What do believers mean when they say, "God gave us a choice to believe or not?" (Buddhism, translation)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
This is one of those things I see posted here frequently: Because God loves us, he gave us the free will to accept him or reject him. It's a choice. If we choose to believe in him, we go to heaven. If we choose not to, we go to hell (or at least, we don't go to heaven).
Belief, for me, has never been connected with choice and free will. My beliefs are formed based on what my mind perceives to be the preponderance of evidence. I believe that, if I let go of a pencil, it will fall to the ground, based on my past experience of letting go of pencils and my knowledge of gravity. I believe that, if I confide something sensitive and personal to Joe in the sales department, he'll use it against me, because he has a history of doing so. I don't believe that the earth will stop rotating at midnight GMT, because there's no reason to believe that. I can't choose to believe otherwise--not without knowing I'm lying to myself, anyway. But that's not really belief, is it?
All of my experience and searching have led me to believe that the Judeo-Christian version of God doesn't exist. There's no malice in my conclusion. I wish I could be certain that there's some sort of afterlife, but I can't.
I'm not going to use my lack of belief to commit atrocities, though. That is where choice comes in. I can't choose whether I believe something to be true or not, but I can choose how I'm going to behave based on my beliefs.
Historically, there have been many people who believe in God yet choose to behave in un-Christian ways. To put a metaphoric spin on things, that seems to make more sense when applied to the notion of "rejecting God" than lack of belief does: "I believe in you, but I reject your authority over me."
That's another thing I don't understand: why some people think that belief in God (or lack thereof) trumps one's actions during life. I can be the worst sinner on earth, but if I accept God and repent on my deathbed, I'll be "saved." Conversely, I can live my life according to Christain principles, but if I miss the technical detail of not believing in God, then I won't get into heaven.
Anyway, can someone here who thinks that belief is a choice explain why they think that?
First of all, the notion that God forgives people at their death bed when they all of a sudden utter the words, I believe in Jesus and accept him as my savior, is nothing more than empty words.
This cannot happen, does not happen and will never happen. :-)
The easiest way to think of God is that He is our Heavenly Father, who loves all of us whether we be saint or sinner.
He gives to us the gift of free will because He does not force us to love him in return. It is always our choice whether we want to do so. When we make the choice to look the other way, we become out of harmony with him, even though we may be really good people.
All is not lost, though, because our lives here are very short and after we pass into the next world, we will have an opportunity to change our way of thinking.
Love is a very powerful emotion and the higher love of God, which is His Divine Love, helps us make that change.
First of all, the notion that God forgives people at their death bed when they all of a sudden utter the words, I believe in Jesus and accept him as my savior, is nothing more than empty words.
This cannot happen, does not happen and will never happen. :-)
This is one of those things I see posted here frequently: Because God loves us, he gave us the free will to accept him or reject him. It's a choice. If we choose to believe in him, we go to heaven. If we choose not to, we go to hell (or at least, we don't go to heaven).
Belief, for me, has never been connected with choice and free will. My beliefs are formed based on what my mind perceives to be the preponderance of evidence. I believe that, if I let go of a pencil, it will fall to the ground, based on my past experience of letting go of pencils and my knowledge of gravity. I believe that, if I confide something sensitive and personal to Joe in the sales department, he'll use it against me, because he has a history of doing so. I don't believe that the earth will stop rotating at midnight GMT, because there's no reason to believe that. I can't choose to believe otherwise--not without knowing I'm lying to myself, anyway. But that's not really belief, is it?
All of my experience and searching have led me to believe that the Judeo-Christian version of God doesn't exist. There's no malice in my conclusion. I wish I could be certain that there's some sort of afterlife, but I can't.
I'm not going to use my lack of belief to commit atrocities, though. That is where choice comes in. I can't choose whether I believe something to be true or not, but I can choose how I'm going to behave based on my beliefs.
Historically, there have been many people who believe in God yet choose to behave in un-Christian ways. To put a metaphoric spin on things, that seems to make more sense when applied to the notion of "rejecting God" than lack of belief does: "I believe in you, but I reject your authority over me."
That's another thing I don't understand: why some people think that belief in God (or lack thereof) trumps one's actions during life. I can be the worst sinner on earth, but if I accept God and repent on my deathbed, I'll be "saved." Conversely, I can live my life according to Christain principles, but if I miss the technical detail of not believing in God, then I won't get into heaven.
Anyway, can someone here who thinks that belief is a choice explain why they think that?
I will not speak for others here but in my raising, I was NOT given a choice, I was indoctrinated from the get go. My Father who was a retired minister told me that if I didn't get into heaven then neither would he because that would mean he had failed his job.
There is no choice when you are brainwashed from a young age.
I get this reply when I ask how god can sit there and watch a child be murdered, well we all have free choice. I see that the killer had free choice and he made the wrong one, but what choice did the child have??
It took me a long time to finally be honest that I don't believe the things I was taught, I pretended for a long time for fear of how I would be treated within the community and family if I came out and told them I thought it was a bunch of hogwash.
