Not_Now.Soon,

Your parable isn’t relevant to me. I was a Christians for twenty-something years and was actively involved in my church. I assisted with Sunday school, was briefly a Youth Group leader, and would attend the weekly Bible study sessions. I lost my faith because I eventually realised that I couldn’t rationally justify my beliefs.

<<But my experiences are of little value because you don't know me, so how could you trust me.>>

Your experiences mean little to me not because I don’t know you (I believe that you are convinced of everything you say), but because they likely have other rational explanations (going by my experiences, and the reported experiences I’ve heard from others).

<<… I think there's danger in casual discarding other people's experiences (or your own).>>

If there is danger in it, then it is God’s responsibility to provide reliable evidence for his existence, instead of playing silly buggers.

<<Regarding unanswered prayer … Sometimes the answer is simply a "no.">>

Or it could be that God doesn’t exist. If you never consider this possibility, then you will never be able to trust the conclusions you arrive at.

As I said before, though, prayer is useless if God is omniscient, because he already knows what will happen and that can’t change without creating a paradox. It astonishes me how many Christians have never considered this. I never did, either.

<<As for Paul, I'm not sure of how many people would want his life.>>

This is beside the point. Furthermore, the suggestion that God revealing himself in a reliable way would inevitably result in what happened to Paul is absurd. Even if it were an inevitability, though, it sounds like it would be a small price to pay compared to what God is going to do to us if we don’t believe in him.

--

OzSpen,

No, it’s not just my personal opinion. I provided reasoning as to why your argument wasn’t compelling, too. Brushing it off as mere personal opinion, without explaining why my reasoning isn’t sufficient, is fallacious.

AJ Philips, with respect I owe you an apology. No one usually likes to be psychoanalized, expecially by those who are not psychologists when it wasn't asked for. However I have to disagree with you.

<<Your parable isn’t relevant to me. I was a Christians for twenty-something years and was actively involved in my church. I assisted with Sunday school, was briefly a Youth Group leader, and would attend the weekly Bible study sessions. I lost my faith because I eventually realised that I couldn’t rationally justify my beliefs.>>

In your confusion of what you believed (or thought you believed) you tossed them away as a conclusion that they weren't rational. This seems to meet up the closest with that part of the parable as opposed to the other two soils the seed fell on. I hope you can forgive my saying so, but I do not see my point as being wrong.

<<Or it could be that God doesn’t exist. If you never consider this possibility, then you will never be able to trust the conclusions you arrive at.

As I said before, though, prayer is useless if God is omniscient, because he already knows what will happen and that can’t change without creating a paradox. It astonishes me how many Christians have never considered this. I never did, either.>>

You asked earlier about unanswered prayers. My answer was based on that. But if unanswered prayers add to the point that God doesn't exist, then doesn't answered prayers exclaime the point that God exists. In this way I can tell you a foundation of my faith being rational. It's the same rationality as Thomas who is known for his doubting. Jesus is said to have returned again when Thomas was there and then Thomas believed. Likewise my observations are my steadfast proof. Seeing is believing, is part of my foundation because God has answered some of my prayers. The same foundation as doubting Thomas.

What more can I say? Would it matter? I would hope that it would, but it's been my experience on forums that with regard to spiritual experiences, those who doubt them eventually come to simular conclusions. Whether they say it politely like it wasn't my fault, or aggressively to leave a sting, the conclusions are that I am not reliable even to myself. In other words crazy, deranged, and ignorant of my own condition. As said before it's usually never appreciated to be psychoanalized by those who don't know any better and get it wrong anyways.

This is why I gave the recommendation to consider the people you've known instead of someone you don't. That way you can identify how rationel they are or whether they have twisted discernment. I'm sorry to hear you've never met anyone who's had an experience that goes beyond just a feeling they get regarding God.

If you would like, I can tell you some of mine own. Though I'm sure you will say they are mundane. Even the one where I am still alive from prayers. They aren't entertainment pieces, nor impressive feats like growing back a limb. But they have shown me that God listens, responds, and sometimes even answers in a recoginizable way that it is from Him and not another reason.

No need to apologise, Not_Now.Soon.

<<No one usually likes to be psychoanalized …>>

It was nothing, compared to some of the offensive psychoanalysis I’m used to from one notorious regular on OLO. I'm sure you will receive one of his diagnoses eventually, too. Many of us have.

<<In your confusion of what you believed (or thought you believed) you tossed them away as a conclusion that they weren't rational.>>

Kind of. It might not be important, but to clarify, I disregarded them after I realised that I couldn’t rationally justify a belief in a god. I didn’t stop believing after I realised that the experiences had more rational explanations.

<<… if unanswered prayers add to the point that God doesn't exist, then doesn't answered prayers exclaime the point that God exists.>>

Logically, yes. But how can you know that a god did indeed answer the prayer? How did you rule out co-incidence? That’s the problem.

<<It's the same rationality as Thomas who is known for his doubting.>>

There’s a big difference between that which can be more rationally explained by co-incidence (no matter how bizarre), and seeing a person you saw killed rise again.

Have you experienced anything that could be akin to seeing a person, who had been dead for three days, rise again? Even if you had, how could you know that it was the work of a god? Not only are we susceptible to hallucination, but any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. How could you rule out either of these two?

Then there’s also the issue of how bad our memories are, which change over time. Especially if we want to believe that what we saw was miraculous.

<<… I can tell you some of mine own [experiences] … Even the one where I am still alive from prayers.>>

Feel free to go into more detail. No pressure, though. But if you just prayed and got better after being sick, or were rescued in hopeless conditions, then I’m unlikely to find it very compelling.

It might take a day or two (or three). But I'll try to give you a few things I have to offer. They aren't that impressive. But to me they are more then enough. I'll try to explain at least a few.

When I was almost two years old, I had a head injury, was in the hospital, and after doctors worked to save my life I was in a coma. Though I wasn't part of the prayers I am told that family and friends of my parents, and two faith communities had the accident in their prayers. After two weeks I woke up. According to my parents I said something that I would say back then. Because of that they knew I was still the same boy, and was ok. I do take this as an answer to my parents prayers, and I also think God was involved with the doctors when they performed surgery to relieve swelling, as well as any of the other medical needs that happened.

Some time later when I was still young, I was down. And though I can't remember the details of why, I do remember a prayer that God would take my life. Instead I got a different reaction. The feelings I had were overcome by a feeling of love and compassion. In a way it's like the feeling you get when hugged on a really bad day, only exaggerate that feeling. The bible talks about the peace and love from God. I think this was it. Since then while still growing up whenever I felt depressed and prayed for God's help he gave me that kind of love and peacefulness. I know you said earlier that a feeling from God isn't what you'd call as anything, but let me tell you, these feelings are worth noting to a person who held occasional episodes of mild depression. They were not my own feelings because those were already there just getting me down. There are other times and other kinds of feelings I've gotten, for now though keep in mind the kind of answers a that deal on a feeling. Your experiences and others might have more merit then you give them.

(Continued)