How should you choose your religion?

[Muffled]

But you believe in Jesus with your heart, don't you? Why say the heart means only one thing, that to trust that love is the same meaning of the heart, as giving into selfish desires, or something filled with rage? Yes, the heart is both, isn't it? If it's only wicked, that do you say your wicked heart loves Christ? That's flatly contradictory.


Spiritual darkness is our own masking of light. And how do you tell the difference in yourself, except by the manifestation of fruit, right? A good tree does not bring forth evil fruit. Isn't the entire thing about nurturing a good heart within us? Teaching us the better way to "let your light so shine"?


But what does that mean? How will you know what that means? Because someone read something he said, puts their understanding into the meaning of it, and then tells you this is the truth? How do you discern, except with the heart? How do you discern with the heart if you do not know how to hear it and listen to it?

"By their fruits you shall know them", those who are true in heart, not by their beliefs or doctrines.


This means you don't trust that "still small voice" which is within you. You try instead to find it outside yourself.

I believe in Jesus because He is truth but I love Him because He first loved me. Choosing to follow him was not a matter of the heart but of the will.

I don't say the heart is only wicked. However one may not depend on it being good all the time either.

I tell the difference by Jesus who is the light. If His light is in me then I am in the light.

Jesus in me is the truth in me so that the interpretation of the word is not mine but His.

This assessment is I believe incorrect because the voice of Jesus is not a feeling. I do not look outside myself for Jesus. I believe Jesus is in me.

 

[Muffled]

I was born to a Christian mother that let me chose my own way. She lived Christianity. I decided to read the Bible when I was 15 or 16. I started in Genesis and read through Revelation. I decided that Jehovah and Jesus were for me. I've yet to find an organization that follows the Bible better than I do, so I call myself an unchurched Christian.

I may not find a place to fellowship until the 2nd coming of Jesus of Nazareth the Messiah.

I go to church where Jesus sends me and that is to church. Although He may take exception with the teachings He endures them as do I. I think that view is consistent with his statement that we are in the world but not a part of it. I am in the church but that doesn't mean that I take part in false teaching.

I believe then all will be as should be.

 

[Windwalker]

I believe in Jesus because He is truth but I love Him because He first loved me. Choosing to follow him was not a matter of the heart but of the will.

The will simply is intention, which follows what is first in the heart. The will keeps you intent on a path which you chose. Ones will chooses nothing. You choose with the heart and the mind, and you are true through the will.

I don't say the heart is only wicked. However one may not depend on it being good all the time either.

Oh but you did say it cannot be trusted when you said "The Bible says that the heart is desperatley wicked," as your response to Shiranui117 saying "Go with what speaks to your heart, with what helps you grow spiritually, with what you find to be the truth, and with what you feel a divine calling towards".

This says to me that you don't listen to what is in your heart because you tell others not to. You quote (misapply) a verse that is speaking of being swept away by emotional impulse and lying to ourselves to tell others that you have to set aside, or at the least make totally suspicious and untrustworthy anything that seems to contradict a religious idea. I am all too familiar with this telling people to distrust their instincts, to never ever listen to doubt, never question what somebody says the Bible says, etc, because, "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked".

That is really a disservice to people, and a complete hindrance to spiritual growth. Spirituality is all about learning to know that inner voice.

I tell the difference by Jesus who is the light. If His light is in me then I am in the light.

Explain how that works. I hear the words, and then I hear a contradiction to those words when you misapply the Bible saying, "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked." I hear people say Christ is in me, and it sounds more like a formula, some thing you do and then you supposedly just 'get' and then that means all is functional and working okay. To me to say "Christ is in me", means you are internally, body, mind, and spirit, in accord with this.

"Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus". It's not some magic pill you took and now suddenly you're protected!! It's an actual, realized transformation of the mind and the heart and the will. And if that is there, then its highly doubtful you would run straightway to saying "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked," in response to somebody saying you should go with what the heart shows you in making a religious choice! You would understand how that works through your own experience.

Jesus in me is the truth in me so that the interpretation of the word is not mine but His.

That scares me the way you say this. You mean you're not in their anywhere? What happens when you encounter another believer who reads scripture other than you somehow magically get the right interpretation? Are you right? This is very scary to hear you divest yourself of any responsibility here.

