Shucks, this one is tough for me, I would say I always have a personal experience every Christmas, because Christmas is just one of the greatest holidays to me, but last Christmas a real Christmas miracle happened and I'm sorry about not going into detail what it was, but it was a personal experience and it helped strengthen my faith.

You're both an inspiration, and I'm unbelevably happy to hear about how you came to Christ.

I am incredibly temped to put why I'm not really that religious here but I'm not sure if I should XD

(Rest assured, I'm not a hot-headed atheist-type that blames everything on religion, it's much more about my personal philosophy and personal choice not to follow a faith)

You're certainly welcome to speak your mind. No judgement.

Okay, so, the way I see it, religion is a choice. A personal choice, and that choice should be based upon whatever helps to fulfill someone's life and bring them happiness, I can understand that belief in a heaven, or an all-loving deity can do a lot to improve someone's quality of life and state of mind, regardless of whether those things actually exist, though it's all about faith anyway. And it would be ignorant of me to claim that such people are ignorant, which is a mistake quite a few atheists make. In fact, my definition of ignorance is intolerance of new ideas and an unwillingness to compromise beliefs, this is commonly associated with deeply religious people, but it's wrong to make such an assumption, I will judge people on an individual basis, I always hold that everyone I meet can argue rationally unless they can prove me otherwise. At the same time, I can't, unlike some atheists proclaim myself a paragon of rationality, we are all human, none of us are perfect, and I think nearly everyone on the planet regards themselves as rational, reality can be subjective like that.

Hence why I don't think I will ever follow a faith. It is my personal choice not to, and it's what makes me content with myself. To sortof illustrate that, if the Juedo-Christian God appeared before us, then I would not be a christian, because I would not be happy with the lifestyle, there are aspects of Christianity that I disagree with (though many parts of it that I agree with in terms of morality) and I don't think I could commit myself to pleasing a deity, and if god is truely all loving, then he would accept that choice.

You see, the closest thing to a religion, or set of principles that I follow is the scientific method, which is nothing more than the least biased, most logical tool humanity has devised for exploring reality, and it has taken us quite far. And the scientific method has one incredible aspect, it always assumes it can be proved wrong, it does not promote any single Dogma. This is another area in which I disagree with religion, or the deeply religious. I view religion as a lifestyle choice, not as a tool for describing and modelling the universe, religion really performs weakly in that area compared to the scientific method, and yet many people push it to illogical extremes to have it treated as a proper science. I mean, for example, you're probably aware of the whole "evolution controversy" which has been a topic in the states for about a century. I don't know what your views are on it, and this isn't the most suitable place to discuss it, but I'm just using it to illustrate a point. I'm not American, but live in a western country. I learnt about evolution in quite a christian primary school, and at secondary school, again, we learned about it with no fuss. I was suprised to find it's a controversy in the states, considering the rest of the western world seems to have accepted it so well. It rather annoys me that it's controversial, as the worldwide scientific community has pretty much been in mutual acceptance for the last century, and we find more and more evidence for it all the time. It's about as accepted/proven as quantum physics, which is very much a proven theory :)

But then you have a bunch of quite religious people who don't just disagree with the theory (which they are absolutely allowed to do aslong as they actually have a scientific argument), but disagree with it on the silliest terms, a woman I talked to once said she didn't accept the theory because she'd "Never seen a cow turn into a person".

She was serious. And it reflects a core misunderstanding of evolution, and people aren't in much of a position to question it if they don't actually know what it is. (which I suppose is comparable to atheists who have a warped definition of religion). Worse still, many advocate young earth creationism, which isn't only wrong on so many levels scientifically, but is wrong theologically! I know I seem to be generalising a bit, which is what I said I didn't like to do, but there are quite a few folks who fit this stereotype, and I really wish it could be otherwise. And don't get me wrong, there are scientific arguments against evolution. It's just that America, apart from perhaps, Turkey is the only western nation where evolution is treated as a serious controversy, and acceptance rates do tend to correlate with the religiosity of a country. Rather than being a scientific controversy, it tends to be treated like matters such as abortion and gay marriage, like a social/moral issue!

