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Did you see this priceless article on CNN? It’s about a tweet by Kelly Oxford, who wrote,
Cain, Perry, Bachmann all claimed God told them to run for President, and all are out of the race. God is hilarious.
This is what gets me about Christians. It’s not just about the presidential campaign. Stuff like that is heard in churches every Sunday: from “god told me to marry her” to “that’s the school the lord told me to send my children.”
I concluded at the end of my Christian life that most ideas churchgoers claim god gave them lead to decisions that a year later turn into prayer requests.
- They have marital problems with or even divorce the person god told them to marry
- The child is having relationship problems at the school the holy spirit led them to send the kid
- The pastor is having issues at the church god led him to
- That oh-so-prayed-for job is a pain in the … neck
- The god-sent friend turned out to be a bitch
- The perfect prayed over house is full of problems
That baffling dichotomy with few overlaps is something I’m unable to live with. They certainly can come up with excuses for every item on that list. But they’re just excuses.
How is saying that god wanted us to learn something from that situation less than a pitiful excuse than saying, “My husband drinks because his job is too demanding?”
What’s more, folks who never pray for anything obtain the same results from their endeavours. As a non-Christian I, too, misjudge people and situations. And when it goes sour, I don’t have to make excuses for god. Maybe I can explain it to myself, or accept that I was miserably deceived. Then, as most mentally healthy folks do, I turn the lemons into lemonade and learn something from the experience.
In my case, I probably will learn to use more discernment, so I’m not fooled again. I will probably make a mental note or two about character traits or clues that may have hinted the negative result.
But, how do you excuse a so-called know-it-all god for an undesirable outcome? The clear conclusion is that there is no god. Or if there is one, she is too hard to comprehend. I should, therefore, ignore god and base my decisions on my own instincts.
Believing that god said anything to us is a waste of time. It is much more productive to hone our observation skills and our instincts and take control of our own lives.
I often think “God told me to” is shorthand for “what I was going to do anyway.”
The problem is when you really have no idea what to do. Then is when I used to agonize tearfully in prayer asking god what I should do.
So glad I don’t have to do that anymore. Lots of stress I removed from my life.
Great post, Lorena. Along the lines of your post and Ahab‘s comment, at least one recent psychological study has more-or-less proven that the type of God people believe in tends to reflect the type of person that they themselves are. It then follows, naturally, that God telling them to do something is a mere reflection of their own wants and desires. That’s essentially proven by the disastrous consequences seen in some God-elected choices, as you point out.
That’s an awesome comment Wise! I could write a blog post out of it.
But I will just add how dangerous I think that reflection thing is. Oh, my! That must be how religious pedophiles feel absolution. They tell “god,” and they hear a to-them-reasonable justification. Scary!
I have a degree of respect for the Christians I’ve known who say that they’re only sure it’s God speaking to them when “what he says” is something they don’t like, wouldn’t normally do, or whatever – anything they’re confident they wouldn’t think or desire on their own.
Whether they always live that out, I couldn’t say, and there’s a huge amount of room for self-deception about your thoughts and motivations, but at least it shows a degree of integrity and gives others a way of challenging their interpretation within their belief system.
I doubted myself so much that I was only sure it was God if it wasn’t something I liked.
‘It’ ended up being something church elders would like. Or that would benefit someone else. Sometimes ‘it’ was something I wanted to do but didn’t have the courage, and I wish I had followed through with more of those.
Recovering & Prairie
I found that those who do what they don’t want may do so for several reasons:
(1) They’re co-dependent. Rescuing people makes them feel important. Sacrificing for others is the source of their self-esteem.
(2) They believe in the Christian doctrine of self-sacrifice to please god.
(3) They may be showing off how good a Christian they are. Tele-evangelists with a large ego come to mind.
I was a #2.
I was mostly a 2, but I’m sure I was also denying 1 and 3 because they didn’t fit into my idea of what would please God.
I was also number 4- someone who believed not only in self-sacrifice, but self-punishment based on belief in human depravity. God loved to punish us, it was proof of his love. He wouldn’t chastise anyone he didn’t love, right?
I was (5).
