Starting today August 7th, 2024, in order to post in the Married Couples, Courting Couples, or Singles forums, you will not be allowed to post if you have your Marital status designated as private. Announcements will be made in the respective forums as well but please note that if yours is currently listed as Private, you will need to submit a ticket in the Support Area to have yours changed.
Condition after condition after condition until you get right down to the only one that matters: acceptance without scrutiny.
My scrutiny led me away from the Bible. It was only OK during the period where I accepted what I was told without studying.
I truly believed God existed, that He created me, sent His son to die for me, and that He came into my heart when I asked Him to because He loved me. I believed the Bible was God's word and that it was true (understanding, of course, that I hadn't read the entire Bible at that time).1. How did you perceive your faith as a child? What was the relationship between your faith and the Bible?
I participated in several Bible studies, "read the Bible through in a year" programs, and an Experiencing God course. This was during a time in High School where I had decided nothing in life was more important that God and was determined to completely devote myself to Bible study. Ultimately, it was my desire to study the Bible and experience God that led to my doubts.2. What made you begin to doubt and when? (i.e. Why did you want to scrutinise it?)
I read the Bible, weighing what I read against what I knew of God. I also weighed it against what I had experienced in life. I studied the differences between the Old Testament God and the New Testament God and found them to be contradictory to God's statement that He never changes. I found it disheartening that He made promises of parental companionship that weren't fulfilled.3. How did you scrutinise the Bible?
That the Biblical basis for God is illogical, unlovely, and highly improbable. That the promises Jesus Christ made as to what the Holy Spirit would provide were unfulfilled and therefore lies. That Jesus' promise to seek me as much as I sought Him was empty. And that if I could achieve the same moral fortitude and social responsibility as a non-Christian, then Christianity isn't worth the paper on which the Bible is printed. The Bible, when read in depth (not mined for the "Good News" verses), is not a good witnessing tool.4. What conclusion did you make of it?
This is exactly what I meant when I said what makes believers go over reason for faith. In other words what makes a believer avoid the more probable truth for a truth that 'emotionally' helps them, almost like a white lie. Although good, yet not so. This is what atheists see when they see heaven. If perceived as an idea, it is something to escape from reality, in our opinion. Or a false hope. Although benficial for your neighbor, it is not the closer truth. This is where faith kicks in, you need faith, 'faith solid as a rock', to just accept it as truth. If confronted with other possibilities, ignore then, or build them around your current truth.
I understand what you are saying. I had a similar situation. When I broke up with my girlfriend, a week after I had the chance to go back with her. So I had the choice, be happy and go back with her, or risk a bit of my unhappiness to do what is right, just get past it and move on, and gain happiness in the longrun, although more difficult. So there was a emotional and logical reason. We understand, is just how can you choose one over the other.
I truly believed God existed, that He created me, sent His son to die for me, and that He came into my heart when I asked Him to because He loved me. I believed the Bible was God's word and that it was true (understanding, of course, that I hadn't read the entire Bible at that time).
I participated in several Bible studies, "read the Bible through in a year" programs, and an Experiencing God course. This was during a time in High School where I had decided nothing in life was more important that God and was determined to completely devote myself to Bible study. Ultimately, it was my desire to study the Bible and experience God that led to my doubts.
I read the Bible, weighing what I read against what I knew of God. I also weighed it against what I had experienced in life. I studied the differences between the Old Testament God and the New Testament God and found them to be contradictory to God's statement that He never changes. I found it disheartening that He made promises of parental companionship that weren't fulfilled.
That the Biblical basis for God is illogical, unlovely, and highly improbable. That the promises Jesus Christ made as to what the Holy Spirit would provide were unfulfilled and therefore lies. That Jesus' promise to seek me as much as I sought Him was empty. And that if I could achieve the same moral fortitude and social responsibility as a non-Christian, then Christianity isn't worth the paper on which the Bible is printed. The Bible, when read in depth (not mined for the "Good News" verses), is not a good witnessing tool.
You really don't need to. I've been through this discussion before and it invariably ends in, "you weren't a true Christian" or, "you didn't seek Him with your heart" or something equally nonsensical. I felt what I felt then and I feel what I feel now and while everyone appears to feel qualified to tell me what I did or didn't do, the fact is that my experience was/is as personal as yours and no blanket statement could possibly apply to both.How, generally, would you like me to respond?
