Hi,


I want to start by saying a few things.

First, I am aware that some might not post because they know that this type of discourse will probably lead nowhere. I agree. I don't expect anyone to come to my way of thinking nor am I trying to make that happen. Yet, if someone is seeking like me... your opinion will help in their journey.

Second, If you know me (and a few of you do) I speak the way I type. That can be misunderstood as being a smart-rear end of a donkey. I am not. I am not smart, and I have only seen a donkey from a far away distance. I am passionate and excited.


I will try to answer the lovely Amy's questions.

1.You believe that Christianity is not unique, it overlaps with other religions and myths?

That is true. You will find similar stories and themes in Christianity as you do in many current religions and also religions that existed before.
I know that it is hard to believe that there were people worshiping gods before the god of Abraham, but there were. We tend to think that the world revolved around our fertile crescent teachings. Yet we forget and are not taught about the orient and the history that was occurring before the time of Christian stories.
This is based on the theory or hypothesis that man exists longer than 6000 years ago. Yes I said theory, but this theory when challenged each and every time still stands. No it is not proven but it has yet to be disproven and every year that passes more and more findings confirm that it (evolution) is exactly what happened and not the other way around.

2.You believe that the God of the Bible, who you previously believed in is a paradox—loving and damning

Yes. The paradox lies in the claim that god is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. I am aware of the OT law vs. the new covenant. Yet the very god that we worship killed countless people in the old testament including children. The law would have you stoned if you committed adultery, and this was approved by god.
Hell is first mentioned by Jesus in the new testament and for those who don't except him into your heart, your eternal destination. This includes the children of Darfur that are still starving this very day despite the prayers of many.

3.You believe right and wrong can be explained outside of the existence of a deity, through the evolution of men's minds, according to what works for our race and according to mens and womens natural desires.

The idea of right and wrong in no way establishes the existence of a god. As Aaron mentioned in his post, the moral compass has been changing for centuries.
I was speaking with a baptist that believed that modern music (christian or secular) was to work of Satan himself. This was based on the rhythms (Bill Gothard teachings). My friend from India has a middle name of Kumar. Now Kumar in KiSwahilli is the slang offensive term for a female's reproductive organ. So morals are subject to the time, location, history, culture and so on.

4.You don't think that the Bible makes logical sense.

It can't. If you believe in talking snakes, talking animals, talking shrubbery, a race of invisible winged creatures, the whole earth under water for 40 days and then all that water magically goes somewhere, virgin birth, walking on water, the dead rising, super strong man that loses his power after his HAIR is cut (heard that before?) , seas split in half--are all real. That these stories actually happened. Having said that, some parts (the books that people happen to read the most) are wonderful and poetic. The teachings of Christ are wonderful and have meaning, yet these are not original concepts. Here is the problem with modern day Christian theology. All this that the Bible claims, all the stories, all the amazing happenings, occurred--we are told that in our days this no longer happens. Don't you find that convenient? Yes we all agree that these stories occurred, but they don't anymore. And we are ok with that?



Your reasons for feeling liberated are:

1. freedom to lust without guilt

No. The freedom to not apologize with a deity for something that every male on earth practices. Lust is natural, I think we can all agree on that. You might say it is a part of our sinful nature. You are half right. It is a part of our nature. Not an excuse in our modern day culture or one that my wife might except. Just remember, lust of the flesh to god is no different than committing the physical adultery itself. I would be surprised if a male (or even a female) can come forward and say that they are free from this act. Every candid conversation with Christian males ALL express their dealings with their lustful mind. None have been freed. None.

2.freedom from the paradox

Yes. Not free from questions. Not free from lack of answers. Nor will we.


3.freedom from what you believe to have been a delusion

Yes. Free from believing what MAN has shaped to fit our modern day culture. Free from what man shaped to begin with. Unless you are a Coptic Christian, you are a part of something that has evolved (sorry) based on time, culture and so one.... Just read "The Message" translation. Complete man. Michael Card was right "We made him in our image, so our faiths idolatry" .


4. freedom to experience life without the intrusion of Christian ideas

No. Some of Christian Ideas are fantastic. Some of other religions ideas are fantastic. They agree with what and where we are in the place and time. My freedom comes from my life and children's life do not having to be shaped by fear and fairy tails.




"You talked about your testimony and personal experience with what you once believed to be God. I don't know that story. Can you tell me what your testimony was and why (if there was any reason outside of having been born into a largely Bible believing society) you once thought God was believable?"

