Why do you believe?

Searching4somethinglost · Jan 18, 2010

I can wake up and look foward to every morning, knowing that I have already been blessed with life. I can wake up and be prepared for whatever comes up. I can look foward to something beyond this world. In this world I see a sinning world, that rather indulged itself in these temporary worldy pleasures. my belief is based on faith and love.

Moviefan2k4 · Jan 19, 2010

If I answered these questions about more than my faith in Jesus, this post would be insanely long...so I'll stick to the topic at hand for now.

For years, my honest answer was "I don't know". I was raised to simply believe in God because the Bible said He was real. Any efforts to ask questions were shot down, and I was looked at as a heathen for wanting a real reason for my faith.

Then, a few months ago, i got sick of it all. I prayed to God and told Him, "I am so very sick of basing my faith on faith alone. I wish it was enough, but its not. If there's really anything to this, I need something firm to found my faith on." An hour or so later, I found a motivational speaker on YouTube named Frank Turek...and one of his videos was addressing my concerns! Does God work mirackes or what?!

Later, I read the book which Mr. Turek co-authored with Christian apologist Norman Geisler, titled I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist. They went through a great deal of scientific, historical, and moral reasons why the Bible actually makes sense. After that, things started getting a bit easier for me. I still wrestle with a lot of issues, but at least I know that my faith isn't vapor anymore.

See above.

What do you mean by this?

In a word, both.

Well, God saved me from an adulterous relationship and a suicide attempt. I'd think those are two good reasons, for a start.

BlackDove · Jan 19, 2010

Well said man. I'm really glad God showed you that faith was never meant to be blind. Faith is trust, and trust must be earned, and I believe God honors that by providing use tangible (note: tangible) evidence of His existence and therefore involvement in our lives. Feelings do play a part personally, I agree, but He's given us facts, and so we should very much utilize them for our benefit as they were intended.

By "Why do you not believe what you don't," I was basically stating a negative of my original question. Take that book title you mentioned, "I don't have enough faith to be an Atheist." I could never be an Atheist because the evidence for God and Jesus' resurrection is just too overwhelming to deny... hence, why I don't "believe" in Atheism.

Lol perhaps that question was a little redundant. ^_^;

jesus_be4_religion · Jan 19, 2010

There is many ways to show that our religion is the most genuine of all faith. 1. No other bible of any religion has went through as much persecution as ours has and still is on the best sellers list every year, and has changed more lives then any book for good. What does persecution prove? it proves that if their is an ultimate God that is good there must be an ultimate evil foe for sin to exist and since we know there is good and evil,light and dark that should make sense to anyone. Well, if there is an evil that is going against God then you would expect the bible to have some persecution. Gods chosen race Satan has tried to wipe out through kings and people like Hitler and they have tried to wipe out the bible the same way. Satan has also come among God's people and caused divisions so great that the amount of Christian denominations and ones that call themselves Christian is staggering. Yet, we still preach around the world which leads me to. 2 If there is a God there must be a Universal truth. Christians are the only ones to preach around the world that our truth is the only truth and the only God.3. You would expect Gods Children to be able to describe God. We are the only ones who can describe our God in great detail even show landmarks where he stepped on this earth to save us from that ultimate evil.We are the only ones who claim God put his Holy Spirit in our hearts to lead us to the truth.

resurrection33 · Jan 19, 2010

The Lord always is communicating with me. He doesn’t tell me how the football gams are going to come out so I can go bet on them, but he teaches me what I need to know to get through life.

loveschild · Jan 19, 2010

The problem is that lots of people believe in what they have been told by their church, by their parents from generation to generation.
They read the bible and don't see what God wrote. They have imprinted in their minds the false teachings of other people.

Aliciaforjesus · Jan 19, 2010

I believe because He made me believe!

He changed me from the inside out, and I can't even take credit for it,

It happened as He revealed Himself to me,

His goodness has led me to repentance and has set me free!

His Grace has taught me to believe.

For the Lord knows I am but the least of these, and yet He chose me!

I believe because of Him!

