Up Close and Personal with @msg768

Welcome to the 4th interview of my Up Close and Personal series where I dig deeper into who our Steemians are and the faith that drives their lives.

Today I had the pleasure of chatting with @msg768. We chatted about his upbringing, life, faith, and Smartcash.

If you missed the previous interviews, you can read them here:

• Up Close and Personal with @papa-pepper
• Up Close and Personal with @anotherjoe
• Up Close and Personal with @creatr

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Up Close and Personal 是一个我在英文区开始的系列。 在这个系列中，我会采访一些Steemians关于他们的信仰、爱好和他们成长的背景。

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Thank you Markus for taking the time to chat with me.

Can you share with me how you first joined Steemit and how you have found the journey so far?

Yeah mate sure thing! I first joined steemit in July this year after coming across a few articles posted on it by dollarvigilante. When I first joined, I didn’t know much about how things work here but I do remember that STEEM was about 40 cents and not very long after I joined, STEEM went to more than 2 dollars within less than 2 months! I thought it was gonna continue to go up but it didn’t. I find the journey quite spectacular to be honest and in spite of the recent dump and the bear market we have been experiencing, I still think there’s potential here. I wouldn’t however advise anyone to put all their eggs in one basket when it comes to investment! STEEM just happens to be one of the altcoins I find interesting.

Tell me a bit about yourself. Who is @msg768? What are you passionate about and what do you enjoy doing in your spare time?

I’m just an average creature saved by the grace of God. I was born and raised overseas, in Iran to be specific. I came to Australia in 2010 and ended up staying. Right now I’m a citizen of this blessed land and I can’t thank God enough for it as I look back and see His hand in my life from the very beginning, as far as I can remember! I have a personal blog where I share about more details about my spiritual journey out of Islam and into Christianity. That’s basically one of the things I like to do in my spare time. To blog about the Bible and my spiritual journey and understanding of God which keeps evolving on a regular basis. I also enjoy programming and trading as well as cooking!

I understand you are involved with the SmartCash project. Can you tell us a bit about what is SmartCash?

Yes I am! I stumbled across SmartCash about 2 months ago on steemit and ended up working part time for this amazing new altcoin. SmartCash is basically an altcoin forked from zcoin and bitcoin with some enhancements and modifications made to it. It uses SHA-3 algorithm which makes it more secure that bitcoin and most altcoins. It has a maximum supply of 5 billion coins of which about 700 million coins have already been mined. 80% of the mined coins go directly into funding and promoting the coin while 15% goes to long term holders and 5% to miners. I wrote a pretty detailed post about it about 2 months ago. If anyone’s interested, they can check it out here.

Tell me a bit about your upbringing. What was it like for you growing up? Were there any special occasions or pivotal moments in your childhood that stands out in your memory?

I don’t have a pleasant memory of my childhood. Let’s not go there! But as far as my memory is concerned, all I can remember is struggle, and confusion. Feeling unlucky at times while trying to fit in. Growing up by devout Muslim parents can be quite intimidating. Not being allowed to listen to music for instance and getting caught listening to music is one thing I can remember which ended up in a punishment. Having said that, my parents have changed themselves quite a lot. They themselves now tend to listen to the same type of music that they used to punish me for!

On your blog you talk about your spiritual journey. Can you share with us a bit of your journey in seeking the truth and how you arrived at what you believe now?

That would be quite a long story to be honest. But to cut the long story short, I was raised in a devout Muslim family in Iran. I used to pray five times a day and fast during the Ramdan and I continued to do so even when I moved to Australia. But after almost two years living all by myself, I couldn’t do it anymore as I found myself breaking more of Allah’s laws. I felt like a hypocrite and so I decided to completely let go of the religion I was raised with and instead follow my heart while still believing that there is a higher power. Then I found myself breaking my own laws too and that was really troubling to me. I was really broken at one stage of my life when I stumbled across the epic miniseries of the Bible on T.V which led to me examining Christianity and their claims. I was raised to mock the Christian faith so this in and of itself was a miracle. After months of intensive amount of research I finally gave my heart to Jesus. Having said that, I later found out that I always had faith in God. I just didn’t know enough about Him but I could see His hand in my life from the very beginning of my life; as far as I can remember!

