My Journey

​A couple of years ago while teaching a class on one of Paul’s Epistles I made the following statement.  “You cannot believe in something you do not know.”  I was surprised that some in the class disagreed.  It wasn’t until later that I realized the disagreement was really centered around not understanding the difference between knowing and having an opinion.  Opinions are judgements or appraisals we form about subjects on which we lack factual knowledge.  Often times those judgements are based on an experience and therefore have an emotional element attached.  That makes them hard to let go of even it not true.
 
What makes this relevant is the premise of my first Blog post: Knowledge of God is not intuitive.  Of all the different possibilities, opinions and religions that exist, only one of the following options is true.  Either all are false or one of them is true.  At a fairly early age I had figured out there can only be one infinite being.  Infinite by definition means no boundaries.  Therefore poly-theistic religions are suspect because they stop short of identifying the one supreme and necessary existence.  I found the atheist denial of an intelligent deity was plagued with no viable explanation for our origins.  Plenty of theories but no way to test them leaves us with the option of pick which ever one you like and believe it.  But that circled me back to the issue of believing something I can’t know as factually real. 
 
So, in the late 1960’s while serving in the military I found a new urgency to come up with a world view that rang of truth.  I wanted answers to some very serious questions.  The big one being does our subconscious sense of immortality mean something.  Sigmund Freud was surprised by that and admitted there wasn’t an evolutionary explanation for it.  He stuck with atheism. My concern was a bit more pedestrian.  Being a theist, I wanted to know if our trip through this reality lead to a heaven or hell.  I had opinions but nothing I could say were factually true. 
And that is when I crossed paths with some Bible believing Christians.  They took time to explain what Christmas and Easter were all about.  I was provided material that laid out the prophetic support for the Deity of Jesus Christ and the evidence for His resurrection having actually happened.  No pressure just a rationale that made sense and was supported by eyewitness testimony.  55 years ago I believed Jesus Christ was able and willing to give me everlasting life for believing in Him.  And that has made all the difference.