# How to Make Yourself Believe in God? **URL:** \ **Category:** General\ **Created:** [September 25, 2026, 7:47am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673 "2026-09-25T07:47:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jk\_vesper](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/jk_vesper/32/1388_2.png) [@jk\_vesper](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/jk_vesper)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2026, 7:47am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/1 "2026-09-25T07:47:27Z")
How can I believe in God if sometimes I feel like I don’t? Can I make myself believe in God? Maybe this is similar to the thread on [what to do if you’ve lost your faith](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/what-if-youve-lost-faith-in-god/1666)… I don’t know. I want to have faith in God and Jesus. I really do. But every time I try, my mind starts pulling apart everything I’ve been taught over the years, especially the stuff I’m learning now in my degree. The more I study, the further I drift from being able to just believe. Part of what makes this harder is that I lost someone very close to me as a child. I watched people pray harder than anyone should ever have to pray. Nothing changed. So how am I supposed to trust that prayer works for the smaller stuff in my daily life when it didn’t work when it mattered most? Edit: I should probably add that I’m not looking to be “converted” or preached at. I’m genuinely curious about people’s real experiences with this kind of change. ---
**Author:** ![narrow\_gate](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/narrow_gate/32/1400_2.png) [@narrow\_gate](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/narrow_gate)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2026, 12:00pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/2 "2026-09-25T12:00:39Z")
You can’t force yourself to believe in God. It’s like trying to fall asleep by trying harder. What you can do is put yourself somewhere belief has room to grow. For me that meant dropping the pressure to feel certain. I’d just say “I don’t know if anyone’s listening, but here I am.” It felt awkward at first, but over time it became something real. I’m sorry about what you went through as a kid. Watching desperate prayers go unanswered leaves a mark, and I don’t think any tidy explanation fixes that. Only time, and sitting with the question. You don’t have to believe today or manufacture anything. Try the no-pressure version for a few months and see. ---
**Author:** ![Capture-The-Great](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/7ab992/32.png) [@Capture-The-Great](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/Capture-The-Great)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2026, 12:03pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/3 "2026-09-25T12:03:24Z")
You can’t make yourself believe in God directly. Belief is a conclusion you arrive at. What helped me was separating the questions: whether God exists, whether Jesus is trustworthy, whether suffering counts against either claim, or whether your degree contradicts faith or just the version you were taught. One at a time. My brain likes to convene an entire Supreme Court hearing before breakfast, so this helped a lot. Read the strongest arguments on both sides and see where you end up. What happened in your childhood taught you that desperate prayer may not prevent catastrophe, and no neat answer should minimize that. Christianity doesn’t promise that praying enough gets us the outcome we ask for. Even Jesus prayed for His suffering to pass and still went through it. I used to treat prayer like heavenly customer service, only to wonder why the complaints department seemed so understaffed. These days I see it more as part of learning whether God can be trusted in a world where terrible losses stay terribly real. ---
**Author:** ![NoahHope\_GB](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/n/c2a13f/32.png) [@NoahHope\_GB](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/NoahHope_GB)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2026, 12:07pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/4 "2026-09-25T12:07:18Z")
Trying to convince yourself that God exists usually backfires. Your mind can tell when you’re pushing toward an answer you picked in advance, and all the studying you described just makes that detector sharper. I hit the same wall in my coursework. The further I got, the more ‘just believe’ sounded like a demand to ignore what I was learning, and I wasn’t willing to call that faith. The real snag is prayer, though. If the hardest prayers you ever watched changed nothing, asking about ordinary things can feel like playacting or like shrinking the loss so your faith can survive it. You don’t have to feel trust about the small stuff before you’re allowed to speak. Name the unanswered prayer first, say you still don’t know what to do with it, then bring up the daily thing. What shifted for me was reading about Jesus in small pieces for a few weeks and writing down in plain words where I still couldn’t accept it. Slowly, the wanting stopped feeling like a line I was rehearsing. If there’s a way to move toward belief on purpose, that kind of honesty was it for me. ---
**Author:** ![violetmood](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/violetmood/32/1480_2.png) [@violetmood](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/violetmood)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2026, 9:42pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/5 "2026-09-29T21:42:55Z")
> [@Capture-The-Great](#): > > Christianity doesn’t promise that praying enough gets us the outcome we ask for. Someone should tell the old version of me who treated prayer like a vending machine and kept shaking it when nothing dropped out. ---