Lad · Jan 20, 2010

i believe in God simply cos i want to. I dont feel the need to prove his existence or need proof of His promises etc to believe. I believe in Christ cos i wanna, and I believe he wants me too as well. as the saying goes...

If you want to believe in something, believe in it, even if its wrong, believe in it.

giantone · Jan 20, 2010

I believe because the the world is full of lies and destruction and being a christian is better and smarter than not being one. If I didn't become a christian I would be dead right now i'm certain, so It was a good smart choice. The more I look at things and the song and dance the world and our leaders try to pawn off on us it repells me away and twards what I believe. Why people accept anything without questioning it just because some big wig named person said it i'll never understand.

I have many more reasons, also many things that would convince sceptics like my brother was and now he's a Christian. I have a driver's permit testimony on the testimony discusion room. But that wasn't something that convinced me God was real, I knew that already, It did convince my brother though.

God gave me a choice and a promise, I chose to accept His Word and His promise and reject death and what the world promises, It was an easy choice.

wattie · Jan 20, 2010

Lad said:

i believe in God simply cos i want to. I dont feel the need to prove his existence or need proof of His promises etc to believe. I believe in Christ cos i wanna, and I believe he wants me too as well. as the saying goes...

If you want to believe in something, believe in it, even if its wrong, believe in it.[/quot

Even if it is wrong?

It isn't the believing the matters the most- but the object of the belief!

That is what the op is kind of getting at here.. that why you believe is not just a subjective thing.. but is based on the reality of Jesus as a real being who really died and really rose again.

Faith and belief are not ignorant of evidence and reality, but are supported by it. I have faith that my bike will take me to town.. but that is because the tyres are pumped up, the brakes work and the handle bars are solid. It is faith that is trustworthy.. indeed faith IS trust.

So how can you trust something that doesn't exist or is untrustworthy? That wouldn't be faith.. but blind stupidity.

Anyway, I am sure that you believe in Jesus for good reasons and that belief is edifying to you. But as the op is pointing out.. try to find real evidence behind the belief rather than subjective experience.

Because if Christ is not risen.. we are yet in our sin and all gonners.

Harley_Angel · Jan 20, 2010

BlackDove said:

I believe in Christianity because no matter what I did in life, somehow it always brought me back to Jesus. I remember the day I was baptized and someone asked me how I felt. I smiled and told them that I felt like if I jumped into the air that God would catch me. When I got older, though, I started resenting a lot about christianity. The church I went to wasn't very nurturing, and the lack of love and the worship of money and prejudice and rudeness I saw there made me think all Christians were like that. After a lot of bad things, I started blaming God for everything. Whenever I prayed for help, my situation just got worse and worse. Looking back now, I see God DID help me. It seemed like the worse thing in the world at the time, but if it hadn't happened, I wouldn't be happily married to my husband.

When I went to college, I was NOT living the life of a Godly person...whenever I thought about God or going to Church, I would literally turn my back on the idea. God actually came to me in my thoughts and in my heart, holding His hand out for me to take it, and I refused and threw myself as far into rebellion as I could. I was in hell, it was literal hell. I nearly killed myself because I didn't think there was anything left to live for.

Then I went to church one day, and I nearly cried. It felt like I had come home, and that my Father was there holding onto me, welcoming me back. I THREW myself into His arms. I picked up my Bible, I studied scripture, I challenged my worldly believes, I threw out ideas in my head that I had once tried so hard to justify (sex before marriage being good, homosexualty being okay, etc, etc). And once I did, my entire life turned around. I'm happy, I've stopped having anxiety attacks, i've got a wonderful marriage, a wonderful life, hardly any stress, and I love God so much.

That's my reason for starting to believe again, and yeah, it's mostly feeling based. If you want facts, I've got a few tangible ones for you.

When I was 14, I was dating a guy who I loved so much. I felt him slipping away and I prayed every night fr God to make everything better. EVERYTIME I prayed, me and my bf got in a fight, or I would hear he was cheating on me, or he wouldn't return a phone call, and finally he broke up with me because he'd gotten my friend pregnant. I was devastated and I blamed God for it. He was supposed to help me and instead He broke us up. Well, through my ex-boyfriend's ex-girlfriend, I met my husband. It was God's will that me and the other guy break up so that I could someday meet my husband...all that time I blamed him, and all He was doing was HELPING me.

