Still Struggling

[Shyone]

In retrospect, I think it was reading Hal Lindsey that started me down the road to deconversion.

 

I was intrigued by end time prophecy so I started reading his book (The Late Great Planet Earth) and decided to mark the prophecies in my bible to see how they related to one another and to read them in context. I thought I might get some insight into how the bible was prophetic and even maybe learn to read it and interpret the prophecies for myself!

 

Well, the prophecies were taken out of context, misinterpreted or over interpreted, and unrelated to one another. It was very disappointing, but he's only a writer.

 

But then I looked into the subject of prophecy a little deeper and found the same things for the biblical prophecies.

 

Then the pieces started falling into place:

 

1. Prophecy is fake

2. Prophecy was used to present Jesus as Messiah

3. Jesus believed in prophecy and used it - even making prophetic predictions

 

So that meant that Jesus was duped and hence not the son of god, the bible was not inspired and contained fake information, and Christianity was as "mystical" and wrong as the Oracle at Delphi.

 

20 years later I deconverted. Long story.

[Kris]

Thank you all so much for your replies-- it is always interesting to see how people end up at the same point, but often use different pathways to get there!

 

Overcame Faith, you should take all of your writings and put together a book on the deconversion process- you are a very good writer, probably as a result of your profession-- but it bet that book would be very interesting and heart-felt. I will probably hit you up for strength when I feel myself slipping back-- but I can tell you that I am finding my fear episodes seem to be lasting for shorter and shorter amounts of time. When I find myself entertaining fearful thoughts, such as "What if this ONE thing in the bible actually comes true?", I remind myself of the conversations we have had in this blog, and also all of the things that I have read regarding the inaccuracies of the bible, including prophecy. That really helps!

 

During my deconversion process, I also ran across the preterist teachings, including Gary DeMar's works. He spends enormous amounts of time debunking end-time prophecy as it relates to fundamentalists, and I appreciated a lot of what he had to say. For the most part, I think that the preterists are the closest to interpeting the bible as it was intended-- but they miss the boat, because they don't accept that some of what is written in just plain wrong.

 

For me, it was the following scripture that made me first question the bible:

 

16:27 For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.

16:28 Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.

 

I had never noticed this scripture before, and realized that this was one of the things that Jesus was supposed to have said-- how could he say that people in his time would not taste death before he returned? If you take the verse right before, it is clear that he is talking about his return in judgement-- not the transfiguration, or pentecost as some would assert. I think it is pretty clear that this is a pretty huge failed prophecy-- unless there are some really old people hiding out somewhere!! Anyway, this verse, and then the companion verses in Mark and Luke that state the same thing led me to question the bible and I am still comforted by a review of these verses as validation of it's inaccuracy-- the opposite of how christians look to the bible to verify their belief!!

[Overcame Faith]

Overcame Faith, you should take all of your writings and put together a book on the deconversion process- you are a very good writer, probably as a result of your profession-- but it bet that book would be very interesting and heart-felt. I will probably hit you up for strength when I feel myself slipping back-- but I can tell you that I am finding my fear episodes seem to be lasting for shorter and shorter amounts of time. When I find myself entertaining fearful thoughts, such as "What if this ONE thing in the bible actually comes true?", I remind myself of the conversations we have had in this blog, and also all of the things that I have read regarding the inaccuracies of the bible, including prophecy. That really helps!

 

Law school tends to hurt people's writing ability. That's why law schools now have classes called "legal writing" to convince lawyers to use plain english and dispense with all the unnecessary wherefores, hithertos, etc., designed to make them look super educated but which clog up and convolute the central message of a writing. Wherefore, I quit using such nonsense language, at least hitherto.

 

Who knows, I may bring everything I've written together and if I think it could help someone, I may consider trying to have it published. I think the thing that sets what I did apart from others, is that my only reference was the bible since the bible is the source for the religion.

 

I am so, so glad to hear you say that your fear episodes seem to be lasting for shorter and shorter amounts of time. That's great progress. And no one deserves any credit but you. You are the one brave enough to confront your fears head on and I admire you for it.

 

But if the fear returns, don't let it get you down. Confront it and, if you like, post it here. I and others will gladly comment on it and try to give you our perspective. I don't think anyone can expect to lose their long-held fears overnight. It is a gradual process and you definitely seem to be making substantial progress.

 

I know that your fear is not something that is logical. But the rational, logical arguments can help to reassure your intellectual self which in turn can help you deal with these fears. If someone is scared of the dark, they can turn on the light and look around and see that there is nothing there to harm them. Enough of this and they will soon learn that it is not the dark they need to fear so long as they have taken proper precautions for their safety like locking their doors at night, getting an alarm system, etc. The same applies to you. You are learning (actually have learned) intellectually that these end-time prophecies are not true, and now you are in the process of accepting that the basis of your fear is absent. You will come to accept this in time. Cling to the truth always.

 

During my deconversion process, I also ran across the preterist teachings, including Gary DeMar's works. He spends enormous amounts of time debunking end-time prophecy as it relates to fundamentalists, and I appreciated a lot of what he had to say. For the most part, I think that the preterists are the closest to interpeting the bible as it was intended-- but they miss the boat, because they don't accept that some of what is written in just plain wrong.

