Posted by Hi AF. Jaypeeto [Jaypeeto] on March 31, 1999 at 11:20:08 {ohFII14TUc/CPYT8orz2Hq/lZhRVmk}:
In Reply to: ***The King and His Son Parable posted by AF on March 31, 1999 at 10:12:59:
I believe that ALL sincere people will be
answered, eventually, and in the best way
adapted to their peculiar situation.
I'll give you a brief example of what I mean.
You mentioned the possibility of a supernatural
revelation. That's certainly something that would set a person to thinking!
But it wouldn't have worked for me.
Why not?
Simple. In MY case, up until a few years ago,
I had a JW worldview. That of necessity "filters" how I
interpreted other people's religious experiences, or CLAIMS TO religious experiences, or the lack thereof! If somebody told me that Jesus spoke to him and said we all have to carry our cross, then I immediately would have filtered that
through my JW worldview, and would have inwardly responded, "If He DID have an experience, it WASN'T the REAL Jesus, because the REAL Jesus died on a Torture stake and not a Cross!"
His experience wouldn't have affected me at all, it
would have hardened me in my position.
Next, in those years, suppose that I had had a supernatural experience. Let's just say!
For the sake of this discussion,
let's say that Jesus HIMSELF, had appeared to me, in BLINDING Glory,
and had said to me,
Take up your Cross, and come follow me, for I am the Lord thy God!
---- Even if I had HAD such an experience,
I would have REJECTED IT OUTRIGHT. Why?
The JW filters! My mind would have immediately responded
with, THIS isn't JESUS! THIS is a
DEMON! Jesus is the archangel Michael, he is NOT
the Lord my God!!
And I would have rejected that experience.
And, since I had always been taught that demons
can "ape" genuine miracles,
then even had
Jesus created a dog for me, from scratch, instantaneously, right before my very eyes,
I would have said that this was a demonic trick.
Why? Because in my view Jesus was the archangel Michael, and this person said
that he was
the Lord My God! ((not to mention the FACT that at least when I was a JW, we were always told that the Lord doesn't directly intervene, ever, in such dramatic ways since the death of the Last Apostle!)).
I had heard the
stories of what took place on
October 13, 1917 at Fatima, Portugal.
I knew that thousands of people, including the reporters for the Lisbon daily newspaper O SECULO, were on hand, and THEY saw it too, and wrote about it on the front
page of O SECULO.
I attributed it NOT to a "virgin Mary" apparition, like the Catholics did, but to demonic activity.
Why? Because the "real" Mary (in my JW view)
would never appear like that, and would never
encourage little
kids to meditate on the life of Christ by means of a Rosary devotion! No way!
I didn't disbelieve the story, I just didn't attribute it to anything "OF GOD," and THAT
because of my then a-priori commitment to JW theology.
Likewise,
if a supernatural being were to appear to me now, in blinding light, and tell me out loud and in the presence of ten witnesses, that JWs ARE the restoration of early Christianity, I would reject that. I wouldn't ***deny*** that I saw
something out-of-the-ordinary, BUT, knowing what I have learned from my study of the early church writers, I would never believe such a thing, not even on the basis of blinding flashes of light
or angelic appearances, etc.
I believe that we are "answered" by sincerely seeking, and then we receive our answers gradually in almost all cases.
Sometimes OUR "sincere seeking" may not be
the kind of thing a Christian might EXPECT out of a person who is sincerely
seeking.
That is why it is not my place to JUDGE
even those who denounce the very IDEA of a god.
I cannot be certain where they are "coming from" in their deepest inner being. I cannot know their motives.
I used to get LIVID
at God in my confusion over all the religious options out there.
I would say horrendous things in my pain and confusion and frustration.
I was discussing this with my pastor/priest this past week, and he said (without condoning the
bad things I said to God in those moments),
YES, YOUR PRAYER WAS HEARD.
I just about fell backwards off my chair.
He then elaborated that sometimes our WORDS fail to do our MEANINGS justice.
In the tale of JOB, the story ends
with God affirming that Job did NOT sin against God with his Lips. And I thought, SAY WHAT?
Read that story! JOB complains DIRECTLY AGAINST GOD in that story, and yet the LORD absolves him of any moral guilt! WHY? Job was
HONEST.
Sometimes the most pious-LOOKING man is the most vicious wolf on the inside, and sometimes
the professedly-atheist man is, on the inside,
the one in whom the Spirit of the Lord is silently doing his
work.
Love,
Jaypeeto :)