On the verge of giving up

[Phil 1:21]

I have kind of accepted the fact that I will go to hell.

That's Satan trying to drive a wedge between you and God.

It's not a good feeling and I've been crying almost all night thinking about it.

That's God keeping you close.

 

[W2L]

I don't really know what to say other than I'm about to give up on God because I feel he has not chosen me and I'm not good enough for him. No matter what scriptures I read and no matter what people tell me, for some reason it doesn't change my mind. I have kind of accepted the fact that I will go to hell. It's not a good feeling and I've been crying almost all night thinking about it. I wish I could be close to God but I don't think he wants that.

When I try and seek God...nothing. And then people tell me I'm trying to hard that's why or I have too high of expectations. Then I stop trying so hard and lower my standards then fall away from God. It's like there's no medium. It kind of feels like I'm being tortured for something I did in a past life. I don't believe in past lives but that's the best way I can portray how I'm feeling.

At this point I wish I was never born. Whenever I read about the straight and narrow or that only a few will go to heaven and the rest to hell I can just picture myself burning forever. The other day I got into a bath that was too hot. And I sat in it wondering if this is how I'll feel when I'm in hell. It's really scary and my mind is being tortured constantly. But now I just accept that as my fate.

I feel God doesn't want me so what's the point of trying. And I know everyone's gonna say anything that goes against the Bible is of the devil, and I know that. But you try having these thoughts fill your mind everyday. You try having a relationship with God and not getting anywhere. The things God asks of us I can't do. I try but I don't succeed. I guess I'm just one that will never make it. I've been suppressing these feeling for so long because I wanted God so bad and I wanted to believe God wanted me but I'm just not chosen and that sucks.

I use to fear hell so much that i finally just gave in. I said to myself that if my lot is hell then so be it. I cannot fight against God. After that my fear was gone. Now i walk by faith instead of sight. Dont give up on God, give up on fear.

 

[Adstar]

Ok but you cant really believe if you have had no experience with it. If I've never encountered God, I will not have true belief.

So your waiting for an ""experience""..

Do you think that God gives all who are saved some kind of physical/ emotional experience?

If you do then i think you are under a huge deception...

We are not saved because we get goosebumps or a tingling sensation or we feel big invisible arms hugging us or we fall on the floor and do an impression of a epileptic seizure.....

We are saved because we believe Jesus and trust in the Atonement He secured for our salvation....

 

[ByTheSpirit]

I don't really know what to say other than I'm about to give up on God because I feel he has not chosen me and I'm not good enough for him. No matter what scriptures I read and no matter what people tell me, for some reason it doesn't change my mind. I have kind of accepted the fact that I will go to hell. It's not a good feeling and I've been crying almost all night thinking about it. I wish I could be close to God but I don't think he wants that.

When I try and seek God...nothing. And then people tell me I'm trying to hard that's why or I have too high of expectations. Then I stop trying so hard and lower my standards then fall away from God. It's like there's no medium. It kind of feels like I'm being tortured for something I did in a past life. I don't believe in past lives but that's the best way I can portray how I'm feeling.

At this point I wish I was never born. Whenever I read about the straight and narrow or that only a few will go to heaven and the rest to hell I can just picture myself burning forever. The other day I got into a bath that was too hot. And I sat in it wondering if this is how I'll feel when I'm in hell. It's really scary and my mind is being tortured constantly. But now I just accept that as my fate.

I feel God doesn't want me so what's the point of trying. And I know everyone's gonna say anything that goes against the Bible is of the devil, and I know that. But you try having these thoughts fill your mind everyday. You try having a relationship with God and not getting anywhere. The things God asks of us I can't do. I try but I don't succeed. I guess I'm just one that will never make it. I've been suppressing these feeling for so long because I wanted God so bad and I wanted to believe God wanted me but I'm just not chosen and that sucks.

My heart breaks for you. I empathize with you as well as this has been my experience as well for a long time. It is very disheartening for me to see people have power displays of meeting God and I get nothing. Where people cry a lot, or tell me they "felt a change", I felt nothing and it seemed as though God had denied me.

But then God told me something: He said some people need displays to build faith, other people have faith already and they need less of the displays. He said people like myself are in that latter group. It helped a little, and I started to notice that I had indeed met God as evidenced by my life and the fruit I was bearing.

