My conversion testimony

[Strefanash]

I posted this on a group i was a member of some years ago. my testimony of conversion




http://www.theism.net/authors/zjordan/mo...evtest.htm

[sheep wrecked]

(10-26-2009 03:21 AM)Strefanash Wrote:  I posted this on a group i was a member of some years ago. my testimony of conversion




http://www.theism.net/authors/zjordan/mo...evtest.htm

Thanx for sharing your testimony, Stref.

I am curious how your relationship with God has changed or perhaps changed your impressions since you wrote that, seeing it was several years ago.

What do you mean that your understandings of the Gospel are "logical" to your intellect - do you feel that is necessary and if so, why?

[Strefanash]

I am a lifelong rationalist: If it is not logical it is meaningless and cannot be true. If God's existence cannot be proven then atheism is a fair call. The reason that people are not queueing up to be saved however is not becasue the logic is lacking, but because honesty is lacking, as it says in romans 1: they know but willfully repress.

Of course i do not make my standards the benchmark as to what is logical. I am carnal minded, but the conviction that the truth is absolutely logical and has to be, even if i am so prejudiced as to not see it, is growing. This especially applies to paradox, where both horns of th eparadox are ratilnally necessary but put together there is an apparent contradiction. The contradiction is only apparent, even if resolution escapes us all (as in the trinity)

And if God is not rational he could not have created the natural world which is consumately rational and the Biblical faith is therefore false, for the creation would then not bear witness to God's character.

Moreover, and most importanty, if God were not rational he would not be wise, and he certainly would not be trustworthy, for were he not rational he would be capricious and driven by dangerous whims whereby I could only livein fear which could never be overcome

I need to know that my christian experience is not simple wish fulfillment, so God has reasoned with me one on one "Come let us reason together", and the outcome has been conviction of sin and repentance.

If God is not rational he cannot be loved with all ones mind. Anti intellectualism is a sin, for it is an irrational reaction to the excuses of the unbelieving: such excuses are not rational even though they try to have us believe they are

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however my relationship with God over these years has been a one on one conversation with a voice who has led and continues to lead me to face my sin to repent and be set free of it.

This voice is persuading me to acknowledge my unbelief which is at the root of my madness and fear, and to repent of it that I might come to accept the love of the Father purchased by Christ, King, God the Son, etc, on the cross and available as a free gift.

it is these doctrines that persuade me increasingly that the voice i am speaking to is the Holy Spirit and not some other

If you reject the idea of "voice" then you cannot claim i have a relationship with God. But whence came these doctrines: a voice not God and certalny not me preached the gospel with **no condemnation at all** and is setting me free? How can this be?

As to how the relationship has changed over the years, it has not, not in form or principle, but I am now being lead to acknowledge and repent of the fact that i rejected love when i was 17, for i decided it did not exist and I thought that for survival's sake in a brutal world I had to cease to seek what was unreal lest i be cut to pieces.

the conversation is deepening, and at times i have crystal clarity as to what the gospel is about, but this only have long since given up reciting the words by force and calling such recitation faith: He would have honest response, and any faith i have come to us only because i admitted the contrary and was forgiven for it and cleansed.

of course the clarity does not last, but i know that this is th eintrsactable nature of my proud unbelief.

intractable to me of course, not the Holy Spirit, so he continues

[Mary]

Thank you for sharing your testimony. While I was reading it, part of this verse came to my mind: be ye thankful. When I looked it up, these 3 verses were impressed on me:

Col 3: 15 -17: And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

I would not dispute that the Holy Spirit speaks to you - He speaks to me too, but because I am afraid of the nebulous and of just being plain wrong, He is kind (too small a word) enough to ensure that what He tells me is confirmed in writing, in His written word.

Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. Grace and peace to you.