I was raised in a Christian family, with fantastic parents and great siblings. Went to a bible believing church my entire life. When I was 19 years old, I became a "born-again Christian". I lived as a devout Christian and made a big effort to make sure that I "wtnessed" to others as much as possible.
When I was 24, I started to think seriously about getting into the ministry in a professional sense. I was considering aquiring a second bachelor's degree by applying for seminary. However, before taking that big step I started to delve deeper into the bible. I wanted to really "know my stuff", when it came to the bible.
This is the point at which I started questioning things in the bible. This was the first time that I seriously studied the bible in depth. I read verses periodically throughout my life and watched a lot of sermons and read what other preachers and evangelists had written for several years. But, now I was reading the actual text myself, directly from the King James version. I used bible study companions to make sure that what I was reading was accurate, and even using translation guide books that corroborated the bible I was reading all the way back to the Greek translations.
For the first time, I started to see the bible for what it really was. Certain parts that were never taught in Sunday school or from the pulpit when I was growing up in church, were shocking to me. I had relied on what others had taught from the bible instead of reading the actual text myself.
This is what finally "put the nails in the coffin" for me concerning my "faith" and belief in the bible.
I would encourage anyone to actually read the bible, because this will allow you to see it for what it is. It's a bronze-age collection of manuscripts that went through translation after translation, after going through centuries of oral interpretations, generation after generation...
Please feel free to respond for an adult civilized conversation on these topics. (ツ)
When I was 24, I started to think seriously about getting into the ministry in a professional sense. I was considering aquiring a second bachelor's degree by applying for seminary. However, before taking that big step I started to delve deeper into the bible. I wanted to really "know my stuff", when it came to the bible.
This is the point at which I started questioning things in the bible. This was the first time that I seriously studied the bible in depth. I read verses periodically throughout my life and watched a lot of sermons and read what other preachers and evangelists had written for several years. But, now I was reading the actual text myself, directly from the King James version. I used bible study companions to make sure that what I was reading was accurate, and even using translation guide books that corroborated the bible I was reading all the way back to the Greek translations.
For the first time, I started to see the bible for what it really was. Certain parts that were never taught in Sunday school or from the pulpit when I was growing up in church, were shocking to me. I had relied on what others had taught from the bible instead of reading the actual text myself.
This is what finally "put the nails in the coffin" for me concerning my "faith" and belief in the bible.
I would encourage anyone to actually read the bible, because this will allow you to see it for what it is. It's a bronze-age collection of manuscripts that went through translation after translation, after going through centuries of oral interpretations, generation after generation...
Please feel free to respond for an adult civilized conversation on these topics. (ツ)