This assessment is I believe incorrect because the voice of Jesus is not a feeling. I do not look outside myself for Jesus. I believe Jesus is in me.

Again, you show you don't understand what I am talking about. You apparently can't relate to it, to what hearing that "still small voice" that I was referencing from the Bible itself. You say "I believe Jesus is in me", yet you can't hear? Simply saying "I believe" does not equate to "I realize". Not remotely close.

 

[Avoice]

I go to church where Jesus sends me and that is to church. Although He may take exception with the teachings He endures them as do I. I think that view is consistent with his statement that we are in the world but not a part of it. I am in the church but that doesn't mean that I take part in false teaching.

I believe then all will be as should be.

I'm glad you think Jesus or Jehovah, or either one, endures determined error. The Bible tells us to be searching for the face of God every day, not running from it.

How can one fellowship with those who partake in such false teachings and make no effort to inform them of their error? Sadly, I don't believe ignorance of the teachings in the Bible is an excuse before God; before man perhaps; before God no.

I've not been able to discuss God or the teachings of Jesus in very many of the organizations I've been to, and in all if one disagrees with their fearless leader one is put down harshly. I cannot live that way. I'd rather be a Bible
engrossed hermit.

 

[Aamer]

after about one year and half here i met wonderful ppl with different beliefs, i just want to ask how everybody should choose his religion?

should s/he choose what fits him ideas or to follow a religion with evidences and proofs even if s/he is convinced it's not a right one, but the right one doesn't fit her/him?

It should be about finding the truth and of course logic should play a part. What's the point in following a religion that suits your lifestyle if it is based on falsehoods or lacks evidence? But I think most people follow whatever religion they were born into due to societal and family pressure.

 

[Aamer]

All religion is right... it is the people that make it wrong by saying other's religion is not true and try to force down their belief to others.

I have not seen any true religious person react in a negative way towards another person that is of not their religion. True religious people have respect towards others, they can talk about the differences of their religions but in a respectful manner and never aim to put down the other.

So how I chose my belief? Through logic. I found that the concept of Karma explains everything that is 'unjust' in the world.

Don't get too uptight about which belief you wish to uphold. Ultimately, if you're a good practitioner, no matter what religion you decide to hold on to, will make you the best of person in the world and you will see at the end of our lives how you never have any regrets because you've lived a life that benefited others, not harming others.

All religions can not be right, especially when most contradict each other. If there is a car behind the wall and we can't see it, it can't be both red and blue at the same time. There's only one truth. Perhaps what you mean is that all religions promote righteousness in their own way. That's different from all of them being right or the truth.

 

[Windwalker]

All religions can not be right, especially when most contradict each other. If there is a car behind the wall and we can't see it, it can't be both red and blue at the same time.

Or, it may be no car at all.

The Blind Men and the Elephant

"A number of blind men came to an elephant. Somebody told them that it was an elephant. The blind men asked, ‘What is the elephant like?’ and they began to touch its body. One of them said: 'It is like a pillar.' This blind man had only touched its leg. Another man said, ‘The elephant is like a husking basket.’ This person had only touched its ears. Similarly, he who touched its trunk or its belly talked of it differently. In the same way, he who has seen the Lord in a particular way limits the Lord to that alone and thinks that He is nothing else."
​

 

[Aamer]

Sure. It may be no car at all. But you can't have one guy say it's red, another says it's blue, another says it's green and another says there is no car and then say they're all correct. There can only be one truth.

 

[Windwalker]

Sure. It may be no car at all. But you can't have one guy say it's red, another says it's blue, another says it's green and another says there is no car and then say they're all correct. There can only be one truth.

Why can't they all be correct if none can see what it is as in the story of the blind men and the elephant? They are all partially correct, and all wrong in saying they have the truth of it. None can see it as it is. And even if you say that someone can see it, without the frame of reference that being sighted can offer you, seeing it directly for yourself and not the report of another, you still have the blind men only hearing about it, and coming away with partial truths based on their limited perceptions.

In other words none of them a right, yet each truth of theirs is a valid interpretation for themselves with what limited access they have. In other words, it doesn't matter if someone claims to have the "true prophet", when they themselves can't see the elephant.

 

[Aamer]

It's a simple issue. You're confusing it and getting too philosophical with it. Whatever is on the other side if that wall is what is there. 6 people with contradicting opinions can not all be right. Either just one opinion is right or they're all wrong. Any other option is not possible if their opinions contradict each other.

