- Nov 19, 2022
- 26
- 38
- 44
- Country
- United States
- Faith
- Christian
- Marital Status
- Single
- Politics
- US-Republican
Hello,
Recently, I encountered what I would consider a calling of faith from God. For almost two decades, I was an atheist, from the age of 23 or thereabouts to the age of 42. Not just the “I don't think Jesus and God exist” type, but the “the biblical God is evil” type. I'd spent a long time analyzing the Holy Bible from a very biased, skeptical point of view. My incomplete, historically ignorant, and secular ethical viewpoint (I'd been educated in public school, with a strong science background, and my parents never took me to church, even though they believe in God) led me into despair; before the age of 23, I'd become a drunk, a stoner, and spent the next eight or so years attempting to deaden the fear and pain from the thought that my Creator was a vile being on par with Charles Manson. Later on in life, I fell into the use of even worse activities. I have faith that God let me fall into such so as to teach me the futility and foulness of such things. It was His wrath, or perhaps simply the lack of His blessings due to my very short-sighted belief system. I degraded myself to the point that, from what I think is God's point of view, I needed to “be scourged with the burning iron rods of jealousy, suspicion, fear, anger, and strife,” to quote Saint Augustine of Hippo. I feel a certain kinship with the man's experiences, though he woke up to Christ's message sooner than I did, and so he also inspires a certain envy in me. I honestly believe he gave me over to a depraved mind, due to my nearly unceasing sinning.
In my delusions and arrogance, I committed what would have been many a capital sin in the Old Testament, were Christians under it's law (admittedly, I still have yet to be baptized into Christ, I'm wondering if I should finish reading the Holy Bible first, and I fear I may have committed the unforgiveable sin given my drunken rantings against Holy God, or may have a devil living in me – I did some -awful- stuff); I did not guard my tongue well where the Lord is concerned. Never until I began to dimly understand the Gospel did I realize just what a friend we have in Jesus, God's only begotten son. I had cursed Him, His Father, and worse, or so I thought at the time. I still struggle with the idea that such is forgiveable – and I am not yet entirely certain. That in itself may also be a sign of the Almighty at work, for how can I develop faith if I have certainty instead? This I think may be a crucial thing to remember – God is sovereign, over us and over nature. Some may say that this makes Him a tyrant, as I once did. If He is so, He is a kind and merciful one, and one by right. Who else knows how the whole of Creation works, and even how our very minds work? All He requires of us is to have faith in Him. And forcing one's self to believe in Jesus and Our Father in Heaven -does- seem to work, at least in my experience. I know I had to, or perhaps that act was inspired of God – I feel it was something of both. A little bit of me, and a great deal of Him.
To my former brethren, the atheists, I give this message: Christ loves you. He loves us, for He came for the ungodly, the same as he came for all sinners, especially all who have become monsters in their own skins due to mounting folly throughout their lives. I do not think it is ever too late to admit that we do not know everything. Think of how in physics you cannot truly measure something at a tiny scale without affecting and changing the resulting measurement by the very action of observing it. We literally cannot know everything, because we change things even just by -trying- to make measurements. For eample, how many of you think the Deluge, the supposedly legendary flood weathered by Noah, was factual? Some say it was a regional flood, others say it was truly world-wide. A certain 2014 discovery in mantle-deep geology has shed new light on this – there is a layer of water-absorbent mineral (ringwoodite) right above a lot of lava. This could be the source of the “fountains of the deep” mentioned in the Scriptural tale. Look it up if you don't believe me. Skeptics will say that this isn't proof – the computer models don't allow for it. But what they don't tell you, likely because they don't realize it, is that no computer model is perfect. Models are created from data which then must be compared to observed reality, and then the model gets changed in an attempt to more closely predict the future. Biblicly, this could be considered a form on numerology or number-worship, or fortune-telling, or prophesy. Possibly false prophecy, as an honest scientist will have to admit that they don't know everything, and that their models are inherently imperfect. Also, how would they know when they had discovered everything there is to know? If you know of the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment, we are quite literally the cat in the box from God's point of view. Consider it.
And feel free to point any would-be atheists you know to this testimony. It may save them the suffering I have gone through, God & Christ willing, and may He open their hearts and minds in truth, as it took Him to open my own. I might be editing and reposting this as God reveals more to me. Only He knows, I do not.
