Do I Believe in God?
by Why I do not believe in God and how life lead me to become an atheist.
The idea that there is a higher being makes absolutely no sense to me. Its like when you are a little kid and make up an imaginary friend, except this one is kind of like “mom and dad say that invisible Bob exists, so that must mean invisible Bob exists”. If God exists, then show me he exists. In science something must be tested and proved before it is accepted as fact. If God exists, then prove it to me and I’ll start believing, but until then I will not believe that he exists.
As for how God came to be created by man, I see God as originating as a control mechanism. I am referring to Abrahamic religions here, because that it what I am most familiar with. In the first book of the Bible, Genesis, God exerts his power over man by expelling Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden when they disobey him. This was intended to show that God punished those that disobeyed his commands. Then, skipping onto Exodus, we find the 10 commandments brought forth by Moses. The 10 commandments were not originally just a way to live your life, they were the laws of the Hebrews. The Bible originated as a book to enforce law among the Hebrew people, for who needs a large police force when people are afraid of eternal damnation in Hell?
Another reason that God was created was to explain things that could not be explained. The early Hebrews did not have the technology we have today to explain how the natural world works, so they created theories that remained theories since there was no way of proving them.
However, God has not remained as he was originally created. God has changed as his role as the omnipotent police man was no longer needed. I like the image of God today more than I like the image of God thousands of years ago. Among the majority of Christian churches, God is seen as a benevolent deity who loves all of man kind and will bring them to heaven, but at the same time a vengeful deity that will send people to Hell if they commit bad deeds. One of the problems here exists because the church, supposedly the voice of God on Earth, defines what is bad deeds. Therefore Christians have a set of morals defined by the church, rather than deciding for themselves what is truly right and wrong. I was raised Christian, and when I decided that I no longer believed in God, I took my morals as they had been defined by the church and modified them. I found that some things that I had been taught to believe were wrong had absolutely nothing wrong with them, and I decided that some things I had been lead to believe were right were actually very bad. One in particular that I dislike is that many Christians believe that people who are not Christian, or at least of an Abrahamic faith, will go to Hell when they die, and I have had many people try to convert me to Christianity thinking that they were doing me a service.
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Post CommentJames
On January 11, 2008 at 6:15 pm
I 100% agree with all imformation in this article. You have a nak for writing and you make very good points, I’m also athiest, and most of my reasons are the same.
wayn007
On January 31, 2008 at 11:12 am
I am a Christian. If I am wrong, and at the end of my life, if I am wrong, and I simply fade away into nothingness, I have lost nothing. If you are wrong however, you have lost a chance at eternal life in heaven. Think about it.
Debby
On February 3, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I too am a Christian, and I would much rather have the promise of eternity with the Father and Jesus — even if after death that turns out to be wrong — than the belief that there is nothing and then after death find out I was wrong and wound up on the wrong side of the abyss.
You have nothing to lose by giving Jesus a try and everything to gain. On the other hand, should you die today, you have everything to lose and nothing to gain because you chose not to listen to Jesus. He is the only way for you to stay out of hell.
Atheism is a lie from your enemy who wants to see you spend your eternity burning with no relief, ever. The concept of eternity is difficult to imagine, I know. But for someone who considers himself such an intelligent man, think of eternity like this.
Your brain has the capacity for creating an enormous potential, without end, as long as it is connected to an energy source. On earth that energy source is your blood supply. Suppose you could exchange that energy source for another? One that would never expire, never need to be rejuvenated? Would that interest you?
The source of that energy to your brain is held within you. It is called your spirit and it will only become available to you when you die. The problem for you is you don’t want to go to heaven. So, your brain will only last as long as your blood lasts here on earth — or so you think.
You see. You will still have a spirit and that spirit – that inner man – will be what burns for eternity in hell. Your brain that you so prize, will do one of two things for you. When you die, it will either help you to feel every single excruciating, painful, burning, sensation, or, your brain (or the essence of it) will spend eternity in heaven with Jesus, your Savior and God the Father, enjoying all the blessings of heaven and everything that goes with it … along with every other Saint who declared Jesus as Savior.
The intelligent person – who you so clearly claim to be – would not want to waste their brain. If you did, you’d be doing drugs now. So my question to you is, are you a drug addict? Is your brain fried already? Are you a junkie? Is there any reasonable intelligence left? What do you want to do with your brain? Do you want to save it or lose it? It’s up to you. The choice is yours. Jesus or hell.
Kassi
On February 19, 2008 at 11:41 pm
Prove to us that God not exist.
Every creation needs a creator. I have heard this example. Take a broken watch apart and put it in a shoe box. Shake the box for 10 billion years. After ten billion years of shaking it, will the watch return to be a fully functioning watch, and miraculously put itself together? Of course not, to believe that would be to insult your intelligence. Now aren’t we and the earth a little more complex then a simple watch?
You do not believe that something came from nothing, the only other option is to believe that nothing turned itself into everything. Which one takes more faith to believe??
