MJ,

I would never tell a child that. But just recently was in our church service listening to a reformed pastor say to the congration (full of children as well) that all suffering including abuse and rape, etc.... is caused by God. He said that he knows people like to say 'allowed' because it seems nicer. but that it is really God 'causing'. I had to wonder how many children might wonder why God would cause them to be hurt or abused or whatever. That just really threw me off.

As a parent, it is hard not to think that God does not want harm to come to a child/person but that people have a free will to choose to sin or not. God is not going to make someone NOT sin becasue that would be taking their free- will away. Then we would be nothing but puppets. Anyway, that's what I always believed prior to hearing that all suffering and all sin is preordained by God.

In Him......

edit: MJ- I am sorry to hear about your abusive situation when you were little. That saddens me- but I am glad to see that you have trusted God with it and are at peace about it. God bless you :)

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Chanin

God does not see time as we do, how he accomplishes His plan for redemption and justice is more complex than anyone can imagine.

Even if man had a free will, God still created people whom He knows will never choose Him, try to imagine for a moment that there was never a time when God didn't know what was going to happen. It is impossible for God to "discover" somthing new, He did not reach a point in time where He formulated His plan for you, it has always been for eternity. Hard to imagine, but again this is wayy beyond how we think about time.
- Joe

Hi Chanin,

With reluctance I will weigh in on this subject. The confusion is caused by a great misunderstanding of God's purposes in redemption. Error begets more error. The trouble is that folk are so intrenched in their views that it is almost impossible to even talk about the topic. I have suffered more abuse on this one subject than any other.

No doctrine can be formulated that does not square with God's revelation of Himself. It does not glorify God to paint Him as the author of sin, etc. and then suggest that, "It's none of our business" because God is sovereign and does what He wishes. God is sovereign. But He has demonstrated His willingness to use that sovereignty to express His benevolence. God is love. God's love is the love that lays down His life for His enemies. If Jesus told us the dangers of offending a little one that believes in him (millstone, etc.) how would He then turn and ordain the behavior? It is blasphemous to suggest that God is the cause behind a sinner's sin. This is to switch God and Satan. What does the story of Job show us? It is Satan that seeks to undo the faith of the saints. Peter found the same also when he was to be sifted.

The concept of 'the will' is difficult to define biblically. God simply says, "Chose ye!" We have the capacity to make a choice. We can obey or disobey God. When God's word comes to us it contains the grace to carry it out. No word from God shall be void of power. So when God says, "Thou shalt not kill" He does not then turn around and ordain men to sin and then send them to hell for following His orders. That turns the entire word of God into nonsense from beginning to end. It makes the conversation between God, Eve, Adam and the serpent into nonsense. God ends up blaming the serpent for His own actions.

Let me say lovingly here that the problem is that men cannot resist seeking to understand these types of apparent philosophical paradoxes. It becomes a source of polarization for the people of God. It becomes a cause of sifting of faith also. I tell you the truth that if we as believers got up and preached a God that damns souls to hell unconditionally and saves others without any respect to a response to Him, etc., then the whole cross of Christ would become of no effect and the God of love as depicted in the scriptures would become the Father of Lies. So we are told to keep these secrets 'in-house' so as not to offend the world.

John Wesley once said that it would be better to say that the passages in question make no sense at all than to say they make a sense such as this (unconditional election etc.). We need to go back and look at the scriptures afresh. Does God really teach that He unconditionally damns sinners or causes sinners to sin, etc? God has consistently revealed Himself as a God of love. His call (command) to repentance is real. He does not command all men everywhere to repent with His mouth with a different conclusion in mind. He is not a double minded man. He treats us as if we are living in the moment with no view to the future. If we want to know about God we must look at Jesus Christ. He wept. He lamented when Jerusalem did not turn to Him. What double mindedness would a man have to have to will something on the one hand and lament the decision the next? It does not make sense and even the teachers of it know it. It does not square with God as He has revealed Himself in His Son. Jesus said, "Suffer the little children to come unto me." He warned about hurting (offending) them. The doctrine does not square with your conscience. Don't give in to it. God is a benevolent God that has His eye on the sparrow. No doctrine can change that.

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Robert Wurtz II

Well thought reply, I respect the sensitivity with which you responded,
Grace to you Robert,
Joe

Thank you MJ for your prayers :)

Robert, thank you for trying to explain things to me in lay terms :) I don't know why I am struggling and fighting with this right now. The church we had been going to that is reformed in theology- i just can't bring myself to go back. I keep fighting with myself if it's my own problem or what. Many sermons are wonderful and they do teach alot about changing and growing. But now I see all their words completely different. I can't listen to them teach about not being lukewarm, etc... and then try to infuse that with their other reformed teachings. It doesn't make sense. I know I am a very black and white person. That's probably part of my problem.

I am just praying that even if i can't find the answers that I am looking for, that at least I will find a sense of peace in what I believe and who God is. I know I've been through alot in these past few years which has really rocked my faith even more. I can't beleive that I once thought i knew exactly what I believed and thought i knew it all :)

Anyway, what I can't understand is my feelings of guilt for not going back to that church. I can't figure out if it's my own obsessive thinking/false guilt or if it's from the Lord. There are no other churches around that I can find that are even close to preaching truth with any conviction. This church has conviction- but it is decidedly Reformed.

