Deletes and Updates

When I used to religiously keep a written journal, I went through several books and many of them, I destroyed because I ended up hating what I wrote.  Flushed an entire journal down the toilet once.
So I did a virtual flush on here by deleting some of my more self-righteous or self-pitying posts.
The difference here is that I am sharing my thought with other people and opening myself to...?  Criticism?  Approval?
Been going to church regularly.  Terrible at reading the Bible.  Terrible.  And there is always a running dialogue on my head about everything regarding Christianity.  But I think I am at a turning point.  I have found some good ways to live and to think outside of the religion box.  But they are not the Best Way.  They are not the Highest Way.  So far, the best way seems to be Christianity.  I know this from trial and error.  I know this from throwing it all away and taking it all back.  I know this from asking every kind of tiresome, self righteous question, from every doubt, from every condemnation of whatever power is out there.  When I was a kid, I stuck my feet under the bed in my dark bedroom to see if there was a monster there.  Still doing that.new thought added on 5/5/12:  why does Christianity work for me?  How does it not work for me?  I feel so differently today than when I originally wrote this post.  Sigh

Cultic Info

So when is it a cult and when is it a group of like-minded individuals?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_(book)

Medication

I hate taking my medication.  I skip it a lot.  I don't know why I am so resistant.
But I pay for it.  My thoughts become disorganized, weird, scattered.  I can't get out of bed til noon then at night I keep waking up from bad dreams.  I get irritable, angry, easily provoked.
The manic thoughts begin to surface then assert themselves as perfectly reasonable.  I feel like laughing, crying, screaming from one moment to the next.  I get a little paranoid.
The drugs save me but they hurt me too.  I have gained so much weight because of them.  I have received grief from family for being overweight.  It's not my fault.  Some of the medications I've been on have been recalled or are still used but dangerous.  They can cause a diabetes-like state.  They can cause fatal liver damage.  They can cause twitches that may not go away.  Drooling.
But what can I do?   The bipolar is getting worse.  I am worse than I was five years ago.  It is progressing.
I have to be on the medication.  But I hate it.  I should be grateful.  I am somewhat grateful but fearful and angry too.

Long Time

So I haven't been on here in a long time.  A lot has gone on.  I returned to Christianity and now I find myself with doubts again.  I don't think I will return to the atheist viewpoint again though.  I did have a thought that regardless of whether I believe there is or isn't a God, there is or isn't a God.  It has nothing to do with my beliefs.  Either there is or there isn't.  In a backwards kind of way, this gives me some peace.  It is not up to me and my thoughts.  I need not prove or disprove anything because things are as they should be.
I did rebuild from atheism or the belief that there is no higher being to the belief that there is.  Where Jesus Christ fits in this precisely, I don't know.  It is my right as a human being to pursue these lines of thought and it is my right to change my mind on things as I grow as a person.  Mainly, I believe in love.  Everything else flows from there.

Some Problems

I have some issues with hell. God (if you believe in Christianity) created hell. I am often puzzled by popular portrayals of hell in which the devil is in charge. Hell is God's place. He conceived the idea.
The way I understand it is that a perfect and perfectly just God must judge the unrighteous and punish them. Hence hell.
According to the Bible, we are born sinners because of the fall of man thanks to Adam and Eve. That is one strike against us. Then we must believe in Jesus Christ as the Bible describes him and accept the Bible as truth, something that can be very very very difficult. Another strike against us.
Are we being judged fairly?
I'm not so sure.

Prayer and Meditation and Practicality

I have been all over the place, spiritually, lately. Sometimes I put out requests to the Universe expressed in the format of "I hope that..." Other times, I have acknowledged that I do still believe in Jesus Christ as a manifestation of the divine and I pray to him.
I have also been practicing some basic meditation...I sit quietly and as I am mindful of my breathing, thoughts come to my head, I perceive them and let them go.
These kinds of mental exercises are beneficial to me. They help me remove fear and anger. They give me hope and courage.
As a traditional Christian, I was an angry person. I was angry at God the father. I could get along with Jesus and the spirit but some of the things accredited to God angered me. I then became fearful that I would be chastised through adverse circumstances to become a more humble and obedient Christian. What's the point of praying about things in that kind of a setup?
Sometimes I still have these anger/fear thoughts, leftovers from a flawed system of belief.
The flaws are within me. Much of religion, or lack thereof, is filtered through my life experiences.
Organized religion is flawed too. Sometimes religion is good and sometimes bad but that is not my battle or my axe to grind.
I want to acknowledge the divine but I also firmly believe that my choices, what I do with the circumstances of my life, can decide the outcomes while I exist on this planet. Circumstances (health, parentage, etc.) are what they are. Find otherworldly reasons for them or not but find out what you can do to be reasonably content and successful.
I see that things are orderly, that there is cause and effect. I would like it if there were a few miracles in my life right now but I continue to work towards what I want out of this life and I also work towards being of service to others. That is a part of my ever-developing Code of finding meaning as a human. I hope for a balanced life and that is within my grasp.

A Conversation and Some Trembling

I had a looooooong conversation with a Christian who is close to me about all of this and I have come to a couple of conclusions:
-I would tremble to deny that there is a higher power in this Universe. At a gut-level, it would feel like playing with fire...not so much in fear of divine retribution but that some sort of "just desserts" might be served to preserve cosmic balance and declare me a fool.
-Who am I to say that there is no higher power?

I have moved another notch in the rebuilding of my spiritual beliefs from atheist to agnostic.

I have been studying eastern religion for a few months now but I find my interest swaying back to Jesus Christ. Who was (is?) this man?
And what of the trinity, particularly the Holy Spirit? It hit me like lightning the other day-the idea that the Universe, chi, the collective, whatever that divine massive thing is may be also called the Holy Spirit.
Is this Spirit the creative force and the producer of the basis for our ideas of prophets and gods? Is this the divine spark that resides within all beings?
Is truth all-inclusive? Can the truth of one religion be the truth of another? Or are they set against each other?