Okay, my friend. :)
We all need true friends. I am one of them. True friends love their friends enough to tell them the truth, not what they want to hear, but what they need to hear.
A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. (Proverbs 17:17)
Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor: for we are members one of another. (Ephesians 4:25)
Since you are sincerely open to knowledge it is a pleasure to respond to your remarks, even though you won't accept the truth that cannot be proven wrong. Truth is eternal. It is universal, and it cannot change or it is not TRUTH. It is just an opinion, a perspective, a fact, or a temporary statistic. There is no such thing as "my truth" or "your truth," we are not creators. We cannot create truth. We may have an opinion, but it has no bearing on TRUTH. All truth comes from The God of Truth. If it can be contradicted, it is not TRUTH.
Every word the God of Truth speaks has to be true, and He must always act according to His first decision every single time, or it proof that He is not Omniscient, because He didn't make the best decision the first time. God cannot learn a better way like we can.
So everything the Eternal God says in Scripture, whether you believe it, I believe it, or anybody else believes it, will never change the truth of it. Atheist seem to think that because they don't believe God exist, He doesn't exist, as if their beliefs can change the reality of the truth. If your beliefs cannot change 2+2=4, your beliefs are not going to make the Eternal Creator cease to exist. Nor will your beliefs change the fact that there is a Lake of Fire where the Holy and Just God punishes unbelievers for all eternity without intermission. Beliefs do not change truth nor the reality of this natural world, nor the spiritual world. Please be wise, and humble yourself to the truth. We all must, or we deceive ourselves, and lie to ourselves.
The whole Bible is truth. The reason why people like you think it has contradictions is because they pull a word out of its context, or the setting in which it was spoken(like the grain of mustard seed), or they try to apply their modern definition of words to it, or their opinion to it, or they reason from their limited knowledge and experience, and base their beliefs on "their own superior" opinions and logical arguments based on fallacies.
God's Word defines itself, but to understand His definition of words we first have to see how "He" uses a particular word in different settings of the Scripture to understand what He meant. Everything word has a context, a setting, and an audience. Only then will can we correctly understand God's meaning of words. Most people don't study The Scriptures, so they read from an ignorant position of limited understanding, and jump to the conclusion that there are contradictions in it.
And account that the long suffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction. (2 Peter 3:15-16)
I wholeheartedly disagree. If there was a god that had given me everything I needed to believe, I would believe, there would in fact be no other option. The fact that a large portion of mankind does not believe in the bible should come as a clear testament to that.
Here, you are claiming that God is unjust to hold us accountable and punish us, because He did not give us the evidence of His existence "to our satisfaction." As if God serves His creation, and must cater to their standard of evidence and proof. God will never give us what we want unless He thinks it is best for us. He doesn't exist to please people, and He knows what is best for us. We exist to please Him, and live by His moral standards of righteousness, not our own. Like I said before, if you are your own god, then stop yourself from getting older, and stop yourself from dying, or go live on another planet, or stop eating natural food, or stop any of the functions God created you to live by, and see how long you live. None of us can put demands upon God. He gave sufficient knowledge for us to believe in our hearts. He is not going to satisfy the demands of our proud minds. It is a choice to believe what we know in our hearts. Your heart knows there is a God, but your head is wired with reasons and logic based on half-truths. A half-truth is a whole lie.
Consider the work of God: for who can make that straight, which he has made crooked? (Ecclesiastes 7:13)
Secondly, your belief of "a large portion don't believe in God's existence" is based upon the false premise that "majority opinion determines truth." Majority opinion does not determine was is true or what is false. The majority is always wrong, because the god of this world rules over the hearts of sinful men, and he is the spirit of the world that forms the opinions of men. Truth is objective. It is never subjective to the opinion of the general consensus.
In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. (2 Corinthians 4:4)
Believing is a decision. It is an act of the will. Believing is the sixth sense of man. We cannot function without believing. Every decision that we make is based upon a belief in the knowledge that we have. We believe the knowledge is true, so we make a decision based on it according to the integrity of our hearts. If we have strong integrity, we make right decisions, if we have weak integrity, we will make wrong decisions. If we have wrong knowledge we will have wrong beliefs. We must seek the knowledge of the truth, to have right beliefs.
However, what I am telling you as a true friend is, that God has given you the knowledge of His existence in your heart. You know it! However, you are "demanding" that He satisfies your "head" with evidence of demonstration, but He will never cater to your proud demands! You must choose to believe the knowledge of His existence in your heart. It cannot not be proven wrong. Atheist must demonstrate God does not exist! They are demanding that God or His people demonstrate that He does exist, but God never will give more than the evidence of His creation, and the knowledge of Conscience in our hearts. Christians are not obligated to prove God's existence to anyone. We are His witnesses. Some are better than others. It is your choice to believe or not believe. God says, you don't have an excuse not to believe He exists.
What is illegitimate or invalid about noticing that there is no sufficient evidence to demonstrate god's existence and thus not believing it because of that specific lack of evidence. What is your legitimate excuse for not believing a green unicorn farted out the universe? What is your legitimate excuse for not believing in Allah, Krishna or Thor? You already disbelieve a ton of religions, why am I unwarranted to disbelieve the claims of yours and how are they any different?
If I told you that Thor is going to stomp your soul into oblivion when you die because you didn't believe in him and you will miss out on Valhalla, would that be a convincing reason for you to start believing in Thor? Would that in any way be evidence for the existence of Thor?
If god appeared to me face to face, that might be convincing. But until that happens, the evidence I'm presented with remains unconvincing. If there is no good reason for me to be convinced why would a god punish me?
