Tags
Accomplishments, Achievements, Atheism, Atheist, Credit, Freedom, God, Me, Religion, Wholeness
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As a Christian, all glory is meant to be directed heavenwards. It doesn’t matter how much work, effort or intelligence you put in, if something is successful it’s: “Praise God” or “Hallelujah” and “thank ya, Jeezus!”.
As an atheist, I have learned the joy of being able to claim my hard work, intelligence and effort as my own. It’s great at the end of a hard day, to crawl into bed with a sigh of satisfaction knowing that I did it.
Me.
I’m the one who kept my patience and loved my son through another screaming fit and remained calm while he puked all over me for the umpteenth time. I’m the one who still had the capacity to care for and feed my family after a long day at work. I’m the one who did the dishes and gathered the energy to clean the bathroom.
Me.
How affirming.
For someone who has spent the bulk life having to accept all my shortcomings as being my own sinful nature or my fault, while giving credit to god for anything good in me, it is extremely freeing and empowering to be able to say, actually, this is all me. Everything. The good, the bad and the ugly. When I fail, when I succeed, it’s me.
It is from MY strength, MY power, MY wisdom, MY tenacity that I have done the amazing, incredible, wonderful things I have done.
Just as it is from MY weakness, MY stupidity, MY laziness, MY complacency that I have made mistakes and fallen-short.
I have learned that, without relying on a god, most things in my life have remained absolutely the same as they were when I did rely on one. And it’s because there is one majorly important factor that didn’t change when I became an atheist:
I’m still here.
Me.
My personality, my characteristics-all the things that truly made me who I am-have stayed the same. I still fight for the things in which I believe. I still show compassion to others. I’m still very giving of my time, energy and resources. I still feel deep empathy for those suffering. I still face every day hoping to do my best to handle what comes my way and to love those around me to the best of my ability. I still lose my temper. I still whine about things that make me uncomfortable. I still get lazy and loaf around.
The only difference?
When I’ve done a good job at something, I can take the credit for it and feel proud instead of having to give all the credit away to someone or something else.
Now I feel whole.
seeking life now 
So much yes to this post.
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It’s a damned shame to think anyone would be made to feel ashamed of their own sense of accomplishment. Congratulations on getting clear of that!
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I found your post a little confusing. I am a Christian and have come to this belief through spiritual encounters and pursuit of knowledge. The New Testament is clear about loving your neighbor and being encouraging in word and deed. So I’m sorry if you didn’t have a church or group of Christians around you to encourage and uplift you. Even still the Bible is loaded with verses that speak about identity. You have a twisted view of Scripture and of God if you cannot receive praise if you do something well. The Bible teaches not to take credit away from God, if God does it give Him praise. If He answered your prayer give Him thanks. But that doesn’t mean you are robbed of encouragement and validation. He is a good Father if you let Him.
Secondly, it’s odd that you changed your belief system that would take EVERY ounce of credit you feel like you deserve. A strong stance of atheism is what’s called determinism. Basically it means you have no free will, you are a machine that has been hard wired a certain way. Every action, every word, every feeling has already been predetermined by the universe. Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and dozens of other atheistic authorities claim this as fact. So with this worldview you can’t claim credit for anything, it was already determined for you.
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Hi williamjcoleman,
Thanks for your thoughts and feedback. It’s great to have a dialogue about it rather than the thoughts just being out there going stagnant.
I’m a bit unclear about what you are trying to say in your second paragraph. Especially since atheism is simply the lack of a belief in a god whereas determinism has to do with understanding the laws of physics. You can be an atheist and not believe determinism. But, I also wonder if you’ve accidentally left-out a few words in the first sentence?
Secondly,I was surrounded by encouraging/uplifting chrisitians all of whom are still friends of mine. I never said I wasn’t.
And, as far as having a twisted view of scripture and of god…doesn’t everybody? Doesn’t everybody paint his/her own picture of who god is based on which parts of the bible are liked and which are not? Isn’t this why there are so many sects of christianity? For example: Those who believe water baptisms are necessary vs. those who don’t. Those who believe in sacraments vs. those who don’t. And those are just 2 of the largest issues that christians can’t agree on when it comes to biblical understanding. The list can go on and on and on and on…hell exists vs. no it doesn’t. Heaven is somewhere else vs. heaven is earth restored to how it was meant to be, etc. etc. etc.
You said: “If god does it, give him praise”- Ok, if you can prove to me what god has done, providing evidence that it was, in fact, god, I will give him the praise for it. In that very statement you have made my point for me. I have no evidence that god has done anything for me, and so, all I can determine from this is that I have done it myself. Good and bad. (with obvious exceptions of where I was helped or hurt by others, etc. which I didn’t write about because, I thought, that would be painfully obvious and it would make the post too long, and less poetic. My writing isn’t to be scientific, or even journalistic. My writing is done to express. To express my experiences, thoughts, feelings and observations. Therefore, I leave-out a lot of boring details.)
Lastly, I want to be clear that I wasn’t saying that I couldn’t receive a compliment. But, even when a christian does a good job at something, is complimented, receives the compliment, etc. god is still praised for “letting it” happen, or “helping” him/her to do it. As if we can do nothing apart from god (which, is another thing christians disagree on).
I could acknowledge when I did something good….but, it was always only to a point until I had to give praise and glory to god, which, in the end, meant taking it away from me.
And, I think, if you try to understand where I’m coming from with this, you might agree with me. A christian can be a good person, and do a good job, but existing with that is the ideology that ‘all praise be to god’. This is a notion taught across churches and denominations. All one has to do is read the words of the songs sung in any church to hear this message over and over and over again.
