So your decision is to roll the dice on your eternal life that there is nothing? Not even science agrees with you. The first law of thermodynamics tells you energy is never destroyed. It can only change forms. We know scientifically that energy leaves the body during death, and we have testimony from Atheists even during Near Death Experiences that there is life beyond death. There are people we know who have passed on, and there is joy and peace there.
Aren't we underestimating God. To paraphrase Edwin Markham:
No. No big trauma or anything like that. I retired, and had time to study for my own entertainment. It took almost a year before I had to concede that most of what I had assumed to be true was just so much bullshit.
I think you should keep doing everything exactly as you are doing it.
As strange as it sounds, it is worth considering--
I look at it realizing not everything in the Bible is about me. Keeps me humble recognizing how little of it does pertain to me personally.
Or, looking like a man of wisdom...because one thing the Bible is firm about is that we are unable to truly know and understand God. Sometimes the reality is that in fact we don't know what we believe.
I spent the first 27 years of my life “knowing” the empty God of Christianity due to family expectations. Then, due to life events I went on an almost three year religious/spiritual search and found the path I now follow. A path based on a personal understanding that The Deity doesn’t give a single fuck about any of us.
Sorry, I tried to buy that line of bullshit for 27 years before I learned better. I can’t even try to pay lip service to that crap anymore. I can’t continue to waste any more time, energy or money investing in the lies of organized religion, especially Christianity.
That's exactly why I don't believe in a god. When I had basic, realistic questions I couldn't find the answer to, and asked people who should be able to answer them all I ever got was " you should pray more" or "you have to believe it all first" and I think this is the first time I have heard I failed some kind of test. I did believe for most of my life, and I did pray ----- a lot, and I don't know what to do about a test that I'm not aware of. If a god exists, and demands I worship him to avoid eternal damnation, he should do something to show he is different from all the other gods that other religions worship. That's not too much to expect.
One of the Commandments says we are not to test God. So if we test God, we already failed. I agree that the pray more and believe is probably not helpful. As I don't know what questions you had that were not able to be answered, I have no opinion on that.
If a god does exist, I'm not sure the one depicted in the Bible, who did all those horrible things is worthy of love. Perhaps fear.
I had the same question. I knew God is love. So why did people in the Old Testament depict Him the way they did? Their experiences of God must have been just as valid as mine. So I went to the Hebrew and rabbinical scholars.
I don’t have a sense of humor. I had it surgically removed at age 4 so my ego could grow to its full size.