The evidence of order in the universe, the unchangeable laws that govern creation, the design of all creation, etc are infallible proofs of an Intelligent Supreme Being. There is no excuse for just assuming "energy" or "matter" has no father that begot them. It is an outright denial of reason and refusal to acknowledge Superior wisdom and power, therefore with that knowledge, you deserve to be punished for not seeking the Living God to make amends for your sins against Him. If you refuse to do so, He has no other alternative than to give you the just punishment that you deserve for your violation of His righteous standards, because His Law of Conscience is written upon your heart. All of the mythical characters or false religions have no bearing upon your responsibility and obligation to The Supreme Being.
This "Creation Scientist" gives reasons for evidence of a Creator and shows the circular reasoning and false premises of atheists on this YouTube video here
Why do you think I am not humble? Isn't it humble to not claim that something is true until you have demonstrated it? I think it is. The position that lacks humbleness is the position that maintains that they know something they can't know. There is nothing humble about requiring belief without reason.
If there are false premises in the arguments I'm presenting, it should be easy for you to save me from my blind evil ways by pointing out why the premises are false. If you've noticed them, it shouldn't be hard to point them out, right? So please do, my heart and mind are open.
Here is the fallacy and diabolical seduction satan uses against "intelligent" unbelievers like yourself to keep you blind to the truth that cannot be proven wrong.
*You are "trusting" in your own heart and understanding instead of the truth.
He that trusts in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walks wisely, he shall be delivered. (Proverbs 28:26)
*You are exalting your own opinions, and the opinions of so called "scientists" against the truth of God's existence that has "already been demonstrated" in creation. (See reasons above, and from the YouTube video.)
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; (2 Corinthians 10:5)
*You are letting other people do your thinking for you. You are allowing these so called "scientists" that they have chosen to deny the truth in their hearts, using circular reasoning to avoid the evidence demonstrated in creation of God's existence to indoctrinate you with their lies.
*Your beliefs are based upon your own arbitrary reasons, majority opinion, and outright false propaganda of these hypocritical pathological liars, that have sold themselves to false beliefs for their own financial security and reputation. You have been prejudiced against believing in a True and Living God, even though you have absolutely no evidence to prove that He doesn't exist, but false accusations against His character, because of the existence of evil in the world, and the ignorance of His Word. There is absolutely no scientific proof that God does not exist, and there never will be. However, there is a false religion called "Evolution" that is indoctrinating men with outright lies, and claims that cannot be substantiated with proof to keep lazy minded people from thinking and reasoning with their own hearts.
O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: (1 Timothy 6:20)
I think those are actually baseless accusations that are trying to be demeaning and condescending, hopefully not purposefully. If you know I'm being deceived or deceiving myself or whatever, just point me to the flaws in my logic. If you can't, saying something like that is a baseless and empty assertion. Even worse, it's an attempt for emotional manipulation much like your other assertions about how god will supposedly judge or punish me for not being gullible and for being reasonable. And you keep doing this without addressing any of the points of substance. You keep talking about what we need, about false premises and about reasons, but you have failed to present me with any. If you have good reasons and arguments why avoid them? It's exactly what I'm interested in!
There are no emotional manipulating tactics in my heart or mind. Those are characteristics of evil wicked devils whose only objective is to deceive and destroy mankind. I love people. My whole life is given to the honor of God, the advancement of His kingdom, and the eternal well being of people.
My words spoken to you were out of a sincere heart of love for you as a brother. The truth of the consequences that will happen to people who refuse to humble themselves to seek God, and end up being eternally punished is the plain truth. I can't change it. If I could I would, believe me. People are so deluded by their own self-confidence, and think that just because there has been no consequences that there never will be.
Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. (Ecclesiastes 8:11)
I volunteered for over a decade in State and Federal Prisons in California, and met 1,000's of people with that philosophy. Every one of them were fully convinced that they would get away with their crimes. However, their "confidence" was based upon false premises, their own standards. The Law of the Land had its own Standards, and executed a just sentence for the crimes they had committed. It will be the same way when we die. Our beliefs will have absolutely no bearing on our eternal destiny. There is a Law of Rule, A Righteous Standard, a Heavenly Court that we will all be judged by, and our sentence will be just based on His ethics not ours. He is just. He is true, and He only wants what is best for mankind. So not telling people the truth about The Lake of Fire, because it is not good news would not change anything. We cannot compromise the truth, because there is not a receptive audience for it. Truth is the only antidote for deception.
He that rebukes a man afterwards shall find more favor than he that flatters with the tongue. (Proverbs 28:23)
Thank you so much for making the time to read my personal conversion experience, and I am very glad that you gave me your personal opinion and knowledge about other people's "spiritual" experiences from the supernatural world. (That could be a wrench thrown into your wheels of "no reality" outside of this natural material world.) I have heard other atheist write off those experience as "hallucinations" even from former atheist who have seen "The Light." God has chosen men as His witnesses, because it is foolish and insulting to "high minded" men who "pride" themselves on their superior intelligence. God likes humble minds. :)
For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. (1 Corinthians 1:19-21)
What I can say in defense of my personal conversion experience, is that it was life changing! I know the person that I was before, and I know that since Christ came to live inside of me, I am totally a new person that never existed before. And even though I have had a few more supernatural experiences since then, the personal relationship that I have with God, and the understanding that He has given me of His character, ways, and wisdom are the greatest things in my life. All of the pleasure, possessions, power, wealth, and women in this world are absolutely nothing in comparison to knowing God personally like I do. I have eternal life now.
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. (John 17:3)
Thank you for the discourse. I appreciate your time and friendship. Have a good weekend!