by Caveat 42 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
However, to accept devine intervention one has to be open to the "voice of god" though any and all sources.
Oops, mistated myself. Coincigod's happen all the time for us. The more we recognize them the more readily we can respond. However, believer or non believer, they happen. The higher self knows.
How do you determine which is which? Context?
And so goes the age old question with religion eh? Maybe if god would give everyone experiences who asked and begged of him in a convincing manner like he did in the bible, it could be determined whether it was real or coincidence.....but noooooooooooooo, he ain't like that cuz he likes playin head games......the little rascal! He gives ya just enough to make you wonder, but usually nothing more.
Gumby
I remember once during the course of my employment, one of staff asked a client, "Does God talk to you?" He said, "no." All seemed well until the end when the staff asked again, "Does God talk to you?" I guess it was in his record about something to that effect.
"No, he said, I'm God, why would I be talking to myself."
About my father experiences (prooved) I would say that maybe he is sensitive to some kind of energy that gives him somehow a pre-science (with no controle on it - he didn't ask for it - it even scared him). We could even imagine that actually we are surrounded by others species (why not ... we are maybe not alone and maybe of course we can't see everything) that does effectivly communicate and truly can operate in our world ... BUT WHY a GOD ? maybe other beings or specific spirit or energy ...
My son even thought about the possibilty that some species feed themself with our feelings (good or bad) and that they could be just like us (good or bad) and play game with us (it looks like the bible stuff somehow) then well you can make a book out of it (speculation or true ???) no answer yet !
Very interesting posts. And I agree with Six, those kinds of experience mainly happen in times of depression or distress.
I personally don't think that it ever implies objectively "more than coincidence". Reminds me of the Gospel saying "the stones would shout". When we really need to hear something we would hear it from anything. To me there is not so much cognitive hiatus between "sensing the weather", "listening to one's body" or "hearing the unconscious", as psychoanalysis taught us to do with our "symptoms", "verbal slips" and so forth. It's all a matter of attention (which is quite rare in "healthy" everyday life).
The problem of monotheism is that it requires an intervention of the "universal primary cause" for each bowel movement, as Gumby put it -- which is rationally untenable. I guess the ancients managed the same experiences better with their concepts of "personal gods" or "daimons". The recent resurgence of "guardian angels" in popular beliefs points to the same direction imo.
No, there's no such thingSo speaks another ludite...
Aahh, leave her alone, LittleToe. Reductionist thinking is a spiritual gift that (blush) some of us don't have.
gently feral
LittleToe,
So sometimes they are, sometimes they aren't coincidences/experiences?
How do you determine which is which? Context?
Denomination? (gawd forbid...)
As a practical magician, I believe it doesn't matter. Grab & run with anything that breaks in your favor, and remember that (in the words of the American spiritual,) "There is more love somewhere; I'm gonna find it."
gently feral
As the end of a story too long to be posted here, I will say this:
The night when an elder told me that my first wife had been having an affair with an elder in the congregation, I was in so much pain that I felt that my heart would burst, as if I was going to die.
I desperately prayed to Jehovah to take that pain away. The next morning, that pain was gone.
The next 20 years started on a more promising note, only to result in the same pain.
The last 2 years, without Jehovah, have been the best of my life.
So, has God talked to me?
Yes...and It is telling me to leave It alone.
Brenda,
Coincigods happen all the time for us.
What a wonderful name for it, Brenda! :) Thank you!
gently feral
...well, he showed me the way to leave that crazy religion and must have said "GET OUT"....because I left with such a ferocity....
