Thanks for your reply! You are right; my intellectual observations about God is overriding what the Bible says about God. So how do I actually make the heart change? How do I convince myself that God is good when all of my logic and reason tells me that He's really not? I thought that prayer would help, but it's been so long, I feel like those prayers are being ignored.
P.S. A troll is a type of cyberbully who enjoys arguing or insulting to create strife online. I technically misused the term "griefer", which usually refers more to a gamer who cyberbullies through poor sportsmanship during online gaming. Everyone who frequents forums have crossed paths with a troll at one time or another. Sometimes you'll see people say "don't feed the troll", meaning not to throw fuel on the fire that the cyberbully is basking in.
Thanks for the definitions. So Paul says we are to reprogram our minds, Rom 12:2. So HOW exactly? The word of God actually. First, in your case because you said you hate God, you need to identify why that is. As David said:
Psalms 51:10 (KJV)
Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
The word
create is the same word in Genesis 1:1 as it is only God who can create something from nothing. We need a new heart, something only God can do. What God will do is put in the desire to change your heart - aka repent. But to do that you have to take the old way of thinking and exchange it for God's thinking.
Ephesians 4:22-32 (KJV)
That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another. Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil. Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with [his] hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Colossians 3:8-17 (KJV)
But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; And have put on the new [man], which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him: Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond [nor] free: but Christ [is] all, and in all. Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also [do] ye. And above all these things [put on] charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, [do] all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.
Put off the old man. Put on Jesus. How do you do that?
2 Corinthians 10:4-5 (KJV)
(For the weapons of our warfare [
are] not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;
The war you experience we all do just as Paul and we come to the same conclusion, just as you have:
Romans 7:24 (KJV)
O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
I praise the Lord God Almighty that chapter 7 didn't end there, but He gave us the answer!
Romans 7:25 (KJV)
I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
So the choice is ultimately yours: do you believe the word of God or your own reasoning and experiences?
