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Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 380667
11/3/2009 2:19 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Another irony is that He knows what weaknesses and imperfections his creations have but never explains why he created them like that. Why doesn't he just create a perfect specimen to begin with? May be he really wanted to create man in his image and we definitely are a reflection of his personality today. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 325497
I am weak. I am maybe 100 pounds and petite. Seems like everything is hard for me or has just felt hard. I feel weak. But God uses weakness for his glory. He has used me to glorify him in many ways. One way I can give an example of is having two children who are shining lights to others.
They both have qualities that others gravitate and turn to.
I could have chickened out and not had children...but I trusted in God to see it through and help me to bear it all.
What a blessing they are...to myself and others. What a difference they have made in others' lives. It is a beautiful thing to behold. It was not easy by any means--
but what a difference in my life and others. I marvel at this every single day. That is, unless their rooms aren't clean ;) |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/3/2009 2:21 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
You say that the desire for sex is a bad thing. I beg to differ ... desire needs to be present before one can procede! So how is that desire a bad thing and how would you apply this to married couples?
The sexual act in its rightful place is no sin. In fact, in all of creation this act is is essential for further reproduction of species whether humans, animals, insects, trees, flowers etc, as ALL species depend on fertilization.
Religion is full of contradiction and confusion and in my view, full of untruths as well. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 380667
I see what you are saying. If you look at it from that perspective then everything is okay. What I tried to say was that in order to break free from this cycle of life (birth and/or rebirth) you have to stop the desire. Sorry about the misunderstanding. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 607707
11/3/2009 2:25 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
That is your PERSONAL choice, God knows who belong to Him and He knows who will walk away from truth over the course of their lives. I've had far too many personal encounters with the Holy Spirit to question the validity of the Bible. Maybe your heart was never fully committed 100%, and that is the foundation of all of your underlying issues.
Point is, if this is your final decision about God, you'll need to brace yourself for judgment day...there will be no 2nd chances after that. None of us will have any excuse on that day. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/3/2009 2:26 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I am weak. I am maybe 100 pounds and petite. Seems like everything is hard for me or has just felt hard. I feel weak. But God uses weakness for his glory. He has used me to glorify him in many ways. One way I can give an example of is having two children who are shining lights to others.
They both have qualities that others gravitate and turn to.
I could have chickened out and not had children...but I trusted in God to see it through and help me to bear it all.
What a blessing they are...to myself and others. What a difference they have made in others' lives. It is a beautiful thing to behold. It was not easy by any means--
but what a difference in my life and others. I marvel at this every single day. That is, unless their rooms aren't clean ;) Quoting: Anonymous Coward 380667
You can reason like that if it makes you feel better. To me, I think differently and I believe in "cause and effect". |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 380667
11/3/2009 2:27 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Go into battle and you will be a believer.. read Kenneth Ring Phd.. and his near death experience book and you will be a believer.
But I will not Judge anyone for their beliefs for what one hears is part of their selection and the Universal Plan. I don't believe today does not mean I will not believe tomorrow.
I find the Bible almost impossible to read.. I don't understand it but I have seen God work wonders more times that I can tell...
It is not for me to Judge I want all people to be part of my life.. their belief in god is personal.. there belief in our relationship is what I have to work on. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 716921
We are living in a time where it may be necessary to go through many hardships before you become a believer. You may be close to death and injured, and you may find yourself praying to God to help you. You may find yourself without food to eat or shelter and you cry out for some help. You may laugh at this post of mine and think that will never be you. Then it happens. We all have our journey... |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/3/2009 2:28 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
That is your PERSONAL choice, God knows who belong to Him and He knows who will walk away from truth over the course of their lives. I've had far too many personal encounters with the Holy Spirit to question the validity of the Bible. Maybe your heart was never fully committed 100%, and that is the foundation of all of your underlying issues.
Point is, if this is your final decision about God, you'll need to brace yourself for judgment day...there will be no 2nd chances after that. None of us will have any excuse on that day. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 607707
THAT DAY has come and gone or may be it will never comes. Don't live for tomorrow or expecting a better life. It's the HERE and NOW that you have to deal with. |
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czygyny 
Kletos-Eklektos-Pistos
User ID: 418932
11/3/2009 2:30 PM
 | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Golly, how sad you could not 'finish the race'.
