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Old 08-05-2011, 04:38 AM
 
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
24,606 posts, read 55,846,883 times
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It's the one thing that is preventing me from having true faith. I haven't had that feeling of truly believing in the promises of the Lord since I was about 15, when the strength of what I was taught as a child drowned out my scientific instincts. Now that strong faith is growing dimmer, I can't seem to recover it because at times the Bible has a disconnect from physical reality. I am trying SO HARD to reconcile it but I feel things slipping away .

It's the fact that the Bible so obviously has no clue about how the Universe actually is. When Jesus talks about the falling stars I hope he's talking about meteorites. The bit about returning in a generation also sounds like one literal generation to me. The explanations some would have offered would be of help if the Apostles themselves seemed not to have expected the imminence of the Second Coming. Again, not trying to play Devil's Advocate but making my burden/yoke lighter, I guess. What frustrates me is I seem so alone! Many who have problems with their faith seem to do so on moral grounds; while that is a small factor in my case, things like Noah's Ark and describing the Universe in limited Hebrew fashion present far greater a challenge to my faith, and I'm struggling to overcome them! People might say you must believe because it's God's word, well I've forced myself and I can't (believe in certain parts), tried humbling myself, but a global worldwide flood is so fantastic! Again I hope I don't weaken anyone else's faith! Then people say, 'you don't have to believe in all of it' but then I'm walking around with a weak faith because I can't trust the Bible 100%!

I don't want to lose my faith but I need help. I pray about it, and hope like heck that God will answer and show me a truer revelation! Why is a believable truth so elusive???

I feel so alone. Most people don't seem to have the same troubles as me. I nearly died recently and was in such despair that the end of everything was upon me. I get so scared there is nothingness for eternity. People don't realise that the end of their lives would be the end of the universe if there is no God and Heaven and yet they seem so cool about it! Sometimes I am too but sometimes I'm not. I know I won't be around to care, so to speak, but I wish there was something more...more Life!

Typing this is making me panicky again...sorry if this is the same old stuff I've rehashed but I'm getting desperate here. Perhaps I'm rather selfish for trying to use this as therapy and tiring y'all again. I know I'll get the same answers, which are good answers, but I don't know, I feel so despair.
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Old 08-05-2011, 07:01 AM
 
Location: Ontario, Canada
2,705 posts, read 3,110,094 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20 View Post
It's the one thing that is preventing me from having true faith. I haven't had that feeling of truly believing in the promises of the Lord since I was about 15, when the strength of what I was taught as a child drowned out my scientific instincts.
Don't worry about Bible cosmology too much, as it is not vital to the Christian faith. I think it's important to keep that scientific curiosity alive! We have this insatiable curiosity because that's we were built that way! IMO, the pursuit of scientific knowledge is one way to know God-- by studying the natural world. I myself have an inquiring mind and am curious about scientific things. (eg. Does a wormhole connect different areas of time as well as different areas of space?)

Quote:
Now that strong faith is growing dimmer, I can't seem to recover it because at times the Bible has a disconnect from physical reality. I am trying SO HARD to reconcile it but I feel things slipping away .
If you insist on biblical literalism, Christian faith may prove too difficult to sustain in light of what science has allowed you to understand and know.

Quote:
It's the fact that the Bible so obviously has no clue about how the Universe actually is.
Don't be so sure! Just because the Bible describes things in language that is poetic and metaphorical rather than precise and scientific does not mean it is clueless about how the Universe actually is.

Quote:
When Jesus talks about the falling stars I hope he's talking about meteorites.
I think the phrase "falling star" actually does refers to a meteorite or comet approaching the earth's atmosphere, but this should not be a deal-breaker. If your faith requires the excistence of meteorites, I'd say your focus is not where it should be.

Quote:
The bit about returning in a generation also sounds like one literal generation to me. The explanations some would have offered would be of help if the Apostles themselves seemed not to have expected the imminence of the Second Coming. Again, not trying to play Devil's Advocate but making my burden/yoke lighter, I guess. What frustrates me is I seem so alone! Many who have problems with their faith seem to do so on moral grounds; while that is a small factor in my case, things like Noah's Ark and describing the Universe in limited Hebrew fashion present far greater a challenge to my faith, and I'm struggling to overcome them! People might say you must believe because it's God's word, well I've forced myself and I can't (believe in certain parts), tried humbling myself, but a global worldwide flood is so fantastic! Again I hope I don't weaken anyone else's faith! Then people say, 'you don't have to believe in all of it' but then I'm walking around with a weak faith because I can't trust the Bible 100%!
Personally, I am not sure how much of the Noah's Ark story is historical. I am not sure how much of it is metaphor. It's obviously a story of profound significance. You have to understand that the Bible is a collection of seperate works that were written in different literary styles-- poetry, history, allegory, etc. My advice is let whatever seems mysterious remain that way, ie. do not try to force everything in Scripture to be literal or metaphorical. Instead, think about the significance of these stories, about what messages they contain and why they are included as part of the canon.

