RE: "Sleepless Dream" - Poems, 004
I can respect those opinions. They are logical. But, too much of what has happened in my life, including my conversations with God, although not miraculous in and of themselves, are miraculous as to their timing. And those things are too significant for me to just say there's no Source or Higher Power or something influencing my life.
This is a silly example, but...a few months ago, I'm driving through Northern California for the first time. I'm seeing mountains; I've never seen snow-capped mountains in person before. It was moving, tears streaming. I was thankful for the moment. I felt like God said He loved me (not a big deal, could have made it up in my head).
As I drove, the sun was setting the sky became a brilliant, fiery red, with a mixture of all these other colors. THE MOST AMAZING sunset I'd ever seen. As I'm looking at how beautiful it is, just enjoying it, I hear "that's you're engagement ring" (back story: months earlier I had thought to myself that if I get married again, I'd love to have an opal, my birthstone). Here in the sky, an "opal sky", God said He's giving me my ring!
In THAT moment, I turn on the radio and a worship song is blasting "I see the world in light, I see the world in wonder, I see the world in life, bursting in living color".
For me, none of those things are miraculous in and of themselves, but the timing and meaning behind them tell me there's a God, one who loves me.
I love science too. My brain is an analytical brain. I got my BA, double major in Biology and Chemistry. So I get the love of the scientific method. But, I became increasingly frustrated with how it and the men using it could only explain very little. It always felt like we were kids playing with grown up ideas that were way over our heads.
Just my thoughts. I really enjoy that we can share our opinions. I have no desire to sway you. I like learning and challenging my thinking. So Thank you :)
Thank you for such a candid response, and for sharing what was obviously a beautiful, personal moment in your life with me.
As always, what I say next will seem like I'm trying to wash out the colour and magic, lol, but just hear me out.
First, I'm curious: Why Christianity? I know many, many people who believe in some higher power but it takes a lot more belief in crazy things to go all the way to messiahs and ressurrections, and especially Christianity's main thing: being born guilty.
The timing of things is something that convinces many people (including me when I was younger) ... But the explanation is like this: Incredible coincidences happen all the time. It's crazy but statistically, right now, 1000 people just experiences an incredible coincidence in their lives. Let's say it happens every second. Or every 30 seconds, on average.
This, combined with how we humans love to think the world revolves around us (we are all the main characters in a book with our name as the Title, like David Copperfield ;P) ... So when things things happen, we naturally are prone to think that it means something ... That there is something behind it. Despite no evidence to back it up, we take it as proof of what we already believe.
And that is my next point: Confirmation Bias. I'll do a post about it at some time... Basically, we are prone to easily notice and accept information that helps back up what we already believe. And just as easily, we tend to ignore(not on purpose... we just don't notice) information that might negate our beliefs.
To me, these moments are still magical! Even though they aren't caused by any higher power... Or actually, especially because they aren't. They are rare moments that, sure, happen to everybody, but that one moment in MY life was MY moment and means something to me. It's unique in that way, and is valuable.
The frustration with science is inevitable, I think, but it's all we've got. And better it than just jumping to conclusions with beliefs that we personally like.
Again, thank you for the interaction... This is one of my favourite things to talk about =)