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Experiencing God's Love

tinker683

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I meant no offense...I'm thinking more of intellectual scientist types; those that think there is a Theory of Everything sans God.

Ah ok. No offense was really taken and I apologize if I sounded annoyed in my post, it's just something that's come up multiple times for me over the years and I really just don't have much of an answer for it and it's kind of annoying when someone just dismisses YEARS of soul searching so nonchalantly. I know many believers have expressed similar frustrations when nonbelievers accuse them of not thinking or of "being stupid" as it's a very similar dismissal of their own respective journeys and it's why I don't do it.

I genuinely do want to believe, I'd love to find some sort of deity that did care about me and wanted the best for me. I've actually started going back to my old Lutheran church as, after so many years of not going, I feel like it's something I need to do and it's where my journey is taking me. Maybe I'll reconvert, maybe I won't, maybe I'll reach some other point. I don't know, but it's something I feel like I need to do.
 

Lark

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plain english, please. i don't understand what you are getting at with the bold.

Sorry that is plain english. If you fundamentally doubt that your significant other loves or relates to you can it ever be sufficiently evidenced to the contrary? The same goes for belief in God. Or in God's love and relating to mankind.
 
A

Anew Leaf

Guest
Sorry that is plain english. If you fundamentally doubt that your significant other loves or relates to you can it ever be sufficiently evidenced to the contrary? The same goes for belief in God. Or in God's love and relating to mankind.

I guess I don't understand why it was directed at me. That's why this made no sense.

I was responding primarily to people posting and then having others write up posts questioning their beliefs.
 

Lark

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I guess I don't understand why it was directed at me. That's why this made no sense.

I was responding primarily to people posting and then having others write up posts questioning their beliefs.

It wasnt a specific reply, it was just a general point. What you had typed made me think of it. Perhaps.
 
A

A window to the soul

Guest
Tell us about a time that you experienced God's amazing love for you.

I've experienced God's love through peace and joy that transcends all understanding. It's a love that transcends any loves I've ever known.

So though God's love has changed me in so many ways, I still have humanly pride that tries to surface when I want to be the best at EVERYTHING, or when protocols are breached, or communication gets poor, or when something is crashing & burning and I’m in over my head; in which case, let’s mosey off a cliff, nobody will miss me. Who could ever love someone like that? Guess what, God can. It’s in times like those that I’ve experienced God’s love in the most miraculous ways; where when looking back, I was able to clearly see where God carried me through.

Finally, I’ve experienced God's love working through people. :]


(Deuteronomy 31:8) "The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged."
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
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I like your post in general, and I used to say things like this before I really believed in God again. But,

I don't often find what I think I need and I am very open.

I reconcile this by believing that what I think I need is different than what God thinks I need.
I think we are not so much disagreeing, as having different perspectives of similar experiences. Now and then I do not achieve something I want despite my best efforts. In these cases, I have learned to reevaluate my goals and wishes, and go with the flow that seems to be coming my way. I have invariably found something even better than what I originally wanted. Perhaps you would describe this as the difference between what you want and what God wants for you. I see it as harmonizing my individual Will with the pattern of the universe. My perspective does not arise from atheism. I am actually quite spiritual, my view of deity is just far from the mainstream, and this is one way I relate to it.

The way I frame my goals and wishes has evolved somewhat in response to this. They have become more broad, more general, so as not to overconstrain solutions or exclude worthwhile opportunities. I also think in terms of gaining the ability to solve a problem or reach a goal, rather than being handed the solution or the result directly. I see myself, then, as very much a participant rather than a recipient.

I meant no offense...I'm thinking more of intellectual scientist types; those that think there is a Theory of Everything sans God.
As someone who most days passes for an "intellectual scientist type", I can tell you that, when my personal faith and spirituality were at their most tenuous, it was the writings of great classical scientists like Galileo and Newton that kept me from losing faith altogether, and set my spiritual development back on track. We are not all godless unfeeling know-it-alls. In fact, we are often in a unique position to observe and appreciate the wonder of the creator through creation itself.

@ OP: I suppose I do not so much experience God's love as I feel God's wonder.
 

Mole

Permabanned
Joined
Mar 20, 2008
Messages
20,284
Longing for Love

As babies we all needed to be loved in order to survive.