Now when I feel that way I use it as an excuse to run to God in prayer and fasting. Because I do believe God is my Father who loves me and so it is not him that failed or forgot, I just need to push through to get to him.

I hope this helps

 

[Aldebaran]

I feel ya. Well I don't really think I will amount to much, especially not to the degree needed for God to use me. Idk, I was having a conversation about predestination with a friend and its been messing with my mind after that.

Try not to worry about the predestination idea. If you have an interest to know God and for Him to know you and you are this concerned about it, then there's no reason to think you weren't predestined. I've had that concern myself in the past and was with a group of Calvinists who apparently decided that if I didn't KNOW I was saved, then I must not be predestined, and they pretty much shunned me.

Also, don't think that you won't amount to much that God can use you. Moses certainly wasn't much, and God used him very well. Remember 2 Corinthians 12:9--"Each time he said, "My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness." So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me."

 

[bekkilyn]

I can't agree with the predestination idea. It sounds too much like God granting us free will, but then not really, since he's already judged who is going where. I know I'm simplifying it a lot here for brevity, but I believe that God wants to to save *everyone*, and though eventually his patience will run out Jesus will return to claim his own, and he is continuously reaching out to us in his perfect love, wanting a relationship with us, and even looking out for us before we accept him, but that it's our free choice as to whether we accept him or not.

I'm also of the idea that hell is an eternal separation from God rather than some actual Dante-like place of fire and brimstone with little horned devils swimming around in it.

 

[friend of]

Thanks for making this thread. Many of us really needed to hear the sound wisdom of the posts here, especially with regard to our feelings at the given time. I'll offer Romans 9:35-39

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
36 As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,
39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God bless!

 

[-HisGirl-]

Ever since I made this post I've been having nightmares. I notice whenever I've been far away from God and I realize it and then start to draw closer to him the devil starts torment me through nightmares.

Wow, all of you sound very wise! I'm very happy that you guys commented and shared all of this with me. I really needed to hear it. I read something that was saying try not to focus on how big your problem is, but how big God is.. So I shall try that.

 

[-HisGirl-]

My heart breaks for you. I empathize with you as well as this has been my experience as well for a long time. It is very disheartening for me to see people have power displays of meeting God and I get nothing. Where people cry a lot, or tell me they "felt a change", I felt nothing and it seemed as though God had denied me.

But then God told me something: He said some people need displays to build faith, other people have faith already and they need less of the displays. He said people like myself are in that latter group. It helped a little, and I started to notice that I had indeed met God as evidenced by my life and the fruit I was bearing.

Now when I feel that way I use it as an excuse to run to God in prayer and fasting. Because I do believe God is my Father who loves me and so it is not him that failed or forgot, I just need to push through to get to him.

I hope this helps

I have often thought that! That makes me feel a little better hearing someone else has been where I'am and got out of it. It sucks though :/

 

[-HisGirl-]

So your waiting for an ""experience""..

Do you think that God gives all who are saved some kind of physical/ emotional experience?

If you do then i think you are under a huge deception...

We are not saved because we get goosebumps or a tingling sensation or we feel big invisible arms hugging us or we fall on the floor and do an impression of a epileptic seizure.....

We are saved because we believe Jesus and trust in the Atonement He secured for our salvation....

I agree with that. But I guess I kind of expected to have an "experience" with God by now because literally every christian I know has told me a time in their life where they have. Some people younger and some older, so I might be deceived about that. I'll pray about it ...

 

[bekkilyn]

I agree with that. But I guess I kind of expected to have an "experience" with God by now because literally every christian I know has told me a time in their life where they have. Some people younger and some older, so I might be deceived about that. I'll pray about it ...

John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movement back in the 18th century was born into a Christian household, his father a vicar in the Church of England, and his mother very educated. She taught her children to be diligent with their prayers, bible study, and moral behavior. John Wesley was very devout, formed "Holy clubs" after going off to Oxford and was often teased for "over-doing" Christianity, and he became ordained within the Church of England himself in the early 1720's. He preached a lot and even went to Georgia to "bring salvation to the heathens" a few years later, but when he found himself terrified during storms at sea and he met a group of Moravians who seemed so much at peace with God, he began to have a very serious crisis of faith.

