Thank You

[TardisThinker]

 

Losing my faith was the most pain I’ve ever been in, and I couldn’t imagine ever being happy and peaceful again without it. 

 

I can relate to that. And for me, that's saying something. But I'm not sorry I went through it, because life is much better without it. 

 

 

I remember being VERY skeptical of ex-Christians’ claims that they were happier without religion. It completely flew in the face of a lifetime of being told that “true joy and happiness comes from god”. I’m very glad to have been proven wrong haha. I feel so much freer and more fully myself these days, I didn’t realize that my religious beliefs were such a weight.  

[josh1975]

Hi thank you so much for sharing.  I walked away from my Christian faith in 2012, after being a Christian for 40+ years.  It was very liberating when I quitted going to church, and all the ministries works - cooking/driving students to fellowship, witnessing to strangers, organizing Bible studies. As if the tons of bricks been lifted off my shoulder. In the past years, I tried to understand why I am where am spiritually.  Best to explain the collapse of my faith is the 3 legged stool.  1. That there is a God, the God in the Bible, 2. That the Bible is the word of God, written by God through man and 3. That God love us as our heavenly father, has our best interest in heart. 

 

Leg 1 and 2 remain strong as ever, but I no longer has leg 3 to stand on anymore.  My personal experiences and that of others made me to conclude all those beautiful promises in the Bible are not what it seem to be. Questions I suppressed in past years just begging for answers.  I never got any satisfactory answers from the Christian community.  Typical responses are " this is a Satan's domain, a fallen world, suffering is good for your character, father knows best ".  None of these make any sense.   I have been searching for forum and ex Christian experiences. Glad I found this web site.

 

 

 

 

[Flutters]

Thank you for sharing such a heartfelt story with us. Welcome! 

It does get better.  

[Flutters]

Josh1975, I understand the struggle you are facing. You are not alone. There are wonderful people here to talk to. People who do so out of a kindness unattached to any rules, rewards or duties.

[josh1975]

Thanks, . It is so heart warning to read your replies.  I remember a year ago, while believing I can still find my way back to God, I tried to join couple Christian forum, just to share while I no long have any energy or motivation to get back into the evangelical wagon (how I can witness to people when I no longer believe in God ?  How can I say Christian life is so wonderful when my life is in such shambles).  I enjoy those forum until one of the senior member of the forum chastised me to get off my self pity and just tough it out.  After that, I just felt I do not belong to those Christian forum anymore.

 

I has been searching for ex-Christian web sites just to feel less freakish about my own decline.  How can a Christian for 40 + years, one who has been hardened by many " blessing of God through fire", turned into someone who think so negatively of God. There are many moments like now (early in the morning when all is so quiet, so peaceful), I do feel the presence of God, yet, I have to say I get so angry at God for the years wasted in sharing the gospel, saving other people, yet my own marriage fell apart.  I felt so guilty by cheating my 2 precious daughter's time by devoting time in Churches, ministries when I should be doting on my kids, to spend time with them. Such a sense of betray by a God who seems to have such an insatiable appetite for  glory - at the expense of the suffering of his children.  Why does God stand by to continue to let the thugs (Satan) to kill, torture and ravage the creation he claimed to love ?  Why God create the nation of Israel (Isaac from Abraham's wife Sarah) yet he also create the nation of Islam from the Abraham's 1st born son Ishmael (by Abe's mistress Hagar). As I understood, the bloody mess we had now of the western world against Islam were originates in this 2 sons that God deliberately create as he said in the old testament that these two sons will be enemy for life.  I used to study the Bible without questioning God's character - all the blood soaked history of the old testaments. Moses used to be my hero and my role model but if he is to be judged by our modern day moral standard, he should be on trial for genocide/ethic cleansing (e.g. Numbers 25:4, Numbers 31:13-18).  Go back to the very beginning when in the Garden of Eden the very reason mankind is cursed.  I always wonder will our parents Adam and Eve be still happily doing God's work if God has not allow Satan to go into his Garden to tempt them.  What parents will not give their children a 2nd chance of he they disobey them ? In the case of Adam and Eve, one mistake of disobedience, they are slammed, shut out of God's family and the generations and generations to come to suffer. Then all these, as we are told, God has foreseen this and that is why Jesus come to save us. Again, all this salvation scheme is with just one goal to demonstrate how incredible kind, merciful, magnificent and wonderful God is. As Pastor Warren's " Purpose driven life" said, it is not about us, it is always about God.  To glorify God is the reason for mankind, for mankind's suffering.  I used to conduct Bible study in the workplace ,chapter by chapter for almost 1/2 year and was so thankful for God's mercy for us to suffer so to give him glory. Now as I look back, it just make me so angry why mess up this logic is. How much glory, how much praise God needs ?

