How atheists made me believe in God

I always find it most beneficial to listen when people share something that goes against their interests.

For example, if someone is trying to sell me something and they offer advice that would make them less money if I acted upon it, chances are it’s solid advice.

Another fascinating example is all the gay people against pride. To be very clear, I don’t personally have anything against gay people. Nor do I care who you choose to love - as long as you’re not a pedophile, I don’t see why we can’t break bread.

But I digress, it was listening to former atheists who made me believe in God.

Growing up, my mom went to church every Sunday and my father is a preacher’s son. They met each other at a joint prayer night. My extended family is also very religious. Needless to say, I never lacked religious influences in my youth.

Despite all that, I grew up atheist for a few reasons.

1. I didn’t want to listen to my parents and typically frown upon authority.

2. The Bible and Jesus Christ simply didn’t make sense to me.

3. … and church was boring. I just dreaded going.

So why the change of heart?

As I matured, I enjoyed taking on leadership responsibility. It brings me joy knowing I’m sending people in the right direction.

But everything has a cost. The bigger impact you want to have, the bigger the consequences.

And I have big things planned. It’ll involve a lot of people.

The responsibility I put on myself because of my dreams is massive. Frankly, the thought of potential consequences is crippling.

It’s a very easy spiral into the world of nihilism - thinking of what can go wrong at every step of the way. It’s a recipe for hopelessness, indecision, and lack of action.

I can’t afford any of those things.

I need to build. I need to take action.

But what direction do I take? Who’s to say my direction is worth pursuing more than anyone else’s? How do I even know it’s a direction that’s good for society?

Think through the price for one of society’s greatest ideals: world peace. The cost of world peace is mass genocide to every race and culture aside from your own. With the same homogeneous views as anyone else you’ll ever meet, there won’t be any division.

If you’ve ever seen the Man in the High Castle on Amazon Prime Video, you’ll recognize that as the idealistic world the Nazis were trying to build.

That’s obviously wrong. Yet even with noble intentions, a misunderstanding of reality can send me off in the wrong direction. I recently almost lost 2 very close relationships because I misread a situation.

And I’m definitely not above doing wrong.

So how can I believe in the direction I set forth? I honestly don’t think I can.

It’s when I came to this conclusion that I was at a recent trough in hopelessness and depression.

Then I came across this definition of God by Patrick Bet-David (former atheist): God is the greatest ideal of good.

If you claim to have no relationship with God, I’m sure you still do things throughout your day based upon what you believe to be good.

By definition, that’s a relationship with God.

No man is perfect. No one ever will be. But we can aspire to a perfect ideal. That ideal is God.

I think pursuing the greatest good is a pretty noble ambition.

And it’s not my path. It’s God’s path.

That crippling responsibility I felt before? It’s alleviated now.

I feel empowered.

I know that my future is in God’s hands. This is a beautiful feeling.

Jordan Peterson said something, not verbatim, that the world is too cruel and life is too hard to not grow bitter and nihilistic without believing in a higher power. Without believing in a greater good.

I think that’s true.

Patrick Bet-David is a numbers guy. He asks where’s the bigger risk? Believing or not believing?

Ultimately, even if believing in God just ends up being a psychological trick, I’ll still be out ahead.

And even without that, I think religious values as a whole are a net positive for society.

For the pessimists out there calling themselves realists, I have one last question for you: at a certain point, isn’t self delusion good? Wouldn’t you rather believe that there’s a greater good?

That’s all. Just my thoughts. Appreciate you being here for the journey.