Hi there,
So I can't discuss this in the non-Christian forum, because I am Christian - but I am really curious? If you were dead in your sins and denied there was a 'god', but the Holy Spirit started to work with you, and you started to think "it would be better if I didn't make up my mind or have to", is that transition from atheism to agnosticism "progress"?
The question is, "are you doubting what the Holy Spirit has revealed to you?" Theoretically, if the Holy Spirit started to point from agnosticism back to atheism, you would question his motive - I wonder if He would ever do that? Is it more progress to keep your atheism and not waver, if the more agnostic you become the more and more you become doubtful (as an agnostic). The Holy Spirit doesn't work on the principle of "cornering people", so I guess He would appeal to God as a "Higher Power" - someone who does not make doubts worse.
So is the point to begin with, to limit doubt? Can you be an atheist in the end, when you have no doubt that whatever you are going to visit in the after-life, the moment you are dead will be the time to do it? Or can you be an agnostic and say "if God wanted me to believe in Him, He would send me back as an elephant" and be justified because you don't doubt what you are expecting? This is all giving God little room to move!
Do you remember being atheist, the same way you remember being "dead in your sins"? I have a very clear memory of wondering how on Earth I could remember the sermon I just heard, if I didn't address my sin. I didn't think to myself "I am too atheist, to care about the sermon or my sin!". Neither did I think "I have heard the sermon already, I will just doubt and doubt again". What about you?
Maybe something God needs to get through to me, is that He doesn't keep records of how much our faith has progressed. God is concerned with how close our relationship is. The more genuine our faith, the less likely others will be able to doubt it - much less obey the Devil! I think that is what God is asking, concerning our faith but also the faith of others: "can you get a relationship this close to Me?" "Can you get a closer relationship to Jesus?"
Now Jesus says "I don't care that they are atheist or agnostic - unless they repent they will perish!" (gospels from memory) and I am inclined to think, that when an atheist or agnostic thinks about that, the truth of their mortality will convert them. So what is this idea of "progress"? How do we go from be depraved, to being motivated in the faith? Is there no seed of faith to plant, which will help us get from the sin we knew, to the sin we crucified?
You can see from this, that I am not trying to prejudice my answers - perhaps that is the fruit I was looking for (or the start of it)? It just concerns me that atheists and agnostics alike seem to be drowning in doubt: Jesus called them "fish"! You don't look at a fish and say "I wish I could breathe water" you say "fish! be caught! you will serve much better as food, than anything you can do in the ocean!" Maybe we need words for half-converted atheists or work hardened agnostics? Ha!
I hope this has been thought provoking anyway; as Ray Comfort says [I'm paraphrasing] "every so often I lower my shield of faith, just a little bit, so that I see what I was without my faith - to remind myself of how important that faith is"
God bless.
So I can't discuss this in the non-Christian forum, because I am Christian - but I am really curious? If you were dead in your sins and denied there was a 'god', but the Holy Spirit started to work with you, and you started to think "it would be better if I didn't make up my mind or have to", is that transition from atheism to agnosticism "progress"?
The question is, "are you doubting what the Holy Spirit has revealed to you?" Theoretically, if the Holy Spirit started to point from agnosticism back to atheism, you would question his motive - I wonder if He would ever do that? Is it more progress to keep your atheism and not waver, if the more agnostic you become the more and more you become doubtful (as an agnostic). The Holy Spirit doesn't work on the principle of "cornering people", so I guess He would appeal to God as a "Higher Power" - someone who does not make doubts worse.
So is the point to begin with, to limit doubt? Can you be an atheist in the end, when you have no doubt that whatever you are going to visit in the after-life, the moment you are dead will be the time to do it? Or can you be an agnostic and say "if God wanted me to believe in Him, He would send me back as an elephant" and be justified because you don't doubt what you are expecting? This is all giving God little room to move!
Do you remember being atheist, the same way you remember being "dead in your sins"? I have a very clear memory of wondering how on Earth I could remember the sermon I just heard, if I didn't address my sin. I didn't think to myself "I am too atheist, to care about the sermon or my sin!". Neither did I think "I have heard the sermon already, I will just doubt and doubt again". What about you?
Maybe something God needs to get through to me, is that He doesn't keep records of how much our faith has progressed. God is concerned with how close our relationship is. The more genuine our faith, the less likely others will be able to doubt it - much less obey the Devil! I think that is what God is asking, concerning our faith but also the faith of others: "can you get a relationship this close to Me?" "Can you get a closer relationship to Jesus?"
Now Jesus says "I don't care that they are atheist or agnostic - unless they repent they will perish!" (gospels from memory) and I am inclined to think, that when an atheist or agnostic thinks about that, the truth of their mortality will convert them. So what is this idea of "progress"? How do we go from be depraved, to being motivated in the faith? Is there no seed of faith to plant, which will help us get from the sin we knew, to the sin we crucified?
You can see from this, that I am not trying to prejudice my answers - perhaps that is the fruit I was looking for (or the start of it)? It just concerns me that atheists and agnostics alike seem to be drowning in doubt: Jesus called them "fish"! You don't look at a fish and say "I wish I could breathe water" you say "fish! be caught! you will serve much better as food, than anything you can do in the ocean!" Maybe we need words for half-converted atheists or work hardened agnostics? Ha!
I hope this has been thought provoking anyway; as Ray Comfort says [I'm paraphrasing] "every so often I lower my shield of faith, just a little bit, so that I see what I was without my faith - to remind myself of how important that faith is"
God bless.
