical or fictional, I can't find any evidence for this proposition from the historical record. Praise the Lord!
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