When one is young we want to try and taste everything, we are eager for new experiences. Young people are energetic and vibrant, on a big learning curve. As one grows older that enthusiasm for new experiences tempers somewhat as we get to understand what we love and what we hate / dislike, prefer to avoid / don't care for. So as we age, we know more of what we like and dislike and we are all different. Just look at trading, we all have homebuilt variations of the same thing. Now I'm not enamoured with the Jewish race, I neither love nor hate them, but they don't inspire me, they have their quirks, I have mine, but I'm not interested in them. Similarly the bible and christianity, I've been there and done that and I'm not interested. I've been surrounded all my life by christians and there was only one person I admired, but I was a kid when I knew this guy, so still lacking in good judgement at that age. So God is going to throw me to the wolves because christianity doesn't turn me on?
One thing about the majority of christian music, I've heard and sung it a thousand times. Keep drumbeating it in but my skull impervious to brainwashing.
As I've mentioned a few times, christianity is about entertainment some enjoy the style of going to church Sunday's, others don't. Similarly church music, designed to tug at the heart strings and raise emotions. I'm over that bs. There have been a few pics I've posted on ET of Scott Morsison singing in church, going gangbusters for God, but the guy is full of shit, he promised 3 years ago to create a royal commission into government corruption and whenever that matter is raised he changes the subject and ducks, weaves, makes excuses, anything but take responsibility on what he promised. Mate, I'm too old to get suckered in by emotional bs, especially the church variety.
I don't know anything about Scott Morison. However, you seem to post about lots Christians that aren't following the standards the Bible sets forth for living moral lives. You can't judge Jesus based on the actions of Judas.
Everyone loves a celebration, right? Nope, not the Joho's, they celebrate nuttink, such a dour lot, they get enjoyment in life by not laughing. They spam the shit out of my maibox with maildrops and bang on the front door year after year to join in their kingdom hall funeral of life with messages of doom and gloom. The JW marketers know they only need a 1% success hit rate, most marketing done is free as foot soldier slaves do it for them, mums, dads, kids with no clue about reality.
Let's think logically for a moment. There are possibly thousands of religions in the world. Within christianity, hundreds maybe thousands of sects. Oklahoma has 4,437 churches alone, ffs! https://www.expertgps.com/data/ok/churches.asp The bible according to many is God's pure word, God inspired, created by the Holy Spirit. Yet humans can't get their act together to agree on that word. Every country has its own variation of the scriptures, the Russian Coptic church thinking differently to the Egyptian Coptics for example, and American Baptist different to UK Baptists. So on ET, christians want to convert me to their religion? Ya gotta be joking, I think Somalian Luddites have it correct, maybe I should join that lot.
What's the bet, the majority if not all are part of a money making tax rort? And nothing will be done about it, because the people running the churches are likely the same people running businesses and the gummint decision making, never mind the church affiliated lobbyists swaying opinion. The only reason for 4437 churches in OK is because money to be made, God is a sideline imo.
I didn't love God before I was saved. I wouldn't say there was anything about Christianity that turned me on. I didn't want to go to hell because that is terrifying. So, I guess you could say I was scared into believing. Is that wrong? The better question would be to ask if that is the way the Bible describes conversion? We are all guilty of sin. Some try to hide that fact by squelching any thoughts or beliefs that remind them of their guilt in things. But God made us "judges." We discern what is right and wrong, even though often times we think what is wrong is actually right and what is right is actually wrong. If you have ever judged the actions of another person or even your own actions, then you have just proven my point. This fact can stand alone as a means to provide evidence that God exists as the ultimate Judge. "So God is going to throw me to the wolves because christianity doesn't turn me on?" No. It has nothing to do with whether or not you like Christianity or even God. It has to do with your guilt and what you do with your guilt. "Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy." Proverbs 28:13 This is a general truth, not the entire gospel. If you think about it, there is really a lot of wisdom packed in that verse that can be helpful for all people. Honest self-evaluation for improvement is also very important in trading. However, in this nugget of wisdom there lies a promising gem. If we take an honest look at ourselves as a holy, good, loving, yet not-tolerating-evil God would see our sin, we find a huge problem. And that problem can turn into the best discovery of a person's life it if leads one to turn in their hearts to Jesus as their God and Savior. The problem is sin. "But your wickedness has separated you from your God, And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear." Isaiah 59:2 Amp We can't get rid of sin ourselves. Just as you can't remove a nail from a board without a hole being left behind, even if we became perfectly good for the remainder of our lives, it does not undo even the tiniest of sins. But we don't need to get rid of sin ourselves. We don't need to get cleaned up before becoming a Christian. We don't make promises to God that we will do better in life so He can let us into heaven. Do you know what "dead works" are? That is a phrase used a few times in the New Testament. Basically, they are whatever we do, our "works," that don't do anything to help our standing before God. I believe it can be used of things we do that are both bad as well the things we do that are good. Neither our good or our bad things are good enough in God's sight. They are all dead works. The ONLY solution is what Jesus had to die for. He had to be the Righteous one who bore our sin so that we could be given His righteousness. how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal [Holy] Spirit willingly offered Himself unblemished [that is, without moral or spiritual imperfection as a sacrifice] to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works and lifeless observances to serve the ever living God? Hebrews 9:14 And THAT is the Solution. It is that Jesus met the requirements of satisfying God's wrath at our sin and living a perfect life in our behalf so that He CAN cleanse us from all the guilt that we have. I'm not going to pry into your previous experience with Christianity, but I do want to put something into your mind for you to think about: Did you have Jesus cleanse you from your guilt before God by personal repentance and deliberate asking of God to apply to you what Jesus did at the cross and the resurrection? This is the key, in fact it means everything. Someone can pray the sinners prayer and have the right words yet not have truly experienced becoming saved if they did not come to rest in Jesus as their guilt cleanser.