You are first called, then chosen by God, but then it is your part to remain faithful.
While I have never disbelieved after my first conversion, I never 'connected' with Him all those many years as I have since I became involved with the Messianic movement.
Even that school of thought is fraught with megalomaniacs and wolves and one must beware...but that is what He expects you to do...always be cautious and discerning.
It solved a lot of missing equations (like the three days in the grave-not the quasi-sort of two days-Friday to Sunday-it was Wednesday to Saturday-Sabbath=3) and other things that were stumbling blocks for me before.
OP, I hope you can 'find' that faith again...how sad to stand on the outside in that Great Day and miss everything He has stored up for you! 
“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” ~Romans 12:21
You can either do the research or remain in ignorance. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 380667
11/3/2009 2:32 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I am weak. I am maybe 100 pounds and petite. Seems like everything is hard for me or has just felt hard. I feel weak. But God uses weakness for his glory. He has used me to glorify him in many ways. One way I can give an example of is having two children who are shining lights to others.
They both have qualities that others gravitate and turn to.
I could have chickened out and not had children...but I trusted in God to see it through and help me to bear it all.
What a blessing they are...to myself and others. What a difference they have made in others' lives. It is a beautiful thing to behold. It was not easy by any means--
but what a difference in my life and others. I marvel at this every single day. That is, unless their rooms aren't clean ;)
You can reason like that if it makes you feel better. To me, I think differently and I believe in "cause and effect". Quoting: Anonymous Coward 325497
It was "cause and effect". My decision to have children was a result of me deciding to trust God in my circumstance.
In both pregnancies, there could have been some problems.
God saw it through. He answered the prayers. I could have let paralysing fear prevent me from having those two children, for one. |
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grrttsgar
User ID: 809474
11/3/2009 2:37 PM
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/3/2009 2:39 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
It was "cause and effect". My decision to have children was a result of me deciding to trust God in my circumstance.
In both pregnancies, there could have been some problems.
God saw it through. He answered the prayers. I could have let paralysing fear prevent me from having those two children, for one. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 380667
I see and I am very happy for you. You are innately a very nice person. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 598066
11/3/2009 4:11 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
THAT DAY has come and gone or may be it will never comes. Don't live for tomorrow or expecting a better life. It's the HERE and NOW that you have to deal with. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 325497
The final judgement of God has come & gone, or it may never come? That is where you & I differ, it has not come yet, it absolutely will come. Here & now we all have to deal with, I'm prepping for the day when spiritual eternity begins - it's all practice so I'm prepared to stand before my Creator. Keeping spiritual blinders from my eyes & not being part of this world's mentality is my daily reality. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 117166
11/3/2009 4:14 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
That is your PERSONAL choice, God knows who belong to Him and He knows who will walk away from truth over the course of their lives. I've had far too many personal encounters with the Holy Spirit to question the validity of the Bible. Maybe your heart was never fully committed 100%, and that is the foundation of all of your underlying issues.
Point is, if this is your final decision about God, you'll need to brace yourself for judgment day...there will be no 2nd chances after that. None of us will have any excuse on that day. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 607707
You are probable a nice, responsible, caring person who balances their own checkbook. But this is 100% bullshit. Sorry. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 117166
11/3/2009 4:21 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Let's try that again.
You are probably a nice, responsible, caring person who balances their own checkbook. But this is 100% bullshit. Sorry. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 809617
11/3/2009 4:23 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
- an atheist after 40 years- but a hypocrite throughout his whole life |
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Volar
User ID: 796327
11/3/2009 10:39 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Isaiah 45:7 (King James Version)
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
At the same time?....Or, whichever comes first? |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 793721
11/3/2009 10:47 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
After about 30 years myself of being brainwashed into believing the holey-babble, and after much study I too came to the realization that it is not true.
And to think that I once was so convinced that I would have died for it!
Yet, I was totally wrong!
You never knew Christ. Quoting: Bugeater
Amen!
Not only that, but you are living proof that "many are called, but few are chosen". The dog that returns to eat its vomit, and the swine once washed that returns to wallow in the mire, to paraphrase the Lord Jesus Christ.