Do what seems right, even if it displeases everyone. In other words, I believed in a god who wanted the best for me. In the end, that way of thinking brought me out of the faith. I thought god wouldn’t want me to be as miserable as I was, and that he didn’t want me to hang out with people I didn’t fit in with.
It does not follow that if all the nuts come from the same tree, the tree is God. Christian nuts come, like any other nut, from humanity – perhaps the universal tree of nuttiness? And I fear it’s a GM tree. Let’s remember abusus non tollit usum. To the Christian woman who told Christian Cliff Richard “God said marry me”, his sensible reply was “he didn’t tell me”.
“…the excesses and atrocities of organized religion have no bearing whatsoever on the existence of God, just as the threat of nuclear proliferation has no bearing on the question of whether E = mc2” (Anthony Flew, There is A God, 2008:xxiv).
I beg to disagree. For example, when the millions of poor, disgraced people of the world pray, they don’t pray to the Christian or the Muslim god. They pray to god, period. And he ain’t listening, because he doesn’t exist.
Nobody prays more than the poor of the world, and nobody gets fewer responses to prayer than they do. And if that doesn’t prove that there is no god, I don’t know what else could prove it.
And please, keep Latin to a minimum. Aqui solamente hablamos Español y Inglés.
Hey Lorena, have you seen this? Maybe you had linked to it earlier, but it fits in here quite well.
What a fabulous video!
If I reject god, why do Christians get mad at me?
I just can’t get over how good that video is. It’s so well done rhetorically speaking. I don’t know who made it, but it is quite profound and all around incredibly good.
Hi Lorena,
It is really nice to see your creativity poured out on to this very cool website, I really like your iPad version too. But i could not stop thinking of your hurt/dissapointment that seems to be the base of your blogs and articles. I somewhat could understand where you are coming from.
If I may share my opinion, unfortunately lots of ex Christians or even Christians see more into their fellow Christians instead of CHRIST Himself. To based your faith in the action of how other practice their faith is like letting the blind leading the blind. As the Bible says that all of us is being perfected every time so No one is perfect not Christians nor their leaders/pastors.
For me God works in his amazing ways that I, as human, sometimes cannot understand. He helps me to see thing above and beyond my own understanding. This is why we could feel rich when in poor, strong in weak. He turns my mourning into dancing.
Sacrifice done to please others could lead to dissapointment and even more stress. But if we do things for the golry of God, He will satisfies our needs. Seek Ye first and the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all the things sould be added unto you.
I do not take your website as negative, it helps me to understand my weakneses as Christians. But i do hope that it doesn’t discourgae People to become Christian as I believe that salvation is only thru Jesus Christ.
My apology if I offend you in anyway.
Love, Dion
Awesome
For there to be salvation there would have to be a god. And if there were a god, salvation wouldn’t be necessary, anyway.
The concept of salvation is fashioned after brutal, punishment-based, primitive societies where killing people just because they were foreigners was morally correct.
So, it is my hope that folks will BE DISCOURAGED from becoming Christians, and will be instead encouraged to live by HUMANISTIC principles where the greater good always wins.
Many unbelievers think that to become Christian or believing in God (in general) is illogical and are nonesense. But I could not think of a more logical thinking than to understand that we all, human beings, are so limited and that the only way to achieve our purpose in life is to depends on the One who is able and limitless – God Himself. Yes, there is a point when you just have to believe because our thoguht is limited by our own understanding- that is faith. But i have to disagree that believe in God is a blind belief. He gives us sound mind,strong and loving heart so that we could use all the three not just one to understand His love.
Without GOD humans life is purposeless as there will be no greater cause than to indulge themselves to self fulfilment and sadly many taking it to the extreme. Also without GOD as the ultimate truth, then we have no base of believing in what is right or wrong. Each human being is created the same as the others, and each of them will have his/her own definition of right or wrong. No one has the right to say what the others do is right or wrong. There will be no law, there will be no justice.
Obviously HUMANISTIC principals are human created principals, so every human has the right to add into it? And how do you solve the difference between one human principals to the others?
