{"id":354,"date":"2008-07-23T05:07:33","date_gmt":"2008-07-23T05:07:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/conversationswithgod\/2008\/07\/how-can-i-know-god-exists.html"},"modified":"2008-07-23T05:07:33","modified_gmt":"2008-07-23T05:07:33","slug":"how-can-i-know-god-exists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/conversationswithgod\/2008\/07\/how-can-i-know-god-exists.html","title":{"rendered":"How can I know God exists?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nWednesday is Question and Answer Day <\/strong>on the blog…a time for exploring many of the questions that people have recently asked about the nine Conversations with God <\/em>books and the New Spirituality. Here’s this week’s entry…
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\nReader’s Question:<\/strong> Dear Neale…I have some very tough questions that have plagued me for a while now. Ever since I got into a belief debate with a friend who’s very scientific (and does not believe in a God), I’ve been stumped. To know that there’s a 50\/50 chance that we’re really alone, and that what I spent my life believing in and loving, may all be a lie has led me into a deep depression. I know now what hell is, I wake to it every morning?: a world without God.
\nI want to know more than anything that God really exists, but how do I know? How do I know you aren’t just receiving the answers from your own subconscious? Your answer would probably be, “Because my mind couldn’t devise those kind of answers.” But are you so sure?
\nI must have dreams every night and I’ve had dreams about things or people that I would never think of (that are the furthest from my personality) yet my subconscious creates them.
\nThe question “what about the powerful, warm feeling a person gets when in deep prayer, baptism, etc.” might arise. Yes, I’ve felt it so powerful the tears have flowed and I could barely stand, but sex is a very incredible experience, too, and it’s a biological function, so couldn’t everything else be?
\nFurthermore, I am familiar with automatic writing, but again, how do I know the answers aren’t of my own biological brain? Lately when I’ve tried to communicate with Him\/Her in this form, I’ve received vague and horribly misspelled answers, then the pen drifting off the paper. And now, nothing at all, just the pen drifting.
\nSo if you could, if you have the time, could you please ask God these things? I’ve asked, but have had no luck, Besides, you’re good at it…
\nIt seems these days God would have to appear before my eyes in human form or I’d have to die before I’d know if he were fact and not fiction (and I really would like to find him before that time). Utterly lost, K., Sunnyvale, CA.
\nPS. I just got an idea! If you do decide to talk with God, there’s a man that I’ve idolized since I was 12. If God could reveal the correct name to you, then I’d know that God is alive and well. After all, how would you know? That’s just a thought.
\nNeale’s Response:<\/strong> Dear K…my dear, dear person…how I wish I could give you the gift of faith in that which you do not know in your experience. I had so hoped that my book would do that. I do know this. If you had had the same experience I had, you would never, ever again question the existence of God, or the source of these writings.
\nBut you have not had such an experience, and how can I give it to you? I cannot. I can only share with you my own.
\nMy friend, I cannot tell you the name of the man you have idolized since you were 12. Such a particular and peculiar piece of personal information I could never know, and I cannot find it in my heart to ask God to do “parlor tricks” in order to prove Herself to you or to me.
\nI understand why you would ask, though. We are all trying to find a simple way to prove to ourselves that God exists. Well, let me give you a simple way. Look into the eyes of a newborn child. Smell the fragrance of a blossoming rose. And, yes, melt into the incredible experience of wonderful, loving sex. You call that a biological function, K. But who do you suppose invented biology?
\nThere is not a “50\/50 chance that we are really alone,” my friend. There isn’t the slightest chance in the world of that. I’m going to ask God to visit your heart even as you are reading this. And because I have asked, God will do so. That is the faith I have. Yet you must open your heart, or you will not feel the presence of God. Or, you may feel the presence and call it something else. (Like a “biological function.”)
\nYou do not wake up every morning to a world without God, K. You wake up every morning to a world in which you do not see<\/em> God. That is an entirely different thing. Say this prayer:<\/p>\n

Open my eyes, that I may see visions of truth that asked for me. Open my eyes, illumine me, spirit divine! <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Those words are from a wonderful song sung by stylist by Chris Williamson, called Song of the Soul.<\/em>
\nWrite to me, and tell me how things are with you. And know this, K. I am with you. I have walked your path. And I love you for your honesty.
\n(Ask Neale<\/em> may be accessed on a daily basis in the Messengers’ Circle at Neale’s personal website: www.nealedonaldwalsch.com<\/a>. Each week Neale selects a question from those posted there, or from the book Questions and Answers on Conversations with God<\/em>, and publishes it in this blog.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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