Belief in God/Jesus through Personal experiences.

I can't count how many times I've either heard or read about someone believing in God/Jesus because of their personal experiences. Yet, most of them refuse to elaborate on what exactly those experiences were. I'm pretty sure the reason for such secrecy is because these people don't want to hear the truth about those experiences, how they were perfectly normal, everyday events.

So, I'm asking for those that are unshakable in their beliefs to please give us some details on just what experiences made them a believer. If the truth is so etched in stone for them, then why fear any replies from those that consider themselves of sound and logical minds?

There are some experiences that no one needs to write about, as in:

I had no money to feed my family, and I found a ten dollar bill on the sidewalk. Thank you, Jesus!
Well, I've had a thousand dollars in my wallet and found $40.00 on the sidewalk. So, this God must love me more, eh?

My wife had cancer, so we started praying real hard, and the cancer went away. It's a miracle!
Each year there are millions of Jesus loving/god fearing people that have been praying since before you were born, and they still died of cancer. So, either god isn't in the game of miracles and your wife was cured through medical means, or cured in a way that we just aren't aware of yet, or he hates those millions of people. Which do you think it is?

My car flipped over on the highway. I should have died, but Jesus and god saved me! What else could it have been?"

Ummm, how about seat belts and air bags? And again, why were you saved while millions of others are reduced to mutilated roadkill each year? This god sure hates a lot of people!
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So, if you have personal experiences other than those mentioned above, do tell, DO TELL!

This was the second vision I had in my life, and it was a lif changing vision for me as it confirmed the reality, and the existance of God for me. Again, this was a vision, NOT a dream

I came home from work, I was very tired. For months I had been crying over a great loss, so sorry, for everything I had ever done in my life, and the way I had let my life turn out, so contrary to what my God would want of me. As I sat on the edge of my bed, Suddeny I was sitting on my Lords lap, my head was being pressed into his chest with one hand and he was gently patting me on the back with his other hand and in the most comforting voice I had ever heard in my life he was saying "everything will be OK" instantly every feeling of dispair was gone, every feeling of lonelyness and regrett and ill was gone, everything was ok... he just ketp saying "everything will be ok" in the most loving voice. I tried one time to raise my head to look at him but he held my head in place and would not allow it. his robes were of a white and purple color that I can not describe, there is no color on earth to compare them to and the glow about him was like the sun but whiter than new snow... As quickly as he came to comfort me he was gone and I was sitting on the edge of my bed, but I never got over the feeling of comfort he left with me, and the knowing that there is a GOD!!! and he is waiting for all of us...

take heed to this if you will... there is a God, I have seen his Son.

reply to post by mcamp2011


That would qualify, surely!

I wanted to address the one thing you said about finding the $40 dollars even though you had one thousand. I remember a passage in the bible where it talks about God's blessings and grace. It says something like; His blessings are given to everyone the same, I think of it as something like rain falling on everyone, those blessings come to the rich and the poor alike. I don;t know how that works, but it makes sense for some reason.

reply to post by jiggerj


Absolutely.

Your question is one about how belief in God extends from personal experience, I will answer it this way. I grew up in a home that was marginally religious, even though my parents were "believers". What I experienced was a quiet tugging at my heart outside, apart from my parents. Even after I was married, I still had this quiet tugging and began to look into why it was so. It was at a moment of complete disbelief in Jesus, when I struggled to believe He was real, that tugging kept pulling me. When I finally could not get away from it, I asked Jesus if He were indeed real and my heart changed, then my mind changed.

The experience was personal and for me in a way that I would stop and listen and then accept, apart and separate from my parents teaching. I am proof that a Christian is not born, a Christian is made from the inside out.

No one can say that my parents influence had anything to do with it, I have a brother that is pagan because he felt a different way. But the realness of Jesus is greater than I can explain, He is so much more than a romantic notion or idea. He speaks to me very lovingly, inwardly.

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.
Something miraculous happening would also become twisted to seem like delusions by those unbelievers with so called sound minds.
Some just can't handle my truth.



I do respect your approach to these questions.

Originally posted by jiggerj
I'm pretty sure the reason for such secrecy is because these people don't want to hear the truth about those experiences....

To someone that has had several of these experiences personally, that statement is pretty mind boggling.

Once you experience something like this, there is no doubt, you KNOW what is real.

Someone who THINKS they know the truth is never going to straighten out someone who already KNOWS.

That reason that you are "pretty sure" of is completely out of touch with reality.

Philosophically, all we know of reality are the eye-witness accounts of others and our own experiences. Sure, a bunch of scientists say they saw something in a laboratory and we take it for granted it must be real. Although, those same scientists can't explain how a really great magic trick was performed. Also, they may have all eaten the same moldy rye bread or some secret agent could have tested the latest batch of L.S.D. in their ventilation system. What interests me is the things we know we don't know. We don't know why gravity is so perfectly weak as to allow our universe to exist. We don't know where our own consciousness resides. We don't know how DNA could code for instincts. We don't even know why time runs forward, or even if it exists. To me, belief is too big a word. I FEEL God is real, and I FEEL Jesus is His Son. To believe is to conquer the world.