If anyone asked you what does it mean to be a Christian and why did you decide to become a Christian, how would you answer?

To be a Christian means to have your sins, past, present and future, forgiven by God. It’s not about what we do, but about what God has done for us, on the cross. The only thing we can do about it is to either receive it like a gift or reject it. I decided to become a Christian, not only because of the irrefutable historical evidence that points to the resurrection of Jesus, but also because of a personal prayer or call upon God with absolute humility and the realization that I cannot possibly know whether any message about God or any religion in particular would be true or false, unless God Himself somehow showed it to me and convinced me from within my heart that this is the truth which led to a subjective supernatural experience that confirmed what the objective historical evidence was pointing to.

Has your life changed in any way since becoming a follower of Jesus?

Absolutely. In many shapes, forms and ways. I feel like I have a purpose and meaning in my life now and not only that, I no longer just know about God, but rather know Him on a personal level. I still have a lot to learn and I don’t think the learning curve is ever supposed to stop. But life becomes a lot easier when you get to know God on a personal level and when you find out that God is not against us, but rather for us. You feel a lot lighter when the heavy burden of your sins are lifted off of your shoulders and you no longer have to worry about facing God one day and trying to explain away all the wrong things you have done in your life. It’s quite refreshing and it empowers me to keep fighting the good fight of faith because I know that no matter what’s ahead of me, this is a fight worth fighting. Not only that, I also know that I won’t be fighting alone but I’ll be fighting with God on my side!

What do you think is the biggest misconception about Christians among the general public?

I think the biggest misconception about Christians among the general public is that Christianity is just like every other religion, in which you have do a bunch of religious rituals and follow a bunch of ethics in order to become accepted by God. This misconception is probably at least partly to be blamed on Christians as well, because most of them tend to have that mindset which is really troubling. But the truth is that Christianity is completely unique in many ways, shapes and forms. One of them is the fact that it teaches that justification before God is by faith alone. There is nothing we can do that would earn us a place in heaven or justify us before a holy God whose laws we have broken. Trying to earn forgiveness is like trying to bribe which would be extremely offensive in the sight of any just and righteous judge, let alone God who is the only just and righteous person according to Jesus Christ. The only thing we can do is to fall on our feet and cry for mercy! The good news is that God who is rich in mercy has provided a way for us to receive forgiveness. Whether we accept the offer or not is up to us and God is not going to force us to accept this offer.

You often hear people say, all religions are the same, and all roads lead to God. What is your opinion on this?

That is a very ignorant statement that only comes out of the mouth of people who seem to have no clue what they’re talking about. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out how wrong that statement is. Consider Islam and Christianity for instance. Two completely different religions that are on opposite spectrums. Christianity teaches that Jesus is the divine Son of God, and the only way to the Father whereas Islam teaches that calling Jesus the divine Son of God is an unforgivable sin. How can these two religions be the same and lead to God? It’s logically impossible unless we cherry pick from both. Pick the parts we like and throw the rest away which is very common among those who stick to the religion of their ancestors and don’t bother to research what their ancestors have believed through an objective mind.

Are there any words from the Bible that has made a significant difference to your life?

There are plenty of words in the Bible that I still tend to meditate on. I love the book of Proverbs in the Old Testament. It’s filled with wisdom and advice, written more than 3000 years ago yet still applicable to us and our society. I also love to meditate on the book of Psalms. It contains amazing passages about the Messiah and His death and resurrection. When it comes to the New Testament, I love meditating on the gospels. I love Paul’s letter to the Galatians which is his defense of the gospel and the book of Hebrews which is an amazing letter to the Hebrews about the gospel. I also love Paul’s letter to the Romans which tends to break the gospel down into simple words, as simple as it can get. Romans 4:5 is my favorite verse where Paul makes a radical statement to explain the gospel in simple terms. The significant difference that verse has made in my life is that now I walk by faith, not by sight!

Thank you for your time. Where can people go if they want to read more of your story?

You’re welcome. It’s my pleasure! The best place to read more about my spiritual journey is my weblog on wordpress or blogspot. I keep two copies of the same blog and they’re both under the same domain: whydoibelieveinjesus. I’ll leave the links below for anyone who might be interested:

https://whydoibelieveinjesus.wordpress.com/
https://whydoibelieveinjesus.blogspot.com/

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