Quote:
I don't want to lose my faith but I need help. I pray about it, and hope like heck that God will answer and show me a truer revelation! Why is a believable truth so elusive???
If you let Him, the Holy Spirit will work with you to give you personal insight.

Quote:
I feel so alone. Most people don't seem to have the same troubles as me. I nearly died recently and was in such despair that the end of everything was upon me. I get so scared there is nothingness for eternity. People don't realise that the end of their lives would be the end of the universe if there is no God and Heaven and yet they seem so cool about it! Sometimes I am too but sometimes I'm not. I know I won't be around to care, so to speak, but I wish there was something more...more Life!

Typing this is making me panicky again...sorry if this is the same old stuff I've rehashed but I'm getting desperate here. Perhaps I'm rather selfish for trying to use this as therapy and tiring y'all again. I know I'll get the same answers, which are good answers, but I don't know, I feel so despair.
I'm sorry that you feel despair. I've given you my best advice. I hope you find some peace, either within the Christian faith or outside it.

Good luck!
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Old 08-05-2011, 07:14 AM
 
Location: USA
17,156 posts, read 11,329,675 times
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Quote:
Then people say, 'you don't have to believe in all of it' but then I'm walking around with a weak faith because I can't trust the Bible 100%!
I can really only commiserate with you because I certainly can't say anything to convince you that the bible can be trusted to be 100% true on any level. I was raised with the idea drilled into my head that one must accept the bible to be inerrant and literally true or else it was worthless (in other words, without the bible, one couldn't have faith that there really was a god). So, when I found out it wasn't inerrant and literally true, it's no surpirse that I did find it of no use, and completely lost faith.

Since then, talking with people here who aren't shackled to a literalist and/or fundamentalist view of the bible has helped. I think now that when one puts such great emphasis on believing that a book written by men is the foundation of faith, it is easier than having faith in GOD. Being human, we want something TANGIBLE to hold onto ... something we can touch and see and something that tells us exactly what we are supposed to believe in black and white (both literally & metaphorically).

Of course, what we conveniently forget is that even if we accept the bible "100%", it still leaves us to figure out how to interpret it. And the thousands of different Christian denominations and what some people call Christian "cults", not to mention the various personal interpretations each of us have, that all rely on the bible in order to have "100% truth" should give one pause in thinking that just because we have a book we really know what it's telling us.

For me, then, it came down to finding a way to let go of the need for something tangible to hang my hopes on, and instead learning to trust something that isn't tangible: God/Love. It's still a work in progress, but the more I'm able to do that, ironically, the more I find the bible once again worthwhile. I see it in a very different way than I once did, of course. I don't expect scientific or historical accuracy, but instead seek the spiritual significance only. I also read it with the understanding that it was written by fallible men, with a more limited understanding of the universe than we have now. They also wrote it with an understanding of God that was shaped by their culture and the time they lived in and those things need to be taken into account.

As I've said to you elsewhere, there is one core truth I continue to trust and rely on now, rather than putting my faith in a book, and that is that God is LOVE. That's a much firmer rock to stand on, even if it leaves me also having to accept more ambiguity in my understanding of the extraneous things about God and about the future.
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Old 08-05-2011, 09:16 AM
 
Location: Sierra Nevada Land, CA
9,455 posts, read 12,488,301 times
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The cosmology of the Bible is simple: God created the universe. Genesis 1 is about that. Remeber this: the creation story was written for the Hebrew mindset.

We (westerners) are of the Greek mindset. By Greek I mean we follow the Greek way of thinking and looking at the world. We want precise answers, facts, figures order of occurrence and dates, etc.

The Hebrew mindset is primarily interested in concepts, with facts and figures being secondary. What mattered to the Hebrews is that God created the Universe. The order and time of the events were not important to the Hebrew mind.

As I see it you run into problems applying Greek thinking to a Hebrew document. That is why the creation story does not make sense to the scientific mind.

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Old 08-05-2011, 03:10 PM
 
9,672 posts, read 9,952,113 times
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Cosmology of the realm of God is no big thing if you know Jesus and reject the legalities of the logic of the mind that can see or not see ....... Seen a demon in the spectrum through my eyes this morning as I went my business getting ready to go to work and the demon flipped up and left very fast, looked like a black rag flip up and disappeared, ... then Jesus spirit said ` that`s demons`..... Seeing things that are spirit but in the flesh realm are there.... No big deal as Jesus spirit is there and the fortitude of the Lord will protect and gives hope in a corrupt world ....... Jesus said we can study the science facts of the world and through men who reject the Lord and His truth and Jesus will honor our will , but Jesus has in His hand a supernatural science and waits for us to go to Him and try to learn the wisdom of all the ages were all blessing come from Heaven ..... Jesus supernatural science is world changing and if believer can get together and believe the knowledge of the Lord , whole nations and peoples can be free to come to Christ and be free of darkness in the world , were land can be healed and set free ..... See Jesus is not the damner in the world but the one who will bring life ...... Be Blessed In Christ......
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Old 08-05-2011, 04:00 PM
 
