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<blockquote data-quote="losthope" data-source="post: 58481148" data-attributes="member: 94863"><p>To joey down under,</p><p></p><p>I hope this works. Christian Forums looks a bit different today with many of the icons and other aspects not showing properly. No doubt it results from the maintenance work done recently on the website and hopefully they will get it properly fixed soon.</p><p></p><p>You sent a fairly long posting responding to my comments. I will go through it and reply, but first there are three points that I want to deal with emotions, self-pity and helping other people.</p><p></p><p>First, I know that I am never going to feel emotions in the way that most people do. I also realise that it is extremely unlikely that I will ever experience spiritual emotions either. This means that there are aspects of life that I am always going to miss out on. However, this should not necessarily mean that I will always lack any experience of God working in my life. God can act in many different ways, and only some of these ways involve the emotions.</p><p></p><p>During my time as a believer I became concerned about my situation because I had no awareness of God responding to me in any way. Thinking about it now (and my ideas have developed gradually over the years) I can think of several possible reasons for this, including the following:</p><p></p><p>1 For most people, God acts through the emotions and in no other way, and I am unable to benefit from this.</p><p>2 God did act on me when I was a believer but I was not aware of it.</p><p>3 God wants to wait until the time is right.</p><p>4 God does not want me as a believer.</p><p>5 I was never a true believer eg I came to God with the wrong attitude.</p><p>6 I am not yet ready to be a Christian. Or I was not ready to be a Christian at the time I was a believer.</p><p>7 God has some other plans for me.</p><p>8 I am just obsessed with being a believer.</p><p>9 There is no God.</p><p></p><p>No doubt there are other possibilities that I have not included. The points I am making are that my lack of emotions is only one possibility among many, and that I am not blaming God for the problems because the cause could be me.</p><p></p><p>Second, you wrote about a poor me attitude and self-pity. Have I ever been like that? Yes, there were times when there was self-pity. But they did not last for long. Any self-pity disappeared in the months after I abandoned my faith. It has not been there for many years.</p><p></p><p>Similarly, there were odd occasions during those difficult months after I stopped being a believer, when sometimes I blamed God, or resented God for making things difficult for me. Once again, that ended many years ago.</p><p></p><p>What I am trying to do now is to understand why my experience of being a believer was so disappointing. When I am more confident about the cause of the problem, I will know what to do about it. That might be to become a believer again, it might be to lose interest in Christianity finally, or it might be to try to persuade Christians that they do not really know God. Or maybe something else; it depends on what conclusions I come to. In other words, I am currently doing the preparation for the rest of my life.</p><p></p><p>Third, you suggested that it would be better for me to concentrate less on myself and more on other people. To help other people instead of looking inward. Several people have suggested that I might find God through helping other people, some of them giving different explanations about why it would bring me closer to God.</p><p></p><p>My answer is that in one way or another I have spent much of my life helping other people. Though as far as I am aware it has not brought me any closer to God. People know that if they need help, I am a person to turn to. Today, for example, I will be seeing three people and helping them with their difficulties. I will be concentrating on them, not on myself.</p><p></p><p>Looking at it in a positive way, earlier this year I was nominated for an award for being the most helpful person around. No, I didnt win. Others see it as less positive, such as the person who suggested that my hobby was collecting lame ducks.</p><p></p><p>I will reply separately to the detailed aspects of your posting.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="losthope, post: 58481148, member: 94863"] To joey down under, I hope this works. Christian Forums looks a bit different today with many of the icons and other aspects not showing properly. No doubt it results from the maintenance work done recently on the website and hopefully they will get it properly fixed soon. You sent a fairly long posting responding to my comments. I will go through it and reply, but first there are three points that I want to deal with emotions, self-pity and helping other people. First, I know that I am never going to feel emotions in the way that most people do. I also realise that it is extremely unlikely that I will ever experience spiritual emotions either. This means that there are aspects of life that I am always going to miss out on. However, this should not necessarily mean that I will always lack any experience of God working in my life. God can act in many different ways, and only some of these ways involve the emotions. During my time as a believer I became concerned about my situation because I had no awareness of God responding to me in any way. Thinking about it now (and my ideas have developed gradually over the years) I can think of several possible reasons for this, including the following: 1 For most people, God acts through the emotions and in no other way, and I am unable to benefit from this. 2 God did act on me when I was a believer but I was not aware of it. 3 God wants to wait until the time is right. 4 God does not want me as a believer. 5 I was never a true believer eg I came to God with the wrong attitude. 6 I am not yet ready to be a Christian. Or I was not ready to be a Christian at the time I was a believer. 7 God has some other plans for me. 8 I am just obsessed with being a believer. 9 There is no God. No doubt there are other possibilities that I have not included. The points I am making are that my lack of emotions is only one possibility among many, and that I am not blaming God for the problems because the cause could be me. Second, you wrote about a poor me attitude and self-pity. Have I ever been like that? Yes, there were times when there was self-pity. But they did not last for long. Any self-pity disappeared in the months after I abandoned my faith. It has not been there for many years. Similarly, there were odd occasions during those difficult months after I stopped being a believer, when sometimes I blamed God, or resented God for making things difficult for me. Once again, that ended many years ago. What I am trying to do now is to understand why my experience of being a believer was so disappointing. When I am more confident about the cause of the problem, I will know what to do about it. That might be to become a believer again, it might be to lose interest in Christianity finally, or it might be to try to persuade Christians that they do not really know God. Or maybe something else; it depends on what conclusions I come to. In other words, I am currently doing the preparation for the rest of my life. Third, you suggested that it would be better for me to concentrate less on myself and more on other people. To help other people instead of looking inward. Several people have suggested that I might find God through helping other people, some of them giving different explanations about why it would bring me closer to God. My answer is that in one way or another I have spent much of my life helping other people. Though as far as I am aware it has not brought me any closer to God. People know that if they need help, I am a person to turn to. Today, for example, I will be seeing three people and helping them with their difficulties. I will be concentrating on them, not on myself. Looking at it in a positive way, earlier this year I was nominated for an award for being the most helpful person around. No, I didnt win. Others see it as less positive, such as the person who suggested that my hobby was collecting lame ducks. I will reply separately to the detailed aspects of your posting. [/QUOTE]
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