It would have been better for you if you had never been born! |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 795140
11/3/2009 10:50 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
From another thread, I have realized what Christians are all about when I asked them about God's qualities. After they'd given the answer, I recognize that the God they worship is the karmic wheel which is the laws of the Universe. Nobody is exempt from this law. The only different between me and them is the subject where to them it's a He and to me it's a It. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 810016
11/4/2009 3:47 AM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I am happier and enjoy greater contentment now than at any other time in my adult life. The dust has slowly settled in my mind and I have come to realize that I actually do not believe in God at all anymore. I haven't looked to become an atheist, but I guess that's what I am... and I'm very happy in my unbelief, thank you very much! Quoting: Ex-Minister 534348
This part of your story is EXACTLY how I have felt for the last 6 years since I came to the same realization. I came to realize that it was all just a sinister fairy tale meant to control us through lies and fear. True spiritual freedom exists, but not in Christian, Jewish, Islamic, etc dogma. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 809310
11/4/2009 4:05 AM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
you are all nuts,
one does need to be religious or go to church, or read the scripture to be a godly |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 809310
11/4/2009 4:06 AM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
you are all nuts,
one does need to be religious or go to church, or read the scripture to be a godly Quoting: Anonymous Coward 809310
well, you do not need to know the Jesus story either. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/4/2009 3:09 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I would like to ask Christians here a question. Have they done any "good" deeds totally out of compassion or unconditional love instead of for the glory of God? If so what is the percentage of those compared to the total number of good deeds? |
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My Take
User ID: 673609
11/4/2009 6:37 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
OP. Hope you don't trash your spiritual component because of your disillusionment with organized religion.
Your example, and I know of many, is a reason I don't worship in a church.
What you seek doesn't come from study of books, but rather by living. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 501151
11/4/2009 6:49 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
What does that tell you??? sex is bad, it's evil, it's a sin, in fact, the greatest sin one an commit according to scriptures. 'Born in sin and shapen in iniquity' is what we're told. Religion has been the crux of much evil and suffering. I gave it up a long time ago. Quoting: jan brown 808387
God created sex as a sacred union for husband & wife. It's a beautiful thing! How can sex be evil if it's a God sacred union to be shared between husband & wife? You can have sex outside of marriage if you want (free will), but remember that you are binding your spirit with another persons. You do this a dozen or so time, and you end up a silly mess. Sex outside of marriage seperates us from God. I can say all of this, because I've lived it - it's when I've been in a sexual relationship without a commitment that I've been the farthest from God, experienced pride, anger, bitterness. Not to mention the amount of VD going around out there...YUCK! |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 501151
11/4/2009 6:53 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I would like to ask Christians here a question. Have they done any "good" deeds totally out of compassion or unconditional love instead of for the glory of God? If so what is the percentage of those compared to the total number of good deeds? Quoting: Anonymous Coward 325497
I was a selfish, hot mess before I asked the Holy Spirit to help me. I would say I've done 'good deeds' because I can love like I was never able to before. I don't have the fear of not having enough. I honestly don't think you have to be a Christian to do these things. For me, it's the only way I ever would have thought more about others than myself. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 795140
11/5/2009 12:08 AM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I was a selfish, hot mess before I asked the Holy Spirit to help me. I would say I've done 'good deeds' because I can love like I was never able to before. I don't have the fear of not having enough. I honestly don't think you have to be a Christian to do these things. For me, it's the only way I ever would have thought more about others than myself. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 501151
Thank the Holy Spirit for "changing" you and thank you for your good deeds. |
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Major
User ID: 574846
11/5/2009 10:05 AM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I was a senior in high school at the time and making decisions about career and college. I was "led" into the full-time Christian ministry shortly after my conversion, so I chose to attend a rather well-known Bible college in South Carolina.
After four years there, I sensed that I'd most likely eventually become an overseas missionary, the which I did. But before accepting a missionary assignment in Italy, I graduated, got married, was a youth pastor, a Bible teacher in a Christian school, put in a year towards my Master of Divinity degree, and finally pastored a church in Philadelphia for three years. Six years after graduation from college, my wife, two children, and I moved to Europe to evangelize and start evangelical churches.
