Think of it as a fairytale to Ellsworth , but as A Song Of Ice And Fire to the others . <| sep |> You mean an atheist who uses some teachings and commandments of Lord Jesus Christ in practice . You can , though He warned that all you will receive is the praise of this world , but it cannot save you from condemnation afterwards . I fully recognize the value of the church as an institution that engineers social prosperity I want to uphold the Church ' s values , because they work . You should ask yourself why they work , unlike various feelgood inspirational teachers , who often take the most pleasant parts from various religions , but fail to create lasting movements . Would not they work because they come from the Creator of the universe , who knows best how it works , as well as able to give you forgiveness of sins and eternal life in God ' s Kingdom of Heaven ? I know Jesus and his crucifixion has a valid historicity , I feel like I don ' t have to believe he was an actual prophet for his message to have value . Prophets of God received their words from God who is allpowerful and allknowing . But Jesus is more than a prophet , but the firstborn son of God , who is God born in human body , descending to do what we cannot do overcome sin and death and pay for our sins on the cross by His perfect offering for sin , once and for all , not animal sacrifices for each sin which could not wipe sins , but pointed that sins lead to death and to the One who can wash us perfectly . Ask yourself how was His message able to withstand 2000 years and be spread all around the world , radically changing the world and rescuing humanity from the depths of pagan barbarity , as well as showing the full intent of Old Testament . Could that simply be because martyrdom is good promotion ? Are we not less likely to sin if we all suddenly pay attention to what this great man had to say ? No . Socrates while called a sort of a martyr , failed to create global movements lasting 2000 years with great results . Even muslims call those who die in battle for their faith whose good parts are copied from the Bible as martyrs but such examples only promote violence and revenge , leading to the constant wars related with Islam . While paying attention to Jesus does certainly give new ideas to people , but knowledge by itself cannot help you overcome sinful temptations without God ' s help in Christ to reject them . That ' s why secular population even if culturally based on Christian faith due to worldly temptation by greed , entertainment , lusts , more and more was spiritually blinded and enslaved to sin . You can see that after french revolution with its supposed secular ideals of fraternity , equality and freedom , while cutting off influence from the Christian church on the state failed to prevent the increasing division and terrible wars . The same i could not overcome sins , until i humbled myself to ask God ' s help and forgiveness for the sake of His son Jesus Christ to forgive my sins and help me what i cannot do to stop sinning and obey His will . I want to look at the bible for what it objectively is a near perfect moral compassAgain , it points to God as the source of the morals and wisdom in it . If the people who wrote it lied , why would you listen to liars . But if they did not lie , why don ' t you accept what they wrote that it was God and Jesus Christ as His son , who helps us be free from sin and give us eternal life , not because we deserve it or can obey Him on our own power . If I could redefine God as the inherent goodness human beings are born with , that would be my faith , that would be a God I could believe in . Yet , it does not explain , why the universe exists , why is there evil in humans , increasing especially when they denied God and Christ like in atheist communist countries or paganizing fascist countries which tried to make Jesus a nonJewish warrior more like Thor or other pagan gods promoting battle and violence as virtue .