S-ROC
On June 23, 2008 at 3:52 pm
All you have done here is mention all the things that other men do to make you dislike man’s definition of God/Jesus. I consider myself a highly intelligent person (who loves math, science, etc.) and find it overwhelmingly odd that people who claim science somehow disproves God’s existence never actually provide any scientific evidence to that end. I agree with the other comments here that mention the “watch example” of creation and about living life with expectations of eternity with Christ not costing me anything if I’m wrong. But, I challenge you the writer to make an “educated” opinion of God from HIM alone and HIS word not from other men’s shortcomings and bad experiences. If you truly were a “Christian” before now, you wouldn’t be able to change into an atheist because the Holy Spirit would indwell you and therefore could not change. While we commonly refer to Christianity as a religion, I wholeheartedly disagree. It is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ himself that only requires you to believe in HIM. Nothing else is required. Please know that although I pray for you and your salvation, I can by no means make you believe in Jesus. I will not force-feed you with “religious” jargon and promises of “fire & brimstone” – but please know that your works / good deeds on this earth will be for naught when Jesus says “…I never knew you.” HE leaves it open for you to seek HIM, but if you die today, you will rest in Hell for eternity apart from HIM. I couldn’t spend eternity knowing I just missed out on Heaven by being too self-righteous, proud, intelligent for my own good. May you decide to seek answers from HIM directly and succeed in finding those answers. Take care.
Matt
On August 4, 2008 at 2:13 pm
I am a Christian, but I must say that I am ashamed to hear my fellow Christians say that to follow Christ costs us nothing. It has cost me everything. I have surrendered all my dreams and goals to follow Christ.
Beyond this, I must say that this article is a well articulated waste of time. It is easy to look selectively at the Bible and pull out some small portions of the text and suggest that the entire purpose is a scare tactic to make people obey national laws. However, if you look more carefully at the text, and look at the entirety of the text, we see that there is much more going on than human manipulation. There are far too many stories that do not make sense within your framework (Think for example about Abraham sacrificing Isaac, about Jacob and Esau fighting over their inheritance, about Jacob wrestling with God) These stories make would make no sense if the writers goal was to create fear in a people group. Also, most commands of the earliest books of the Bible are written to the political and religious leaders. They are being commanded to be more righteous than the people that you suggest are being manipulated. Later, several entire prophetic books are aimed at the corrupt political leaders of the nation. This doesn’t sound like government manipulation to me.
Second, assuming that the Bible was originally a scare tactic is difficult because of the long expanse of time that elapsed between the writing of so many of the books. The events described in the Pentateuch took place over 500 years before the time of David, who lived over 1200 years before Christ. How could the 39 Old Testament books, written over a time table of 1000-2500 years be created with the singular purpose of keeping people obedient to the government?
Third, why would people continue to follow a powerless, imagination created god? If God did not truly exist, then people would stop defending him as soon as their life was on the line. Peter, Stephen, James, and John would not have continued to teach about Jesus when they were being crucified, stoned, and beaten unless they truly had seen Jesus live again after his death. No man would be willing to die for something that he knew was a hoax. Even today thousands of Christians are martyred for their faith. The only possible explanation for their courage is that they have experienced God.
That leads me to my final point. How do I know that God exists? I have experienced God for myself. I have knelt in prayer and heard Him answer. I have heard his word speak to me as no other book could ever do. I have felt him direct my life. As a cynic, this would be the time that you could again point out that scientists believe that there is a gene within people that makes them belief in God. I believe scientists are probably right about that, and it makes me rejoice. Why would I rejoice that my DNA is designed so that I will believe? Simply put, because that is a gene that evolutionary theory can never explain. If evolution is all about survival of the fittest and becoming more able to survive in a competitive world, then why in the world our bodies mutate a gene so that we would believe in a higher being? What evolutionary purpose would that fulfill? The only explanation of such a gene that is reasonable in my humble opinion is that God himself created us with a built in desire to know Him. God designed us to know that there is a God.
In conclusion, therefore, if you really come at this topic with an open mind, the only evidence that is truly overwhelming is that God does exist, and that he has created us to follow Him. I hope you find this little comment insightful and, perhaps, a little instructive as you search for the truth.
Phyllis Pipher
On October 1, 2008 at 12:03 am
I can not imagine any one who sees how our bodies work and not believe in God It’s as simple as that. I’m so glad Iam a Christian.
Brandon
On October 13, 2008 at 10:52 am
Good Post. There are a lot of things that make no sense to me personally but it doesn’t mean they are not true or can’t be true. I think if one approaches the concept of God according to the definitions of religion then of course it can be easy to disprove or prove depending on what is considered evidence. But saying it makes no sense doesn’t mean it is nonsense. There are many aspects of the big bang theory still not understood to laypeople or scientists alike, but it is not dismissed as nonsense. Obviously BB and God are in different categories but I am sure reasonable people can make a reasonable case for a belief in a God outside of religion, such as the case Paul Davies makes. I too have transitioned out of Christianity, but still think the idea of a God is plausible.
Sammy
On November 20, 2008 at 10:35 am
I believe in god this has made me become stronger as a belever and as a person you must read this it will help i promis.