u/Ok-Pipe-4277

So I have genuine questions for Christians. For context, I grew up as a pastor's kid, and literally went through Christian schooling from JK to graduating from university. Over the years, I've started questioning Christianity and I've essentially left the faith.

However, I genuinely try my best to have an open mind to ideas of both sides because as I've grown older, experienced life, traveled the world, met multiple people, I've gained more intellectual humility.

Now, I essentially identify as an agnostic...

Anyways, my questions are the following:

1. Does a universal God speak to us? If so, why are there so many variations of Christian messages and denominations? There are over 40000 Christian denominations. Our favorite biblical scholars, professors, pastors, spiritual leaders, etc can't all universally agree on a singular doctrine. What's going on here? If the biblical message was that important, shouldn't it have been sent more clearly? Mere humans have full careers dedicated around careful communication (lawyers, public relations, psychologists, public relations, journalists, etc) but God seems to haven't been as clear here.

2. If you believe in the afterlife consisting of eternal torture (hell) or eternal paradise (heaven), what happens to all the people who haven't had a chance to hear the gospel? What about those who've died? What about those who live on remote islands who've not encountered Christianity? If your answer is that they'll be judged on what they know, then wouldnt spreading the gospel be to their disadvantage? Because they'd be judged by a lesser standard for not knowing the gospel, correct? Or not?

3. Do you honestly believe that choosing Christ is a simple choice or rather a matter of being convinced? For example, someone can tell me the sky is green. I can go about life acting like I believe it's green. But if I'm not convinced, what do I do? How about people with mental disability or limitations? Do they have a choice to choose?

4. If Christ meant to save the whole world during his return, why was he sent to Jerusalem of all places? I mean, weren't there humans living all over the world at that time? Was there no plan to send a guy to East Asia, Europe, North America, Africa, etc? Was the best plan to spread Christianity to colonization, slavery and massacre? The Bible says during Christ's second coming "every eye will see him." If every eye saw him, I think that would be a fair way to give everyone an equal chance if God is all loving. But he was sent to a small village in Jerusalem? Like couldn't send a few different 'sons' around the world to give everyone a better fighting chance against eternal torment? Doesn't that add some sort of honest skepticism?

5. Do Christian's not realize that for many who leave the church, it's actually harder for them than staying in the church. All my family and friends are still in the church. It's super lonely to leave the faith. Life would actually be easier socially if I was still in the church. But I found myself highly skeptical and unconvinced of the message. I found myself as convinced of Christianity as I was of Santa Clause or the tooth fairy. So I just stopped going instead of blindly going through the motions. I didn't leave the church to go 'sin.' Funny enough, many people I come across still assume I'm Christian based on the way I carry myself and dress. I would probably pass as a Christian over 8/10 Christians based on how I carry myself and my personal values.

But anyways, I post this post in good faith. I'm just trying to have honest conversation. Let's see how this goes.

I grew up as a pastor's kid in the SDA church. My parents were very conservative, even by SDA standards.

My dad was a pastor that was very strict musically. Music has to be a certain way. Now, myself, I grew up around music. I grew to love jazz, and gospel and how the two were infused. I loved the rhythm drums brought.

However, my dad was very adamant about NOT having drums in the church. He was even against the style of piano playing I had. I remember he once asked me to play for his church when I was a little older and I had to directly just tell him no.

I would also get asked to play (for money) for multiple non-adventist churches on Sunday. My dad was so against that. I had to go play and make my money behind his back.

My brother also sang in a gospel choir at one point. My dad wouldn't listen to his performance because it was too much for him.

Now, as I got older into my later teenage years and younger 20s, I'd simply ask... "If God speaks to us, why can't we agree on anything?"

Like within Christianity:

1. How are there thousands of denominations?

2. Within Adventism, how can we not agree on something as simple as music?

My brain then logically asks:

Why don't we just ask God what he wants? Like duh? We all say God speaks to us? Right? So let's literally just call him and sort this out.

No Christian has been able to answer that question... Yet they all appear to simultaneously believe God speaks to us.

This makes me strongly consider the argument of humans being Gods themselves. The argument for an external, universal God, that we all humans connect with and universally communicate with is bullshxt to be quite frank.