This was my life and ministry for over 28 years, but all during this time I was struggling to maintain my faith. I had so many questions about the Bible and its teachings. I kept suspecting that Christianity really didn't "work." I mean, prayer didn't really work. Faith didn't make me a new person. My old "sins" were still plaguing me. I rarely sensed any "presence of God" in my life. I looked for God's guidance, but rarely was sure I got it. And even then it often turned out to be patently erroneous. I experienced church and missions from the inside and became very disillusioned with it. For an enterprise headed by the God of the universe, it sure was awfully human, and terribly fallible. I really saw precious little that could be called "evidence of God" in it all.
My questions about the Bible and its teachings just multiplied over the years, until I had to intentionally close my eyes to them in order to maintain anything like enough faith to continue my ministry without feeling like a total hypocrite. But the struggle only got worse...along with depression and very real self-loathing (for my feelings of hypocrisy.)
Finally, after 28 years overseas, I came to that place where I just could no longer consider myself a believer. I could no longer represent Jesus and the Bible, as my missions agency called on me to do. Honesty demanded that I quit the ministry and return Stateside.
It is now almost five years that I've been back in the "secular" world. I no longer attend church. I have come to peace with my unbelief. In fact, I am happier and enjoy greater contentment now than at any other time in my adult life. The dust has slowly settled in my mind and I have come to realize that I actually do not believe in God at all anymore. I haven't looked to become an atheist, but I guess that's what I am... and I'm very happy in my unbelief, thank you very much!
That's my story in a nutshell. If anyone wants to comment on it or jot me line, feel free (rjtrueman AT gmail DOT com). I'm not crusading for atheism, but neither am I ashamed of it. Quite the contrary.
Be well! Quoting: Ex-Minister 534348
I hear what you are saying but something inside of me is questioning your testimony here. It just does not sound right to me. |
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Major
User ID: 574846
11/5/2009 12:14 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
After about 30 years myself of being brainwashed into believing the holey-babble, and after much study I too came to the realization that it is not true.
And to think that I once was so convinced that I would have died for it!
Yet, I was totally wrong!
You never knew Christ.
Amen!
Not only that, but you are living proof that "many are called, but few are chosen". The dog that returns to eat its vomit, and the swine once washed that returns to wallow in the mire, to paraphrase the Lord Jesus Christ.
It would have been better for you if you had never been born! Quoting: Anonymous Coward 793721
Sad but true.
1 John 2:19
"They went out from us but they were not of us, for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that it might be made manifest taht they were not all of us". |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 325497
11/5/2009 1:02 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Sad but true.
1 John 2:19
"They went out from us but they were not of us, for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us, but they went out that it might be made manifest taht they were not all of us". Quoting: Major 574846
What's with the us vs. them? You and "them" are one and so is God and Satan. Cannot have electricity without + and -. |
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Anonymous Coward
User ID: 809475
11/5/2009 1:15 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
I have a similar story, I couldn't have been a better christian...I lived my religion and not just on Sundays...
then I started researching what I believed... you know there are so many denominations... I wanted to belong to the "right" church... first I read the Bible in Greek and then in Hebrew... then I researched the origins of the Bible and then the origins of religion and the origins of the Torah...
all of it was designed to control the masses... and it works great on those too lazy to do their own research.
I have no doubt that there is "higher intelligence" or that Jesus was inspired...but neither are "god" and those who believe such a thing are self deluded... which is very understandable, when you consider they were taught this clap trap by their parents for generations. The isolate themselves from "sinners" and only associate with like minded people... If they could only step out of the prison/box they insist on hiding from the truth in, they would find that Jesus tried to tell them
THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE
think about it... no more guilt...no more sin...no more hypocrisy. |
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ROJO DAWN
User ID: 811051
11/5/2009 1:20 PM | | Re: Atheist after 40 years a Christian Minister | Quote |
Ive been away from GLP for nearly 1.5 years now. I thought on my lunch break, Id pop my head in for a minute and see how the crazies are doing.
Im generally a pretty easy going individual and tolerant of peoples' religions but this is absolutely sickening. For the amount of hate most of you Xians are spouting here, Im somewhat inclined to say to hell with all of you.
Grow up. There is no magical sky fairy. Be filled with awe and mystery by the universe that surrounds us. Your immature theo-philosophy is laughable at best and evil at worst.
STFU. |
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