I am certain this post will get me some worried comments about my further slide into heresy. So let me say it clearly: “I do believe God exists! I believe there is a God, as revealed to us through nature, our conscience, Jesus, and Scripture.”<\/p>\n
Now, on with my post.<\/p>\n
I was recently having a discussion with a friend of mine who doesn’t believe God exists. He gave me some interesting books to read, which, in the format of a novel, present “god” and “satan” as highly evolved energy-based life forms. He believes there is a “force” out there, but it is not “god.” Instead, there are only\u00a0“aliens” who tweaked the evolutionary process on earth, and have been “playing” with us ever since.<\/p>\n
So he says he doesn’t believe in “god.”<\/p>\n
I asked him\u00a0why he doesn’t believe in “god” but does believe in an advanced species of energy-based life forms.<\/p>\n
He replied, “I just can’t believe in a\u00a0god who kills innocent people, and slaughterers the Canaanites, and sends prophets and preachers who condemn gay people while secretly raping little boys and stealing money. The god we read about in the Bible\u00a0tells us to obey the government no matter what, and pay our taxes so our armies can go steal the oil and wealth of other countries, and imprison innocent people. I don’t believe in a god who\u00a0can create humans to live forever, but then decides to create of place of pain, suffering, and torture for billions of them to live in forever. And then in light of all this, he calls himself ‘good.’ If that is god, he sounds more like the devil.”<\/p>\n
I think he was waiting for me to defend my belief in God. But I\u00a0only looked at him, nodded my head in agreement, and said, “Yes, I don’t believe that<\/em> god exists either.”<\/p>\n I certainly believe in God, but I don’t believe in the god my friend described. I don’t believe that kind of god exists. Also, I don’t believe that the god held forth by most of modern “Christianity” exists either. I certainly believe God exists; but not that<\/em> god.<\/p>\n Which raises the question: Since I am certain that some of my beliefs about God are incorrect and inaccurate,\u00a0does the God\u00a0I believe in\u00a0actually exist?\u00a0How much of our view of God must be correct before we can say we are believing in the God who truly exists? (A similar question could be asked about Jesus. Lots of Christians accuse others of believing in the “wrong Jesus.” Some people believe in Jesus, but their views of Jesus are so warped from the real Jesus, that the Jesus they believe in doesn’t (or didn’t) actually exist. But none of us are 100% accurate in our beliefs about Jesus either, so does that mean we are believing in the wrong Jesus?)<\/p>\n What do you think about all this?\u00a0Are these sorts of questions just a result of the effect of\u00a0Platonic Dualism on our thinking\u00a0(where all we know about God is some sort of dim reflection of reality) mixed with Hindu Brahmanism (where the most we can say about God is what he is not)? Also, what can you say or do to show a person who doesn’t believe in God that there is actually a God worth believing in? How can we show them that the God they don’t believe in is (most likely) not the God of the Bible?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I am certain this post will get me some worried comments about my further slide into heresy. So let me say it clearly: “I do believe God exists! I believe there is a God, as revealed to us through nature, our conscience, Jesus, and Scripture.” Now, on with my post. I was recently having a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[12,19,28],"class_list":{"0":"post-796","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"tag-bible-study","7":"tag-discipleship","8":"tag-theology-general","9":"entry"},"yoast_head":"\n