Another example is that I have the WORSE problem with patience. I can't stand waiting around for stuff, and I REALLY can't stand anything not being in my controlled schedule. I was waiting on my husband to get off work so he could get me some paperwork I needed to get our marriage liscence, and the courthouse was going to be closing soon, he was several hours late, I had no way to get back to my car (parked off base), barely enough gas to get me back to the courthouse anyway, and if we didn't get our marriage liscence that day we wouldn't be able to get married the next day. I was stressed. So I sat down, and I prayed and prayed and prayed. When I turned on the telly, Evan Almighty came on. And it was at the part where Morgan Freeman was saying something about when you pray for patience, does God give it to you, or does he give you the oppurtunity to be patient? I was flabbergasted! Here I was praying for God to make everything work the way I wanted it, and He was giving me a situation to show me that everything was going to work the way HE intended, and all I needed to do was relax and let it happen. I got the courthouse with 15 minutes to spare and we were married the next day

I can't tell you how many times I've prayed about something and a song or a show or something comes on that answers my prayer. Sometimes when I feel really bad or am confused about something, I pray about it, and then close my eyes, and let my Bible open. Nearly every time the page lands to Scripture I can use to help.

God is real, I can feel him, and I have tangible evidence in my life of His existance. It's just like the wind. I can't see it, but I can see how it affects things in the world, I can't grab it, but I can feel it on my skin and through my hair. Same with God. I can't see Him, but I can see how he affects lives, especially mine. I can't touch him, or grab im, or measure Him, but I can feel Him in my heart.

sunshine_debbie · Jan 20, 2010

BlackDove said:

If all you were doing was trying to get a specific answer, why not just post what you wanted to say in the thread rather then having people try to answer and putting down (intellectually of course) everything they said, except the guy who had the answer you wanted all along.

It seems like this is an exercise in futility since you were obviously seeking a specific answer. So why even ask? Was there a point to this exercise or were you just trying to teach us something about belief. Because if you were trying to teach us something, I missed it. Maybe you could post it for the non-intellectual in the thread. Because honestly, I just dont get it, and I feel like you are mocking my belief in God because I dont believe in God for the reasons that you want me to. That is not edification.

Debbie

Graybeard · Jan 20, 2010

charisenexcelcis said:

I believe in what I do because of the convincing weight of scripture. My surest beliefs have the greatest weight of scripture. I believe in the inspiration of scripture. I believe that such inspiration is divine, unique, living, complete, and verbal. I believe in the surety of God's preservation of the word of God. I follow the literal method of interpretation. I believe that the canon was completed in frist century A.D. I believe that not only is scripture the sole guide to the faith and its practice, but also is the judge of all our words, natural and prophetic.

what he said above....and I'll just add one more... because I believe by faith...

charisenexcelcis · Jan 20, 2010

Graybeard said:

Thank you and your add-on is good. I think that it is interesting not only the various answers but the various interpretations of the question.

charisenexcelcis · Jan 20, 2010

Nice post harley. Everytime I see your name I think of Harlequin, Joker's sidekick. Shows that I'm a geek. lol

Thaddaeus · Jan 20, 2010

I believe in God, because of the creation, the earth, plants, animals and yes even people. and know that there has to be a higher power to create all these things. so my faith may be weak, for it takes more faith to say that there is no God and all the things I can see, just evolved on their own. I believe in Jesus because of a mother's love for Mary to watch her Son go through all that Jesus did, the beatings, the 39 lashes, the crown of thorns and then to watch him to be put on the cross and die, and know that all she had to do to save her son was to speak up and say He is not who He says that He is, I can prove it by showing you all who His earthly father is, He is no son of God but rather merely a son of a man. for a mother to let your son die for a lie. no that ain't going to happen. it was real , He was real and He is the God that I believe in, and not only does the Bible say so but a jewish Historian Josephus confirms alot of the 4 gospels. to know that many writers over a large time period confirming thing other writers says. should be enough proof that the Bible is true.