 

[Windwalker]

It's a simple issue. You're confusing it and getting too philosophical with it.

You're over-simplifying it, and making it not fit reality. 10.000 people looking at the same thing will have 10,000 individual understandings of that thing. You are familiar with how witnesses in a courtroom will all report seeing something differently, and they we all verified witness at the scene? There's tons of research into this phenomena. It's not philosophical at all. It's psychological. Each one is speaking truth. No one can directly know 'reality' without all those factors that mediate understanding. They are not lying, and are speaking truth, as they see it. Not one bypasses that process and therefore is the Absolute Truth on the matter.

It's not a simple issue whatsoever. That's black and white thinking in a highly complex world of how we experience and understand reality. I understand the appeal to wanting it to be so, but it simply is not that way in the real world.

So what do you think of the Blind Men and the Elephant story? All men are blind. All men see only partial truth. They were not contradicting each other, only unless they were insistent its a "simple matter", and they are right. If you pull back and look at the whole, they are all right, and all wrong.

Whatever is on the other side if that wall is what is there.

But when it comes to God, is there an "other side of the wall", and furthermore, is there any "thing" to be observed? What I mean is that is God an object? Is God a thing, "out there", beyond some wall, located some "place"? Or, is God the Subject of all that is, and that us being part of all that is, it is impossible for anyone to be "outside" that in order to see God.

I don't assume God to be an object.

6 people with contradicting opinions can not all be right.

Are you really sure about that? What about the Blind Men and the Elephant? What about the courtroom witness phenomena? What human do you know who bypasses a mediated reality, created and filtered through language, culture, personality, etc, etc.?

Either just one opinion is right or they're all wrong. Any other option is not possible if their opinions contradict each other.

Nope.

 

[Aamer]

Haha. Let's agree to disagree. I do agree with you though that God is not an object and the creator is beyond the comprehension of our limited abilities. I was just using the car behind the wall as an example to show absolutes. For example, if Christians say Jesus is the literal son of God while Muslims and Jews say he's not. Both can't be correct. He either is or he isn't. That's just one small example of differences between religions. Now, I do believe that every organized religion has it wrong in some easy. I don't think it's about being a member of a particular group. That's just human nature to form a gang and develop a superiority complex, taking pride in our gang and saying everybody else is wrong. Rather, It's about seeking the truth to the best of your abilities and having a personal relationship with God. Just my opinion based on the scriptures I have read so far.

 

[Windwalker]

Haha. Let's agree to disagree.

I'm curious if you actually know the research and schools of thought I am referring to, or if this comment is just a way to not try to understanding something that seems so "wrong" to you? To simply laugh it away, doesn't impress me.

I do agree with you though that God is not an object and the creator is beyond the comprehension of our limited abilities. I was just using the car behind the wall as an example to show absolutes. For example, if Christians say Jesus is the literal son of God while Muslims and Jews say he's not. Both can't be correct. He either is or he isn't.

Define "Son of God". I would say that Jesus is the son of God. So am I. So are you. You see, to say something like this is extremely abstract. It is not like talking about a physical object like a car. The world simply cannot be reduced to black and white facts.

The minute you move away from the material word, it becomes enormously more complex and fuzzy as to what things mean. When it comes to the human mind and emotions, it is anything but like a "car" or some material object. Relationship are full of nuances and subtitles. Let alone when you move up into taking about the spiritual domain! This is anything but a concrete reality. Words are fluid and abstract, dynamic and utterly symbolic, metaphoric, non-literal.

The problem with religious believers, many of them, is they don't stand back from what these words mean and try to take them as flat facts, like that car in your example. You do realize that Christian theology has evolved enormously in understanding, and that a single symbol can be seen and interpreted numerous ways? "He either is or he isn't", is trying to reduce the spiritual to something like looking at your car out your window. That's absurd.

What the valid thing to say is is not they are either right or wrong, but rather to say what I will say which is this is how they understand what that means for themselves. I don't see it the same way. It is right in the context of how they see the world for themselves, and not right for me in how I see the world in my context. How I see it is not right for them, but it is true and valid for me. I see Jesus as the son of God, but not in the way they do. Where is the "either he is or isn't" in my comment?