The supposition that people "grow up into the religion" is only valid where the religion has been established for a long time, and if you're a Muslim or a Jew (who, to some extent, believe that people are born Muslim or Jew).
If you look at the history of Christianity it simply is not the case. It began as a very small sect in Judaea, a Roman province. 2,000 years later it is a global religion. Surely not every Christian in history was born to a Christian and raised as a Christian! None of the 12 disciples were. Paul wasn't. St. Augustine wasn't. First generation Christians in Asia and Africa of years past weren't.
But since I myself was born to Christian parents, I cannot presume to be able to answer this in full, as a personal experience. But most Christians outside the western world are adult converts. If you find one, they'll tell you their story.
You really don't need to. I've been through this discussion before and it invariably ends in, "you weren't a true Christian" or, "you didn't seek Him with your heart" or something equally nonsensical. I felt what I felt then and I feel what I feel now and while everyone appears to feel qualified to tell me what I did or didn't do, the fact is that my experience was/is as personal as yours and no blanket statement could possibly apply to both.
I'm happy with my direction in life. I engage in conversation over religion because it's something that fascinates me, especially given my background.
I realize that you've got three conversations to keep up with and must be strapped for time. I'll try to keep my questions short.
Even if a person was not indoctrinated from birth, I still cannot imagine a scenario where a person's personal and highly emotional experience would lead them to believe in specific god. A god, perhaps, but not a specific one like Yahweh. Emotional experiences don't come with nametags attached to them telling the experiencer who it was from. If it was, in fact, from a god, it could have been from any of the millions of gods that have been believed in since the dawn of mankind.
If a person has an experience that brings them to believe in the divine, what could possibly make them conclude that the influence was that of Zeus, Thor, Yahweh, Amaterasu, Ra, or whoever without prior steering toward that god? A person doesn't just have a grand experience and then jump to Yahweh because Yahweh specifically said his name to the person. They have to already have it in their head.
This can be seen as simply as Googling "religion map" and see how the geographic distribution of world religions breaks down. Such things should be very unsettling to anyone that believes that they found the right God through his moving influence alone rather than how you've been culturally trained to think. Just to throw out an example, if Yahweh were the one true God then he must really favor the western world.
If our convictions weren't the product of our culture but of honest personal revelations, religions would not have geographic correlations. I was going to post a map but I don't have a high enough post count yet (no biggie 'cause one is easy to find).
Our conversation is unfortunately tracing ground that I'm sure is familiar to both of us. I'm sorry that I have to come back to dead-horse territory but such areas of discussion are popular for a reason.
And once again I'm hopelessly long-winded. Bleh. Sorry to eat your time. My best regards all the same!
EDIT: I just wanted to add that I don't wish to sound like I aim to debate. I'm not interested in proving anyone wrong. I'm more interested in the why behind many things when talking of belief. Again, I must stress that I greatly appreciate the discussion. Sometimes it's hard to find others with the patience to continue at length about such things.
I'm certainly open to answering questions. I think sometimes it's interesting to talk through my past experiences, and even helpful to me in some measure. And I appreciate you realizing that analyzing and/or criticizing my personal situation over the Internet is not a simple or even fruitful task.Yes, sir. I understand that feeling. It would be extremely difficult, unfair and rude for me, as a stranger, to judge your personal experience over the internet, and I will not do that.
In fact, I was just interested in asking more questions.
But only if you feel comfortable.
I'm certainly open to answering questions.
Thank you for your politeness.Thank you for your kindness.
Your assumption is correct.I assume that you were born to Christian parents, that as a child you went to church with them on a regular basis, that, almost, whatever you believed what because of whatever they believed.
Because when I was young, everything about Christianity was fun. The baby Jesus, talking donkeys, Noah's ark, Jesus' taking time for the children, diseases and deformities healed; it was all like magic and fairy tales! The church I remember the most had wonderful, nice people. I specifically remember one older gentleman at our church who always kept a pocket full of Jolly Ranchers for the kids. To this day I think of him when I eat Jolly Ranchers.Why did you enjoy Christianity at your young age? For example, was it because you enjoyed the friendly atmosphere at your church? Or what?