**Author:** ![Iceagator](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/iceagator/32/14_2.png) [@Iceagator](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/Iceagator)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2026, 9:50pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/6 "2026-09-29T21:50:45Z")
That “I don’t know if anyone’s listening, but here I am” prayer. It carried me through a long dry season too. ---
**Author:** ![TurbulentKiwi](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/turbulentkiwi/32/1422_2.png) [@TurbulentKiwi](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/TurbulentKiwi)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2026, 9:54pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/7 "2026-09-29T21:54:39Z")
Remembering that Jesus Himself prayed for the cup to pass and still suffered has helped me stop reading unanswered prayer as proof that nobody was listening. ---
**Author:** ![tentmaker\_pauline](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/tentmaker_pauline/32/1474_2.png) [@tentmaker\_pauline](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/tentmaker_pauline)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2026, 10:00pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/8 "2026-09-29T22:00:34Z")
> [@NoahHope\_GB](#): > > Name the unanswered prayer first, say you still don’t know what to do with it, then bring up the daily thing. Unanswered prayer first. Naming it up front keeps the daily prayer from feeling like a way to dodge the deeper hurt. One thing that’s helped me is just saying plainly, “I’m still angry about this.” Being that honest with God feels more real. ---
**Author:** ![jk\_vesper](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/jk_vesper/32/1388_2.png) [@jk\_vesper](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/jk_vesper)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2026, 12:38pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/9 "2026-09-30T12:38:19Z")
> [@tentmaker\_pauline](#): > > One thing that’s helped me is just saying plainly, “I’m still angry about this.” Being that honest with God feels more real. Thank you for this. I always assumed prayer had to be polite, that you had to show up already believing and already grateful. Maybe that’s part of why it always felt so fake to me. Last night I said “I’m still angry about this” out loud. It felt more true than anything I’ve tried in years. ---
**Author:** ![WalkinginChrist](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/walkinginchrist/32/1311_2.png) [@WalkinginChrist](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/WalkinginChrist)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2026, 5:22am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/10 "2026-10-01T05:22:42Z")
The chair analogy always stuck with me. You sit down without testing every screw first. That’s how faith started making sense for me, practical confidence. What shifted things was science. Newton’s equations describing motion, the precision of physical laws. Nature doesn’t write its own math. The more I studied, the more I saw design instead of randomness. Maybe give it a try. Not forcing belief, being open to seeing things from that angle for a while. ---
**Author:** ![progresswonder](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/progresswonder/32/952_2.png) [@progresswonder](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/progresswonder)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2026, 5:26am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/11 "2026-10-01T05:26:55Z")
My dad once told me about a plastic bag he saw on the street. It said ‘you won’t die.’ He and my mom took it as the clearest possible sign about her illness. She died anyway. So now whenever I notice something in my own life that feels like a sign, I don’t know what to do with it or how to trust it after watching it fail so completely for someone else. My dad stopped believing after that. His reasons sit in the back of my mind constantly. I want to believe. But that story. ---
**Author:** ![psalm\_and\_pencil](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/psalm_and_pencil/32/1483_2.png) [@psalm\_and\_pencil](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/psalm_and_pencil)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2026, 3:08pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/12 "2026-10-01T15:08:36Z")
Taking a mental break from trying so hard to believe might be part of your path. I stepped away for a while. What brought me back was discovering my own reasons to seek God instead of inheriting someone else’s belief. Make this your decision, not something you’re pressured into by upbringing or expectations. Find what’s missing for you and pursue it with honest intent. ---
**Author:** ![EvesApple](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/evesapple/32/177_2.png) [@EvesApple](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/EvesApple)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2026, 12:16pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/13 "2026-10-02T12:16:58Z")
Love God with everything you have. Love your neighbor as yourself. Those two carry the whole weight of the law, according to Jesus in Matthew 22. I’ve found belief sometimes follows action. When I stopped trying to force certainty and started living as if love mattered that much, something shifted inside me. The intellectual questions didn’t disappear, but they stopped blocking me. ---