 

I apologize for venting, my pain is that I can not be an atheist as some of the testimonials I read. I still firmly believe in the God of the Bible, what I observe in nature, looking at mirror, my own hands, there has to be a creator.  I firmly believe in the Bible. But for the God I used to think who loves me, who welcome me as his son, I can no longer see him as such.  I desperately want to go back to him. But I can not find the path back to the God I used to love and trust.

 

I love the book of Psalm, the psalmist ( I think King David wrote most of this, a person whose character I can identify with) so eloquently express his pain and confession and beg God to save him from his sins . I printed out my favorite scriptures and put that on my desk.  Psalm 40:1-3 " I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear the Lord and put their trust in him."

 

How much I wish I can go back to be that little child who can still trust God and never question God's authority, just believe whatever he said. But I can not go back anymore. I just can not resolve all these questions about his character, and things just do not add on.  It is agonizing to be in such limbo - free yet not entirely free from Christianity.  I am not a Christian (if that is defined as a follower of Christ) yet I still believe He is God.  So I am going a bit crazy here.

 

  Now it is 4am, still up. A high school friend just emailed me pics when we were young that was 40+ years go.  Really make you want to cry when realizing at how fast time has slipped by.  Wish I can turn back the clock and live my life again.

[LifeCycle]

Josh, PM incoming.

[TardisThinker]

It sounds like the bible still has a hold on you; I think I know that feeling. It can be really difficult to break free from that way of thinking. I don’t know how similar our backgrounds in Christianity are, but for me I was deeply entrenched. I’d gone to a progressive church all my life, and learned about how Christianity makes sense from intelligent people (my dad, for example, is a theoretical astrophysicist and devout christian). I took christian apologetic classes at my church and school. I think my background made it harder to search for clarity because most of the basic secular arguments didn’t really work on me; my history ensured that I was armed with rationalizations.  

 

If you’re interested, one resource that helped me was the channel by TMM (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQb22imbIqKKWOC98C8Rm2A). To me it seems like most of his videos go more into depth, which was what I needed (specifically his playlist of refutation videos). Another resource that helped me was ‘An Atheist Reads The Case for Christ’ (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8B722E1FA8681B70). You’re probably familiar with that book, and this collection of videos is a very thorough answer. There are 16 videos, and they’re all like half an hour long, so it took a while, but again that’s what I needed at the time.

 

I hope I'm not out of line. I’m not trying to change your mind, I was just thinking that it’s possible to believe in a god without believing in the bible (or like those people who identify as spiritual and view all the world’s religious texts as containing nuggets of truth), and it sounds like the Christianity angle is a source of anxiety for you.  

[josh1975]

So refreshing and comforting to be able to share and (received replies) from people who "been there and done that ". Thank you, Tardisthinker for the web links. I will read up so we can discuss later on. I have been reading testimonies of people who left Christ.  Here is a very good link for some testimonies that I resonate with. I feel like I was the person in the testimonies. These testimonies are long, thoughtfully and meticulously written by people who document their spiritual journey. Several stories in particular I appreciate are written by Kendall Hobbs, Ken Daniels and Amanda Avellone.  http://infidels.org/library/modern/testimonials/

 

Try as hard as I may, I think I will be forever be tormented in this limbo state.  Like a three legged stool example I use to share with friends why I fall off the wagon. Leg 1 - Believe in existence of the Biblical God, leg 2 - believe in the authenticity of the Bible as the word of God and Leg 3 - that God is a loving, just and caring God.  Leg 1 and leg 2 are as strong as forever.  But leg 3 is totally busted. Based on my personal experiences of the past 40 years of Christian journey and that of mankind have to endure, the only attributes I can describe this "loving heaven father " is sadistic, unfair, narcissistic,  favoritism (why Israel is apple in his eye, yet everyone else are dogs eating the bread crumbs),  egotistical, insatiable appetite for glory (at the expense of the suffering of his children. 

