Do you believe mainly because of testimony?

Hmm said:

I stopped reading there. Such arrogance.

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I'm sorry if you got arrogance out of my post. That was the farthest thing on my mind, it's just basic common approaches to reading scripture I put out in the post, one way to study and get deeper understanding. If you're not reading your bible you can't receive from it. My hope is that you would. Honestly.

To answer the title question, I believe because basically I always knew there was God. But Jesus was a side bar name. At 29 I hit a low in my life, knew no way out and turned to Jesus, He changed my life by saving it. That was 1979. The evidence is my own testimony, He did it not me. But I gave my life to Him that day for sure,nothings been the same since..

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

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Thank you Hmm you have brought to my attention a very important aspect to becoming a Christian. I believe that everybody has a story to tell and for those that are willing to consider God and Jesus as reality can benefit from their sisters and brothers testimony to strengthen and develop their own belief in the truth of the holy scripture. We all need a little help along the way and some people can benefit from the experience of others. It is very beautiful to have a personal experience in our lives that reveals the light but sometimes we can benefit from the light that has shined on others.

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

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Any person of any religion can have a personal testimony.

What is unique to christianity is the Bible, a person becomes a believer and receives God's free gift of Eternal Life because of the witness of The Bible. The Bible points us to, and instructs people on how to receive God's free gift of Eternal Life. The Bible shows people who (and how, by belief) to trust in, to receive God's free gift of Eternal Life.

In the Bible you do not see personal testimonies used, just people pointing people to The Messiah

Hmm said:

Interesting point. Were the apostles successful in spreading the gospel because they were able to give a convincing personal testimony or was there.something more? That they had to wait 40 days to receive the Holy Spirit before they could begin on their commission suggests the latter I guess.



Paul gave his personal testimony.

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When one of you says, “I am a follower of Paul,” and another says, “I follow Apollos,” aren’t you acting just like people of the world?

After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building.

For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bond servants for Jesus’ sake.

Was that not at a trial.

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

Click to expand...

For me I don't think personal testimony in the form of words is all that helpful - but in the form of actions? yes... that is.

People talk during war, and in Iraq during the rise of ISIS a Christian family (parents and children) were asked to say shahadah or die... The parents said shahadah, the children chose death.

That was a powerful testimony to me of Christ that has stayed with me since, and it was children who spoke it.

I had to go to a soup kitchen as a non believer and the love I was shown, someone not of their faith, was a powerful testimony of Christ that has stayed with me from that day.

It's always actions for me, which sometimes include words, but don't have to. Granted in a forum setting all we have are words, but I think it's far less impactful, because anyone can say words. Actions not everyone has.

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

Click to expand...

For me, my mother prayed me out of a cult. When I accompanied her to church one day her prayers were answered. I don't remember any particular testimony per say. Blessings.

Hmm said:

It's because I struggle to make much sense of it whereas if I read someone else's thoughts on it, from someone who has studied and reflected on it, I usually get something out of it. The last time I read the Bible was a couple of years ago now, sad to say. I was reading the account of the Last Supper and I got a real sense of the anxiety and fear Jesus must have felt knowing what sort of death was awaiting Him. I guess that's the sort of thing I'm missing out on by not reading the Bible.

Do you ever read anything in the Bible that doesn't really make sense to you? What do you do when/if that happens?

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Instead of reading someone else's thoughts, you might try reading the Bible with someone (where two or more are gathered, I am with them). You might not understand, but the Spirit inside of you understands perfectly, so you need His help. Pray, fast, meditate, wait (listen) and get with like minded others.

I believe more out of my own personal experience: 1) That Christianity makes me a better person, and 2) My own experience. Hearing other people's testimony also is encouraging, and useful. I however have different thoughts and expectations from many Protestants who believe people must "make a decision for Christ" etc. to be born again, or baptized etc. at this one particular time, they must feel something kind of cathartic experience etc.

I believe based on history, experience, scripture etc. that people can actually be "raised in the Faith" as believers where our Faith is something we pick up just like everything else we absorb. (Basically the notion that we have to make a formal decision at this one specific time like an altar call etc. that is a more modern view of the Faith that you don't really see until the last few centuries.)

Proverbs 22:6

6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.


