Finding the Lord is not an intellectual Pursuit..do you agree?

Question

You see so many questions here on "religion" that say things like: "Prove to me there is a God" or "Why should I believe" or "Why doesn't the (Ever Changing) Science agree with this or that. That's because is God is spirit you can never understand God on a human brain level..you have to go deeper to the spiritual level.This comes through seeking him..and asking. Being in his word and seeking him in a honest way. I am convinced that most try to convince themselve there is no God because they don't want to be accountable or they've had a bad experience with a "religious person". You will never "Get it" through human reason...God requires a higher level. Some get it..some will never..but we all know deep inside that tells us the earth the universe just didn't happen..there has to be more than the latest new science theory..that's the hunger..that's why many non-believers come here. Okay for some..mock away!!!!!!!!!

Do you agree?

Answer 1

i believe this scripture says it all.
1 Corinthians 2

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=2&version=31

the wisdom of the Spirit is meaningless to those without the Spirit.

Answer 2

In contemporary discussion, spirituality is most commonly associated with intellectual disengagement. A "spiritual experience" is achieved through the elimination of critical thinking and its replacement by a more diffuse, even dreamlike state of mind. Spiritual experiences are realized-if at all-through song, chanting, meditation, and (with a lot of practice, but still very rarely) prayer. The "spiritual" is to be found in the woods or meadow or mountains, not in the office or classroom.

But can intellectual study be "a spiritual experience." This is an interesting and even crucial question for two reasons: first, because study demands intellectual engagement and critical thinking, and second, because study has been central to the religious life of some spiritual people for many centuries.

Study incorporates many voices. There is, of course, the voice of reason. As the discussion of reason progresses, it becomes difficult to distinguish the Divine voice from the incorporated voice of reason. Both merge into a tentative harmony. But, as anyone who has ever studied to a deep level knows, the study f any form is incomplete without your own voice (the voice of the learner) to provide the connective tissue. And study makes no sense without your own interpretive voice to test and re-test possible interpretations. So, in the first-and-last step, your own voice joins the other voices of reason and divintiy to create a full orchestra. Crucially, this is not an external cacophony; it happens inside you. So you feel, welling up inside you, the voice of God and the voices of God's creatures, in rich and ever more complex exchange. If all goes well, you will lose yourself in this exchange-as you lose yourself in any spiritual experience. The difference is, in this spiritual exercise, God's voice becomes one of many voices inside you-voices which merge to become indistinguishable. This is, I think, what is meant by devotion to God.

In the course of the spiritual exercise, you never give up your critical faculty. One question is always followed by another. The spirit never demands that you abandon the intellect. So you can be reasonable and spiritual at the same time. To modern sensibilities, this may seem counterintuitive. But by opening up alternative spiritual models, spiritual study potentially enriches the religious soul in unique ways.

Answer 3

No. I have not had no bad experiences with religious people.. I don't believe in the christian deity nor christianity (among other religions) because I don't believe the theology. I am married to a christian and my family is primarily christian. Given what I have seen, read and feel I have made the decision for myself and myself only. Anyone else is free to believe as they choose.

I don't come here because I secretly want to be a christian again... I never had faith in christianity even when I was forced to go as a child. I come here because comparative religions was one of my favorite courses in college and I'm interested in what people say in more of a sociological view. That's it. No guilt, no secret longing.

I don't mock anyone's choice of belief. I do not tell others they are wrong. I don't receive the same respect in return all the time. I like who I am; if others don't, then that is their choice.

Answer 4

I agree somewhat. I just think people miss the big picture. Why would God give you a big brain and then expect you to not use it. Science IS. Anyone who disputes that is not living in reality. However, and I've said this for years, science is not against belief in god or against spiritual faith. It is in conflist with the religious stories that people take too literally and get all wrapped up in. Some religious people do not believe in dinosaurs because there is no explicit mention of them in the bible. Do you really think the thousands of bones are faked? Of course not. The bible is an incomplete collection of gospels and myth. They round out faith, they are for lesson and thought. It's the people who insult their creator by dismissing the rest of the cool world he created who think that if it is not in theor sacred text, it is not true. That is like saying that while we cannot possibly understand god, every prophet and theologian in the bible did understand. It is possilbe that no one, including most of the people in the bible do not understand much?

Answer 5

You make your argument like it's a good thing. Belief in God requires a lack of reason, a lack of intellectual curiosity, a lack of evidence and a lack of testability. And you argue that this is somehow a virtue. I'm not sure why the skills necessary to pass fourth grade math are so bad when it comes to examining the fundamental questions of the universe.

I disagree with you.

Answer 6

The concept of God is a part of philosophical thought, and philosophy is an intellectual pursuit.

But it's pretentious of you to think you are a higher being because someone doesn't believe your theory of a deity in the sky who is omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent without some sort of logical proof.

Answer 7

christianity has always been for the intellectually inept. Ever since the beginning of christianity it has been about war. war with heretics war with other countries war war war. Jehovah was a God of War and not Peace, but to screw with your head he pretended like he was a Peace God. well hes very crappy at such things. Oh and the Creator is not Jehova FYI the Creator made Anu first not Jehovah

Answer 8

Any intellectual Pursuit of God is doomed to fail because it always seeks God as something external.

You can never find something by looking where it is not.

Jesus said that the kingdom of God is within each of us. The moment we stop looking For God in silly places like clouds called heaven. We find him/her exactly where Jesus always said God was.

God waits patiently within for you to notice Her exactly where Jesus always told us he would be.

Love and blessings.

Answer 9

no
It is an intellectual pursuit. Yes it is God's mind/intellect we are to pursue.
There is the intellect of the world, of which God says is foolishness.
He even says that he will trap those in their own cunning.

The intelligence of God though is perfectly comprehensible for humans. We after all were created in His Image!
That means that we have mental faculty that can "Have the mind of God"

Answer 10

I agree, it is a heart thing. The Holy Spirit prompts a person on the inside to want to accept Jesus Christ as savior, and they are drawn to Him, and give themselves to Him. We must be drawn to Jesus through the Spirit. "No man comes to me, except by the Father". Jesus said that. Garnet

Answer 11

I agree. Talk to God, one on one, people, and change your life forever. I speak from the experience of many years.