Evolution? #ELIF Explain Like I'm Five

 When I talk to most people who don't believe in God, it's because they think the Bible is a book of fables and myths. 

I've heard all the usual things from non-believers about God. They call Him "the old man in the sky" or refer to Him as mean and unloving and unjust. 

When checking Twitter recently - mainly to see if the rumors of its demise were possibly true - I saw this:

Many, many agnostics and atheists present arguments to do with people being "good" or "bad", poor, sick, sad, etc. They wonder how a loving God could "allow" such situations as the rich getting away with things or the poor being mistreated. 

The main argument I hear from some people right in my own family has to do with sexuality. "Why does a loving God hate gays?" is one I've heard several times. One person I am close to has decided that their gay lifestyle is just fine with God.

Probably the main thing I hear from people in online forums has to do with evolution. A lot of people can't bring themselves to even consider the idea of a Creator God. They can easier believe in the "Big Bang".

I can talk about all those other things another time but, I want to deal with evolution in the next few (or more) posts. In my opinion, evolution is harder to believe in than anything. To me, evolution is almost a ridiculous theory. Even when I was in school, hearing about a Creator God in church and being taught evolution in school, neither idea seemed to outweigh the other. Of course, I was young and had never thought critically about either belief.

This is what I want to hear from people who believe in evolution to do: Explain like I'm five (thanks Reddit) why you believe in evolution. Or why you don't believe in a Creator God? And I want details.

I've said before, here and elsewhere, that my faith is not blind. I don't believe based on feelings or emotions. I do feel joyful that I have come to believe in God. Without that belief, I would have no hope outside of living this life here on earth. It's not been a really bad life, but if this is all there is to be, how sad that would make me.

So the next posts will all be some of my questions and some of my opinions.

Peace

--Free

Anything But God

 I am stunned by the people who call the Bible 'silly' and say they can't believe that Christians (including me) believe. 

This is some of what I have heard people say about the Bible and/or about Christians:

• How can you believe in some 'old man' in the sky (or - 'old white man' from those with a problem with a 'white' God')?
• You believe that a man was swallowed by a fish and lived? Or: you believe in talking snakes and talking donkeys? Or: `insert a comment here~.
• You believe that a "loving" God will send people to Hell?
• You believe that a virgin had a child and that child grew up to become a Savior for the world?
• You believe in a flood that killed everyone except for one man and his family?

I could go on for a while. I can answer a lot of those questions but I won't in this post. What I will say is what I always think when someone makes such a comment and that is this: You laugh because I believe in God and in a Bible that is a history of people. Then why do you believe in aliens or witchcraft or that you can think your way to what you want or attract your way to success? Why do you believe that everything came from nothing? And why do you want or need so badly to believe that there is no God?

By the way, the comment I personally have heard - and not always from people being mean - is Do you just need to believe in a God because you're afraid not to?

Sounds legit

I will answer that one. I believe in God because this world, the universe, nature, and human life testifies to a Creator God. 

The other day, I was listening to a podcast (love a good podcast!) about a man (and other people) who pretty much dedicated his life to a study of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes. (I recently mentioned how much I like stories about Holmes.) Some of the people mentioned in the podcast are those who are so extreme in their fandom that they have clubs and meetings. The main subject of the podcast was a man who even recreated Holmes' Baker Street home in his own home. (Oh my.)

There are people who fall under the spell of gurus to the point of risking or losing their lives to follow them. There are people who believe in some of the most inane things but they have a problem with my belief in God?

I. Just. Can't. 

Back in Anchorage where everybody talks to just about anybody in the store or on the street, I ran into a lady who believed in angels but not in God.  I know a lot of people who believe in demons and ghosts and the like but don't believe in God.

There are lots of people who believe in reincarnation and the like. 

Here is the one thing that has always confused me: if God is not real, then why do so many people try to dispute his existence? I don't see people picking on the gods of any other religion. Scientologists believe in the most ridiculous things I could ever imagine. 

So, yes, I believe in the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. I believe in the Son and I believe in the Holy Spirit. And until you or your god can speak life into existence from nothing, leave me alone.

Peace

--Free

P.S.: I saw this old title of an article after I initially wrote this post: Why you don't need God. In the search engine, this was the teaser: "Without God, life is still meaningful (Opinion)". My immediate reaction was to think: "But is death?" And that, in my opinion, is what so many people miss. Life could be good or bad for people, but it's death where eternity comes in. That's the part they should be thinking about.