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> I split my time between serving adults (pastoring type stuff), children (Sunday school stuff), and the poor (I run a temporary food pantry). I also run a business to support my family, help my community, and build wealth. I keep busy and wouldn't change anything.

Lets say, for the sake of argument. You don't believe in god. What would stop you from doing the above things you mentioned? Would it be fair for me to make an assumption (and I apologize if I am wrong), that you are not necessarily doing those noble things because you think those things will help people, but possibly you are doing those things to appease your god so that you get a better after life.

Assuming my above assumption is right (again I apologize if its not), do you see the inconsistency in your morality?

Nothing stops me from doing anything but I did none of those things prior to following Jesus. So the notion of the motivation behind works is important to understand. Also I typically give myself a B- to a C+ for what I do. I'm not always great at it.

Faith without works is dead. Works without faith is just work. Faith and works is a living faith supported by a living God. If you have faith but do nothing in response then you should work that out. If you have no faith and works Jesus says that you already got your reward and you're all set. He has nothing to give you. I pretty much summed up the book of James in the Bible.

As for the afterlife everyone who follows Jesus gets a pretty awesome deal and while there is some hinting at a bonus for doing well it's not really that interesting because level 1 heaven is pretty awesome. There is a law of diminishing marginal utility after all.

So to be clear works get you little and faith is the source of everything.

How did you know it was god? How did you rule out being mad and hearing voices?

I haven't entirely. I accept that's still quite possible.

I was told to read the Bible and after reading the gospel of Matthew I was told that what I was reading was reliable and to be trusted entirely.

And so you have no difficulty with this? I haven't been in your position, so I can't be certain, but I like to think that the first thing I would do if I was hearing voices would be to seek some sort of reliable independent corroboration, and failing to find it would be deeply troubling.

You have presented the only religious argument I can't actually argue with. I can only humbly say I haven't had the same experience as you, and if I did, I would freak out.

The only way I know about to get started is to pray which is hard for anyone. Say hi sometime. If God is there he'll say hi back.

You know what freaks me out? The idea of seeing an angel. No idea why but it freaks me out good. I hear kids often say they see them and it freaks me out whenever they tell me that. I am no one a kid would ever try to impress mind you. I just hear these things because kids are so free to share with you. Weird I know but I don't want to see one till I am dead.

This whole crazy stuff started while reading GEB if you are familiar with that book. I really was minding my own business.

This sounds like you just started having an internal dialogue with yourself labeling the personification on the other end of your consciousness as "god". If this is the case, and this is really all it takes to qualify as having "spoken to god" then probably the vast majority of humanity have done it. They could even push it a little further and say ludicrous stuff like the bible is true, etc etc etc.

I admit that possibility freely. I'm not sure what you're trying to say that I didn't already. I do claim the Bible is true as well based on these experiences.

I'm not sure a 22 year old programmer goes from reading Russell and Nietzsche one day to following Jesus the next day without something having happened. Whether that's psychological or spiritual something happened to me.

Sure, I grasp that, I'm just puzzled as to why you jump to the conclusion that requires logically inconsistent supernatural phenomenon rather than than the one that just requires garden variety mental illness?

Not trying to offend you, in your shoes, I'd like to think I'd pick door number two.

In other respects I didn't act like someone with mental illness. Most mentally ill people have trouble functioning in society and contributing in a meaningful way.

These experiences didn't let up for two years and I found myself feeling strongly pulled to do things like buy Bibles and attend church. Eventually I did both of those things and my life only improved from there.

I'm not so sure that anything I believe is logically inconsistent. I believe that God intervened in human history in a big way and in such a way that makes it possible for me to approach him with confidence.

I think you're being too generous to this kind of argument. I'd say it's "the only religious argument I can't immediately dismiss".

One way of proceeding to argue with it, for example, would be to say, "how do you know you're not mad?".

[Amusingly half way through writing this comment, this radio programme started: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ahistoryoftheworld/objects/pZ-Jq-iaTOia... It's about an object that apparently people used to use to talk to god!]

I tend to avoid arguments that can't possibly convince my opponent, though if the objective is to convince a neutral third party I guess that might be a promising argument.

The other side of that sword is that the personal religious experience argument isn't especially convincing to others, either.

I was minding my own business when I started hearing from God.

What is that like?

God is the nicest, happiest person you'll ever talk to.

If you ask him how he's doing he's always doing great. If you ask him how you're doing he always say you're doing great. I've asked him this immediately after doing something I knew was pretty stupid and God seemed unconcerned even though I asking him hoping to get corrected and some guidance on the issue. He told me that he wasn't too worried about it.

The actual sensation is pretty weird. I'm not the most gifted person at hearing from God but if you ask him to he'll talk to you and say some pretty cool things. I freely admit that I could be a crazy person talking to myself of course. The reason I believe otherwise is that I'm not the crazy person type and I hear weird things from God. I'm always expecting him to be mad at me or disappointed but he never is. The story of God's people is that they always expect one thing and he's working another way. It's the Wire when Marlo says "You want it to be one way-but it's the other way."

I want it to be religious way (i.e. doing things to make God happy or at least less angry) but God has things setup another way. If you have a kid you can sort of understand but it seems like God sees us like we see our own children. I'm happy watching my daughter do just about anything and I think God is happy seeing me do just about anything too. Yesterday my two year old daughter comforted two crying boys and cheered one of them up pretty well. She really cares how people are doing and wants to make them feel better. I think God reacts the same way I did when I saw her do something good-he couldn't be happier just like I couldn't have been happier. She didn't earn my love there but she made me very proud of her.

Hope that helps a little :)

Yes, thank you for describing.