Comments on: Mental Xenophobia and Retaining Beliefs

By: Frank

Frank — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 05:48:01 +0000

Hi Conrad,
Thanks for your message. You speak (I understand negatively) of:
“the process of creating a belief and protecting a personal world view”.
I believe “belief” is not something we should ever try to create.
Our “personal world view” (particularly about God) must be developed through personal experiment, desiring above all things to discover the truth.

In my opinion, it is foolish to believe something because:

1) It’s what you were brought up to believe,
2) It’s what someone persuaded you to believe,
3) It’s a belief you chose because you thought it sounded nice.

It is essential to check out the facts (as far as is practical) before you believe something. My discovery concerning God, is that He teaches anyone who sincerely cries out to Him for the truth !

(Which (as I see it) is what the Bible actually teaches !)

By: askland

askland — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 19:14:46 +0000

Thanks for sharing. If you’ll notice, my blog post does not speak directly of any particular belief – but is instead about the process of creating a belief and protecting a personal world view.

By: Frank

Frank — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 09:25:52 +0000

“Study the opposite of what you believe !”
Wow ! What a challenge !
Guess what ? I did that very thing !

For the first 27 years of my life, I was a total unbeliever.
I took great pleasure in arguing with anyone who tried to convince me of God’s existence.
I always knew my arguments were a million miles better than theirs.
In my 28th year, the day came when I was chatting with a friend, unloading great distress and worry.
(Yes, OK, it was over a case of unrequited love.)

My friend said, “Well Frank, Arl pray for yer.” (Aussie accent.)
I said, “Huh ! I might even pray myself !” (I was THAT low !)
My friend said, “When yer pray, yer gotta ask God ter forgive yer fer what yer’ve done wrong, and yer gotta thank ‘im fer what ee’s done for yer.”

Armed with this data, over the next few days, I began to pray, just as I’d been told, and asking God for the help I felt I needed.
Things started to happen.
One night (over another matter), I was in great emotional distress, facing a situation I felt I just totally couldn’t cope with.
I asked God’s forgiveness, I thanked him for all he had done for me, and I asked him to change me deep inside, to give me the courage and patience and all the other stuff I needed to carry on. I went to sleep straight away, which was amazing, considering how I felt.
I woke up the next morning, feeling incredibly full of life and strength and everything I needed to cope with what faced me. This was a million times more than just a good night’s sleep (which I know I wouldn’t have got without God doing something).

I got invited to a church that preached the gospel. I started reading the Gospels very sceptically, asking the Lord to convince me if it was true or false. To cut a long story short, I became a Christian, convinced of the Gospel because I checked it out for myself, and found it worked when put into practice.
I can now honestly say to anyone,
“Forget religion. Check out what Jesus actually taught. It works.”