That's just one small example of differences between religions. Now, I do believe that every organized religion has it wrong in some easy. I don't think it's about being a member of a particular group. That's just human nature to form a gang and develop a superiority complex, taking pride in our gang and saying everybody else is wrong. Rather, It's about seeking the truth to the best of your abilities and having a personal relationship with God. Just my opinion based on the scriptures I have read so far.

Well, here's where we agree to agree.

 

[Avoice]

If I may ask, what standards do you use? What makes your way of following Christianity better than anyone else's? What are your beliefs and practices?

A lot of questions:

1) I read the Bible daily. For 20 years I read it consecutively from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation and worked on whatever I found I lacked from Jesus' teachings.

2) Organizations do not work on their own lackings by and large. Individuals in each may, but trying to get into that crowd is like pulling teeth. I do the best I can to follow the teachings of Jesus first and the epistles second, OT third.

3) Put Jehovah first along with Jesus at His right hand and love my neighbors as I would have them love me. That is spiritual love. I have no practices other than doing my best to live up to Jesus' expectations of me. I avoid what the commandments say to avoid, where I have God's help to do so (my error is cusing). Other than that I'm a law abiding citizen.

Are you willing to answer your own questions as shortly?

 

[Muffled]

I'm glad you think Jesus or Jehovah, or either one, endures determined error. The Bible tells us to be searching for the face of God every day, not running from it.

How can one fellowship with those who partake in such false teachings and make no effort to inform them of their error? Sadly, I don't believe ignorance of the teachings in the Bible is an excuse before God; before man perhaps; before God no.

I've not been able to discuss God or the teachings of Jesus in very many of the organizations I've been to, and in all if one disagrees with their fearless leader one is put down harshly. I cannot live that way. I'd rather be a Bible
engrossed hermit.

I usually do inform as to what I believe is false teaching but cease if it appears the person is not teachable. The usual way one fellowships is in the way that a person is a fellow. So although I may lack fellowship with false teaching, I am able to fellowsip with true teaching.

I have been called before the elders in two different churches and in one they muffled me so that I didn't feel comfortable enough to stay although I visit on occasion. I agree it is difficult but it isn't as though you were stoned, crucified or burned at the stake. The way it works is that I will be salt and light as much as I can be.

I don't believe this is God's will in general but I wouldn't rule it out in an individual case.

 

[Muffled]

The will simply is intention, which follows what is first in the heart. The will keeps you intent on a path which you chose. Ones will chooses nothing. You choose with the heart and the mind, and you are true through the will.


Oh but you did say it cannot be trusted when you said "The Bible says that the heart is desperatley wicked," as your response to Shiranui117 saying "Go with what speaks to your heart, with what helps you grow spiritually, with what you find to be the truth, and with what you feel a divine calling towards".

This says to me that you don't listen to what is in your heart because you tell others not to. You quote (misapply) a verse that is speaking of being swept away by emotional impulse and lying to ourselves to tell others that you have to set aside, or at the least make totally suspicious and untrustworthy anything that seems to contradict a religious idea. I am all too familiar with this telling people to distrust their instincts, to never ever listen to doubt, never question what somebody says the Bible says, etc, because, "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked".

That is really a disservice to people, and a complete hindrance to spiritual growth. Spirituality is all about learning to know that inner voice.


Explain how that works. I hear the words, and then I hear a contradiction to those words when you misapply the Bible saying, "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked." I hear people say Christ is in me, and it sounds more like a formula, some thing you do and then you supposedly just 'get' and then that means all is functional and working okay. To me to say "Christ is in me", means you are internally, body, mind, and spirit, in accord with this.

"Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus". It's not some magic pill you took and now suddenly you're protected!! It's an actual, realized transformation of the mind and the heart and the will. And if that is there, then its highly doubtful you would run straightway to saying "The Bible says the heart is desperately wicked," in response to somebody saying you should go with what the heart shows you in making a religious choice! You would understand how that works through your own experience.


That scares me the way you say this. You mean you're not in their anywhere? What happens when you encounter another believer who reads scripture other than you somehow magically get the right interpretation? Are you right? This is very scary to hear you divest yourself of any responsibility here.


Again, you show you don't understand what I am talking about. You apparently can't relate to it, to what hearing that "still small voice" that I was referencing from the Bible itself. You say "I believe Jesus is in me", yet you can't hear? Simply saying "I believe" does not equate to "I realize". Not remotely close.

