Posts

UGW #5: Prayer Matters

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  Understanding God's Will #5: So prayer really does matter when it comes to making sure that God’s Will happens? Yes, it does!  God hinges a lot of things on our prayers and our choices.    But if we (like Calvinists) believe that God always does whatever He wants regardless of us and that He has preplanned and controls all we do and so we don't get a choice anyway, then we won’t realize how much prayer matters in discerning God’s plans for us and in getting His Will done.   And o ur prayer life will be weak.    And there are examples in the Old Testament that support the necessity of prayer and the fact that it affects whether His Will gets done or not. In  Exodus 23:32 , God tells Israel to make no covenant with the people in the land of Canaan after they take possession of it.    But in  Joshua 9 , we read about the Gibeonite deception and how they did make a treaty with these people, believing that they were from a distant land...
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UGW #4: Taking Our Responsibility Seriously

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Understanding God's Will #4: Is  there danger in believing that God will always work His plan in our lives, regardless of what we do or any responsibility we have?                Definitely.   And I think this is a big pitfall for Calvinists [and lukewarm "just go with the flow" Christians].  Because i f we think that everything that happens is God's Will, regardless of what we do or don't do, (because in Calvinism, God essentially preplans and controls everything we do, so everything we do  is  His Will, even our sins), then we don’t think so much about what we do or don't do, about our responsibilities as Christians.    We won’t take seeking righteousness, wisdom, His kingdom, prayer, and obedience, etc., as seriously as we should, because we don’t see the effect it has over our lives.    If He’s just going to do whatever He’s going to do anyway, then it doesn’t matter what we...
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So sorry

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So sorry that I haven't added new posts in a long time.  I plan to do it eventually, but I have been so mentally-exhausted that I needed to get away from it all for a while.  And with a busy summer coming up, it will probably still be a little while longer before I add anything new.  God bless.  And enjoy your summer!    
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When Calvinists say "But predestination!" (tiny, bare-bones version)

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[Here's the tiniest version of my "But predestination!" post.  The short version with more memes and quotes and information can be  found here , and t he longest version (a series of posts full of many more Calvinist comments, my Calvinist ex-pastor's sermons, and my replies to them, written for my own amusement and for my ex-church) can be found by  starting here .  But this tiny version includes only the most basic parts you need to know, with a few memes and quotes thrown in to spice it up and prove my points.  (I know this could be much tinier, but Calvinism has so many bunny trails, so many interlocking ideas, that it's hard to address one part without addressing more.  So this is as comprehensively tiny as I dared to make it.) ] At the heart of Calvinism is predestination and God's sovereignty (among other things, like "total depravity"), which according to Calvinism essentially amounts to:  "God preplans and controls everything, even sin ...
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