Life without God

I don't know what to say.1. You will curse at me as usual for contradicting you. (Which never works, because mikey-happiness never ceases. )
2. You will not believe that there is a genuine "faith" rather than this generic false faith you guys infer from the modern pluralism.In all honesty, your asking God to find your keys or wallet, is, to a person born again, for many years, rather child-like. What we would do is to thank God, not for the keys, whether we get them back or not, but for our lives. For our food, during the day, for the gift of life, etcc....this gratitude is lesson 1 at best. It's just that you cut-off the fact that you can feel gratitude towards the One that made you. Why ofcourse you can. If anything perhaps God could have been trying to get your attention.That is to say - a mature and genuine faith in God can be equated to an old wise man, but a person that "de-converts" usually will expound stories like yours that prove to the old man that you never got past the milking stage.That you never got past the stage most of us would consider embryonic, as a whole is not special news.I think that a lifetime of faith is not comparable to the superstitious generic "faith" you are talking about.Unfortunately, when people such as yourself read the Gospels, they don't seem to understand that there is no second-guessing God. In other words, you can now only believe that faith is a generic psychosomatic cognitive dissonance, in short - a mental "trick" people play on themselves. But when I read your posts, and read other superstition-type posts, and responses from similar chaps with similar experiences, the one thing that strikes me the most is that you can only analyze these scenarios intellectually.But the whole point of the New Testament is to show that there is a faith that comes from God, by receiving the Holy Spirit, and through revelation. Not intellect. Now I could be the biggest bore and talk about confirmation-bias, memory bias, post hoc ergo propter hoc and the likes, but these things do not tell use anything about the faith that comes from The Lord Himself.Most believers, we left the superstitious when we left milk and went onto solids. As you learn more, and experience more, then the more you grow and mature until you get to a stage that God has given you so much personal confirmation evidences that you reach a point which is called past the point of no return, where no reasoning or science or argument however persuasive, can remove the reality of a life lived in God. Therefore it does not surprise you when amazing things happen - miracles, etc..cavediver, it is not the miracles or the proof that satisfies me anymore. Christ said that the people were fulfilled not because of the signs they saw but because they ate of the bread and were satisfied.Unless you eat of the bread that came down from heaven, you will not be satisfied.Oh man, today you are here, tomorrow you are gone. We are less than vapour, if we were weighed on the scales we would be altogether less than vapour.When I consider the heavens the works of Your hands, what is man that you are mindful of him?I have ate of the bread. But you spat it out. But I believe that you have not passed the point of no return. You have not reached that stage of arrogant intellectual pride, that you see yourself as omniscient. It's a sorry scale. For at the end of the day - who is Dawkins? Is he not also vapour?Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

You don't get it. You can do all those things for a thousand lifetimes.Maturity does not come via quantity. My parents are as children to me, BECAUSE of what the bible says about the sinful nature. Petty arguments, trying to get others to support their side of things, constant bickering, hysterics.What about personal sin? I can look back down the road and see the changes God has brought about through the conviction of the Holy Spirit.I don't say these things to judge you, or judge what you have done. You have either walked away from a genuine belief, that was immature, or never had any faith, or whatever - I am not going to state things about you I can't know, what I am saying is that your life, the beief you had, or left or didn't have or whatever, does not say anything about a life-changing faith.Have where Jesus says people will do all manner of works, and yet He will say, "I never knew you."I don't judge you. I am just showing you that if you think my faith is a genuine sham because of your life-experience then you are dead wrong.It proves nothing that one can have done all those things and still walk away because that does not negate genuine faith.If you genuinely did know Christ, then you can say that He answered you, because all those in faith know this to be so. We know how, and what He has done for us.But people such as deconverts that I have talked to, most of them do not describe a genuine relationship with God. Most of them will think they had it. Some will do works, and believe they believe. t is usually very obvious, because they will mention that they do things for God, but they are stone-cold, not feeling anything, not truly talking to Him, not truly worshipping Him.I am not trying to comfort myself, I simply know that there is genuine faith. I have been doubtful myself, despite having this faith - it is entirely possible. People have walked away only to return years later.I like you cavediver. I am not attacking you, I hope you will come back to belief. I would be interested as to why you left.

This is an intellectual question, concerning, The Problem Of Evil.This suggests a lack of knowledge about our beliefs concerning the fall of man, a deteriorating world, and a groaning world awaiting redemption?At this time, this is a fallen world we live in, because of what is referred to as the "curse". (I don't know how much you know about this, but basically, bad things happening, etc....are the result of going it alone without God. I agree, that in this world things can "just happen". I do not claim that Jesus came to change this "present sytem of things" (paraphrase).You have to remember Taq, that these are very common questions we get asked, but we ourselves believe that we have sufficient answers to these questions. Answers that don't seem to satisfy atheists, but to ask them again does not mean we don't have answers.Perhaps you could read my blog, as there are some topics that deal with the problem of evil, giving an explanation. HERE (As you can see by the date, I have not just written this.)All the best, mike.Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

The first statement That is not true (necessarily). Unless you have been me, and experienced what I have experienced, and made the decisions I have made then this is a fallacy in that you are conflating two potentially different things. Mike has X, as claimed in the bible.
Cavediver had something he claims was X but is now heavily NOT X and therefore has a natural bias against X therefore cavediver had what mike has.This does not follow because you yourself have no clue as to how mature your belief was or how mature mine is, even if we both have X.And you forget another possibility. That salvation is eternal. Therefore I do not necessarily believe that you don't have X. You could just have a very deep denial of X. Ofcourse, whatever you believe, the truth will be the truth, whether you believe it or not.Believing then not believing or not believing then believing, in itself cannot logically affect X, if X is true.Ultimately, we can both only argue from subjective places.You believe that it is inevitable that what you now consider a "generic false faith", will erode. But that is based upon the premise that it is false.Technically, I admitt that I can't prove my faith is true.I enjoyed our discussion and will let you have the last word. It's okay - you can curse me out if you want, mikey is willing to take it because he loves cavediver.All the best.Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