You see, he had never really "felt" God within him like these Moravians seemed to do. His faith at the time was more in the manner that if he could do enough good things for people, he could earn his place in heaven. The Moravians taught him differently about accepting Jesus into his heart for salvation, and even after he agreed with the idea himself, he just couldn't feel it!

He spoke to one of the Moravians that he was thinking of quitting preaching since how could he preach a faith he did not have for himself? How could he preach salvation that he felt he did not have?

The Moravian told him that he should not quit preaching. That he should, "Preach faith until you have it, and then because you have it, you will preach faith."

So he continued to preach, though still undergoing his personal crisis of faith.

Because he could feel nothing like others described.

He returned to England from Georgia, still having faith issues and still questioning his salvation, until one day in 1738 (he was 35 years old at this time) he visited a meeting at Aldersgate where someone was reading Martin Luther's preface to the book of Romans. As he listened, something happened and he wrote in his journal, "While he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death."

It took him years to reach this point, even though he'd been a Christian practically all of his life. Though he considered this experience to be his moment of true conversion, he did come to the conclusion later in his life that he likely did have salvation before then even though he couldn't feel it at the time and so it caused him a lot of despair and confusion, and all the while he was even an ordained priest.

So in my very roundabout way here, I wanted to try to reassure you that you are not alone, and even some of those who turned out to be considered some of the most influential people within Christian history had similar issues to yours.

 

[Thir7ySev3n]

I agree with that. But I guess I kind of expected to have an "experience" with God by now because literally every christian I know has told me a time in their life where they have. Some people younger and some older, so I might be deceived about that. I'll pray about it ...

I know this is long, but please read the whole post. I have invested much time into edifying brothers and sisters in Christ who experience these deeply troubling problems, and I want to edify you s much as God has enabled me to do.

The real problem, fundamentally, is that what you are asking of God is impossible for Him to give you. At first glance that may seem an odd statement, until you appreciate that you are dealing with a context of persons and a relationship, not something like an impersonal force or law of nature.

As aforementioned, your emotions and mental states are personal responses of your heart and mind to what you perceive. To clarify what I mean in my distinction of persons and impersonal forces, there are ways that we understand things to exist that cause us to perceive them differently. When we perceive things which are not persons, we recognize them as having no motivations, no ambitions, no thoughts, no emotions, no consciousness nor will of any kind. Therefore, we readily conclude, that whatever is a mere thing exists the way it clearly presents itself to our senses.

As an example, think of a simple object like a bottle of water, or a natural law, like the law of gravity. Imagine the bottle of water appears to your eyes to be half full, and when you pick it up, it has the weight of the water. When you become thirsty, it would never occur to you that upon twisting off the cap, the bottle which appeared and felt half full will be revealed to actually be completely empty upon tilting it towards your mouth. Why? It's very simple. As an impersonal entity, the water bottle must be at least approximately what you experienced it as and can not have had any motivations to deceive you concerning its content, like not wanting to be devalued and consequently recycled. Likewise, you will never suspect that if you were to jump incessantly for hours that you may eventually be trapped in suspense or thrown more forcefully to the ground on account of gravity growing irritable with you testing its patience or having a particular agitation with you. You expect these things to remain as they are and be as they appear because you know they do not have any thoughts or feelings about how you treat or use them.

Similarly, when we think about God (and as you've disclosed personally), we have the same clear content of His Word presently before us as we read, and we have the historical event of the cross on which Christ was crucified for our redemption. However, the fundamental difference here is that now we are dealing with presentations by a person, who does have motivations, thoughts, feelings, ambitions and every form of will. So while we understand that God attests to His love for us in Word and deed we sometimes suspect that, like other persons, God can cease to mean what He previously sincerely did (if He ever meant it at all). We suppose that God can grow irritable, impatient and indifferent enough to us to change His original ambitions and desires for us. The problem with this kind of thinking is that it anthropomorphizes God, which means to conflate His nature with that of a human's. To see how that is logically absurd, see my extensive post on the topic by clicking here. Beyond the logical problem, there is still the ultimate need to trust the person of God as He has disclosed Himself. This brings us to your suggested resolution of the problem, in paraphrase, "why not just give me some experience of Himself and His love?"