Sure!

The short version: I grew up exposed to church (we went to the same one). I am sure that I excepted Christ as a child just due to a zealous Sunday school teacher or a camp of some sort. Yet, when I grew older I was unable to pinpoint a moment or "birth day" that I could rely on. My official salvation occurred during my parents terrible divorce. You remember that? My father lost his mind and became nothing less than a monster. I needed something and god was a natural path for me. I called out the name of god. I believed in the Trinity, the virgin birth, the death and 3rd day resurrection, and the power of the blood. I asked Christ into my heart and know at that time that his act on the cross replace my birth given sin.


"After that ( i know this is a lot of trouble but remember you started this not me) could you tell me about the very first moment you started to question God's existence? Was it a terrible struggle or just a pleasant release to begin with? How did it progress from there? I have to know where you're coming from to know how i would like to respond."


Sure. It happened over a long period of time. It started in Bible college and was the reason I studied apologetics. It was more for me than for others. They were reasonable answers, but answers that I never had (nor wanted) the chance to hear the opposing side. That is something as Christians we don't want to do. We will argue a non-believer (pleasantly). We will read Christian books that answer non-christian questions..... but! we won't travel to books-a-million and read what the "other side" is saying. We rest in the bias answers of our leaders and that is good enough. And that WAS good enough for many years. I would lay my questions down as the great mystery of god, or other feel good answers. To be honest, I believed because I wanted to believe. Like most.
Then real questions began to dig through my comfortable mind. I will not list most of them unless you beg me but I would never sleep if you did. : )
But one that stands out is one that is not that profound or life changing to most. It was the Deep Field picture from the Hubbell Telescope. Google it : )
This is a picture from a spec in the sky. A grain of sand (or less) from where we stand. What is showed challenged everything (it might support everything to you)
What I saw were galaxies, not two or three, but hundreds maybe thousands. Galaxies. Each filled with billions of solar systems. Now.... our planet is one of eight in our solar system. Think real hard. It is estimated that there are 4000 billion galaxies observable from earth. I used to argue that we are unique, an impossibility.
Yet if you do the math (we can't--our calculators don't have a big enough screen) and see that the possibility of billions to the millionth power of planets exist. Are we? Is this earth special? When every planet in our solar system is uninhabitable by humans, and most of earth is. When 99.9% of all creature that have existed on the planet are extinct, despite the efforts of a man that slept with his children. Is this intelligent design? No.
I can see the other side on this. That it proves an all powerful god, but that is not what the Bible says and the galaxies falling apart and destroying each other, black holes that reside in the center of every galaxy eliminating the existence of what we can only imagine. These do not fall under the "fall" of man on this planet. We would be silly to believe that our sin on this, one of a 100000 Zillion possible planets, effects the whole universe. Yet it would make sense to peasant story tellers that only knew of what was believed to be a flat earth. That the moon produced light independent of the sun. That our world was only that of the known land. See, they had very little to go by. And they made a wonderful story.


Christians are only one god away from Atheism. They reject all other gods but theirs. All for the exact same reasons people reject your god.
I can not prove there is no god, no one can. I can not disprove that fairies live in your garden, yet I have seen your wonderful drawings in the past and know you would be thrilled if they did. : ) Yet everything works without the assumption of a god. There is nothing left remaining to explain that can only be explained by a god. That is why I said we are on the edge of two worlds. Do you want to believe the very first attempts at geology, cosmology, astronomy, biology, etc. ? Or do you want to believe more modern day attempts that have vindicated the deaths of people that stood up and said to the church that the earth is indeed round and orbits around the sun. Science does not get off as easy as religion. It is tested and goes through peer review and this repeats over and over until something might be standing at the end. And if it is not standing, they deal and move on. That is why we know that the earth is billions of years old. That is why we know how fast light travels. That is why we know that the Grand Canyon was not a result of a global flood.

L

EDITED by user on 2008-02-12 19:41:23

Hi Lance. Thank you so much for answering my many questions. I have just now read your responses. I have lots and lots of really good excuses for why it's taken me so long to come back to the site and read your response. I could make a whole other forum devoted to my excuses but I doubt that i would have many members sign on. Anyway, I will respond to your response very soon. I may even start tonight.

