Why Belief?

I didn't say anything so stupid as that a person wouldn't know who Ronald McDonald was or what pizza is, we're talking about PERSONAL CONVICTIONS AND BELIEFS AND I made an analogy to likes and dislikes as well. I'm sure all of us know which churches are in our neighborhood but that doesn't make any of us Christians.

The question is how, given the logic here, you EVER escaped Chrsitianity considering how much of it is in this culture.

Uh-huh. And if I told you that I was a victim of coulrophobia, the irrational fear of clowns, and that I had lived next to a McDonalds as a child, wouldn't you find it pretty hard to believe if I tried to tell you those two things were unrelated?Never mind, I'll answer for you: "not if you were a Christian." That's right. Faith will balk at absolutely nothing so long as it has the imprint of her religion.

I went to college; an experience that, for most everybody, radically alters their perspective towards the culture in which they find themselves. (Christians are right about one thing - college is bad for faith.)

Yes, it changed mine as a matter of fact, or actually, to be exact, some "liberal progressive" high school teachers and friends changed it. Not that there was a lot to change. I'd been sent to church all my childhood but it wasn't hard to give it up when presented with "intellectuals" who ridiculed it. From that point until my midforties I was a committed atheist, even a somewhat aggressive one.The point is you cannot judge ANY PERSONAL CONVICTION by mere statistics. That's logical idiocy. You have to KNOW WHAT THE PARTICULAR INFLUENCES ON A PERSON WERE.This message has been edited by Faith, 05-11-2005 05:17 PM

No I wouldn't. I'd have to know you better or interview you to find out about what influenced your feelings.

You two should be experienced enough to see when a debate changes to simply bickering. This is a debate forum, not a bicker-fest.If you two are interested in discussing this topic, open a new thread and present arguments. Since both of you both presented your arguments and neither is convinced of the other's position, I don't see the purpose of it. It'll just wind up in another bicker-fest.For here, this argument was tangentially on-topic, but at this point there's no purpose in continuing here.Crash, watch it with the personal attacks: If you think this way, then take it as a sign to stop debating Faith. Either debate the issues without these kinds of comments, or don't debate.Closing down for a bit to "cool off"This message has been edited by AdminBen, Thursday, 2005/05/12 07:38 AM

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The question is, "Why Belief?" This a thread telling personal experiences or a story about what made you come to believe in your current religion.If you find you have questions about somebody's story, ask away.If you want to debate the validity of somebody's story... take it to another thread. This is not the place to be doing that.Questions? Problems? Feeling ill because you just want to scream? Follow the links below people.Added subtitleThis message has been edited by AdminBen, Thursday, 2005/05/12 11:32 AM

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So here's a story for all you truthlovers out there!"I need you to close your eyes and imagine with me. Please do not open them until you imagine the environment of Jamaica-Queens, NY.I was born in Jamaica-Queens, but I moved with my religious parents here to Delaware in the blizzard of '96. I wouldn;t even be here if it weren't for the fact that my mother prayed.
One day in 1988, my mother found out she was pregnant with twins. She already had an older son, who was currently two years old, and she was about 4 months into pregnancy. About this time, there was an african-american man in a white van wo drove around looking for pregnant women, who he the would stab and kill after kidnapping. My mother was walking down 100th Avenue in Queens, and she held her already swelling stomach in her arms. She was attractive (I guess that's how she got my Dad), and she was picked up by a man in a white van who asked for a ride. She accepted, and was locked inside, when he passed her house. SHe prayed with all of her might, and almost instantly the van stopped, and the man commanded her to get out. It turns out that the twins she had were my twin and I. See? prayer really does change things for the better.And in case you were wondering, Yes, this did happen in 1992 and my mother still does see angels! But that's not going to change a thing! "Does that answer your question?