 

I accepted Christ in 1975 when I started college. I still remember the encounter as clearly as yesterday. I was minding my own business, studying the class notes in the lounge. A student approached me and drew on the paper what he called the bridge illustration. Persistence seems the trademark of this evangelical campus group.  I attended Friday fellowship and later recited the sinner's prayer and became a Christian, pretty high pressure " do-not-worry-you-do-not-understand, just received him and you will be a new creation in Christ".  The discipleship training began: memorizing the  scriptures, quiet time, fellowship and how much I resent the cold turkey witnessing to total strangers to add up the body counts, and to pretend to be zealous for the Lord when you were loaded with school work.  For a few occasions, I do feel the high of being "spiritual", how intoxicating are the praise hymns (even now I still find myself singing my favorites from time to time: seek ye first, be thou my vision, as the deer pants, Mary do you know). I still have that little plastic index box full of 3 X 5 cards of scriptures I categorized and memorized. In my fit of rage, I trashed the years of collection of spiritual books, tapes (good bye Ken Ham of your Answers in Genesis, or pastors xyz of your sermons, or the Bible CD).  It was so liberating to throw away those reminder of my 40 years worth of faith. This index box, and a book by Joni Eareckson who was paralyzed yet became a evangelist by sharing her suffering as God's great plan for us. In her introduction page, she quoted II Corinthians 4:8-12 " we are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed, we are perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not forsaken, struck down, but not destroyed - always carry about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body".  This one passage had sustained me in many very dark times in my life, even at this very moment I still feel its power in me. That is why I am suffering because I am free by walking away from God yet still enslaved by all these deeply ingrained, for lack of better word " programming ".  I am still a Bible quoting freak even though I am so angry with God the way he does things.

 

What now ?  Since 2012, I stop going to church, stop fellowship, have nothing to do with Christians ( except a few open minded, non-judgmental one). Just try my best to live a good life by being friendly and kind to others, build up practical skills to help people in needs. My remaining little flame for God will either be extinguished by itself or somehow God will connect the dots for me to see his wonderful plan. I do hope that one day I will share with you, God is great. But for now, I do not want to have anything to do with him.

[dangitbobby83]

Josh, indoctrination is one of the most powerful mental "spells" that can be almost impossible to destroy. The longer the indoctrination, the more difficult it is to be rid of.

 

I'll comment on a few of things you've said to hopefully give you some perspective.

 

 

You've mentioned seeing a creator in yourself, the world around you, the universe, etc. As you know, this is a typical apologetics argument, but it is a very weak defense of the christian faith. Why? Lots of reasons, but let's focus on the most obvious:

 

A creator is possible, sure. But that doesn't mean that creator is the god of the bible. It is entirely possible that this creator is unable to be known by us humans. It's possible this creator is a programmer in a higher "universe". It's possible this creator is actually Vishnu of the Hindu faith. Or that it's simply a "force" like in star wars.

 

The thing is - you have to make a HUGE logical jump to go from some deistic creator to YWHW of the bible. Mankind as a whole has worshiped tens of thousands (or more) gods in our time on this planet. Why does it have to be YHWH/Jesus?

 

In fact, based on the actual evidence, the creation story of the bible appears to be pure myth. Even if it's "true" - it has to only be true in the broadest of strokes, with almost every word allegory of some kind. But that's being exceptionally generous. And, without the "sin" of Adam and Eve, then there is no point of Jesus coming to die for us. The creation story sets everything into motion and without it, then God is guilty of our sin, by evolutionary design alone.

 

So to prove that YWHW is the creator, you must:

 

1. Provide ample evidence that a creator exists. You say that creation is the evidence - but the only real evidence is that creation exists. It does not tell the story of how we got here. It is entirely possible there is a natural explanation and most apologists skip this explanation and hand wave it away.

 

2. After you've provided ample evidence that the world was, in fact, created, you must then provide evidence that the creation story in Genesis is the truth. As stated above, this is practically impossible to do.

