Repetition of affirmation leads to belief...

It's not a matter of convincing, but a matter of nullifying the use of God in an argument as using a supernatural excuse merely slows down an argument.

I had to convince myself daily that God was not real and had no bearing on my life.

I had to repeat (sometimes aloud, sometimes in my head) all the stuff I was told in school or heard on the nature channels or from other people as to why naturalistic evolution had to be the only way things could be. Eventually it became easier to stay inebriated so I wouldn't care as much.

Anti supernaturalism is a presupposition that I argued myself into and convinced myself of by repetition of the aforementioned. I think that a person could argue someone out of that presupposition but they can't argue someone into salvation. No one can argue them out of actual regeneration/salvation in Christ because real conversion is a supernatural act of God.

It is like what is going on with the Chinese Christians and the Communists over there right now. The Chi-Coms want the villagers to "convert" from religion to the Party, so they are using food subsidies/poverty relief to urge/coerce those believers to take down crosses and images depicting Jesus and put up posters of the Party Leader. Those believers who are actually regenerated by God will take down the images but still worship Jesus and pray to Him and read His word while eating the Communists' food, some may prefer to continue to be poor without more food. Anyone who totally abandons Christ for atheistic communism was never regenerated by God in the first place.

In response to the meme, atheists don't really blame God for their suffering or another's suffering; that is rhetoric made to criticize God's holy nature.

Well, I'm not stopping you from being Christian if it helps. I mainly like to challenge those who take religion too seriously and try to put others down for not having the same one, or those who try to put religion into the government as an excuse to oppress others.

I have the same problem with atheists as well. The atheist page in Reddit was rated 3rd most bigoted on the site. Some of the most well known atheists still don't fight against sexism, Islamophobia, transphobia, etc.

The guy in the meme would represent me when I was an unbeliever. Whenever someone made the mistake of bringing up God around me, I would lay out all the problems that I was going through due to nothing I could control or had anything to do with. Next would come the classic atheist cliche, "If God is so good or it is even real, why did this bad thing happen or this, that or the other...?" You've heard it, maybe even said it.

I'm not sure what you mean by "rhetoric made to criticize God's holy nature." I know what it means to me, and how it applies to when I did it as an unbeliever. God's holy nature means that He must punish sin and the world we live in is fallen and sinful therefore bad things do happen and are used by God for His purposes.

I didn't understand that when I was an unbeliever so I blamed all the problems that I have no control over on God when I spoke to people about God even though I claimed I didn't believe in God.

"Next would come the classic atheist cliche, "If God is so good or it is even real, why did this bad thing happen or this, that or the other...?" You've heard it, maybe even said it. "

Most definitely. I'm trying to find the answer to the question, but all I get are incomplete answers of "he has his reasons" and "he works in mysterious ways", etc.

By "rhetoric made to to criticize God's holy nature", I mean it's when atheists pretend to blame God for the problems in the world as to criticize the beliefs of the religious. I added the holy for good taste.

I blame the problems that I have no control over on politicians (for doing stupid things), nature(for natural disasters), and the news for causing more of the problems I didn't want to know about by televising it(One Week: "We just have a report of a mass shooting."Next Week: "Ditto."), because once something happens, many copycats are going to jump onto the bandwagon.

It is good to know that some atheists use that cliche as rhetoric to "pretend" to blame God only to criticize Christian beliefs.
I used it as a defense mechanism to get Christians to shut up and avoid me. But I was genuinely confused as to why I was suffering. I didn't really care about other people's suffering but the more "blame" to put on God the better. Right?

I had an entitlement mentality and thought that I deserved something better from God (if He existed) than the suffering I was going through. It was only after studying the bible that I came to understand that the only thing any person deserves from God is His wrath and justice.

I can try to explain God's purposes, reasons, and mysterious ways but until someone actually lives through it they won't understand it. There are Christians who have been saved longer than I have that still don't understand because they haven't been through it.

I've learned the principles not through bible study and teaching alone, I have also lived them and seen them work in my own life. I'll reply tomorrow with an explanation. If I don't get back until after the holiday, happy Thanksgiving.

They use it to criticize Islamic and Jewish beliefs as well, just not in this site as not to side with the Christian Majority.
I definitely don't think atheists tell people that God isn't real to affirm it with themselves. Otherwise, we'd have people making the same case to convert Christians to Muslims.

I don't think I deserve anything from God (if he exists). If anything, I am, for the most part, very content with my life.

What if someone dies through God's purposes? Let's say, for example (totally not from some video I saw), if God is real and as loving as monotheists perceive, that a train crashes and nearly everyone dies, excluded for this one baby. Many will jump to the conclusion that the baby's survival was a miracle caused by their beliefs. However, they conveniently forget that the people who suffered on the train didn't get any miracles, let alone the fact that the baby grows up and gains survivor's guilt after finding the out about the train crash that spared them. Imagine how someone could exploit the person's guilt and survival to turn them into a believer. Is it Christ doing the talking, or is it the priest doing the talking?

Happy Thanksgiving. :)

God does love everyone that was on that train. But he does not love everyone to the same degree. Just like you and I can choose to have more or a different type of love for our family than friends or acquaintances.
God has saving/redeeming love for those who have received Christ and for those whom he has called to salvation.

God is causing all things to cooperate for his glory and the good of those who love him. God is glorified by the death of the wicked because they receive justice (see meme.) He is glorified in the death of his people because they are glorified in heaven. He is glorified in the lives of the survivors because he can use those circumstances to draw them into a relationship with himself or to draw them closer if they are already his people or to draw others to himself by an example of the brevity of life and the need to be assured of where one will spend eternity.

People who want to call those types of circumstances miracles don't understand that God is working in all the details of everyday life for his glory and the good of his people. God can use a circumstance like that for his glory and to draw the survivor and others to himself for salvation, but he may not, the results are up to him. Most definitely and especially anyone's salvation. That alone (salvation, the regeneration of the spiritually dead to spiritual life) is the only for sure miracle that I have experienced and witnessed in my life.

That is totally 100% the work of God and if a priest/preacher or whatever tries to use someone's guilt or bad experiences to "turn them into a believer" apart from the actual supernatural working of the Holy Spirit that will just be a person who has religion/Christianity without God. But God can even use someone who has the wrong motives or doesn't understand what they are saying to be the gospel witness that leads a person to hear the gospel and receive Christ. We know when Christ is speaking to someone because the person will truly be changed, the will follow Christ and never turn back. Jesus says, "My sheep know my voice... and will never follow a stranger."