Question for Christians (page 4)

upside/down

I knew what my pets were thinking.

"Creeeepy!"- Ace Ventura Pet Detective

u/d (of the thinks like a dog class)

sheshe

Order! Order! Why all the fuss?

Everyone's experiences are REAL to them. Everyone. Let's respect each other's differences. Isn't diversity a beautiful thing? Frankly, I enjoy reading both sides.

Any of you ever hear of a guy named Lee Strobal? He was an atheist and reporter? He set out on a mission to prove there was no God. He wrote a book about his findings. I haven't read his book completely though. It's called, "The Case For Faith"

FYI...Some said Faith was ill? Persoannly, that qualifies as an insult....

tetrapod.sapien

faith,

look up the deffinition of debate. from google:

argument: a discussion in which reasons are advanced for and against some proposition or proposal; "the argument over foreign aid goes on and on"
discuss the pros and cons of an issue

it's a discussion that involves arguments for or against an issue.

if you had preceded your personal experiences with "this is my subjective experience", then they would not have been interpreted as they do appear: positive assertions. and positive assertions require proof. even if the positive assertion is part of an experience, it still must be tempered with evidence. especially on the touchy subjects of god etc. i for one, do not like the idea of lurkers coming here from the WTS, and thinking that positive assertions for the supernatural or god or whatever, go critically unchallenged.

like i said. don't take it personally. read some of the other debate threads on theism, and you will see that the debates get heated around here sometimes. but it's just a bunch of people being raw and honest. i'll take that anyday.

start a support thread, and you will get support.

TS

peacefulpete

What does "discussion" mean to you? Does it involve learning? If so then we must be ready to challenge our current beliefs. If what you want is to be told that your interpretation is the only way to understand your experience then you need to go to a forum that deals exclusively with ESP and moderates away any dissenting voice. I hope that you don't go away as that means the board will be poorer for it and you will be intellectually isolating yourself.

Faith

I don't want to start a thread just to have some bully's come along and debate everyone's post that you don not agree with. No thank you. There are plenty of forums that I can post at without every word being cut and pasted and picked apart and negated. I am not interested in "arguments." If my experiences and thoughts are not acceptable in this forum, fine. My experiences are not valid since they are mine and not yours. I had enough of closed mindedness as a JW. Have fun playing with yourselves.

Peace Out,

Faith

ps you just may be getting what you deserve if self righteous religious people come in here to tell you how to think. You reap what you sow, Karma, cause and effect....

hmike

Some may have the idea that, for Christians, God's direction and leading is always nice and soft and comforting. Not so! The challenges and corrections are sometimes difficult to accept, and can be made more so by our resistance. It can be a hard road because we are imperfect and, in that imperfection, would like to be left alone to live our lives in a way that is comfortable to us. Sometimes, the comfort for us comes just in knowing that God cares enough to point us in the right direction.

Upside/down, I appreciate what you are saying. The bulk of our understanding comes from the Scriptures, and we always have to be careful about claims made--people have started cults and committed murders based on what they claim to have heard God tell them. Still, I think there is such a thing as being directed by God. We need to evaluate things based on whether or not it is consistent with what is revealed in Scripture.

Faith, that's quite a testimony! Understand that many of the members here have come out of an organization that dictated their thinking for the organization's own purpose. They're not going to allow themselves to be sucked in to something again, especially something that sounds much like what they left. My advice is to just present your case, support it as well as you can, and let it stand on it's own merit. I always say, "You never know who's watching, what they are thinking, or what they will remember."

stillconcerned

Toe-

Thanks for taking the time to write what i wouldn't take the time to write...

Ticker-

I'm a lawyer. I am logical by nature, and attached by training and personal preference to empirical evidence.

My experience with communication from/with God has been personal, direct, real, emphatic.... and something i can't 'prove' by the rules of evidence.

That said, God speaks to me regularly. The communication is real, and consists of dialogue, not monologue.

How can i 'prove' it's God? What to say? I know that i know that i know.

How can i 'prove' i love my daughter? I can point to external indicators like care, provision, indications of emotion (tears etc), and words indicating love (from me to her or another), but does that quantify or prove the existance of my love?

Here are some indicators, in my dialogue with God, that are common 'themes', if you will:

He NEVER shames me, but often tells me to look again at my words/behavior.

He seldom speaks something i would come up with on my own.

He OFTEN tells me things I'm not getting, may not even WANT to hear, but need to hear.

He speaks with parental affection.

He understands me in a deep sense, encourages me, and gives me His perspective.

He often initiates the conversation.

He convicts me in a loving, creative way that is tailored to ME.

He has a great sense of humor... :)

Hope this speaks to you-

Kimberlee D. Norris

[email protected]

Faith

That is true Mike. I love reading most of the posts. I really don't enjoy the posts that are purly debate and aurgument. I don't mind someone disagreeing with me if I am making a claim that my interpration of a passage in the Bible is right and thiers is wrong. But I don't feel the need to push my beliefs on someone else. I did that during the glory days where I dutifully performed my door to door service as a child. I'm grown up now and thank God I don't have to knock on anybody's door to tell them the world is going to end in 1975.

I wrongly assumed I could share some of my life and experiences here, but some still feel the need to knock on my door to tell me their perceptions of my life are more valid than my own. This is one door I have the power over to close. I'll keep reading for awhile. I really do care and love others who went through what I did. No child should have had to be raised like that, growing up in the shadow of Armageddon and there was only one way to survive.

I apreciate that one would be afraid, or..not want to trust the world or people in the world or their experiences. I can understand that. If using this forum to vent your fears and cynicism helps you, great. But just do it knowing that you may be hurting someone that may really need a group online somewhere. Someone that needs to be welcomed by a group of people that may understand what they went through.

Doesn't anybody want to be part of the solution rather than just another voice connected to the problem? Why do you feel the need to hurt others? Are you so sure you are correct and all the rest of the world is wrong? Are you so opiniated you can not just listen and offer encouragment? I would do as much for you.

peacefulpete

Are you so opiniated you can not just listen and offer encouragment? I would do as much for you.

No, you wouldn't and haven't. You made comments that bore on a subject, the subject being prayer. When others made comments that bore on the subject as it was being discussed you condemned them as rude bullies. I have made great effort to live up to my call name. LT and I have made exchanges for years, he is not likely to be so easily offended by my somewhat sardonic response to his comment. Take a lesson from such ones. Life will appear a lot less hostile.

Faith

So now you are claiming that I percieve this world as "hostile"

You are making generalized assumtions on how I interact in my world, wow you must be a mind reader. You know quite a bit about me from a few posts. Amazing.

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