This ostensible resolution only circles us back to the fundamental issue, however, which is that God can not give you an experience of His love in the emotional sense, nor would any mere sensation He give you be beyond doubt itself. Let me give you a final example to demonstrate this with the analogy of a human relationship. In a spousal relationship, a husband may attest to many things concerning his intentions, desires and his love for his wife. He could, for example, claim that when he marries he he will be with her for better or worse and that he will truly be forsaking all others til death does them part. However, due to past experiences or intrinsic insecurities, the wife never truly achieves comfort, and, even after many years, continues to suspect that if the right circumstances present themselves (prolonged period of arguments, "more attractive" woman, etc.) he could likely become unfaithful. Even when the husband reaches out and touches and embraces her, and she feels the sensations of his touch on her skin, she could ask herself, "is it really love or is it just how he feels right now?" Despite the sincerity of the words, deeds and affections of the husband in his own heart and mind, the woman herself will not feel the truth of these things simply because they are true. She will only have comfort and security in his love when she believes it is really as he says it is. He response is internal and personal, and therefore can not be a provision but must be a response.

In conclusion, to not drag this on much longer, I want you to understand that, as a person, a true self, God could not make you feel any sort of confidence in His Word or His deeds as a provision without circumventing the personal part of you, the heart and mind of you that responds by your own will. Thus, to make you feel God loves you, God would have to actually make you cease to be you so long as you believed it by His irresistible force upon on your heart and mind. For you to truly feel God's love, you must take the clear content of His Word and deed and every reason He has given you to have full rational confidence (again, click the link above for my more extensive version of this argument) and respond to it in agreement with your heart and mind. Then, at that moment, when you appreciate and accept it's truth, you will feel loved, you will have confidence, and you will have peace and full assurance.

 

[-HisGirl-]

I know this is long, but please read the whole post. I have invested much time into edifying brothers and sisters in Christ who experience these deeply troubling problems, and I want to edify you s much as God has enabled me to do.

The real problem, fundamentally, is that what you are asking of God is impossible for Him to give you. At first glance that may seem an odd statement, until you appreciate that you are dealing with a context of persons and a relationship, not something like an impersonal force or law of nature.

As aforementioned, your emotions and mental states are personal responses of your heart and mind to what you perceive. To clarify what I mean in my distinction of persons and impersonal forces, there are ways that we understand things to exist that cause us to perceive them differently. When we perceive things which are not persons, we recognize them as having no motivations, no ambitions, no thoughts, no emotions, no consciousness nor will of any kind. Therefore, we readily conclude, that whatever is a mere thing exists the way it clearly presents itself to our senses.

As an example, think of a simple object like a bottle of water, or a natural law, like the law of gravity. Imagine the bottle of water appears to your eyes to be half full, and when you pick it up, it has the weight of the water. When you become thirsty, it would never occur to you that upon twisting off the cap, the bottle which appeared and felt half full will be revealed to actually be completely empty upon tilting it towards your mouth. Why? It's very simple. As an impersonal entity, the water bottle must be at least approximately what you experienced it as and can not have had any motivations to deceive you concerning its content, like not wanting to be devalued and consequently recycled. Likewise, you will never suspect that if you were to jump incessantly for hours that you may eventually be trapped in suspense or thrown more forcefully to the ground on account of gravity growing irritable with you testing its patience or having a particular agitation with you. You expect these things to remain as they are and be as they appear because you know they do not have any thoughts or feelings about how you treat or use them.

Similarly, when we think about God (and as you've disclosed personally), we have the same clear content of His Word presently before us as we read, and we have the historical event of the cross on which Christ was crucified for our redemption. However, the fundamental difference here is that now we are dealing with presentations by a person, who does have motivations, thoughts, feelings, ambitions and every form of will. So while we understand that God attests to His love for us in Word and deed we sometimes suspect that, like other persons, God can cease to mean what He previously sincerely did (if He ever meant it at all). We suppose that God can grow irritable, impatient and indifferent enough to us to change His original ambitions and desires for us. The problem with this kind of thinking is that it anthropomorphizes God, which means to conflate His nature with that of a human's. To see how that is logically absurd, see my extensive post on the topic by clicking here. Beyond the logical problem, there is still the ultimate need to trust the person of God as He has disclosed Himself. This brings us to your suggested resolution of the problem, in paraphrase, "why not just give me some experience of Himself and His love?"