Without GOD how do you even define greater good? what is goodness? isn’t that just based on majority? – an easy get away…
In contrary the concept of salvation is beautiful, it is based on love and forgiveness. Everyone wants to be loved and forgiven, don’t they? but not everyone realise that the way to love and forgiveness is not easy. When we follow CHRIST we must love and forgive. Does your humanistic principle says the same?, and although it says the same, why? – my point is there is no certainty in following human created principles. As we are, human being, are changing will also their principles.
“Without GOD how do you even define greater good? what is goodness? isn’t that just based on majority? – an easy get away…”
You’re kidding, right? Religion has inflicted more pain and suffering in this world than anything else, yet you come here to say that GOD IS THE MORAL STANDARD?
Come on! The greatest humanitarians in the history of the human race have been those who got rid of the chains of religion to dedicate themselves to the good of others.
HERE AND NOW is what counts. Stop living for “heaven”and live for today, and you will see all the good you can do.
Again, who did inflict pain and suffering? GOD or people who says believe in GOD (I hope you get my point).
Do not get me wrong. I don’t say non believers are bad… there are some good people as you mentioned. And I totally agree with you. At the same time you should also agree with me that there are some greatest humanitarian who believes in GOD.
IF there were only two options: Christians who say they believe in GOD but do not do what they are supposed to do or unbeliever who do good things then I would have chosen the later.
But there is another option; Believe in GOD and do what GOD’s people should do and do good things. What a perfect combination. This is what I had chosen.
Saying that I ask GOD to give me wisdom and strength in doing what HE wants me to do, because I am far from perfect and at times I am afraid that I had become a stumbling block for others instead of blessings.
Michelle Bachman was the most unbelievable candidate. She believes in the biblical marriage fallacy and that the husband is her head. Apparently, he instructed her to become an attorney and study tax law. By her own admission Michelle wasn’t interested in tax law, but she wanted to be “submissive” to her husband. Imagine having someone like that as President.
It would be terrifying to have someone as president who thinks that way … and holds that up as a moral standard for others!
Those Republican women hold such double standards. How can anyone be biblical and be the president of a nation, The United States no less.
There would be millions of men they would be the HEAD of.
It is sad to see many people making decision about their life/believe upon what others are doing.
Do you stop going to school because you see many students turn out worsen off than those who don’t go to school? Many people are called student because they go to some educational institutions. Although they are students many of them do not “study” or do what they are supposed to do.
General public will call anyone who go to church, say read the bible… as christians. Truth to be told there are many people who call themselves Christians who do not do what they are supposed to do. ironically these are the example that are many atheists or humanistic used to defend their arguments to question God’s existence. Also, there are many Christians who undoubtedly do good but none of them are mentioned. – You could see how bias is the argument..?
But above all, if you genuinely want to find out the truth, stop looking at christians and start looking at CHRIST himself.
How can I look at Jesus, Dion? My imagination abilities are poor, and Jesus is a figment of your imagination.
That is a very good question Lorena. Depending on where you are going with the question.
Jesus is in the bible for a start. Read it and hopefully you will know HIM better.
Jesus is also in everywhere Lorena. Some might not be able to see HIM because they refuse to acknowledge and to choose only their own bad examples. To be able to see Jesus one should start from genuine desire to know and not based on our own negative pre-judgemental attitude.
The same way with gravity. We could not see it but we know they exist, or don’t you?
We know gravity exists because anything that we throw up does down (in my simplest explanation).
We can also see Jesus in similar way – thru the work that HE has done in the people who believe in HIM.
There are indeed good Christians out there where you could see Jesus in them. But do not held them responsible for your decision to follow/not to follow Jesus. No one is prefect.
To me Jesus is real. I could see HIM everyday at home at work and wherever I go through HIS work in me and other people around me.
—
Do you stop going to school because you see many students turn out worse off than those who don’t go to school?
So why do you stop being Christian just because you are disappointed that other Christian are not up to your standard?
If I saw a school where the students were consistently worse off than when they went in and the only students I could wish to be like didn’t believe most of what they were taught, then I would stop going to that school.
btw- We can test gravity. It is a theory because it has been rigorously tested. Faith could not be faith if it could be tested and proven consistent. However, faith-related aspects such as prayer have been tested rigorously. There is no evidence to suggest that it works.