Location: The Lakes Region
3,074 posts, read 4,712,147 times
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The reference listed below provides an excellent cosmology treatise of "The Fifth Epochal Revelation."

http://beamsdoorway.bizland.com/urantia/science.htm
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Old 08-05-2011, 04:58 PM
 
Location: City-Data Forum
7,943 posts, read 6,038,272 times
Reputation: 1359
Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20 View Post
It's the one thing that is preventing me from having true faith. I haven't had that feeling of truly believing in the promises of the Lord since I was about 15, when the strength of what I was taught as a child drowned out my scientific instincts. Now that strong faith is growing dimmer, I can't seem to recover it because at times the Bible has a disconnect from physical reality. I am trying SO HARD to reconcile it but I feel things slipping away .

It's the fact that the Bible so obviously has no clue about how the Universe actually is. When Jesus talks about the falling stars I hope he's talking about meteorites. The bit about returning in a generation also sounds like one literal generation to me. The explanations some would have offered would be of help if the Apostles themselves seemed not to have expected the imminence of the Second Coming. Again, not trying to play Devil's Advocate but making my burden/yoke lighter, I guess. What frustrates me is I seem so alone! Many who have problems with their faith seem to do so on moral grounds; while that is a small factor in my case, things like Noah's Ark and describing the Universe in limited Hebrew fashion present far greater a challenge to my faith, and I'm struggling to overcome them! People might say you must believe because it's God's word, well I've forced myself and I can't (believe in certain parts), tried humbling myself, but a global worldwide flood is so fantastic! Again I hope I don't weaken anyone else's faith! Then people say, 'you don't have to believe in all of it' but then I'm walking around with a weak faith because I can't trust the Bible 100%!

I don't want to lose my faith but I need help. I pray about it, and hope like heck that God will answer and show me a truer revelation! Why is a believable truth so elusive???

I feel so alone. Most people don't seem to have the same troubles as me. I nearly died recently and was in such despair that the end of everything was upon me. I get so scared there is nothingness for eternity. People don't realise that the end of their lives would be the end of the universe if there is no God and Heaven and yet they seem so cool about it! Sometimes I am too but sometimes I'm not. I know I won't be around to care, so to speak, but I wish there was something more...more Life!

Typing this is making me panicky again...sorry if this is the same old stuff I've rehashed but I'm getting desperate here. Perhaps I'm rather selfish for trying to use this as therapy and tiring y'all again. I know I'll get the same answers, which are good answers, but I don't know, I feel so despair.
hey, that's the same thing that happened to me! I've never been in too great of a near death situation but I have always awaited death like I await a dreamless sleep, both because I love my nightmares and because my dreams are pretty boring and I forget them fast. Anyway, I seem a little different from you.
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Old 08-05-2011, 05:00 PM
 
5,503 posts, read 5,545,042 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pleroo View Post

Of course, what we conveniently forget is that even if we accept the bible "100%", it still leaves us to figure out how to interpret it. And the thousands of different Christian denominations and what some people call Christian "cults", not to mention the various personal interpretations each of us have, that all rely on the bible in order to have "100% truth" should give one pause in thinking that just because we have a book we really know what it's telling us.


As I've said to you elsewhere, there is one core truth I continue to trust and rely on now, rather than putting my faith in a book, and that is that God is LOVE. That's a much firmer rock to stand on, even if it leaves me also having to accept more ambiguity in my understanding of the extraneous things about God and about the future.
That GOD IS LOVE is the crux of Jesus' teaching!
~Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and they neighbor as thyself.
...this do, and THOU SHALT LIVE.
Luke 10:27-28

Followed by: "The Parable of the Good Samaritan"
It was the Samaritan whom Jesus used as the example of loving God and neighbor as thyself...not the priest or the Levite (pastor.) Luke 10:29-37

Now the question is, why did Jesus use the contrast between the three...is he telling us that faith without works is dead???
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Old 08-05-2011, 05:02 PM
 
6,822 posts, read 6,606,267 times
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‪David Flynn - Astronomical Procession 1/5‬‏ - YouTube


‪Missler - Signs in the Heavens - Pt 1‬‏ - YouTube

There is absolutely no reason to believe the Biblical God is not our creator. It is only account that stands.
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Old 08-06-2011, 12:01 AM
 
2,854 posts, read 2,042,392 times
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people dont lose faith because the bible seems wrong

rather, people think the bible is wrong because they lack faith.

I've studied it and I'm quite impressed with how accurate it is.
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