(no subject)
Ok this is a problem I have with christianity. It's my religion, but I have trouble with this.
How do you know you have faith? I want to seek it INSIDE of myself, and it does not always work. Then, on another day, out of the blue, I find myself having what I call faith. That anything will have a happy end when I stay with Jesus. That I really and truly love this God. That I am willing to go through hardships for the faith, even when things get tough.
Is that ok faith? Sometimes I don't know what people mean when they tell me to trust God. They seem to say trust Him, He will enter your life and all that, and then they take emotional experiences as proofs for God. I am not discounting such experiences, but after having been often times mislead by my illness which sometimes fakes divine experiences, I am wary.
What can I really expect of God, and what not?
I noticed that many people say we gotta do things in God's power, as opposed to my own power. How am I supposed to distinguish between the two? I only notice that sometimes I am strong, and sometimes I am weak. Sometimes when I think of God I get a rush, an invigoration, but I don't know whether that could also come from being fascinated by Jesus. I pray for strength but it seems to me that God, when He gives us strength, simply charges again our human battery, that there is not an infusion with divine strength. At least I've always experienced it at way, can't put it differently. That's what I understand as living by God's power - that He gives us human strength for us to be able to face our human problems. Am I correct?
My problem is when people tell you to give up relying on your strength and learning to live out of divine strength. This is really a problem which I think makes people burn out. They wait for God to strengthen them and when this doesn't come to pass they suffer from their weakness, and that while all of this might be very normal. I don't view christianity as a sports game where you must always give your maximum. For me it's a sober (and joyful) religion acquainted very well with human weakness. I've never had God prompting me to do real work for Him. It was all about getting rid of sinful habits and becoming faithful to God.
Except for one thing. I know that the Holy Spirit is a person, but I also view Him, when being in work in us, as God's effective power. There is scripture that says that God's spirit got effective on someone. So sometimes I try to do stuff that I otherwise can't do, by calling on the Holy Spirit, and trusting Him. I say to myself, in the spirit I can do this, or in Jesus I can do this, and it works pretty well.
Somehow I trust in Jesus and His Father and the Holy Spirit. Somehow I think they are incredibly good beings. They are just, they are holy, and they do not despise man at all. (For the record, I do believe in the trinity, but I don't think it can be fit in words very well, I guess in Heaven they use another language than ours.)
How do you know you have faith? I want to seek it INSIDE of myself, and it does not always work. Then, on another day, out of the blue, I find myself having what I call faith. That anything will have a happy end when I stay with Jesus. That I really and truly love this God. That I am willing to go through hardships for the faith, even when things get tough.
Is that ok faith? Sometimes I don't know what people mean when they tell me to trust God. They seem to say trust Him, He will enter your life and all that, and then they take emotional experiences as proofs for God. I am not discounting such experiences, but after having been often times mislead by my illness which sometimes fakes divine experiences, I am wary.
What can I really expect of God, and what not?
I noticed that many people say we gotta do things in God's power, as opposed to my own power. How am I supposed to distinguish between the two? I only notice that sometimes I am strong, and sometimes I am weak. Sometimes when I think of God I get a rush, an invigoration, but I don't know whether that could also come from being fascinated by Jesus. I pray for strength but it seems to me that God, when He gives us strength, simply charges again our human battery, that there is not an infusion with divine strength. At least I've always experienced it at way, can't put it differently. That's what I understand as living by God's power - that He gives us human strength for us to be able to face our human problems. Am I correct?
My problem is when people tell you to give up relying on your strength and learning to live out of divine strength. This is really a problem which I think makes people burn out. They wait for God to strengthen them and when this doesn't come to pass they suffer from their weakness, and that while all of this might be very normal. I don't view christianity as a sports game where you must always give your maximum. For me it's a sober (and joyful) religion acquainted very well with human weakness. I've never had God prompting me to do real work for Him. It was all about getting rid of sinful habits and becoming faithful to God.
Except for one thing. I know that the Holy Spirit is a person, but I also view Him, when being in work in us, as God's effective power. There is scripture that says that God's spirit got effective on someone. So sometimes I try to do stuff that I otherwise can't do, by calling on the Holy Spirit, and trusting Him. I say to myself, in the spirit I can do this, or in Jesus I can do this, and it works pretty well.
Somehow I trust in Jesus and His Father and the Holy Spirit. Somehow I think they are incredibly good beings. They are just, they are holy, and they do not despise man at all. (For the record, I do believe in the trinity, but I don't think it can be fit in words very well, I guess in Heaven they use another language than ours.)