Recently, I encountered what I would consider a calling of faith from God. For almost two decades, I was an atheist, from the age of 23 or thereabouts to the age of 42. Not just the “I don't think Jesus and God exist” type, but the “the biblical God is evil” type. I'd spent a long time analyzing the Holy Bible from a very biased, skeptical point of view. My incomplete, historically ignorant, and secular ethical viewpoint (I'd been educated in public school, with a strong science background, and my parents never took me to church, even though they believe in God) led me into despair; before the age of 23, I'd become a drunk, a stoner, and spent the next eight or so years attempting to deaden the fear and pain from the thought that my Creator was a vile being on par with Charles Manson. Later on in life, I fell into the use of even worse activities. I have faith that God let me fall into such so as to teach me the futility and foulness of such things. It was His wrath, or perhaps simply the lack of His blessings due to my very short-sighted belief system. I degraded myself to the point that, from what I think is God's point of view, I needed to “be scourged with the burning iron rods of jealousy, suspicion, fear, anger, and strife,” to quote Saint Augustine of Hippo. I feel a certain kinship with the man's experiences, though he woke up to Christ's message sooner than I did, and so he also inspires a certain envy in me. I honestly believe he gave me over to a depraved mind, due to my nearly unceasing sinning.
In my delusions and arrogance, I committed what would have been many a capital sin in the Old Testament, were Christians under it's law (admittedly, I still have yet to be baptized into Christ, I'm wondering if I should finish reading the Holy Bible first, and I fear I may have committed the unforgiveable sin given my drunken rantings against Holy God, or may have a devil living in me – I did some -awful- stuff); I did not guard my tongue well where the Lord is concerned. Never until I began to dimly understand the Gospel did I realize just what a friend we have in Jesus, God's only begotten son. I had cursed Him, His Father, and worse, or so I thought at the time. I still struggle with the idea that such is forgiveable – and I am not yet entirely certain. That in itself may also be a sign of the Almighty at work, for how can I develop faith if I have certainty instead? This I think may be a crucial thing to remember – God is sovereign, over us and over nature. Some may say that this makes Him a tyrant, as I once did. If He is so, He is a kind and merciful one, and one by right. Who else knows how the whole of Creation works, and even how our very minds work? All He requires of us is to have faith in Him. And forcing one's self to believe in Jesus and Our Father in Heaven -does- seem to work, at least in my experience. I know I had to, or perhaps that act was inspired of God – I feel it was something of both. A little bit of me, and a great deal of Him.
To my former brethren, the atheists, I give this message: Christ loves you. He loves us, for He came for the ungodly, the same as he came for all sinners, especially all who have become monsters in their own skins due to mounting folly throughout their lives. I do not think it is ever too late to admit that we do not know everything. Think of how in physics you cannot truly measure something at a tiny scale without affecting and changing the resulting measurement by the very action of observing it. We literally cannot know everything, because we change things even just by -trying- to make measurements. For eample, how many of you think the Deluge, the supposedly legendary flood weathered by Noah, was factual? Some say it was a regional flood, others say it was truly world-wide. A certain 2014 discovery in mantle-deep geology has shed new light on this – there is a layer of water-absorbent mineral (ringwoodite) right above a lot of lava. This could be the source of the “fountains of the deep” mentioned in the Scriptural tale. Look it up if you don't believe me. Skeptics will say that this isn't proof – the computer models don't allow for it. But what they don't tell you, likely because they don't realize it, is that no computer model is perfect. Models are created from data which then must be compared to observed reality, and then the model gets changed in an attempt to more closely predict the future. Biblicly, this could be considered a form on numerology or number-worship, or fortune-telling, or prophesy. Possibly false prophecy, as an honest scientist will have to admit that they don't know everything, and that their models are inherently imperfect. Also, how would they know when they had discovered everything there is to know? If you know of the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment, we are quite literally the cat in the box from God's point of view. Consider it.
And feel free to point any would-be atheists you know to this testimony. It may save them the suffering I have gone through, God & Christ willing, and may He open their hearts and minds in truth, as it took Him to open my own. I might be editing and reposting this as God reveals more to me. Only He knows, I do not.