It was more like 14. I was very active in the church and I wanted to start teaching Sunday School classes and VBS. I realized that I hadn't really dug into the Bible as much as I'd need to in order to teach, so I was bent on really reading and studying it in detail.Secondly, when you decided you wanted to study the Bible (at the age of 16? You said high school), what made you want to do it?
I would guard against relying on a search result on Google to map the world's religious distribution. I suggest that it's impossible to do so.
First, how can an accurate measurement be made in countries where there is no religious freedom or, simply, an accurate census system? I have just described the majority of the developing world, where most of the world's population live. Any figures coming out are probably highly skewed, or based on guesswork.
Plus, as you yourself prove, there are dissenters and non-believers within each culturo-religious group. If your culture didn't influence what you believe in as an adult, on what grounds do you judge that others must have been influenced by their culture in what they believe as an adult?
So, on those technicalities, I cannot agree with your assertion that "God favours the western world".
Christianity is also the only real religion in the game of converting so heavily. I can agree that Christianity has a message that other religions don't that persuades many people to convert. However, the message of Christianity is spread by people. This is vastly different then someone having a life-changing experience and then converting to Christianity because of it. This isn't a unique feeling of the Holy Spirit's influence in people's lives (the "nametag" thing), this is unique effort of proselytism.First, in the history of Christianity, most converts have been from other faiths or religions--the vast majority of people in world history were religious in some way; atheism is a new and minority way of thinking.
Therefore, there must be something unique about the message of Christianity that other religions do not provide that persuades people to abandon their own religion and convert to Christianity.
Something about your wording here is making it hard for me to understand what you're saying. If you're interested in wording it differently so that I don't misunderstand I'd be happy to hear out your points. It feels like we're drifting into fuzzy language here where just about anything goes.On an even more general scale, if I may take a bold step of generalisation, every religion in the world has its own unique message, meaning different things to the same mind. So each "experience" is different. A person doesn't just have "an experience"; they have an "experience" that is attached to a certain religion.
Mind you, this is just one general guesswork, extrapolated from a Christian perspective. I don't know whether Jews, Muslims or other people have any "experience" with God. There is a tangent here, about the influence of other spirits, but we won't go there for now.
Secondly, the "experience" doesn't just happen. There must be an existing ground on which to happen (i.e. a person's previous history and personality) and the "experience" for different people will be different based on from which religion the "experience" is coming.
Therefore, some people can have the same experience, but not the same conclusion, based on the status of themselves when they had the "experience".
This is my attempt to direct conversation more toward understanding. These questions go for absolutely anyone at all. Forgive the somewhat philosophical nature of them.
Imagine for a moment something that is ultimately and eternally incomprehensible, unexplainable, irrational -- something that defies reason, that we need faith to believe in or accept as reality. It need not be anything religious, specifically.
Four questions:
Some of those may look redundant but I believe there are nuances about them that are important. I encourage expansions on anyone's answers to give a better understanding of their views, but this (of course) is left up to those who reply. I'll answer these too at some point but not immediately.
- Does such a thing exist?
- Should such a thing exist?
- Do you want such a thing to exist?
- Would you be happier if such a thing existed?
I'm hoping more people will jump into this thread to so we can hear some more voices around here.
Does such a thing exist?This is my attempt to direct conversation more toward understanding. These questions go for absolutely anyone at all. Forgive the somewhat philosophical nature of them.
Imagine for a moment something that is ultimately and eternally incomprehensible, unexplainable, irrational -- something that defies reason, that we need faith to believe in or accept as reality. It need not be anything religious, specifically.
Four questions:
Some of those may look redundant but I believe there are nuances about them that are important. I encourage expansions on anyone's answers to give a better understanding of their views, but this (of course) is left up to those who reply. I'll answer these too at some point but not immediately.
- Does such a thing exist?
- Should such a thing exist?
- Do you want such a thing to exist?
- Would you be happier if such a thing existed?
I'm hoping more people will jump into this thread to so we can hear some more voices around here.
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?