It comes down to what you were brought up believing. There are several religions that believe in reincarnation. There are over 2500 different gods and goddesses know to man.
If you believe in one of them and not the others you are an atheist to the other gods. Which god do you pray to for enlightenment?
Is it the Muslim god, the Jewish god, the Christian god, one of the Greek gods, one of the Hindu gods, one of the Celtic gods, one of the Egyptian gods?
There are so many, if your god is real and all the others are imaginary, how do you know? Did you do research on the others to make sure? Did you pray to the others to see if you could get an answer? Other religions that pray to their gods all affirm they have received answers to their prayers.
If there is only one true god then the prayers of the other religions would go unanswered. I want to believe there is a god out there, and sometimes I think there is because I grew up believing in it. If I had been born under different circumstances the god I grew up with would be someone else.
6 comments:
Well, there IS only one God. Different religions just call Him a different name. When I was in Hong Kong, I read some of the Chinese bible. I read about a Great Monkey that went on all these journeys, and performed all these miracles, just like Jesus did. IN fact, the stories were almost identical. So, in my opinion, while there are tons of religions, and tons of Gods, they are all the same God. Pretty much everyone we talked to would say to us "Ngoh deih Baai Saan!!" - meaning, "we worship God". We would say back to them "Ngoh deih DOU Baai Saan!!" - meaning, "we ALSO worship God." WHen we said that, they would stop and stare at us for a moment. After that, some people would listen to us, and others didn't. But, at least they knew that we believed in God too.
lelyism - the belief that all Gods are, indeed, one God.
riartion - what happens to all Gods once you believe that they are all one God... They riartion into one.
I believe that Father reveals Himself to anyone who wants to believe in a Supreme Being, in the way the individual can best understand. Accepting the existence of a God is the first step in obtaining faith unto salvation. The second step is having a correct understanding of His attributes, character, and perfections. The third is knowing that the way you live is acceptable to Him. With those three things, a person could conceivably arrive at a point where he knew the truth about divinity, regardless of what may have been his original conception of God.
At the heart of the whole matter is the principle and experience of personal revelation. Did God speak to Mohammed or Guatama? I would not be a bit surprised. Have the teachings of Islam or Buddhism remained pure and undiluted since the days the first revelations came? No more than the truths that originally pertained to Judaism and primative Christianity.The passage of time and the philospohies of men have sometimes deformed those truths that once filled the minds and hearts of those who received them. Hence the need for continuous revelation, general and most especially personal.
We Mormons say that we have a living Prophet, one who speaks with God face to face as one man does with another. Is there any way that we can know that to be a fact? Yes, but it requires a bit more than just contemplating the possibilities.
There is a promise given to all those who want to understand spiritual truths. It is a promise based on the nature of God Himself. God, by definition, is a family man, one who loves His children and wishes only the best for them. We may see some of Him in us when we express similar affection for our own children. Jesus said it plainly: if your child were to ask for bread would you give him a stone; if he aksed for a fish to eat, would you give him a serpent instead? So likewise, the God of Heaven will reveal Himself to you, if you ask in faith, with no more than a simple desire to believe in Him, if He is there. There are millions who have done so and have received satisfactory answers to their petitions.
He will deal with us, however, as He has always done: according to where we are in our progression at any given moment. He will not overload us, overwhelm us with His majesty just to prove His existence. But He will lead us along, kindly, gently, with great patience and love, if we will let Him.
That has been my experience,
Dave says: “Which God . . . ?”
I agree with Chris (It’s the same God), and with Dad, and I think most LDS people think so, too. God delights to bless his children and to answer their prayers. Believing Muslims also hold that Christians, Jews, and Muslims are all descendants of Abraham and “People of the Book” --basically, all came out of the same religious background, and therefore prayed to the same God.
I have always believed that there is one God with different names. As I continue to read I have discovered that the nature of God in his many names is the same.
I also know that God reveals himself to those who seek him. As Dad said, he reveals himself in ways that we can handle based on your present condition.
I know that the prophets know God. They could not testify to us they way they do without that pure knowledge.
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