This ostensible resolution only circles us back to the fundamental issue, however, which is that God can not give you an experience of His love in the emotional sense, nor would any mere sensation He give you be beyond doubt itself. Let me give you a final example to demonstrate this with the analogy of a human relationship. In a spousal relationship, a husband may attest to many things concerning his intentions, desires and his love for his wife. He could, for example, claim that when he marries he he will be with her for better or worse and that he will truly be forsaking all others til death does them part. However, due to past experiences or intrinsic insecurities, the wife never truly achieves comfort, and, even after many years, continues to suspect that if the right circumstances present themselves (prolonged period of arguments, "more attractive" woman, etc.) he could likely become unfaithful. Even when the husband reaches out and touches and embraces her, and she feels the sensations of his touch on her skin, she could ask herself, "is it really love or is it just how he feels right now?" Despite the sincerity of the words, deeds and affections of the husband in his own heart and mind, the woman herself will not feel the truth of these things simply because they are true. She will only have comfort and security in his love when she believes it is really as he says it is. He response is internal and personal, and therefore can not be a provision but must be a response.

In conclusion, to not drag this on much longer, I want you to understand that, as a person, a true self, God could not make you feel any sort of confidence in His Word or His deeds as a provision without circumventing the personal part of you, the heart and mind of you that responds by your own will. Thus, to make you feel God loves you, God would have to actually make you cease to be you so long as you believed it by His irresistible force upon on your heart and mind. For you to truly feel God's love, you must take the clear content of His Word and deed and every reason He has given you to have full rational confidence (again, click the link above for my more extensive version of this argument) and respond to it in agreement with your heart and mind. Then, at that moment, when you appreciate and accept it's truth, you will feel loved, you will have confidence, and you will have peace and full assurance.

Thank you for explaining everything very well! Everything i'm on board with but I'm having trouble with the last paragraph. Because I have tried to believe and agree with His word soooo many times and I don't truly believe it. No matter how much I read His word or pray or do anything! Even when I try and just accept it and leave it at that, It's just like I'm making myself try to believe something I don't really believe. A couple months back I literally put everything aside to just purely focus on God. I eventually stopped because I was getting nowhere with God, or I thought that. I don't know, I've had talks with wonderful people of God who tell me a lot of the same things everyone here is commenting but for some reason I still don't believe. I feel like there's something wrong with me where I just literally cant believe no matter what. I cant appreciate and except it if I don't believe it. I want to believe it but I don't. So I don't really know what to do. I get upset because everyone says I just have to believe, but it's easy for them to say because they already do believe. Its like no one really knows what I'm going through.

 

[Mafeking]

I don't really know what to say other than I'm about to give up on God because I feel he has not chosen me and I'm not good enough for him. No matter what scriptures I read and no matter what people tell me, for some reason it doesn't change my mind. I have kind of accepted the fact that I will go to hell. It's not a good feeling and I've been crying almost all night thinking about it. I wish I could be close to God but I don't think he wants that.

When I try and seek God...nothing. And then people tell me I'm trying to hard that's why or I have too high of expectations. Then I stop trying so hard and lower my standards then fall away from God. It's like there's no medium. It kind of feels like I'm being tortured for something I did in a past life. I don't believe in past lives but that's the best way I can portray how I'm feeling.

At this point I wish I was never born. Whenever I read about the straight and narrow or that only a few will go to heaven and the rest to hell I can just picture myself burning forever. The other day I got into a bath that was too hot. And I sat in it wondering if this is how I'll feel when I'm in hell. It's really scary and my mind is being tortured constantly. But now I just accept that as my fate.

I feel God doesn't want me so what's the point of trying. And I know everyone's gonna say anything that goes against the Bible is of the devil, and I know that. But you try having these thoughts fill your mind everyday. You try having a relationship with God and not getting anywhere. The things God asks of us I can't do. I try but I don't succeed. I guess I'm just one that will never make it. I've been suppressing these feeling for so long because I wanted God so bad and I wanted to believe God wanted me but I'm just not chosen and that sucks.

