Where's God?

[POI]

Does he pop up in my dreams? Is he the one whom produces my goose-bumps? Is He the one giving me my "moral compass"? Is he only experienced during deep meditation? If I have enough faith, will he appear to me? But seriously. Where is he? I was a Christian for decades. I earnestly prayed for him to reach me, to no avail.

For debate: Why have I not felt his presence?

A) I never tried hard enough; lack faith
B) He does not want to reveal Himself to me (yet)
C) Evil is blocking the request(s)
D) I'm too dumb to realize he's reaching me
E) He's not really there at all <- Current conclusion

Do not answer yet. This topic has spawned from another unrelated topic. I decided to devote this large topic to itself. Below are some premises:

P1) does god exist? (dunno)
P2) does god want a relationship with all, especially the ones who seek him (apparently so)
P3) is god capable of communicating (apparently so)
P4) can god communicate his message in a way in which the recipient could no longer deny (apparently so)
P5) have I asked for this communication earnestly and repetitively (YES)
P6) does the Bible state god answers the call to all who seek him (YES)

At best, god has opted not to contact me YET. And this would be after decades of actively seeking him. Without any emotion, I'm logically left with 2 options.

A) God is not really there <- Current conclusion.
B) God is not adhering to his promise (yet).

[brunumb]

[Replying to JoeyKnothead in post #61

Religion is the practice of carrying on about a magical entity that can't be shown to exist.

Can such an entity be shown not to exist?

As I've mentioned elsewhere, cosmic materialism isn't an adequate default position since material existence has no way of accounting for itself.

Can anything which is non-existent be shown to not exist? Surely non-existence is the default position until there is some compelling reason to think otherwise.

Why does material existence need to account for itself in order for it to be the status quo?

If it doesn't account for itself, something else has to account for it.

Does that something else need to account for itself?

[Athetotheist]

[Replying to JoeyKnothead in post #61

Religion is the practice of carrying on about a magical entity that can't be shown to exist.

Can such an entity be shown not to exist?

As I've mentioned elsewhere, cosmic materialism isn't an adequate default position since material existence has no way of accounting for itself.

Can anything which is non-existent be shown to not exist? Surely non-existence is the default position until there is some compelling reason to think otherwise.

Why does material existence need to account for itself in order for it to be the status quo?

If it doesn't account for itself, something else has to account for it.

Does that something else need to account for itself?

Perhaps it does more easily than the material.

[brunumb]

Perhaps it does more easily than the material.

And how will we establish the difficulty of either?

[Shem Yoshi]

I believe in the Bible after i read it because it convinced me that it is the Word of God. You have that same evidence and choose not to believe it, for what reasons this is we can only speculate.

Belief is not a matter if choice. One is either convinced, or not. Ironically, many have gone from belief to non-belief simply by reading the Bible, all of it.

I am not sure if i agree with you that belief is not a matter of choice. I believe in freewill... I suppose one example might be physicist Philipp Lenard who actively pushed back against Einstine's relativity.... The man had Nazi Germany backing him... Sure he could have just believed the truth of relativity, but chose not to.

OK then, use your free will to choose to sincerely believe that leprechauns come from Mars. If you can't, ask yourself why you can't. If your brain is not convinced that something is true you will not be able to simply choose to believe that it is true. You may outwardly state or express belief, but that is not the same thing. Did Lenard actually not believe that Einstein's theory was correct, because he actually had his own counter model?

I believe Lenard's counter model was his anti-Semitism. Through the sciences of Darwinism Lenard was compelled to believe some humans are inferior to other humans, and he believed that in the case of physics the theories from inferiors races that hey were inferior to those of aryan races... German physics was superior to Einsteins Jewish Physics.

[Shem Yoshi]

[Replying to POI in post #1]

You should stay faithful my friend.

Then I suggest you start, or continue to remain faithful, in all the competing god-faiths, for which you have not YET had personal experiences of such a god(s) speaking to you. And maybe, eventually, you will experience what all of them, in these other competing faiths, also experience

Do you personally believe these others are true?