My heart may want too much chocolate but my mind knows that too much chocolate isn't good for me and my will decides to follow my mind instead of my heart. After deciding I may intend not to eat too much chocolate but fall victim to my appetite or I may act on my will as it overpowers my appetite and desires.

The heart is not always wicked (I am repeating myself) so I do listen to my heart when it is good. Ro 10:10 for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
However one can not just listen to the heart and count on it being good since it quite often is not.

First of all I believe it is not a misappropriation of scripture and the scripture says nothing about emotional impulse. I suppose you are saying that emotional impulse comes from the heart but that is not necessarily true as you indicated by mentioning instinct although I suspect that in most cases that is something due to a psychological trigger. For instance chocolate may touch the psyche which associates it with family gatherings at Christmas and Thanksgiving and the heart responds in kind. Although this is an example of a good psychosis there are also some that are damaging. So what ae you saying, that people whould follow something nebulous as though that were more valuable than what God has to say?

There is no contradiction. Jesus uses scripture. The Spirit of God works in me the way my spirit would work in me as a conscience and in part to control the mind and thereby my body. I say in part because the mind has a will of its own.
My spirit is in accord although I believe my mind is the recepter and decision maker so it is also in accord.

It is impossible to have the mind of Christ. What is real is to have the intelligence of the Spirit of God which was in Christ and that expressed itself through the mind of Christ giving the same appearance. Having this inelligence then I can aptly say that the scripture applies.

I am there as an observer. If there is a difference it is because someone thinks he has the Spirit of God but does not. I usually ask God if He has spoken to the other person. I once had this happen and God showed me that there was not a contradiction as it appeared but that there were different aspects to the same issue. Another time God simply told me He wasn't speaking to the person who thought he was hearing Him.

On the contrary, I am fully conversant with the still small voice and walked with Jesus that way for many years before reaching my present exalted state.
I say I believe in order to follow site rules that say I can't state it categorically.
He will still communicate with me in that way on occasion.

 

[England my lionheart]

this is the closest answer to my heart

What if you wrote every single religion in the world down on some pieces of paper,maybe the size of "post it" notes and wearing a blind fold shuffle them round so you cannot tell where each is,then taking a pin in your hand and asking for supreme guidance you stab at the papers and where the pin falls thats the religion,just to make sure you do it at least three times but it should land on the same one each time.

 

[Me Myself]

Jesus said that the worship of God would not be easy....
Matthew 7:13 “Go in through the narrow gate; because broad and spacious is the road leading off into destruction, and many are the ones going in through it; 14 whereas narrow is the gate and cramped the road leading off into life, and few are the ones finding it."

One of the things which makes the road to life difficult is the fact that it requires sacrifice as Jesus said:
Matthew 16:24
Then Jesus said to his disciples: “If anyone wants to come after me, let him disown himself and pick up his torture stake and continually follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save his soul will lose it; but whoever loses his soul for my sake will find it"

So upon finding that road to life, it may not be what you expect or what you wanted, it may not be easy but its well worth the effort.

The most narrow road to one is the most broad one to another, so if Jesus really thought that as a maxim, then he would have been really open about different religions fitting for different people.

Then again, I am sure this religion would be ****loads harder than christianity for most christian and it definetely involves a complete disregard for your own life and physical health :

[Youtube]GEpJdHS1pV0[/youtube]

 

[LuisDantas]

after about one year and half here i met wonderful ppl with different beliefs, i just want to ask how everybody should choose his religion?

I guess you either learn from others (family, mainly) and decide that it is fine for you to accept those beliefs unchanged, or you question them to some degree.

There is no ready-made way far as I can tell.

should s/he choose what fits him ideas

Definitely. There is no point in attempting to believe in something that you don't find sound.

or to follow a religion with evidences and proofs even if s/he is convinced it's not a right one, but the right one doesn't fit her/him?

Again, there is no point in attempting such a feat. I'm not sure a religion can even have evidence and proofs and still be a religion.

Maybe I'm missing something?

 

[InChrist]

Since I believe eternal destiny is impacted by spiritual beliefs where one places their faith makes choosing wisely very important. I can think of no better way than to sincerely ask and seek direction from the Creator.