How do you know that the man and the van in your mums story are the man and the van involved in the killings?How do you know that the prayer stopped the van? Tell that to the poor souls whose loved ones jumped from the Twin Towers, or who were taken hostage and killed in Iraq, or who were blown up in Inneskillen. Did their prayers change things for the better?I'm sure there's some excuse though, there always is. These horrific, heartbreaking tragedies are all forgotten when a prayer happens to be part of a coincidence.Prayers are always answered, the answer might not be the one you wanted but they are all answered. Bit poinltess really don't you think since there is no way to prove that a prayer was answered or not?Brian.

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How do you know that the man and the van in your mums story are the man and the van involved in the killings?

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That's a valid question.

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How do you know that the prayer stopped the van?

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If the man and the van WERE involved in the killings then the van's stopping is a VERY good indication that it was answer to prayer.

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See? prayer really does change things for the better.

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Tell that to the poor souls whose loved ones jumped from the Twin Towers, or who were taken hostage and killed in Iraq, or who were blown up in Inneskillen. Did their prayers change things for the better?

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I'm sure there's some excuse though, there always is. These horrific, heartbreaking tragedies are all forgotten when a prayer happens to be part of a coincidence.

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Prayers are always answered, the answer might not be the one you wanted but they are all answered. Bit poinltess really don't you think since there is no way to prove that a prayer was answered or not?

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How do you know any of the above are Specter's point of view? You seem to be going on and on about a preoccupation of your own. And what's wrong with the idea that sometimes God doesn't answer our prayers anyway? There are certainly times that when He does it's pretty dramatic, as in the case of a murderer's stopping the van as he did -- IF indeed he was that known murderer.

I fail to see the connection. The driver could have had a change of heart, the police could be stopping traffic up ahead to interview people, the driver may have had a phone call to go somewhere quickly, there are lots of reasons. The prayer might simply be a coincidence. What specific views are you talking about? Because it makes the entire prayer game redundant. All it does is to convince the believer that when anything at all that they pray for comes to pass, in some way, then hey presto God has answered the prayer. If they do not get what they prayed for then they inoke the 'God has said no' clause. It makes prayer pointless. Or pretty coincidental. It is weird that prayers from believers from all faiths appear to be answered sometime or another. I reckon old Yahweh musn't be a jealous god after all. Even if he wasn't the murderer it is a great accomplishment for a normally useless entity to do.BTW, how would we test to see if it was the lady's prayer that prompted God to stop the van?Brian

Do you think that sometimes the person himself doesn't know or understand the influences that affected them? You say you had "no sense at all" about Christianity and yet: Despite the fact that you state in message 90 that you began "simply believing it's (Bible?) the truth" and you looked at other religions, perhaps the childhood experience with the Christian church influenced your decision to follow Christ. Couldn't that be considered as a possibility?What about Proverbs 22:6--Train a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not turn from it?I'm sure that your church talks about planting seeds that may bear fruit later (in regards to evangelism). Perhaps those seeds were planted in you when you were a young child. You seem to deny that possibility by saying the your late teens and early twenties were devoid of or had a multiplicity of religeous influences.Do you really think that you had no Christian influence in your life before you came to your latest understanding of the truth? None? Your own testamony seems to refute this. Did you even consider that this was an influence on you?Can you see why Shraf and Crash have doubts that there were no influences on Jackel25?

I received Jesus, the Christ as savior and lord about 60 years ago at age 10. It was only a few years thereafter that Israel became a nation again after nearly 2 milleniums. This being a major fulfillment to major Biblical prophecies, both Old and New Testaments, I soon, as a teenager, being mentored by inspirational Biblical teachers and preachers, began an intense indebth study of Biblical prophecy. Fulfilled Biblical prophecy, exceedingly unsurpassed by any other existing literary work of man is what absolutely convinced me of the veracity of the HOLY BIBLE.

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The immeasurable present is forever consuming the eternal future and extending the infinite past. buzsaw

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It was only a few years thereafter that Israel became a nation again after nearly 2 milleniums. This being a major fulfillment to major Biblical prophecies, both Old and New Testaments,

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Hi dearWhat are those prophecies of OT and NT, can you tell me that please?

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"An uninformed person cannot conceptualize the essence of knowledge nor its sublimity. One who fails to conceptualize something, its significance will never become rooted in the heart."