bible belt and my beliefs

[lenvdb64]

The Christian Church teaches that you accept Jesus as you Saviour, and he then comes and lives in your heart. They align this concept with the verse from Rev 2. I stand at the door and knock....

And at so many altar calls they tell the sinners Jesus is standing at the doors of their hearts knocking and wanting to come in.

It is a Pauline concept.

Jesus expects us to Follow Him. And this is a matter of following the Ancient Path. I did so by studying the Tree of Life, which is Esoteric Kabbalistic by nature. It lead me to a Soul Awakening. So the Christ which Paul and the Church talks about who lives in our hearts is Jesus, whereas having a Soul Awakening is a very different Path for me. I do not profess to have a Christ living in my Heart. During a SOUL Awakening one realises ones own divinity. I do not HAVE a SOUL or a Christ in me, I AM GOD, and I am having a human experience. (Be still and KNOW that I AM GOD).

This is perhaps why most of the Mystery Schools including Freemasonry rejects the teachings of Paul.

[Molearner]

Originally Posted by lenvdb64

I do not HAVE a SOUL or a Christ in me, I AM GOD, and I am having a human experience. (Be still and KNOW that I AM GOD).

.

lenvdb64,

This is, of course, difficult to comprehend. In your previous post(#9) you said that you do have a soul and characterized it as being "a fragment of God". In this post you do not have a soul. Unfortunately for most of us(I assume) we attribute certain characteristics to God....e.g omnipotence, all-loving, etc. I would guess that you reject such concepts or if, as you believe, that if you are, indeed, God you share these attributes? Or is it that the human experience renders God powerless? This is not intended to be picking on you but is more a quest for understanding your POV and wondering how you reconcile this seemingly inconsistencies.

[seedoflight]

Hello Rosie

You are not alone and I think you found a great place to explore and develop your spirituality. I think most of us have gone through or are going through what you are. I was born into a devout Catholic family and even studied to be a priest. In the end although I still believe and consider myself a Christian, I do not think man can put God in a little box and say "this is what God is". My experiences growing up were in conflict with a few Christian beliefs/practices and the guilt was horrible. I could not rationalize why God would give me certain gifts and "His" churches and servants would condemn me for them..
In the end it was science that helped me to see that there is truth and then there is belief. Truth stands on its own. Where belief is man's attempt to explain or share truth and sometimes it gets distorted down through generations of passing it on. In whatever I do, I look for the love in it... If there is love in something, a person, belief, action or ideal I am comfortable with it. If there is no love... well I avoid it. Its kind of scary to go against what we were taught to believe as a child, especially religion, but its something that truly if you ask God to help you with, I think God will be all too willing to help you understand "Him". In other words, I'm thinking as long as you are trying to know or understand God, you are actually doing OK. Its when you think you are above God that you should maybe be concerned.
Hey just my two cents here..

[Molearner]

Originally Posted by seedoflight

Hello Rosie

You are not alone and I think you found a great place to explore and develop your spirituality. I think most of us have gone through or are going through what you are. I was born into a devout Catholic family and even studied to be a priest. In the end although I still believe and consider myself a Christian, I do not think man can put God in a little box and say "this is what God is". My experiences growing up were in conflict with a few Christian beliefs/practices and the guilt was horrible. I could not rationalize why God would give me certain gifts and "His" churches and servants would condemn me for them..
In the end it was science that helped me to see that there is truth and then there is belief. Truth stands on its own. Where belief is man's attempt to explain or share truth and sometimes it gets distorted down through generations of passing it on. In whatever I do, I look for the love in it... If there is love in something, a person, belief, action or ideal I am comfortable with it. If there is no love... well I avoid it. Its kind of scary to go against what we were taught to believe as a child, especially religion, but its something that truly if you ask God to help you with, I think God will be all too willing to help you understand "Him". In other words, I'm thinking as long as you are trying to know or understand God, you are actually doing OK. Its when you think you are above God that you should maybe be concerned.
Hey just my two cents here..

seedoflight,

Thank you. Your 'two cents' correspond in value to the widow's mite. It is a breath of fresh air to hear love elevated to the stature it deserves. I am reminded of the Christian hymn......."And they'll know that we are Christians by our love". I hope that Rosie sees this.

[LibraIndigo]

Originally Posted by rosiegirl

I have a Christian family, at least on my mother's side. My mom is Christian, but also believes in spiritual, hippie stuff. I don't know what to call it. My aunts are very open-minded with different beliefs, but my grandparents are conservative southern Baptists. Growing up, I went to church, was taught bible verses, I was a part of the church's GA (girls in action) program, which was basically like church girl scouts, and went to vacation bible school. Also at this time, I was learning about astrology and psychic stuff. It felt right and my parents facilitated it. At that age, though, I wasn't aware that many Christians condemned those beliefs.

This brings us to about 10 years later, where I am now. When I was almost 18 and starting college, I moved from North Carolina to Georgia, in the bible belt. I live in a pretty open-minded city, but it's still been hard to figure out my spirituality when I'm still surrounded by churches and bible verses everywhere I go. Ever since starting college, I've been exploring my spirituality more and more, which is great at helping me find substance in it. However, I feel like I'm being alienated from the people around me. I'm starting to not take parts of Christianity seriously and the cynical part of my mind keeps on shooting aspects of it as false or silly and pushing it away. It's not a great feeling inside. I'm becoming one of those "spiritual, but not religious" people, and I'm having a hard time with it. I hope I've explained my conflict well enough. Does anyone have advice on finding peace between the religion that I grew up with and my family still practices, the religious nods that I see out and about, and my inner spirituality? Has anyone else gone through a similar experience?

I have a simpler solution than turning away from it all. You are in college, no?

Take theology classes. Not just ones only about Christianity. If you study different religions from a non biased perspective, you can learn a lot and then it will make more sense how everything is connected.

I realized most Christians where being mind controlled when I brought up the topic of "the other books" that had been removed from the bible.
They immediately said I was lying and they would not hear such non sense. It's the devil!

But I am not lying. That is history.

Here is an article someone else posted about why the church stopped teaching about reincarnation

http://reluctant-messenger.com/reincarnation-pope.htm

I wouldn't turn away from Christianity completely. I would learn more about it. From an academic stand point. There are great documentaries about the different books and one that was found recently and stored in a vault somewhere by an antiquities thief. I think it was the book of Judas?

I have been studying budism lately. And while I am still a Christian, I feel like Buddhists have it more right regarding what we are supposed to be doing at the core level.

Hope that helps

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Update: it was the gospel of Judas

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=5327692