Hello Hisgirl. What you are saying about GOD not wanting you is really nonsense. I think you are just filled with self-pity. What you need is to affirm your faith in GOD without your emotion getting in the way. GOD has told us in His word that He loves us so much that He gave His one and only Son to be a ransom for our sins. Read John 3.16. You remind me of this woman I knew who was always fussing and getting mad at her husband and hiding from him in various corners of the house so he could come running after her. He did that for all their lives. But GOD is different. He wants us to be comforted by His word and have faith in what He said. Stop being a suck. Grow up and love your GOD. He loves and cares for you. That is for sure.

 

[Rockworx]

There are many good replies in this thread... I have struggled with doubt at times (and I've been a Christian for years). I recently came across a really good video on youtube called "Is God Ignoring Me? Making Sense of God's Silence - Dr. Gary Habermas"

He deals with this specific issue. Worth a look.

 

[Thir7ySev3n]

Thank you for explaining everything very well! Everything i'm on board with but I'm having trouble with the last paragraph. Because I have tried to believe and agree with His word soooo many times and I don't truly believe it. No matter how much I read His word or pray or do anything! Even when I try and just accept it and leave it at that, It's just like I'm making myself try to believe something I don't really believe. A couple months back I literally put everything aside to just purely focus on God. I eventually stopped because I was getting nowhere with God, or I thought that. I don't know, I've had talks with wonderful people of God who tell me a lot of the same things everyone here is commenting but for some reason I still don't believe. I feel like there's something wrong with me where I just literally cant believe no matter what. I cant appreciate and except it if I don't believe it. I want to believe it but I don't. So I don't really know what to do. I get upset because everyone says I just have to believe, but it's easy for them to say because they already do believe. Its like no one really knows what I'm going through.

If you do not believe on account of hearing the Gospel itself, I can only infer that your difficulties with coming to faith are intellectual. I am fully aware that there are people outside the faith and who have come to Christ that sincerely have these issues and aren't simply using them as some kind of smoke-screen for perpetually resisting God. If this is the case for you, I would desperately recommend visiting this site and browsing the abundant logical and empirical resources there, as well as purchasing the book, On Guard: Student Edition, which is a simplified version of the authors alternative book Reasonable Faith. This book presents a rigorous and highly developed cumulative apologetic case for the existence of God and the historical case for the resurrection of Christ, and this version of On Guard (one for current Christians wanting to be better equipped for evangelism and one for those seeking the answers themselves) is specifically geared for the seeker.

That site and that book is authored by the man William Lane Craig, who has been engaging in an apologetically oriented evangelism for almost 40 years, and who has debated all the top contemporary atheist scholars (videos of these formal debates are all on Youtube as well). Take the time to look through these resources and it will be more than worth it.

 

[-HisGirl-]

If you do not believe on account of hearing the Gospel itself, I can only infer that your difficulties with coming to faith are intellectual. I am fully aware that there are people outside the faith and who have come to Christ that sincerely have these issues and aren't simply using them as some kind of smoke-screen for perpetually resisting God. If this is the case for you, I would desperately recommend visiting this site and browsing the abundant logical and empirical resources there, as well as purchasing the book, On Guard: Student Edition, which is a simplified version of the authors alternative book Reasonable Faith. This book presents a rigorous and highly developed cumulative apologetic case for the existence of God and the historical case for the resurrection of Christ, and this version of On Guard (one for current Christians wanting to be better equipped for evangelism and one for those seeking the answers themselves) is specifically geared for the seeker.

That site and that book is authored by the man William Lane Craig, who has been engaging in an apologetically oriented evangelism for almost 40 years, and who has debated all the top contemporary atheist scholars (videos of these formal debates are all on Youtube as well). Take the time to look through these resources and it will be more than worth it.

Thank you! I will checkout that site. I'm just worried that something might actually be wrong with me intellectually like you mentioned. I always thought that... but I'm not sure. It sounds like that might be my problem.

 

[_-iconoclast-_]

Thank you! I will checkout that site. I'm just worried that something might actually be wrong with me intellectually like you mentioned. I always thought that... but I'm not sure. It sounds like that might be my problem.

Hello.

Thank you for your story and may you find what you are looking for.

You seem to be missing faith. Christianity works on faith, love and hope. A belief in God is a three bound chord which is not broken easily.

A christian needs to have faith in God, hope in His promise and love for Him and your neighbour. If you miss any of the three, it wont work.

You have suggested that no matter how much you try, you dont truly believe or have not had an experience with God.