In closing I will add some interesting testimonies. From time to time, I encountered stories of people who were raised in good families. Some of these people were raised in churches that had infant baptism while other were raised in churches that had "believers baptism". But they had the same kind of basic story. They were raised in good families, and pretty much taught to be Christians from the get go. But they lacked the super dramatic testimony of other people who were drug addicts, gotten into crime, maybe even gotten possessed by demons so on. It is very funny, the side affect of the testimony Christianity where people believe that actually being raised in a healthy family is somehow a illegitimate way of coming to Faith because it is less cathartic and dramatic compared to being raised in darkness. There is a Christian Apologist David Wood who is especially vocal on this kind of phenomenon. He was born a psychopath and came to Faith while serving out a sentence in a mental ward. He grew up seeing crime etc. and marvels what it would be like to be come from a healthy background.

What makes people believe is encounter. No one believes without experiencing Christ for themselves, and if they claim to believe without such an experience what they believe in is not authentic. Testimony can help facilitate encounter as can various forms of apologetics but ultimately encounter only happens if the gospel is being spoken, so every message whether testimony or logical discourse or any other form of evangelistic endeavor must be structured so that within it the gospel will be clearly enunciated.

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

Click to expand...

"Create" our own story?????

Saving faith is a work of the Holy Spirit, not of created stories.

Hmm said:

If you (plural) feel your life doesn't have a story then it will also feel that it has no meaning. It's why people write and enjoy reading autobiographies. It's important...

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I listened to a sermon once - or read it I can't remember now - and the pastor spoke about conversion stories specifically.

He said many people grow up in the church get baptized and so forth and then fall away. Sometimes they have a powerful story of coming back to faith and they start their story from that point when they are "saved".

But the pastor made a good point, it's that these stories, when you begin them at the actual beginning, show just how faithful God is, even when we are not. And we can't discount just how faithful, and patient, God really is.

I found that teaching to be very powerfully true. Our God is faithful, and ever patient with His people - even when we aren't - and more stories that show that aspect of Him are awesome because our stories are talking about God and showing His nature to the world, and they need to focus on Him and His nature, so conversion stories need to begin at whatever real beginning we have.

To me there is no greater than the work of God who has the ability to change the human heart.

GallagherM said:

To me there is no greater than the work of God who has the ability to change the human heart.

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I like listening to Pastor Paul Washer, and he describes our re-creation to be a greater feat than the creation event itself.

I happen to agree - it's a definite miracle!

Hmm said:

Do you think other people's testimony is the main reason you believe in God? For myself, I've had personal encounters with God but I don't think I would have become a Christian if it wasn't for reading and listening to people talking about their own experiences and beliefs. These gave me a framework in which I could understand my own experiences.

I think testimony is powerful because we naturally tend to believe what people are telling us about their own experiences. But it can also be confusing. On a forum like this for example, there are so many views all sincerely held and equally plausible but all different enough to make you feel a bit unsure about what to believe. Perhaps I need one of Douglas Adam's Electric Monks:

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watched tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believed things for you, thus saving you what was becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expected you to believe.

Unfortunately this Electric Monk had developed a fault, and had started to believe all kinds of things, more or less at random. It was even beginning to believe things they'd have difficulty believing in Salt Lake City.
​

If personal testimony is a good way to communicate the Good News, do you think there should be more of this in church and should we be more willing to tell our story to others (in the right context so not necessarily at work for example)?

And because we're all individuals and have our own particular story that's unique to us in some ways, is it important to learn from these but also to have the confidence to create our own story?

Click to expand...

I don't think testmonies did that much for my conversion. My mom prayed for me and they also prayed for me in the Pentecostal church in town. I believe that was a big part of why God started to show himself in my life. I have always been interested in the existential questions, and I got more and more interested in finding the real truth. Looking within I found things that conflicted with my worldview. I found evil within, and I couldn't get my head around that. That was a big part of it.

The Scripture verse came to mind, "and they overcame by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony" but "it also goes on to say and they loved not their lives unto death." My experience was that of being pulled by God out of an awful vortex and transformed by His love. What I found in His Scriptures is the witness of others who saw His hand and His own words that feed me, as Jesus also commented that "man doesn't live by bread alone but by every word from God." Funny, my first bought Bible after that moment was a Thompson chain reference King James. The small concordance in the back really helped me get started finding where the verses were. We can find things pretty quickly on the internet, so you can type in my quotes and find out where the verses are. His word is a lamp to our feet, a light to our path. I'd say we need all of the above for an effective Christian life: His word, our testimony, and the blood of the Lamb. It seems there are enough verses I've found in there to remind me to be on my guard against the error of feeling saved without actually counting the cost and doing what Jesus said was necessary. Seems there is a parable or two Jesus shared about people caught short. If we don't want to hear Him now, what makes us think He'll want to keep talking to us THEN? Be encouraged to continue to ask, seek and knock.