I have been having an ongoing dialogue with a theist friend from work. Yesterday he encouraged me to study the Bible. I thought about it for about 24 hours, and ended up emailing him this:
So yesterday at the end of lunch, you encouraged me to "really" study
the Bible. I don't remember your exact words, but the implication was
that, thus far in my 38 years of living and 30+ years of identifying as a
believer, that I had somehow failed to study the Bible as effectively
as I could have. Another way of looking at it is that you are saying
that there is a way I could study the Bible now (perhaps studying
specific parts of it, or all of it, or with a certain mindset or a
certain level of intensity, or maybe a certain number of hours a day, or
maybe even by praying a certain way before studying it so that
otherwise inaccessible truths may be revealed to me) that would allow me
believe in God, where all the rest of studying I've done in my life
failed to give God a fair chance in my life.
I've been thinking about that most of the afternoon and evening yesterday, and most of the morning as well.
You have been a believer (I use that term since you have, on almost
every occasion expressed a dislike of the term "Christian", and always
attempted to make the distinction between what you are, and
"Christians.") since the 70s, you told me yesterday. About 30 years. I
also spent 30+ years of my life convinced that there was a God, that I
was a sinner, and that my only hope for Salvation was to accept Jesus
into my heart and acknowledge the sacrifice He made for me. In my adult
life, I've spent hours reading the Bible, either on my own, or in
response to a specific Bible study or Sunday school lesson I'd been
assigned to learn. I've spent hours praying, and have experienced
intense emotions quite frequently during those times. I interpreted
those feelings as the Holy Spirit communicating to me. I was sure that
God was speaking to me, through the Holy Spirit, in a non-verbal way to
answer my requests for guidance, comfort, a wife, etc. I made important
life decisions based on these "answers" with confidence that God was
showing me the right choice to make.
If your implication is true, and I somehow in all of my 38 years of
living just haven't tried hard enough, or studied the Bible the right
way, or the right parts of it, or have failed in some way to truly open
myself up to God, then what does that mean? I can tell you that for all
of the time that I did call myself a Christian, I was absolutely sure
that I did have a relationship with God, that he did answer my prayers,
and that I was going to be in His family eternally when I died from this
earth. So are you saying that it's possible for a person to study
God's word for decades, pray to Him that whole time, and still somehow
not have a true relationship with Him? Seriously? What does that say
about God? Is He really making Himself so elusive that 30 years of
trying to have a relationship with Him could fail? Or maybe it wasn't
Him. Maybe it was me. But I can assure you that I genuinely tried with
all of my heart and all of my abilities to have a relationship with Him
and to please Him and do His will. I gave it everything I had, which
is everything He gave me. So do I not have enough? Did He not give me
enough that I could have a true relationship with Him? How does that
make any sense at all? Seriously? If He is that hard to find, how can
any other amount of studying and praying bring me to Him?
From other things you've told me, you seem to believe that the Christian
community is full of fair-weather fakes who do not have a true
relationship with God (As I mentioned before, you almost always make the
distinction between yourself and "Christians", so you've certainly gone
to great effort to point out that there is a difference, making the
implication that there are lots of fakes out there). So the implication
is that you are pretty certain you have a true relationship with God,
but that you are suspicious of many other people claim the same thing.
What do you have as a basis for making this distinction? What do you
have besides feeling God in your heart? Don't you think me and,
excepting the truly deceitful, every other self professed Christian on
the planet has felt what you feel, and been as sure of their
relationship with God as you are? What kind of being is God if this
many people can be duped into thinking they have a relationship with Him
when they really don't? What kind being would make it so damned hard
to really get it right that even the people that are trying with all
their might can fail? It makes absolutely no sense to me.
As for studying the Bible, I've been doing it more in the last few
months than in the last few years, and I will continue to do so for the
foreseeable future. I will examine it with a critical and questioning
eye. If God truly exists, I'm still giving Him plenty of chance to show
me. If He is as elusive as you seem to think, and I end up in Hell
because of it, then what else could I have done? It's not like I'm
sitting down here shaking my fists at Him in anger and avoiding him.
I'm spending 2-3 hours a day reading a mixture of the Bible, and other
people's opinions on it (Atheists and Christian Apologists alike). So
if He is really there, I'm exposing myself to His book, and plenty of
discussion about Him and His book where he could lead me back to Him.
If that's not enough, He could blind me on the roadside and speak to me
directly. I'm not trying to hide from Him, but it really feels like
He's trying to hide from me.