So, my point here is that religion is a life style choice, it's not something that should be enforced on other people, and it's also something that should be taken with a grain of salt, holy books like the bible and Q'uran were written by different people, and in the case of the bible, about a century after Christ's death (oh yes, this thread is about Christ isn't it? Jesus' probably did exist, it's hardly unreasonable that 2000 years ago, a man looked at the world and thought "Humanity needs love and peace", and for that I respect Jesus). Books that have been rewritten by governments and religious sects to suit their beliefs/policies.

So yes, that's my opinion on the matter, religion has two sides (or at least the main religions like Christianity, Islam, Buddhism) , one side promotes peace, love, and free thinking, and the other promotes intolerance, extremism and ultimately anger and unhappiness.

I enjoyed reading this ryanjames, if you ever have a free moment and you feel like discussing more about this topic can youmessage me? I am a pretty private person lol

For a time being, going through the toughest of all things, hooked on adderall, porn, masturbation, and hate, I gave up on life wanted to kill myself a couple times, and I was always complaining, and then I decided to go back to being in a relationship with christ, but it was weak because I still didn't exactly grasp him, I went on not giving thanks and all that stuff.


But things got a little worse with committing adultery. And then the better things came, Summer Camp, and finally I asked to be sobered up from all the bad things and my old ways.

I was finally desiring him and all his ways and said "Use me!", I started having surreal conversations with the lord sometimes outside at night and stuff, laughing at how dumb the drama can be, and that I'm happy I'm not in it anymore.

So now, I have the desire to serve and pray to bless everyone in a time of war and poverty, because anyone would switch my place so that they could have a house, food, water, a loving mother, and books. And it makes me say, "Thank you, I don't know where I would be without you god".

And now lots of the past is now but memories, no more pain and sorrow.

Reading the word has helped me a lot to even see the things that evildoers do, "For the lord saves even the evildoers for an evil day." And I bless them, because that's what being humble is, and how everything in the bible is summed up "Love God and Love others".

I don't care who reads this, whoever does however I pray it helps!

God bless you, Spaps!

Well, I was raised Christian so I don't ever think there was a time in my life where I didn't believe, but my faith wavered a couple of times and I doubted God. However, each time it wavered, where did I find myself in an argument? Defending Christianity. Being raised Christian has nothing to do with it though, as Christianity makes the most sense and I am a Christian by choice. If you wanted to hear about my story of fully devoting my life to Christ, it's a bit of a boring one if I'm to be truthful. In late February of 2013, I went on a trip for a week with a few other members of my local church. On March 1st, I was supposed to go to a rally in the camp auditorium for songs and a play put on by some of the staff members. Unfortunately, the play was past midnight, and I don't like staying up late. I was miserable for most of it but part of the rally must have hit me deep because the next thing I knew, they were asking if anyone would make that prayer and devote their life to Christ, and I raised my hand. God bless you, Speerit.

God bless you too, Burgeris. What an awesome story

hey so about 4 years ago i was camping when i 11 ish i fell an hit my head well when i came too i looked like a drunk kid as soon i saw my mom she started running at me then i blacked out about 5 mins later i woke up and felt pain in my back and legs it was much pain and for some raeson i could not talk or walk at all so my mom toke me to a ER and they said they dont know what it is so after going to 5 or 6 people we found a natruist that said he has seen it before just not sa bad as mine and so the only why i could talk was doing ASL so i had a trip coming up i was able to run and play like before evey now and then i still walk some times i cant but i know that god was there sorry if some of the words are mispellt i cant type like i uesd too but i can still try

and now i am going on a trip to africa in june or july i dont know yet.

Wow God is mighty, and He has done BIG things in your life! That is splendid. Good luck in Africa!

thank you if you want to learn more let me know good day

Oh lawdy, this thread. I hate reading my old comments lmao