Seekers: Day 1 Handout ("Decide What You Believe")

Every day we make decisions - some major and some minor.
   - Decisions flow from our experience
   - Decisions flow from our belief system

Life is a series of choices:
   1. We examine
   2. We believe
   3. We decide

Life is a sum total of our experiences and decisions.  Decision-making determines who and what we are more than any other aspect of our lives.

1. What do you believe?

James 1:3 "You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors"

It is under pressure that we see what we really believe, but what we do reveals more about what we believe than what we say.

2. Why do you believe what you say you believe?

Reasons for belief:
   - Tradition: I was taught
   - Pragmatic: It works for me
   - Intuitive: I just feel it's true
   - Mystical: I believe God just told me
   - Authoritarian: I was told this by an authority

These reasons are not adequate to build your life around, to stake your future to, and your eternity on.

There is something better!

EVIDENCE - Not proof, but evidence.  Every day we stake our lives on things we may not be able to prove, but there is sufficient evidence that we believe in our decision.  God does not expect us to take a blind leap into the dark; He wants us to commit our life, based on evidence:

Two tools to find evidence:
  - Reasoning/logic
  - Experience

3. What evidence do you have for what you believe?
A. Apologetics - defending your faith
B. Why does it matter?
   1. You can live opposite to your opinion, but you cannot live opposite of what you believe!
   2. What you really believe will mold and direct your life.  Whatever your image of God is directs your life.
   3. What you believe can be your greatest enemy if you believe a lie.
       John 8:32 "... and you will know the truth, and the truth shall set you free."