And as children and adolescents we needed to be loved in order to thrive.

But many of us weren't loved enough in order to thrive and so we are constantly looking for love.

And so we are easily exploited by those who peddle God's Love.

Our only consolation is that the worst has already happened and that we weren't loved enough in order to thrive, leaving us to neurotically search for love for the rest of our lives. Each one of us is the Flying Dutchman, condemned to sail the seas forever and never put into port.

The port
was longing

the port
was longing

not for
this ship

not for
that ship

not for
this ship

not for
that ship

the port
was longing

the port
was longing

not for
this sea

not for
that sea

not for
this sea

not for
that sea

the port
was longing

the port
was longing

not for
this &

not for
that

not for
this &

not for
that

the port
was longing

the port
was longing

not for
this &

not for
that
 

The Outsider

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I meant no offense...I'm thinking more of intellectual scientist types; those that think there is a Theory of Everything sans God.

I'd say those types are the open minded ones, since they don't jump to completely unfounded assumptions about a theoretical entity outside their perceivable universe.
 

AphroditeGoneAwry

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I think we are not so much disagreeing, as having different perspectives of similar experiences. Now and then I do not achieve something I want despite my best efforts. In these cases, I have learned to reevaluate my goals and wishes, and go with the flow that seems to be coming my way. I have invariably found something even better than what I originally wanted. Perhaps you would describe this as the difference between what you want and what God wants for you. I see it as harmonizing my individual Will with the pattern of the universe. My perspective does not arise from atheism. I am actually quite spiritual, my view of deity is just far from the mainstream, and this is one way I relate to it.

I like the way you said this. What do you mean by 'pattern of the Universe?'

How would you describe your 'view of deity?'
 

Lightyear

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Jul 3, 2008
Messages
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Tell us about a time that you experienced God's amazing love for you.

During the first half of 2010 I had a pretty shitty, lonely time at work (and I also happened to live in the same house as my employers which didn't make the situation any easier). The situation had been going on for months and I came to a point where I was so depressed that it felt like all colour had been sucked from the world and I felt so hopeless and was in so much pain that I would break out into tears at the most random moments.

In my church people believe that God can speak to you by putting phrases into your head and during each Sunday service people come forward to share what they think God has told them for the congregation. In the middle of July 2010 the associate pastor of my church shared that he had gotten the phrase "tears in the darkness" for someone in the congregation and he added "No one knows that you are crying but God knows and God sees and he will lift you up and restore you." That prophecy fit me perfectly but I was in such a state that I thought "Let's just see if anything happens at all."

Within six days the whole situation I had been struggling with for ages was completely and unexpectedly resolved. I lost my job as a result and had to find a new place to live but that was actually a blessing in disguise since I could finally move on, just breathe out and start to heal. I found a new, cheap place to live in a beautiful area without even having to try, a friend just offered it to me and I also soon got a better paid job in a much better working environment. During this whole transition period God's timing was just perfect and he showed me through many little practical and personal details how much he cared, he just treated me with such tenderness. I remember looking back and thinking, "God has saved me, he has genuinely saved me."

Also God speaks to me through art, especially music, and again I wasn't in a very good place emotionally when I watched the movie "Revolutionary Road". The soundtrack of this movie has a transcendent, otherworldly quality to it and I remember sitting in the cinema, feeling very down and God somehow comforting me and saying to me through the music that though we are struggling down here on earth there is another, a higher dimension and things will be fine, things will be okay, God is in control.

I could tell several stories of how God has supplied me with places to live, jobs, emotional support etc over the years. One of my favourite Bible verses is 2 Corinthians 4:7-9 because it shows that we can make it despite our weakness through God's power: "We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed." I really, really love God.
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
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I like the way you said this. What do you mean by 'pattern of the Universe?'

How would you describe your 'view of deity?'
How much of an answer do you really want? I'm not trying to be evasive, but while I see these ideas quite distinctly (and visually) in my mind's eye, and even feel them, any expression they might take in words will likely be quite lengthy.
 

skylights

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yesterday i went running and the sky was an incredible blazing azure blue and the trees were emerald and golden and flaming orange and crimson and the air was wet and the temperature mild and the energy was flowing through me like water.

i am not much of a theist, but i would count that experience as some beautiful type of divine love.
 
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