 

For me, it was the following scripture that made me first question the bible:

 

16:27 For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.

16:28 Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.

 

I had never noticed this scripture before, and realized that this was one of the things that Jesus was supposed to have said-- how could he say that people in his time would not taste death before he returned? If you take the verse right before, it is clear that he is talking about his return in judgement-- not the transfiguration, or pentecost as some would assert. I think it is pretty clear that this is a pretty huge failed prophecy-- unless there are some really old people hiding out somewhere!! Anyway, this verse, and then the companion verses in Mark and Luke that state the same thing led me to question the bible and I am still comforted by a review of these verses as validation of it's inaccuracy-- the opposite of how christians look to the bible to verify their belief!!

 

Exactly. It is this kind of clear rational and logical thinking that will eventually get you through this. And you do it so well.

[Shyone]

I had never noticed this scripture before, and realized that this was one of the things that Jesus was supposed to have said-- how could he say that people in his time would not taste death before he returned? If you take the verse right before, it is clear that he is talking about his return in judgement-- not the transfiguration, or pentecost as some would assert. I think it is pretty clear that this is a pretty huge failed prophecy-- unless there are some really old people hiding out somewhere!! Anyway, this verse, and then the companion verses in Mark and Luke that state the same thing led me to question the bible and I am still comforted by a review of these verses as validation of it's inaccuracy-- the opposite of how christians look to the bible to verify their belief!!

I know you're really not interested in the apology for this verse, but there is one.

 

They have to redefine death as death of the spirit, and since they "went to heaven", they are not dead spiritually and hence haven't died.

 

However, it fails because it says that "some" of the people standing there would not taste of death. If they were all "saved" then none or the majority should not have died without "tasting of death."

 

Clearly the author meant that some would still be physicially alive, but apologists can twist the shit out of the bible to excuse their faux pas.

[Kris]

I had not heard this arguement before, but find it to be very weak. I always find it interesting that christians want to literally interpet most verses-- but when one comes along that cannot be easily reconciled through the literal interpetation, such as this one-- then they try to say that it really means something else. It is pretty clear to me that Jesus was saying that some of these apostles would not die before he returned. As an arguement to this-- if Jesus really was talking about spiritual death, would this not apply to ALL of the apostles-- so he should have said that NONE of them would taste death. He explicitly states "some" will not taste death, which indicates that some of the apostles might have been expected to pass away prior to his return, but not all-- Also, take this verse with others that indicate Jesus would return in this generation's lifetime-- and the apostles lifetime, and I think that you could easily disregard the "spiritual death" explanation-- WEAK!!

[ilovemybrain]

Hi Kris! May I suggest a book that has really helped me? It's called "Leaving the Fold" by Marlene Winnell (there are 2 books with the same title - I haven't read the other one.) I think this is available in the ex-c bookstore, or available for download on her site - you can google it. She is a psychologist who was a deconvert from evangelical fundamentalism herself, and noticed so much psychological damage from religion in her clients that she saw a need to write a book helping people heal from the religious abuse. She talks about dealing with these crisis episodes of fear, and how to develop your own inner resources to overcome the twisted thinking ingrained in us, and build a good life for yourself. It was one of the first books I read as I deconverted, and it helped me learn to be kind to myself and start enjoying my freedom.

 

I agree with OvercameFaith - you are strong enough to face your fear, deal with it rationally, and ride out the times when fear happens anyway.

 

BTW your posts reminded me how scared spitless I was when I watched The Exorcist at about age 13. It kind of scared me into xianity and kept me from questioning my faith for a long time because I was so afraid to be possessed. I laugh about it now. I feel so much healthier now that I'm not afraid to question, think, reason, and not cut myself off from dissenting information.

 

One more thing - something that helped me too, was to look at a universalist website - sorry I don't remember which one - but they explained in detail why they think the bible doesn't even support the concept of eternal hell. For instance, it isn't even taught in the old testament. The word used a few times in the ot is sheol, which just means grave. It was probably added into xianity later because the concept of the underworld was so prevalent in all the other mideastern relgions of the time of the NT.

 

And, on a final note - your post keeps making me think of Pascal's Wager, ie. "why not believe in xianity just in case hell is real?" but by that logic you'd have to believe in every religion in the world just in case they were real. LOL

 

Keep reading, take some time to look at youtube videos about atheism, etc, and keep posting here!

[Kris]

Hey Ilovemybrain,

 

I love your brain too-- it seems to be a lot like mine! I saw the Exorcist when I was 7 years old-- my mom took me to the drive-in with her. That one did a number on me as well! I worried for years that my bed would start bouncing around with me in it-- scary!! I watched the movie a few years back and still found it to be frightening-- but mostly because I think it is just a very good movie about good and evil-- even though I don't believe in the overall concepts. I also read the book, and found it to be even better.

 

I will take a look at the book you recommended. I am reading a lot of different things right now, and it is helping a whole lot!