Originally posted by mcamp2011
This was the second vision I had in my life, and it was a lif changing vision for me as it confirmed the reality, and the existance of God for me. Again, this was a vision, NOT a dream

That is a lovely vision, mcamp. I cannot (will not) even try to take away the specialness you felt, whether it came from your own mind when it was in need, or from god. What I will tell you is that I also had a dream that would have confirmed the existence of god for you. But, again, this was a dream, NOT a vision.

reply to post by jiggerj

After that, you scepticism and doubt reigned supreme..?! How sad.

What's so hard about "love God above all, and, neighbor as self"?

Originally posted by Murgatroid

Originally posted by jiggerj
I'm pretty sure the reason for such secrecy is because these people don't want to hear the truth about those experiences....

To someone that has had several of these experiences personally, that statement is pretty mind boggling.

Once you experience something like this, there is no doubt, you KNOW what is real.

Someone who THINKS they know the truth is never going to straighten out someone who already KNOWS.

That reason that you are "pretty sure" of is completely out of touch with reality.

So says the one that has yet to divulge said experiences.

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
reply to post by jiggerj

 

After that, you scepticism and doubt reigned supreme..?! How sad.

What's so hard about "love God above all, and, neighbor as self"?

Why is it so hard to accept that people dream about a god? I'm sure Muslims dream about Mohamed. Jews about...?...Abraham?

If you have a "vision" about Jesus, and a Muslim has a "vision" about Mohamed, which is truly a vision and which is just a dream?

reply to post by jiggerj

Some dreams are much more vivid than others and are meant to be remembered with perfect clarity.

You missed the whole point, you silly atheist you! (i mean that playfully)

Originally posted by goldspirit
Philosophically, all we know of reality are the eye-witness accounts of others and our own experiences. Sure, a bunch of scientists say they saw something in a laboratory and we take it for granted it must be real. Although, those same scientists can't explain how a really great magic trick was performed. Also, they may have all eaten the same moldy rye bread or some secret agent could have tested the latest batch of L.S.D. in their ventilation system. What interests me is the things we know we don't know. We don't know why gravity is so perfectly weak as to allow our universe to exist. We don't know where our own consciousness resides. We don't know how DNA could code for instincts. We don't even know why time runs forward, or even if it exists. To me, belief is too big a word. I FEEL God is real, and I FEEL Jesus is His Son. To believe is to conquer the world.

Great questions! Wish I could comment on all of them, but I fear I'd be derailing my own thread. I really like the way you say that you FEEL God is real. It implies that if you were presented with in-your-face evidence to the contrary, you would accept it. Not saying that the evidence is there, but that you wouldn't kill people over a FEELING, as some would over a challenged belief.

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
reply to post by jiggerj

 

Some dreams are much more vivid than others and are meant to be remembered with perfect clarity.

You missed the whole point, you silly atheist you! (i mean that playfully)

LOL I understood it as playful.

Great deflection, by the way. You didn't answer on which is a dream and which is a vision. How about a "vision" of the Hindu god Ganesh? If you are Christian, surely you would call it just a dream. Right?

Originally posted by jiggerj
So, if you have personal experiences other than those mentioned above, do tell, DO TELL!

Before I would share my experience with you, I would like to know if what I would say would fall on solid rock and thus not take root, or if the soil is ready for planting.

Tell me my friend, and please consider this very carefully, what kind of experience would leave you with no doubt?

What would you like to see?

reply to post by Nooneimparticular

Don't bother. In my experience the atheist is closed and this one will even admit to have seen proof, and still he's back to being an atheist! It's absurd.

P.S. God even revealed himself to him in a dream, but because God didn't have an elephant head or a Buddha belly, he dismissed it out of hand..!

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
Don't bother. In my experience the atheist is closed and this one will even admit to have seen proof, and still he's back to being an atheist! It's absurd.

You and I have had different experiences with Atheists.

Take the Atheist from YOUR mind and you will see it is nothing more than another Brother with a different point of view.

Originally posted by Nooneimparticular

Originally posted by jiggerj
So, if you have personal experiences other than those mentioned above, do tell, DO TELL!

Before I would share my experience with you, I would like to know if what I would say would fall on solid rock and thus not take root, or if the soil is ready for planting.

Tell me my friend, and please consider this very carefully, what kind of experience would leave you with no doubt?

What would you like to see?

I've presented this list many times. In order to believe beyond doubt I would need to witness events such as these:

1. Amputated arms and/or legs miraculously cured.
2. Two mountains side by side, only one of them is defying gravity (as only a god can produce) and floating thirty feet in the air.
3. God or Jesus appearing in the sky and speaking to everyone on earth.

Experiences that leave nothing BUT doubt:

Long lost rings found.
Someone telling me they've experienced god because the thought of god made them feel good.
A book full of inconsistencies and contradictions.

I could show you these things, but still you would not believe.

Originally posted by jiggerj
1. Amputated arms and/or legs miraculously cured.

Go to a VA hospital and see for yourself.

Originally posted by jiggerj
2. Two mountains side by side, only one of them is defying gravity (as only a god can produce) and floating thirty feet in the air.

You are one mountain and stuck on the ground. I am the other mountain begging you to come up and play with me.

Originally posted by jiggerj
3. God or Jesus appearing in the sky and speaking to everyone on earth.

I am in the clouds with my feet planted firmly on the ground speaking to you, and you still do not believe.

Look up cloud computing.