Cause if we were all talking to the same God, the message and interpretation would not be so diverse.

Anyways, this was the beginning of my long deconstruction journey. Overtime, many more pieces began to crumble.

I have a few genuine questions for the devout religious folks here.

1. Why did you choose your religion?

2. Why do you believe your holy book and take it literally?

3. What benefits have you received since joining your religion?

4. Do you believe in an afterlife where there are only two options being eternal suffering (hell) or eternal paradise (heaven)?

Growing up, when I saw people leave the church, I always thought it was because they decided to turn their back on God or they just wanted to go off and 'sin.'

Now, as a grown adult who's been deconstructing for over 10 years, I find that ideology highly flawed from my personal experience.

I never decided to leave the church. I was simply unconvinced by the evidence.

I truly believe some people may have more of a natural propensity to believe in a faith compared to others.

Even look at some of the talented folks in society.

Some people have a natural propensity to be good at art, music, physics, math, dancing,etc.

Why is it far fetched to believe that some people are more inclined to be able to truly believe certain belief systems and religions?

Moreover, when you tell a Christian you're struggling with a belief, they will probably tell you to read the Bible more, pray more or go and surround yourself with other believers... I mean duh... That's literally the rule book for every other religion. It doesn't make it true though.

A scientist would never say "if you don't believe in gravity, then surround yourself with people who believe in gravity and read science books on gravity." Lol.

Anyways, I never made the choice to leave the faith. The brain that "God" gave me did.

Also, quite comically, many people I interact with still think I'm Christian by the way I carry myself, talk and dress. So much for those preconceived notions.

This is a short post but just sharing a perspective.

I have a hard time believing in Christianity or the Bible anymore. There's too many contractions that don't make sense.

God is a good of love yet he kills people whenever he feels like it. Destroys Sodom and Gomorrah, kills Uzzah, kills Lot's wife... Etc.

But in the Bible, God shows favoritism towards Israel. He supports them in their fight. They are essentially the protagonist in the Bible and God is there supporting hand.

God then also doesn't abolish slavery but creates rules around it.

I hear Christians make the argument around chattel slavery vs indentured servitude.

Well Christians, go read Deuteronomy 21:10–14. What does that sound like?

It's literally a book people wrote to control people in the way they wanted.

There's more I can say but I'm just ranting here now.

Religion is strongly determined by where we are born. If Christianity was exclusively true, everyone should have an equal and consensual opportunity to join. Let me try to explain my reasoning better below.

Imagine if you were born on a remote island without Christianity. Or let's say you're born in a vegetative state. What are the basic human necessities for survival? Water, food, sleep?

If you did the most "default" human activity without any social influence (only drank water, ate food and slept), it's quite insane to believe you're going to hell for the lack of belief.

Moreover, I always wonder about this. In Revelation 1:7, it says every eye will see Christ 'when' he returns. What this verse is saying is that he has the power to notify the entire earth. However, when it came to the first time, he was born to some girl in a remote village in the middle East? The universal plan to protect everyone from eternal torture started in a remote area in modern day Israel/Palestine (whichever name for the region you decide.. idk).

But no plan for people who lived in East Asia? No plan for Southern Africa? No plan for the Americas? But the plan to save the WHOLE world was to send a man to the middle East??? Like God literally just gave a middle finger to the rest of the world by not sending 'savior' closer to their region. Not to mention, they didn't even have air travel back then. So imagine traveling and spreading 'the soul saving gospel message' from the middle East to modern day Japan, or Mozambique, Australia, America, etc.

How does this make any sense?

Let's say one day I decided to breed dogs. Let's also assume I've never had dogs, or had any obligation to breed dogs.

When the dogs are born, I expect the dogs to act like 'good boys and good girls' and follow all my commands. The dogs that don't follow my commands and resort to their typical, untrained, instinctual dog behavior, I have tortured and burned slowly.

Now, I never had to start breeding dogs.

I could've just continued on with life.

But I decided to go out of my way to breed them, then expect the dogs to behave against their nature.

I am now the most loving dog breeder.

Do you see the parallels?

If God is real, how can he be all loving while hell exists in the first place? And especially if the criteria for going is simply as easy as not having faith, which isn't a default, instinctual human behaviour.