We also see it time and again with singers and sports athletes. Even though they have put in the long hours, dedication, skills, training, etc. to be able to perform, many of them say “all glory to god”, as if he is responsible for all of that. Because, christians actually believe that god is responsible for all of that. He allowed it, facilitated it, grew it, encouraged it, gave breath to it, was the power/force behind it, etc.
But, logic would say ‘if all praise be to god, than no praise be to me’ (but, probably a bit more grammatically correct). If “all” of something is going one direction, then there can be nothing left to go in any other direction.
For years I thought it was god’s strength, patience, wisdom, etc. helping me through tough situations and performing well at different tasks, but now I know it wasn’t. It was me. I know this because I no longer rely on this god and I still manage to navigate difficult times and succeed in life. In fact, I would argue, that I manage even better than I had before.
All the best,
H
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In my second paragraph I was trying to get this simple point across, that many of the leading speakers and proponents of Atheism in the world today agree that determinism is as true as evolution. I obviously am not apart of the atheistic community so I am not aware of every single teacher or proponent of atheism in the public sphere, but when those that are writing the best selling books, and teaching at the leading universities say with certainty that we are predetermined organisms, it’s something to make note of. So I can summarize what I meant in a simple question: how can you claim credit for something you were predetermined to do?
What would give you the evidence to say that determinism isn’t real and that Hawking, Dawkins, and Harris are wrong?
No, not everyone has a twisted view of Scripture. There is the study of scripture and orthodoxy in which most of the Christian world would agree on. Basically there are majors and minors. Majors you agree with or it’s not essentially Christian, minors you don’t have to agree on but just because there are different interpretations of a certain Scripture does not make irrelevant or disprove the existence of God.
I can give you many evidences of what He’s done in my life and what I’ve seen Him do through me. I’ve seen cancer healed, deaf ears opened, scoliosis straightened and more.
Yes, throughout all bible believing churches, they should be saying all glory to God! He deserves all the glory. Think of the theology. He created the world. He created you. Jesus emptied Himself and came to this Earth to die for your sins and bring the potential of eternal life. What has He done to not deserve all the glory?
Life goes on whether you believe in God or not. He will not force you to be in a relationship. I 100% believe that if you ask Him to reveal Himself, He will do it.
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What would give me the evidence to say that determinism isn’t real? First of all, you don’t prove that something doesn’t exist-you prove that it does. Secondly, I have no idea. I am not an expert in determinism or physics. I never claimed to be. I also never brought up the idea of determinism as something in which I believed. You did. I don’t have to prove anything here, because I haven’t made a claim.
When it comes to the study of scripture—you, yourself, used the words “most of the Christian world would agree on.” But, how do you quantify that? Are you sure that “most” agree on these things? Do you have numbers to back-up that claim?
When it comes to the majors and minors, I disagree that most of Christians agree with this. As I stated in my first response, major groups of Christians disagree about what is required to be saved, or get into heaven, or be a Christian. Aren’t these Major topics?
And, if there are different interpretations, based on each person’s understanding/experience, after all, these were major factors when canonizing the bible, does that not mean that humankind has, from the start, been picking and choosing for themselves a great deal of what they consider important or not when it comes to who god is and how to follow him? We can even go back further than that. When it all started there were people deciding what they thought was important to record and what was not. Just look at how much scripture has been changed or rewritten based on how mankind has evolved and adjusted it based on what is acceptable by today’s social standards.
You are right, disagreement in the text doesn’t disprove god and I don’t think I said it did. But, it also doesn’t prove his existence. In fact, nothing has. The disagreement in text proves that there is not one, solid, truth in which every Christian agrees (perhaps, with the exception of ‘god exists’).
I would love to see the evidence of what he’s done in your life with verifiable backing. How do you know that those healings were a result of god? Because something is happened that you can’t, reasonably seem to explain, does not automatically equal ‘god’.
There is no proof that god created the world, or me, or that jesus emptied himself, etc. And, on that note, it’s not much of an emptying when the bible says that as soon as it was done god elevated jesus above everything else. I would gladly give-up everything I had if I knew that I would come back to life in even greater power and glory. That’s not really a sacrifice. It was a moment of pain for an eternity of glory. Kind of like going through childbirth. It was hell and I felt like every bone in my body was being crushed, but I would do it a million times over if I had to, in order to be able to hold my son in my arms.
You should also be careful to not draw presuppositions about who I am, my experience, my past, my knowledge, and so forth. I was a “zealot” for god since I was 7 or 8. I spent years preaching in a church and have lived my entire adult life in ministry and service. I have had experiences. I have seen “miracles”. But, the truth is, there is still no proof that it was god. Just because I don’t have an answer for everything, doesn’t automatically mean the answer must be god.
Lastly, when I was going through my “crisis of faith” I cried out to god. Like you, I believed that because he knew my heart and knew that I was just honestly seeking him, not demanding anything, he would surely give me some kind of reassurance. He did not. So, either he is not there, or he is really mean. What loving father would hear his child crying-out for his presence and deny it?
While I understand how you end your last comment, and I used to feel exactly the same way about things, I know you that you are wrong. I asked him to reveal himself, from the purest of places, as a Christian who was struggling with unanswered questions, as a Christian who had given-up my entire life to that point to him and in his service, I had literally sold everything to work for him, and he did not reveal himself to me.
He, simply, did not do it.
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