Amy

I know someone who likes to watch political television all the time. She pays close attention to whichever conservative is on television at the moment. But she presses the mute button whenever a liberal person begins to give a response. It was frustrating to watch those shows with this individual because i could never hear the entire conversation and could never be sure who "won" the argument. I asked her once if she ever wondered what the liberal person was saying in response to the conservative. She said, "We know what they're saying Amy. Lies. Nothing but lies."

I think that's really funny! But i also think it is a good illustration of what you were saying in part of your testimony. When you were in Bible college and you were hearing answers from Christians to Christians regarding Christian beliefs. It sounds like you felt that no one (including yourself at that time) wanted to hear the other arguments that were out there. I can see that. They might have been scared to hear the opposing thoughts—afraid that they might be swayed. Or they might have been like the lady i just mentioned—they might have figured that there was no point in hearing the opposing views because they would be nothing but lies anyway.

I would be extremely warey of going to Barnes and Noble and just picking up a book by whoever to hear what they had to say about why i'm here or about whether or not there's enough evidence to believe in a god. This is why: I know in my heart that Jesus is real. When i went through a terrible (not at all freeing) time of doubt, my doubts would vanish when i read the gospels. My doubts couldn't survive when i read about Jesus. But later in the day they would come pounding back in on me. I say that it wasn't freeing because the only real freedom i've ever experienced has come through Jesus—reading about His life, believing His words, and being amazingly revived by Him in dark times. My doubts were like a prison or like a compelling trap that i couldn't seem to avoid for long even though i knew it was a trap. I also knew that if there was no God—if Jesus had been my wishful thinking or hoping then there was no real meaning in life and no real help either. The funny thing was that when i would be wrestling with these questions i would realize that i was praying about them. In other words i was praying to God about whether He existed or not, sometimes telling Him i was afraid He wasn't there—at other times thanking Him that He was. Anyway, like i said i would be warey to go to a bookstore and read a random persons arguments against God because i don't want to go back to that place. I don't want to doubt Him. It was so dark. I don't want to invite that darkness or those doubts. In this case i'm pretty much okay with "muting" the other opinions. Honesty. I told you i liked it. there are probably a lot of people who could read books and books of arguments against Christianity and they may never be tempted to doubt. But honestly, I don't think i'm one of those people. I am a distrustful person and a questioner. Questions come whether i want them to or not. When i come to a point of crisis i go to Jesus. I really don't want to go anywhere else.

You may wonder why I'm interested in discussing your evolution into atheism since i wouldn't want to read a book about atheism. The reason is—because i know you and have for a long time. And because i believe in Jesus and that He is freedom. And if He is freedom then you're not free and i care about that. I agree with you that discussion like this is unlikely to inspire some sort of paradigm shift in your life or in mine. But i think it's the most important topic that people are capable of discussing or thinking about and that in itself is reason to discuss it. But i think caring about you is the main reason it's worth dicussing. Hope—that's a good reason too.

I'll share thoughts on the hubble telescope next time maybe. I love outer space. It's a big place. Full of questions. Lots of stars. Lots of planets. Fairies? probably not— Still Love It!

Aims

Hubbell—not Hubble. Whoops

YIKES!!! I did not see that you had a new post. I am reading now and will reply.


Thanks Amy!

Amy,

I would not recommend going to a book store and grabbing just any book and expect it to be filled with wisdom for your life. Although Christians do this all day long in "Christian" bookstores. If it is under a particular roof, then it must have life applicable nuggets for me to discover.... What trust.

I will say that there are authors who don't have the luxury of writing about how they personally feel without knowing that a vast, extremely well educated community of peers will be taking their every word, placing it under scrutiny beyond what any Christian author could imagine and allowing their comments to sink or swim based on those hopefully well thought out statements. <- massive run-on/ I know for a fact that if the Jabez book can become a best seller in the Christian circles... anything can have legs and run if it has warn fuzzy thoughts throughout the text. Not a good position to be in.

So my point is this... If you did randomly grab a book about science or evolution at the store of your choice, and it was indeed a best seller, you are far better off knowing that there is something that has stood some level of scrutiny vs. another Rick Warren "feel good" book that can be hammered out in a week and on shelves months later. There is a big difference.

My argument would be that what you feel can easily be duplicated without the gospels. The mind is capable of so much. The placebo effect is proof in that. These results are being felt by million's of believers in the very god's you reject. According to primary Christian theology... your god preaches in the gospels that he loves you with all his heart, enough to die for you. Yet he will allow billions to suffer eternal torment based on their geographical and cultural "luck". Some love. : )


L

EDITED by user on 2008-05-11 20:06:39