Also, since you seem to be reading these comments, I should point out that Lorena knows the bible better than you do. I suggest you read the Q’uran without a prejudgemental attitude. Then you would see that it is the truth and you will know God better.
obviously some people get really emotional about it. I could only testify my experience in GOD and to bring you the good news.
The rest is up to HIM to work on your heart.
If you want to take off your negative pre-judgement, you will also find evidence that prayer works for many others.
Mind you, the right concept is we follow GOD, not GOD follow you. IF you think that we always get what we want from praying to GOD, then you misunderstood. But I know that I always get the best for me by praying to GOD in the name of JESUS.
I have been reading your blog, and lots of other articles and books. I was raised in a baptist household in the “Bible belt” of the midwest…and I am just now brave enough to question all of the things I have believed all my life (I’m 30). I can’t stop thinking about it, any time I have a minute alone (I have 2 small children, so they keep me occupied…) my mind dwells on the questions I am having. I want to believe what I always have. I already knew all the biblical answers and had my life planned out. If I change my beliefs, I have to refigure everything including what to tell my children. I would lose most of my friends and greatly disappoint my family. My husband is loving and supportive (we were both raised in christian households). He listens to my questions and adds his own. I can’t live a lie and I would like to figure out what I actually believe.
Wow! Difficult situation you’ve got in your hands. It’s not easy to figure out what to say to you, because no matter which decision you make, the result will be unpleasant, at least for a while.
If you leave the church, you enumerated perfectly what will happen. On the other hand, if you stay, you will have to live with the agony of pretending.
Anthony Robins (whom I don’t necessary admire) once said that we change our behaviour when doing what we’re doing hurts more than changing.
I believe that you will end up doing what hurts less. I don’t know what that is. Only you do. But I wish you the best on the decision you need to make. As one who has been there, at least I understand what you’re going through.
For what is worth, I’ll tell you how I went about it. I didn’t let out my disbelief for a few years, about 4. I stopped going to church, yes, but I didn’t tell my relatives or Christian friends who didn’t attend the church I was going to at the time.
That bought me time. It helped me come to terms with the huge change I had to make in my life. Now I have reached the point where I don’t care. I could stand at the top of a mountain and scream that I don’t believe. The reactions of the bystanders don’t bother me any more.
I waited until I felt their disagreement wouldn’t bother me.
So, I went about it really slowly, and 6-to-7 years later, I have enormous piece of mind.
I wish you wisdom in deciding what direction your life will take.
Sorry to hear your struggle MDL. I will keep you in my prayer. I disagree with the concept of ‘blind faith’ where you just accept what is told to you. I believe that GOD gives us sound mind, strong and loving heart to use them all.
I just did bible study on the merchant who sells everything in order to buy the best pearls he finds. The only way you know that something is the best is buy being critical, ask questions, express your doubt and find the answer. So do not be afraid to ask questions, but follow up your questions with effort to find the truth. When you come at the other end you can be confident that you have made the right choice.
The same thing with believing in GOD thru Jesus. To me, It is the best because unlike other idols or ideology, it promises you not day without storm nor freeway on your life journey, but his accompany and strength to face those challenges. Looking back, I now understand that those thing that I thought was bad, is actually not bad at all.
True Christian friend will not leave you when you are facing issue with your faith. They should help – after all we are all sinner and our faith goes through ups and downs. At the same time if they do, do not be disappointed – because no one is perfect. But do not let their action cause you your life. Keep praying and ask Wisdom from GOD, HE knows what best for you. You are in the right place, but as it is said sometimes flesh is strong but the spirit is weak, this weakness that sometimes lead us to the wrong path.
My suggestion will be to seek help from people you can trust and to pray hard because HE listens – that’s my experience.
For me personally, if I ever doubt GOD, the questions I ask would be:
- What do I get by leaving GOD
- What do I lose by leaving GOD
- and which of those more matter to me.
I will pray for you that GOD will give you wisdom to be able to hear HIS voice.