I'd say my lack in belief, for all placed forth god claims to me, are roughly the same. I just so happen to give Christianity much more investigation time, as I was raised in it, and it continually surrounds me, via geography. Now can you please acknowledge what I said?

Then I suggest you start, or continue to remain faithful, in all the competing god-faiths, for which you have not YET had personal experiences of such a god(s) speaking to you. And maybe, eventually, you will experience what all of them, in these other competing faiths, also experience

Well I think there is a difference here between you and I. Although i find myself more liberal with other religious beliefs, reading pretty much all the works of Abraham religions, as well as exploring Greco-Roman religions, Celtic religions, and a little bit of Hinduism, but that aside.

Belief in Christ gives us reason to not believe, or to be skeptical of "competing god-faiths" (as you put it)... We would have a positive reason to not believe, for Christ himself said dont believe these false prophets and false messiahs. It isnt that I dont believe in other supernatural claims, in fact Christianity tells us others WILL show great signs to deceive people (as well as true prophets of Christianity), its that I believe in Jesus Christ as the Truth... However if I was not a Christian, I would think it to be reasonable to seek out answers to god. I do believe the default position is an open mind, instead of a closed mind. Although Christ would give us reason to not believe, atheism doesnt really give us any reasons to not believe.

[JoeyKnothead]

[Replying to JoeyKnothead in post #61

Religion is the practice of carrying on about a magical entity that can't be shown to exist.

Can such an entity be shown not to exist?

Lol

Now we're down to "Ya can't show it ain't! Ya can't show it ain't!"

As I've mentioned elsewhere, cosmic materialism isn't an adequate default position since material existence has no way of accounting for itself.

But a magic man in the sky does?

We observe the universe. That's about the extent of my claims in this regard.

[Athetotheist]

Perhaps it does more easily than the material.

And how will we establish the difficulty of either?

As I've submitted elsewhere,

Whenever you set out to account for the existence of the material with nothing but the material itself to draw upon, your explanation is going to be the very thing you're trying to explain. That makes the argument circular.

From there I propose that the only way out of an infinite reduction is to assume the existence of something to account for all of what's observed. That we don't know its full nature doesn't really matter. It's like the case with Dark Energy; we don't have to fully understand it to be able to conclude that it's there.

[Athetotheist]

[Replying to JoeyKnothead in post #61

Religion is the practice of carrying on about a magical entity that can't be shown to exist.

Can such an entity be shown not to exist?

Lol

Now we're down to "Ya can't show it ain't! Ya can't show it ain't!"

As I've mentioned elsewhere, cosmic materialism isn't an adequate default position since material existence has no way of accounting for itself.

But a magic man in the sky does?

We observe the universe. That's about the extent of my claims in this regard.

Materialists do a funny thing. When asked how to account for the universe's existence, they'll bend over backwards trying to get a universe from nothing with nothing to cause it. They balk at the idea of a "magical god", so they take the god out of the picture but still try to conjure up a universe with magic.

[PolytheistWitch]

[Replying to brunumb in post #68]

Then you are pushing atheism.

[AquinasForGod]

[Replying to POI in post #51]

And there we have it. I'm confused or a liar.

You showed I was correct. When you started to ask God to communicate with you, when you needed him to talk back, you no longer were believing. YOu were on your way to disbelief. But while you believed, you also never had any experiences that you recognized as God.

So when you did believe and just never experienced God, I cannot be sure what the reason is. For all I know, God wants you to go through this time of not believing, so that when he does reveal himself to you in such a way that you believe for real this time, you will know the difference between indoctrination and knowing God. And then perhaps, God will use you and your testimony to reach others, even if that is just to strengthen the faith in others.

You can say, hey, I have been there. I have been an atheist. But I am telling you, there is a God that you can experience. Don't give up. And that I can say to you. I have been there. I have been an atheist, even antitheist. I even ruined some people's faith in God, for which I am utterly sorry. But God can reveal himself to you in a way that will convince you. He did it for me and countless others.