**Author:** ![Followinghissteps](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/followinghissteps/32/1333_2.png) [@Followinghissteps](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/Followinghissteps)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2026, 3:10am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/14 "2026-10-03T03:10:07Z")
If the intellectual side is bothering you, The Case for Christ is worth checking out. The author was an atheist journalist who spent years looking into the evidence. He walks through what convinced him without being preachy. I get what you shared about losing someone close. Christianity doesn’t promise that faith will shield us from suffering, and Jesus said his followers would face hardship. It doesn’t make the pain of unanswered prayer any smaller. You could try asking God to show himself to you, with no expectations. Just an honest request like “if you’re there, help me see you.” ---
**Author:** ![Overhead\_Light](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/e36b37/32.png) [@Overhead\_Light](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/Overhead_Light)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2026, 4:39pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/15 "2026-10-03T16:39:53Z")
Sometimes I catch myself wishing I had been raised in a Christian home. My parents were good people, completely secular, and I didn’t step into a church until my twenties. My brain had already built all these analytical walls. Last year I watched my neighbor go through a divorce, and she had nothing to hold onto. The older woman down the street has been through way worse, but she has this steady calm about her because she believes someone’s listening. You can see how comforting belief would be but you can’t flip a switch. ---
**Author:** ![LightBearerX](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/lightbearerx/32/1229_2.png) [@LightBearerX](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/LightBearerX)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2026, 8:26am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/16 "2026-10-04T08:26:27Z")
Surrender. Seeking God through scripture and living by its principles puts your heart in a posture where faith can take root. It’s a process, not a switch you flip. Sometimes the evidence only shows up after you’ve already collapsed and given up trying to manufacture it yourself. ---
**Author:** ![CrossroadsKid](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/crossroadskid/32/1309_2.png) [@CrossroadsKid](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/CrossroadsKid)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2026, 6:36am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/17 "2026-10-05T06:36:42Z")
Quiet moments. That’s where the Spirit’s shown up for me most clearly, random ones, almost like a ‘why are you still asking when you already felt this?’ nudge. _The Chosen_ might sneak past that skeptical brain of yours better than a sermon could. ---
**Author:** ![doxology09](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/doxology09/32/1442_2.png) [@doxology09](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/doxology09)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2026, 6:47am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/18 "2026-10-12T06:47:48Z")
You’re not some weird exception. It helped me to learn that Mother Teresa (of all people) went something like fifty years barely feeling God at all, and nobody knew until her letters got published after she died. And C. S. Lewis wrote this short book, A Grief Observed, after his wife died. He’s furious and confused in it. Doesn’t tie it up neatly at the end either. A lot of the people I assumed had it all figured out were limping along too. Knowing that made me feel less like I was failing a test. ---
**Author:** ![TomnToms](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/tomntoms/32/915_2.png) [@TomnToms](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/TomnToms)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2026, 11:44am UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/19 "2026-10-15T11:44:33Z")
You deserve care for that part of you, whatever you believe. Losing someone that close as a child and watching the adults around you pray that desperately is a lot to carry. See a grief counselor for the loss, separate from the faith questions. Sometimes grief that never got room to breathe shows up as doubt about God later on. ---
**Author:** ![solebricks](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/user_avatar/forum.victoriousinprayer.com/solebricks/32/951_2.png) [@solebricks](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/u/solebricks)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2026, 2:53pm UTC](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-to-make-yourself-believe-in-god/1673/20 "2026-10-18T14:53:19Z")
Maybe try one tiny thing first. Pick a single question from your studies that feels like it clashes with faith and write it down on paper. Then leave it for a whole day, [without trying to fix it](https://forum.victoriousinprayer.com/t/how-do-you-surrender-to-god/1669) or pray about it right away. After that, read one short gospel story out loud to yourself. No pressure to feel anything. I did something similar when my thoughts kept spinning, and it gave the questions a bit of space.