Salvation is through accepting that Jesus is the Son of God and died for your sins. A christian may go the next step and experience God through Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit of God is a gift given to anyone who wishes to accept it. The evidence of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.

Dont give up, keep praying and keep seeking. Some dont experience God for many years, some get it like that. The main thing is faith.

love being the greatest of all three

Open your heart to God. Let Him in, focus your self to God and with every last inch of your being declare that you love God and want to be with Him. Close your eyes invite Jesus in and communicate with God - prayer.

You must pray and focus, with full conviction you are being heard and keep doing so. You need to build a relationship with God.

Please dont hesitate to ask anyone for help in starting a relationship with God.



I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

 

[FutureAndAHope]

I don't really know what to say other than I'm about to give up on God because I feel he has not chosen me and I'm not good enough for him. No matter what scriptures I read and no matter what people tell me, for some reason it doesn't change my mind. I have kind of accepted the fact that I will go to hell. It's not a good feeling and I've been crying almost all night thinking about it. I wish I could be close to God but I don't think he wants that.

When I try and seek God...nothing. And then people tell me I'm trying to hard that's why or I have too high of expectations. Then I stop trying so hard and lower my standards then fall away from God. It's like there's no medium. It kind of feels like I'm being tortured for something I did in a past life. I don't believe in past lives but that's the best way I can portray how I'm feeling.

At this point I wish I was never born. Whenever I read about the straight and narrow or that only a few will go to heaven and the rest to hell I can just picture myself burning forever. The other day I got into a bath that was too hot. And I sat in it wondering if this is how I'll feel when I'm in hell. It's really scary and my mind is being tortured constantly. But now I just accept that as my fate.

I feel God doesn't want me so what's the point of trying. And I know everyone's gonna say anything that goes against the Bible is of the devil, and I know that. But you try having these thoughts fill your mind everyday. You try having a relationship with God and not getting anywhere. The things God asks of us I can't do. I try but I don't succeed. I guess I'm just one that will never make it. I've been suppressing these feeling for so long because I wanted God so bad and I wanted to believe God wanted me but I'm just not chosen and that sucks.

God is not as harsh as you think. Think of what the bible says the fruits of God's Spirit are: love, joy, peace, do they sound like harsh attributes. Jesus also forgives 77x7 meaning infinitely. We are told to comprehend how "deep and wide" god's love is. The bible says God IS love. How may times there did God mention "let's consider God's judgment", no not once. We are to comprehend his great love.

God wants you saved. You have fixated your self on one scripture without looking at all the others. Every time Jesus talked about hell he spoke of those who do not show kindness to the needy. He wants a humble heart willing to assist those around us who hurt. Do you think he would hurt you, he is not hurtful to the innocent. Man slayers, murderers, thieves, and those who take advantage of others, the guilty, they are those who love not their neighbour. Love God, and love your neighbour, and you have fulfilled God's requirement.

Even then the work that God gives us is to believe on him. Even our compassion does not rescue us from hell, it is God's arms of mercy extended in the death of Jesus, taking our place so we can live.

 

[LoricaLady]

To me it sounds like you are under spiritual attack from the pit. Now there is a way to fight back that is seen in the Bible. Singing praises.

David did that to make evil spirits leave Saul. When King Jehoshaphat saw enemy armies coming against his nation of Israel, far more than his people could ever win a fight against, he sent out priests, with the Ark, to sing praises before the enemies. They armies turned on one another and not one was left. But 3 days of booty collection was left for the Israelites! When Paul and Silas were in prison they sang praise songs and were miraculously freed.

When the enemy comes against you, don't argue, don't fret. When you feel discouraged, sing praise songs. There are tons on YouTube to learn if you don't know any. I would recommend singing TO, rather than about, as in "You are holy" rather than "He is holy."

Also, do you have any occultic materials in your home? Things like "cute" little statues of Buddha, books about ghosts, dream catchers, Masonic artifacts, and so on, movies like Gremlins? Any hard rock music? Any, well, porn? If so, those are said to attract evil spirits.

Playing Bible in the background can also help. The Bible is in audio form on the net in various places. The Psalms are great, ditto Proverbs, but really anything in there.
Praying for you. I don't believe those lies from the devil that you are being told, not one bit.