 

3. After you've provided evidence that genesis is true, you then must provide evidence that the rest of the bible is true. Just because a single few chapters in genesis is true doesn't mean the rest of is.

 

4. Wrapped up in 3 is needing evidence that Jesus was real, Jesus was the son of god, Jesus actually said the things he did, Jesus actually did the things the bible claimed, and finally evidence that the soul and holy spirit is real.

 

You already have evidence against #4 - my last point - the Holy Spirit.

 

How can the holy spirit be real? Look at how many True Christian™ sects there are! I think somewhere near 40,000 different churches, denominations, fringe groups, fundies, liberals, and everything in between. Funny that all of these True Christian™ sects make their version of Jesus the Real Jesus™. 

 

If the holy spirit is real, how could he have failed so miserably in unifying the church? In fact, Jesus himself prayed for complete unity and this prayer FAILED! 

20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

- John 17:20-23

 

Complete unity - the world will know you sent me - because my followers will be in complete unity. 

 

Read that again. And again. And again and again and again. Ponder it. Ponder the 40,000 christian sects. Ponder why christians persecute each other. Why they have, time and again, killed each other, tortured each other, maimed each other and proclaimed each other followers of satan. 

 

Ponder that prayer. Jesus is god, right? How could his prayer fail so miserably? His prayer states: This is PROOF you, YWHW have sent me - my followers will be in complete unity!

 

And how sadly that has failed. His believers aren't even close in unity. A church splits practically everyday because they can't decide on the right color of the carpet and this is supposed to be evidence that god sent Jesus. Yup.

 

Hopefully this will help you consider the problems of christianity and will help you break free of the chains indoctrination has on you. We at ex-c are here for you friend.

[hockeyfan70]

I can tell I'm not fully deconverted, because every time I see the title of this thread, I think of that stupid Ray Boltz song "Thank you for giving to the Lord..."

[LifeCycle]

I can tell I'm not fully deconverted, because every time I see the title of this thread, I think of that stupid Ray Boltz song "Thank you for giving to the Lord..."

For I am the LIFE, that was chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanged!!!

[hockeyfan70]

That man had quite the glorious mullet.

[hockeyfan70]

The first time I heard that song, I was interning at a large church in Arizona. There was a guy who did a dramatic reenactment of that song and his other hit, "Watch The Lamb." Even creepy back then.

[josh1975]

Hi Dangitbobby,

 

that is a very good one about the Holy Spirit in Jesus's prayer on unity... further more, Jesus also said that " after he was gone, he will send the Holy Spirit as our teacher to enlighten us, to lead us to the truth (John 16:12-16). And as you put it so well, the Christian faith has so many denomination. Quite chaotic. If every believer, as I was told, the moment he/she accept Christ, the HS will enter the person.  So shouldn't the entire C community be united in perfect harmony ?

 

I think this forum should have a collective project to organize all these great Q & A and develop a comprehensive  ex-C apologetics handbook. 

[dangitbobby83]

Hi Dangitbobby,

 

that is a very good one about the Holy Spirit in Jesus's prayer on unity... further more, Jesus also said that " after he was gone, he will send the Holy Spirit as our teacher to enlighten us, to lead us to the truth (John 16:12-16). And as you put it so well, the Christian faith has so many denomination. Quite chaotic. If every believer, as I was told, the moment he/she accept Christ, the HS will enter the person.  So shouldn't the entire C community be united in perfect harmony ?

 

I think this forum should have a collective project to organize all these great Q & A and develop a comprehensive  ex-C apologetics handbook. 

 

That's a great suggestion! It might already exist, I've just not seen it or really searched for it, but maybe the powers that be here will consider it if not.

[josh1975]

dangitbobby,

 

I think the ex-c community will really benefit from this. Kind of like counter part to " Evidence that demands a verdict " by Josh McDowell.   So in a way, we collect evidence, argument and all these contradictory scriptures references to organize into an ex-c handbook.

 

Mcdwell's book really had a big positive impact in my early c life.  Some of the statistical claim is somewhat outlandish as I recall.  McDowell was saying the chance of all the OT prophecies to line up as is, is like finding the right coin in an area the size of Texas piled with many feet of coins.

[LifeCycle]

That man had quite the glorious mullet.

And closet man addiction (not that there's anything wrong with that).