Possible Conversion-Signs From God
Hello, thank you for choosing to chat with me. 🙂
You can call me Eren (pseudonym). I’ll get right to the point. Although I was raised Protestant Christian, lately, I’ve been considering following Noahidism and eventually converting to Judaism. But of course, I’ve been afraid of “but what if Christians are right about nonbelief in Jesus meaning eternal death in Hell?!?”. Even though I don’t really believe that, I still worry, thinking to myself “but do I really want to risk the Christians being right?”. And it really does suck, I feel threatened and sort of bullied into Christianity. I know that if the threat of Hell wasn’t present, I’d confidently convert to Judaism without fear, because I feel drawn to it and I believe in it so much.
But anyways, I prayed to G-d for guidance earlier today and asked Him to send me a sign, to tell me if I’m going in the right or wrong direction in my faith. And I think He may have sent me one.
I drove home from vacation today and saw many billboards and trucks saying “JESUS” in huge letters. But really, that location seems to just be very religious and Christian anyways, so I don’t know if that’s very convincing to me as a sign.
The most striking thing I saw was in the sky tonight. I saw the moon surrounded by rainbow-ish light like I have never seen before. And a cloud came, which looked to be in the shape of a hand, and moved to “grab” the moon perfectly in its fingers. Before the wrist of the “hand” was a huge wall of clouds, which tried to cover the moon after the “hand” had “grabbed” it. Although I’m not sure if the last bit about the wall of cloud is part of the sign/relevant.
I was debating meanings/symbolism. For example, “the moon could be G-d, and the surrounding rainbow could be the Gentiles, the descendants of Noah. And then the hand could be G-d’s gentle touch, meaning that only Gentiles will go to Heaven? But that would be strange, the Jews are G-d’s chosen people, why wouldn’t His gentle touch be touching them? Or maybe He’s telling me to become a Noahide with the rainbow… not sure about the rest, but I feel like the moon would symbolize G-d somehow”.
So, Rabbi, do you have any ideas on what this sign could mean? Or is it even a sign from G-d at all? And what do you suggest on my current Judaism vs Christianity predicament?
Thank you so much for devoting your time to helping me. 🙂
Answers
While I empathize with your desire to be given some kind of clear sign from the Heavens as to what you are supposed to do, I think that the signs that you saw are not very conclusive as they can be interpreted to fit a person’s state of mind.
What I do feel is that fear is not a very compelling argument to live one’s life in a particular way. Especially when speaking about a person’s relationship with God. A person needs to feel a love for God and a desire to do His Will because they want to and not because they are being coerced to do so by the threat of eternal damnation. More than that, a person’s connection to God – through their belief system – needs to offer then a healthy and positive connection that will allow them to continue building and drawing closer to God every single day of their life.
Best wishes from the AskTheRabbi.org Team