Harley_Angel · Jan 20, 2010

charisenexcelcis said:

I know it's wierd, but when i see your name I think of fire. I think it's because it looks like Char-is-in-extra-celcius to me outta the corner of my eye. lol.

Moviefan2k4 · Jan 20, 2010

Harley_Angel said:

Wow; chemistry gone berserk. =)

All joking aside though, thanks for sharing your testimony Harley. Depending on God isn't easy when the world seems to be falling apart, but it really is worth it in the long run.

BlackDove · Jan 20, 2010

sunshine_debbie said:

There is more than one way to say it, I wasn't looking for merely a specific answer. I happen to think that the resurrection of Christ is the strongest evidence supporting belief in Christ, but surely there are others:

Archeological evidence validating scriptural events and characters
Philosophical evidence (e.g. why would the apostles have given their lives for a lie that would not have benefited them)
Evidence in creation
Fulfilled prophecy

All of these things are things that people can look at: tangible things that show us our faith is not meant to be blind. If I were an atheist exploring Christianity and asking people why they believed, and got answers like "I believe in God because God is awesome!", I would say to myself, "Wow, that's circular reasoning, they must not have any good reasons to believe this, so I don't have a good reason to believe either." So instead of having people here have to fall into that situation and might I say, doing the Gospel a disservice, I think it's healthy to challenge people in a controlled environment where we can mess up and learn from ourselves without any real, detrimental consequence. Which brings me to...

The reasons I presented this topic in such a way is because:

1. I like people to interact with a spoken message more than I like just "talking at them". They usually get more out of it.
2. It's a very rhetorical approach, which I find usually has a powerful impact on getting the point across. When people willingly expose their -to lack of their knowledge- childishly founded object of belief and receive something of a "sting" to themselves when their thought processes are questioned and see other people encouraged for how they answered differently, it usually makes people realize that they need to double check themselves in this area, and usually leads to... spiritual growth!

Not too long ago, I was asked by a brother in Christ, "Explain to me what Christianity is, without using 'Christian-ese' such as 'the blood of Christ' or 'salvation' in of themselves," (the idea was to basically give a text book definition while not deviated from the message of the Gospel; this is so any person you explained it to could understand). Honestly, I couldn't explain it very well with using "Christian-ese"! And you know what happened? It literally shamed and embarrassed me into further study and understanding, thus benefiting me spiritually and ultimately, benefiting the Gospel!

So I'm sorry if you're a little offended or feel pressure being put on yourself or on the integrity of what you feel is valid, but in the most loving way, I'm not all that sorry, because it's what I'm trying to do. Faith was never meant to be blind, and although I am IN NO WAY discrediting personal experience with God, as the Holy Spirit is very, very real and has touched my life in profound ways as well... personal experience simply is not enough, because a Mormon, Jehovah's Witness, Muslim, Jew, or any other person of faith can claim the exact same thing. If we want to make a real impact on this critical generation (just like the generation of the early church!) then we need to go back to the thought process of the early church and set the core of our beliefs on the evidence we have to show the world that we are the exclusive truth and have great reason for believing so, not just because we feel butterflies in our tummies.

BlackDove · Jan 20, 2010

"When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me."

1Cr 13:11

And as my signature says,

"God endowed us with sense and intellect; God endowed us with reason we neglect. And despite the abolition by the current inquisition of any intuition that they don't choose, when it comes to God I find I can't believe that He designed a human being with a mind he's not suppose to use!" - Lyrics from Godspell's 'Tower of Babel'

People call me an intellectual... I don't know if that's really true, as I don't necessarily see myself as one... but if I am, then I wasn't always one. I dropped out of High School, didn't really do much with myself, until I decided to start using my brain a little bit. I'm not the smartest person in the world, and I'm not always right. But if no one challenges themselves on their own opinions or the way they think, or allows others to do so to them, then you certainly will not become any smarter. Ever.

If no one here considers themselves "smart" or "intellectual", then strive for it! God gave you a beautifully wonderful brain, and He meant for you to use it.

Why do you believe?

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