Thank-You
I just wanted to say THANK YOU for taking the time and effort to create and maintain this web site!! I visit it almost daily and it has helped me quite immensely.
Here's my story if you care to read it. After 9-11 I was in a total state of panic. With all the talk about it being the beginning of the end of the world and such I didn't know what to do. I started to talk to a co-worker who is a devout Christian and out of fear he convinced me to accept Jesus. I'm sure with no malice intended he saw an opportunity to convert another lost soul. He told me I needed to read the Bible daily and that God's word would be revealed to me. I started reading everyday and attending weekly Bible classes, but the problem was that none of it made sense to me and I couldn't understand it. There was so much contradiction it didn't make any sense. When I asked why I couldn't make sense out of it I was assured that I would understand when God decided to reveal himself to me. The old story of I just have to have faith was the usual response!
In the mean time I continued to have conversations with this friend. He told me about Revelation and the rapture and that the world is going to go through it all in the very near future. All this time the more I read and studied the more depressed and hopeless I felt. It affected my family life and everything. I love my family more than anything in this world and when I asked about my family I was told it was up to God whether they went to heaven or hell. That was the straw that broke the camels back, I couldn't take it any more. I didn't feel any peace and love when I read the bible, all I felt was despair, loneliness , depression, & etc.
To me the Bible is full of nothing but hate, anger, bigotry, death, destruction, all the things I abhor. You're site helps me to see things clearer although I must admit I do at times still have fear of the future, anxiety about what if the end times are real, worry for my family, and other things like that.
There's that nagging little doubt about not knowing what to believe. I have friends that say Nostradamus predictions are coming true and they correspond to the Bible and we are all going to be destroyed, things like that.
It's a little disheartening!
But little by little my faith in mankind and our self reliance and will to continue on is becoming stronger and stronger. I think mankind still has a long way to go and I think that the future will be better.
I'm sorry for rambling, I'm not a very intellectual man and it's hard for me to put my thoughts into words. Thanks for listening!!!
P.S. please don't post this, it sounds like babbling and is not very good!
R
R,
Thanks for the email!
Since you asked me not to, I will not post your letter to the site. I wish you would let me post it, or an edited version, if that would be okay, as I think it would encourage others.
I am encouraged and glad that you are helped by the site. If you have read my ex-testimony, or any of the others posted on the site, you realize that you are not alone in your doubts about religion.
Now that we are out of religion, it does not mean we have the answers to all of life's questions, but we do know that blindly believing what we know is falsehood just to be accepted, or out of fear, or because it makes us feel safe about hell, or fear of the end of the world, or whatever, is foolish.
Welcome to the thinking crowd!
Or rather, welcome back!
Dave VanAllen
webmaster of ExChristian.Net
First off thanks for replying. You are right, go ahead and post it. Please edit it as you see fit, just please don't include my name or e-mail. I don't really feel like getting into debates with people.....I've had enough! Again Thanks for you're time and all that you do, Keep up the good work!!!
R
Here's my story if you care to read it. After 9-11 I was in a total state of panic. With all the talk about it being the beginning of the end of the world and such I didn't know what to do. I started to talk to a co-worker who is a devout Christian and out of fear he convinced me to accept Jesus. I'm sure with no malice intended he saw an opportunity to convert another lost soul. He told me I needed to read the Bible daily and that God's word would be revealed to me. I started reading everyday and attending weekly Bible classes, but the problem was that none of it made sense to me and I couldn't understand it. There was so much contradiction it didn't make any sense. When I asked why I couldn't make sense out of it I was assured that I would understand when God decided to reveal himself to me. The old story of I just have to have faith was the usual response!
In the mean time I continued to have conversations with this friend. He told me about Revelation and the rapture and that the world is going to go through it all in the very near future. All this time the more I read and studied the more depressed and hopeless I felt. It affected my family life and everything. I love my family more than anything in this world and when I asked about my family I was told it was up to God whether they went to heaven or hell. That was the straw that broke the camels back, I couldn't take it any more. I didn't feel any peace and love when I read the bible, all I felt was despair, loneliness , depression, & etc.
To me the Bible is full of nothing but hate, anger, bigotry, death, destruction, all the things I abhor. You're site helps me to see things clearer although I must admit I do at times still have fear of the future, anxiety about what if the end times are real, worry for my family, and other things like that.
There's that nagging little doubt about not knowing what to believe. I have friends that say Nostradamus predictions are coming true and they correspond to the Bible and we are all going to be destroyed, things like that.
It's a little disheartening!
But little by little my faith in mankind and our self reliance and will to continue on is becoming stronger and stronger. I think mankind still has a long way to go and I think that the future will be better.
I'm sorry for rambling, I'm not a very intellectual man and it's hard for me to put my thoughts into words. Thanks for listening!!!
P.S. please don't post this, it sounds like babbling and is not very good!
R
R,
Thanks for the email!
Since you asked me not to, I will not post your letter to the site. I wish you would let me post it, or an edited version, if that would be okay, as I think it would encourage others.
I am encouraged and glad that you are helped by the site. If you have read my ex-testimony, or any of the others posted on the site, you realize that you are not alone in your doubts about religion.
Now that we are out of religion, it does not mean we have the answers to all of life's questions, but we do know that blindly believing what we know is falsehood just to be accepted, or out of fear, or because it makes us feel safe about hell, or fear of the end of the world, or whatever, is foolish.
Welcome to the thinking crowd!
Or rather, welcome back!
Dave VanAllen
webmaster of ExChristian.Net
First off thanks for replying. You are right, go ahead and post it. Please edit it as you see fit, just please don't include my name or e-mail. I don't really feel like getting into debates with people.....I've had enough! Again Thanks for you're time and all that you do, Keep up the good work!!!
R
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