AND really, my lack of belief is not about choice, I TRIED so hard to believe what I was taught, I really did. I searched for understanding and belief but found nothing. I can't force myself to believe something.
He gives to us the gift of free will because He does not force us to love him in return. It is always our choice whether we want to do so. When we make the choice to look the other way, we become out of harmony with him, even though we may be really good people.
All is not lost, though, because our lives here are very short and after we pass into the next world, we will have an opportunity to change our way of thinking.
I'm glad you don't state that hell is the automatic alternative, but your answer presupposes that I do see God, and that I choose to look the other way. That implies that I believe in God, and that I'm trying to deny my belief. What if I look as hard as I can, but I don't see God, despite my best attempts to do so? I can't turn away from what I don't see in the first place. There's a difference.
I respect people like you who come to a belief in God and who view it in terms of love and forgiveness, rather than punishment and blind adherence to bureaucratic dogma. In my experience, a person's attitudes, level of happiness, and overall worldview shape what kind of theist, deist, agnostic, or atheist they are. I've seen benevolent and malevolent examples of each of the above. Within a given temperament, I find that when two people of differering opinions discuss their views long enough, they see that their differences are primarily semantic and metaphoric.
My search has led me to conclude that, if there is a God, he/she/it doesn't resemble the omniscient, omnipotent supernatural creator who stands apart from his creation, who intervenes in earthly affairs at seemingly random times, and who has provided an unambiguous set of rules that he wants people to live by, and by which we'll be judged. Any God that exists would have to be vastly more complex than that, and probably unfathomable to human minds. So if I have any sort of faith, it's a faith that things will be "all right" in the long term. When I die, either my consciousness will die with me (in which case, I won't be feeling any pain), or there will be something else, which I'll deal with when I get there. In the mean time, I'm in awe that we (and everything else) even exist, I'm grateful for each day that I wake up in good health, and I have empathy and respect for other living things and for our planet. If that turns out to be insufficient for whatever comes next, well, at least I'll be able to tell myself and anyone else that I gave it my best shot. If there's a God, and he says, "Yes, but you didn't acknowledge and love me specifically!," then God is a vain, petty tyrant, and I guess I'm screwed. But I can't "believe" in something out of fear that there's an infinitesimal chance that it might be true.
I will not speak for others here but in my raising, I was NOT given a choice, I was indoctrinated from the get go. My Father who was a retired minister told me that if I didn't get into heaven then neither would he because that would mean he had failed his job.
There is no choice when you are brainwashed from a young age.
I get this reply when I ask how god can sit there and watch a child be murdered, well we all have free choice. I see that the killer had free choice and he made the wrong one, but what choice did the child have??
It took me a long time to finally be honest that I don't believe the things I was taught, I pretended for a long time for fear of how I would be treated within the community and family if I came out and told them I thought it was a bunch of hogwash.
AND really, my lack of belief is not about choice, I TRIED so hard to believe what I was taught, I really did. I searched for understanding and belief but found nothing. I can't force myself to believe something.
You raise a good (and sad) point: we don't have a choice of what to believe during our early, formative years, when all we know is what we're taught. This is especially true when we're not exposed to alternative viewpoints. I have a friend who married a Fundamentalist Christian, became Born Again, had kids, and told me that he and his wife weren't going to allow anything into the house that expressed alternative viewpoints. He wouldn't let them watch Carl Sagan's TV series or read any of his books, because he didn't want them to be exposed to anything spoken or written by an atheist. "When they turn 18 and are living on their own, then they can make choices," he said.
Of course, all parents express certain viewpoints to their children, and don't let them do certain things they find inappropriate, so it's subjective. One thing I always tried to do with my stepkids was acknowledge differing viewpoints and explain the thought process that led to my believing some were right, and others were wrong. I always told them that they undoubtedly would come to some different conclusions than I did, and that this was perfectly fine, as long as they reached their conclusions honestly and in good faith. My wife and I tried to raise them with what we believe are good, basic values, and allow them to draw their own conclusions based on those values. For example, we taught them to treat other people with kindness and compassion, and to respect diversity. If they behave that way, I don't care whether they do it in the context of Christianity, Buddhism, Wicca, atheism, or what have you.
I don't need the lure of an afterlife. Many Christians can't stand that nonbelievers can be good for goodness sake.
If God gave us free choice, why do his followers keep threatening nonbelievers with hell? They should leave us alone and respect our choice.
Maybe it's that they don't understand that "nonbelievers can be good for goodness sake." Behaving well only because you fear punishment represents a very low level of moral development. People who don't understand why nonbelievers don't rape, pillage, and plunder must desire to do those things themselves. If they abstain only because they fear eternal damnation from an all-seeing God, then I'd say they're adhering to the letter but not the spirit of their own laws. Such people don't understand the concept of empathy.
That's where I part company with atheists who believe that religion is utterly without value. If "fear of God" keeps some would-be criminals in line, then great. At the other end of the moral-development scale, if some believers behave well because they think it's the right thing to do, and that right and wrong come from God, and they don't try to force specific belief-based behaviors (i.e., no alcohol sales on Sundays) on others, I'm perfectly fine with them.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
