For some, it is baby steps, at first. For others, it can happen all at once. Some resist but finally accept, and many reject and refuse out of hand. It is definitely personal and experiential (Spurgeon would say ‘experimental’, in 19th century English ) and there can be counterfeit experiences (as well as counterfeit witnesses), and it is not all just intellectual. I, for example, could not tell you date, hour and minute when I became a Christian. There are probably some Christians who would doubt that I even was a Christian and find my faith suspect, since there was no conscious ‘decision’ on my part that I can point to. There can be false ‘decisions’, as well.
When I was a child, I freely accepted the testimony that that Japan existed. I was given it from trusted sources – my parents, teachers, pictures, books, maps and globes. I was a ‘believer’ in the existence of Japan, or maybe more accurately a ‘believist’, a ‘Japanist’, making a somewhat esoteric and technical distinction. Now that I have been there and have seen it firsthand, I am not going to deny its existence, and I am a ‘believer’ – a ‘Japaner’.
A believer, then, is someone who has had something irrefutable happen in their life experience and which they will never deny as being legitimate evidence. That evidence can be as personal and intimate as a recognition of a change in heart and a change in their heart’s desires and a willingness to trust and to be obedient, but it can also include events that can be documented (Maggie, for example). Either can certainly be denied as being evidence by others, as flat earthers deny any and all evidence that the earth is spherical, but denial does not constitute proof of the contrary fact. There are many who count themselves as believers, or say that they used to be believers and have ‘deconverted’, when in fact they are now or used to be merely ‘believists’.
For me, it started in my childhood, like my analogy. My parents were Christians… and before anyone objects, points and shouts “Indoctrination!”, indoctrination can be a good and necessary thing, if the doctrine is true: I have been indoctrinated not to put water in my gas tank or in my car’s engine. So my parents were Christians, and early on I easily recognized that I was not always a good boy, a sweet child. Maybe that is the first thing for me that pointed to the truth of Christianity – it teaches that every one of us is broken and sinful in our very core, not that we are all as bad as we could be. But, “There but for the grace of God go I.” And I recognized that I needed to be saved from myself, if nothing else.
I would agree faith can be an outgrowth of making sense of our experience. Since it is grounded in our experience, it doesn’t travel well. How you make sense of your experience is rarely going to settle anything for somebody else. Their experience isn’t what needs explaining for us.
I’ve also had to expand on a purely material explanation in order to make sense of my own experience. From that experience I can see how traditional God belief could provide a perfectly good explanation. It is after all the explanation provided by our culture for experience which defies purely natural explanations. But since I was not immersed in a community of Christian belief that wasn’t the alternative I took. Reading psychologists like Jung and Hillman, it was easier to explain the something more as another co-product of consciousness right alongside the mystery we call our “self”. Not that I’m recommending my choice to you, of course. You’ve made a time honored choice which seems to satisfy you. I’m only trying to help you see that other people make other choices and also find them satisfactory.
But I’d also like for you to work less hard at trying to recruit me for my own good. I’m not exactly suffering. I assure you I am not here hoping for conversion. What I like about Christians is that they realize there is something more to explain. We have that much in common and that is something I appreciate about you all. At most Christian websites, that wouldn’t be enough. But here it seems to count for something as it does for me.
Of course it is and we all provide all that we can for our children. I’ve spent enough time on atheist websites to know why you chafe at that charge. But I’m not the one making it.
Certainly not, but we are also talking about testimony, please recall. And there is a little precedent – how many Christians over two millennia? Not that an ad populum means anything in itself. And a few of them (understatement is better than overstatement, most times )… a few of them were and are rather brilliant thinkers, so I’m in good company.
Oh, I see that well enough and have for a long time. The only problem is the respective truth claims. The Bible speaks to that as well, in both Old and New Testaments – wealth, comfort (including good health), self-satisfaction, and how deceptive and ultimately dangerous they are.
No, I didn’t mean at all to suggest that it was. It was just sort of a tongue-in-cheek preemptive strike against anyone who might object on those grounds.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
194
First time I saw that I laffed till the tears ran down me trouser leg.
Dangerous? What, good health dangerous?
If you are saying self satisfaction is smugness and superiority etc., then yes, but it can be simply contentment. Nothing dangerous about that.
I don’t know what you are referring to and I don’t know the Bible very well. But I don’t believe that good health and comfort can lead to complacency. We don’t become proud and smug and indifferent to others from having good health.
Even comfort though is not going to over-ride our conscience. It is our conscience that counts because that is the moral guide that God has given us. It is based on our spiritual connectivity or love (agape). A person can even be very wealthy and still be good to others and give of their wealth. Wealth doesn’t corrupt a good person. It corrupts someone who is already degraded.
Those riding around in multimillion dollar yachts and buying personal islands do. Health and wealth are deceptive and dangerous. There but for the grace of God in Jesus go I.
Those riding around in multimillion dollar yachts and owing personal islands haven’t acquired all this by being ethical. You’ll find the 99.999999% are greed driven at the very least.
20 years ago I might have said the same thing. However, the more I learn about self made billionaires the more I think they are driven by wanting to win. Money just happens to be the score they use to determine who is winning. They are more interested in making money than having money, if that makes sense.
Well,what I do like here is Mark D’s remarks of a few postings back, from two days ago, noting that what he likes is that Christians seem to realize that there is something more to explain — even though that is as far as he goes with it for the moment. I think we are getting a bit off-topic —even maybe off the Solar System — with discussions about things that sit six digits to the right of the decimal point. But go on with it, I suppose, if you like it…
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
207
Christians and supernaturalists in general don’t realise anything special. They desire that there is something more to explain. There is no requirement, no lack in nature that needs explaining. And it would take another two significant figures to run out of ethical human beings like Ani99.
For the record I don’t count alluding to anything as being ‘supernatural’ as any kind of proper explanation. The supernatural is just a black box for things we give up trying to explain. A proper explanation should, to my way of thinking, make ties between what we wish to explain and things we are more familiar with. Putting it in a black box doesn’t do that, though in the case of the supernatural there is a narrative about why such things are unknowable to lowly humans. But I personally find that dissatisfying. So for me, any proper explanation is a natural explanation Of course there is no guarantee we will be able to give everything in our experience a proper explanation. Some things just are a little difficult to pin down. That doesn’t surprise me.
) and there can be counterfeit experiences (as well as counterfeit witnesses), and it is not all just intellectual. I, for example, could not tell you date, hour and minute when I became a Christian. There are probably some Christians who would doubt that I even was a Christian and find my faith suspect, since there was no conscious ‘decision’ on my part that I can point to. There can be false ‘decisions’, as well.
So my parents were Christians, and early on I easily recognized that I was not always a good boy, a sweet child. Maybe that is the first thing for me that pointed to the truth of Christianity – it teaches that every one of us is broken and sinful in our very core, not that we are all as bad as we could be. But, “There but for the grace of God go I.” And I recognized that I needed to be saved from myself, if nothing else.
)… a few of them were and are rather brilliant thinkers, so I’m in good company.