Exactly. Whereas I have never attended church.A true born-again faith is not the same entity. Not even the same ball park.Nothing was expected of me. I had a kind of agnostic-type Theism in my teens, which I thought was "faith". Sure - I would tick the "I believe" box but it meant nothing.You may not know this, but people who doubt, who never pushed deeper, who went cold and left, that is not a surprise to me. But did you ever genuinely repent, to God - and ask Him to change it? No - you left.I am afraid this is not what has happened to those that did not leave. But that's the thing - if I had wishful thinking I would do as my flesh wanted. I would obey lust, anger, selfishness, etc? ht does the flesh profit? It profits nothing - and if I am honest, I never particularly wanted to live forever, not in this world.Tis quote is begging the question in that you assume the truth of your assertion. You assume that your position is "reality", without proving it.Your atheism isn't "reality", except in your own subjective head.The sky does not proclaim that, "atheism is reality".You said yourself, a fallen world is indistinguishable from a chanceful one. Therefore I accept reality, without accepting the wishful thinking that I can sin and not be judged, and make my own morals, while Joe makes his.Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

Thanks to Taq and cavediver. I hope you will think about what I said. This concludes my participation.(Please don't PM me anyone, as sometimes I do not lurk for long periods of time).All the best.

Well, I don't have religious compulsions. This is the thing, that feeling you have, of awe, or whatever it is, I don't truly get it. Whatever it
is, is not what I have.You have to remember that the religious people of Jesus's day, the Pharisees and Sadducees, etc..they had "religion". Now some of them Christ would say to them; "You are not far from the kingdom of heaven". Even nowadays people are very religious, or have a kind of "head-belief", a kind of generic faith. This is not what I am talking of.This is what is so very hard to convey. You talk of deconversion, but deconversion from what? Nothing anyone has described, has described the reality of the genuine faith-gift of grace which is the real gold. I have been shown some amazing things, but I have that real and genuine gold.Can you remember a time when you walked with God, and had peace and joy, even in difficulty and a deliverance that comes from conviction of sin? Did God ever speak to you, in some way you deemed powerful to you? Were you ever delivered from a situation? Did you ever have any of these things happen to you on any level?If you didn't then you might not have actually been born again. Did you ever repent of your sins, and allow God to deal with those sins in any fashion? Did he, over the years, highlight specific sins He wanted to deal with, did you have a deep conviction of these sins?I ask these things because those who have faith, all of them I know, will all agree that they have had an experience that proves God exists to them on a personal level, and they can all say they have had prayers answered in specific ways, they have been spoken to by God, whether a still small voice, through the bible, etc... without a doubt, that they have been specifically guided, helped or delivered and that they have no doubt at all that He exists.If you can look back and say, "no - God did not answer, did not do anything, did not help me, was not there, I only imagined it was so", then it is highly unlikely that you truly had the faith that comes down from heaven because those of us that do have this faith, it is life-changing.I have known people that were delivered from drugs and alcohol addiction instantaneously. I have heard testimonies of healing from fellow-believers, hundreds of similar stories, and they all describe the same supernatural feeling when they are healed. This is a reality for them, you are not going to explain away how they walked again, to them, or whatever, because they were physically healed in reality, which has nothing to do with fantasy.I am afraid that from what people have said in this thread, I am more and more convinced that they have only ever had a cheap imitation of the genuine article. Now I could be wrong, but very early on I said that you can't second-guess God. He is omniscient - He does know those that will not choose to trust in Him, and if He knew this, would He give them gold? Why would He, foreseeing that they would walk away because of doubt, give them bread? f you want this bread, repent of your sins, truly acknowledge that you fall short of the glory of a Holy God, and as to be born again.Now you can all believe we are deluded, but that's just nothing to me, because I have the gold, and all I can do is laugh at the arguments that come against it. The only way to describe it is like this; I have been given a million pounds, and have been spending that money, and people don't believe me, because they don't see the evidence for themselves.What would you do? Laugh? Scream? You know it but they don't - it's infuriating. It's tantalizing, it's inexplicably impossible to convey with words like I am trying to do in this post without success.It can be frustrating, but ultimately, only I can know that I received the million, and even though I enjoy the million, and buy everything I want, you are telling me to drop this delusion - to burn this "fake" cash and end my mental illness, forget all of the things I have obtained, as they are in my mind.Sorry guys, but my hope and joy and love cannot be destroyed and cannot be taken from me.(Colossians says - "do not let anyone cheat you...with empty philosophy" paraphrase).Well - for me, you are standing in the dark with a small flashlight shouting; "we have the light we have the light!" Meanwhile I am smiling with joy, because I am standing in the sun, and the brightness is completely filling my whole being, and all I can do is smile.--No need for any responses, I am leaving this forum now and won't be lurking again for a long time. --P.S. If it is any consolation, I understand where you are coming from cavediver, and I truly meant it when I say that I like you. I like you a lot, whether you are atheist, or Buddhist, green or blue, gay or alien.Well, that terrible news of the tsunami has come to me now. Bye for now and do sincerely and with hope, so so so hope you will join me in the daylight some day. If I could guarantee it for you, I would give up my own salvation, but I do not have that power.Bye for now.