To have faith, you need to be introduced to the Bible and to Christianity. These are not default things that occur.

That means God would've created most humans to go to hell. All those people in non-Christian countries stand very little chance.

I've heard many Christians make the argument about God making humans with free will. They use that as the excuse for sin and having the choice to follow Christ.

However, I was thinking about it. Humans were never given freewill, just the illusion of it.

Why?

Having true free will would be you'd need to have the choice to be born in the first place. By not having the choice to be born or to continue non-existing (as you were before birth), you've essentially lost your free will from jump.

If someone ends up being born in the jungle with no access to the message of Christianity, they are essentially doomed to eternal hell without any choice.

And even if Christians make the argument that God judges based on what people know (whereby the jungle people would not being condemned for not having access to the message of Christ), then it actually proves that spreading the gospel does more harm than good. Because the people born in the jungle would have a better chance at any form of salvation by not having access to the gospel in the first place.

Ignorance would be the easiest and best path.

Hey all. I've been learning Spanish for just under a year. I started my journey with Pimsleur. Then added in tutoring on preply then group classes with Lingoda.

PIMSLEUR

With Pimsleur, my growth and confidence was growing at a faster rate. My grammar was garbage and I couldn't read well or write well. But my conversation was good and when I started tutoring on Preply, my instructor was shocked at how little time I'd been speaking it. However, overtime, I found Pimsleur to get very boring and it was harder to motivate and be disciplined to continue to do it daily.

PREPLY

It was very good. I enjoyed having a set time for class daily and my instructor was very energetic. However. I got frustrated because my instructor would always show up late for class. Sometimes 15 minutes.

LINGODA

I like the structure of having the classes in my calendar. Regardless I've I want to do the class or not, it's in my calendar. However, I find with Lingoda, my progress with speaking has slowed down quite alot. It takes longer to form sentences. And I feel they spend a lot of time on nitty gritty things that I personally don't think matter that much (differences between subtleties of Spanish in different cities).

Anyways, my goal for Spanish is just to learn it conversationally so that I can travel and have fun with locals. I don't really care to study or do formal activities in Spanish. I want the fastest and most efficient route to speaking in a conversation.

What do you recommend for me if I want a method to keep me motivated and to progress fast?

So I've been deconstructing for years and a few months ago, I was in church (long story) and it was the final straw that broke the camels back. After that, I cut my involvement and ties with the church.

Now, I was raised a pastor's kid. I went to Christian school all the way from JK to University. I'm the youngest and my older siblings are in the church.

At this point in my life, I've only told my oldest brother. He has a more rational viewpoint on Christianity and if all Christian's had his perspective (simply just live an example like Christ did on earth and forgo all the additional fluff and BS), we'd all have a better world.

Anyways, my parents are fairly conservative. I remember my mom almost lost her mind when her brother told her he didn't believe in God. So now imagine her son telling her that. My parents are in their 70s and part of me kinda wants to just keep the peace and not distress them in their older ages.

I don't live with them but occasionally they visit and ask me why I'm not home on Friday nights or at church on Saturday (the family is SDA).

Looking for additional perspective on this.

If heaven is a real place, I guess based on their religion (Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, etc), they're all gonna burn in hell.

It sounds so ridiculous when you say it. But religion is literally determined by where you're born.

If God is fair and just, then all those people are going to heaven regardless of their religion.

If all those people burn for not choosing Christianity, then God is not fair and just.

Overall, If heaven is real, I think it's more individualistic than we've been taught. For example, if someone believes they'll be in heaven with all their family, they'll die and have "projections" of that all being true regardless of the life their friends and family lived. I don't necessarily know if I believe in our consciousness being connected after death. I believe heaven to possibly be more of an eternal dream "if it's real."

In Christianity, if God truly wanted the entire world to be saved through Christ, why would he send a man to Israel to be born in this secretive birth hidden in a manger? Many other nations of the world are older than Christianity. Wouldn't it have made sense to send a guy to one of those regions too??

Plus the Bible says in the second coming every eye should see God. So if the Bible was true and if any of Christianity was real, wouldn't it have made sense for the first coming to be as grand for everyone to see if God was indeed fair and just and wanted to give everyone an equal chance?