Ahh, I just want some peace :)

Thanks again.
In Him......

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Chanin

<quote> I know I've been through alot in these past few years which has really rocked my faith even more. I can't beleive that I once thought i knew exactly what I believed and thought i knew it all :)</quote>

I have never seen a person hear the views you alluded to that it did not shock them or in some way sift their faith; so you are not alone. No one can imagine Jesus Christ, that is the image of the invisible God, (to have seen Him is to have seen the Father) stand up and lament the rejection of Him in Jerusalem like He did if He had actually foreordained their actions.

<i>O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not! (Luke 13:34)</i>

Time for some common sense. Did Jesus Christ put on a show here? Was their guile found in His mouth? Was the poison of asps under his lips. Did Jesus Christ the Son of God in expression of the person of the Father here say, "Oh Jerusalem that did what I ordained of thee! Why did I predetermine to doom and damn thee, Oh Jerusalem! Why did I kill the prophets through thee, oh Jerusalem!"

<i>Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.</i> (Matthew 5:42-48)

Is God a publican? What blasphemy! God's Love (agape) is our example of how we are to Love and if we have some sort of 'back-room theology' meant for the illuminated and spiritual then we can effectively just love in that back-room theological sense. To be like 'God' I can just go out an arbitrarily distribute my love and when questioned I can just tell the person, "It's none of your business!" I mean, if that's really how God is then we are commanded to love like God loves (to be like God). Let's all just go out and love like our back-room God loves? Is this what the Bible teaches?

If we are called to be 'perfect' even as the heavenly Father is perfect; that perfection means that we love indiscriminately. That is what the Bible reveals. Forget philosophy. If I am called to be conformed to the image of God then I need to act like Jesus Christ because He is the express image of His person. If that person is not what I have believed He is then I need to adjust my behavior to reflect these new revelations. Can that be true? Can I love arbitrarily and call myself a Christian? The canned answer? It's none of your business what God does! Sure it is! I need to know how to act and live in this world and the only revelation I have is in the Bible. Whatever God the theologians come up with I hope they are planned to imitate Him in His distribution of His love and grace. If God don't treat all with grace and love then to be consistent I should not either. But if God has commended His love towards us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for the ungodly - then that must be my reference point. God is Love and how we understand that one truth is utterly important.

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Robert Wurtz II

Robert,

thank you. this makes alot of sense to me. I will be thinking on this for awhile tonight :)

In Him....

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Chanin

It's not problem. I just became a bit concerned that the issue has brought confusion. I think we need to focus on God's Love. We need to know that God really loves us.

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Robert Wurtz II

About trying to "wrap my head around" some concepts... are those Bible concepts, or are they those of men?

Some ideas of man, in general, may be so difficult to understand. I heard one theologian say God himself couldn't understand some theories - because they aren't true! (Like, can you understand why 2 + 2 is 498 ? No one can; it isn't true!)

About the idea of God predetermining everything: When Israel said God was taking them into the desert to kill them, God didn't like it. This is mentioned in Hebrews and also Numbers. Without re-quoting all the scriptures, to sum it up, God wanted Israel to believe in His goodness because of all they had seen (deliverance from Egypt, etc.). God REALLY didn't like it that they said God was going to kill them.

That is the problem with the idea that God kills people, innocent people, destroys His children, etc.

One thing Piper mentioned was in Proverbs 16 - verse 33. He referred to it as the most random thing possible. But it was a specific thing - like rolling dice. One elucidation of this verse is that it refers to the Urim and Thummin, which God is supposed to control. This does not imply it refers to ALL dice throws, etc.

We can have that God DOES cause SOME things to happen (like the result of consulting the Urim and Thummin), but not necessarily all.

What about Job? The Lord giveth, said Job, and the Lord taketh away. However, we ought to note that Job also - later - said that he didn't know what he was talking about! And, in Job, God said something about "words without knowledge". Also, it is clear in Job that God did NOT do those things to Job - the devil did. God merely allowed them.

The main thing I see is that, based on Numbers 14-15 and Hebrews, the thing to avoid is accusing God of trying to do bad things.

Jesus taught that God is good. He even said he, Jesus, was not good, but only the Father. Jesus also said the devil came to kill, steal and destroy, but that Jesus came to give life. It is important to note that Jesus made a distinct contrast.

So, I would be encouraged, and not believe that God is going to cause bad things. I really don't think the Bible teaches that, at all... regardless of the opinions of man. Jesus warned of taking the statements (traditions) of religious leaders over the word of god.

I have heard that allowing man any choice about anything, equated to God not absolutely determining everything, makes man more powerful than God. We aren't of this mind, however, when good people refrain from committing sins they are tempted to commit. This argument for God's predetermination of all things, is to my mind, rather ethnocentric - assuming that God, like us, has to PROVE his power or else He doesn't have it. It applies the values of fallen man to a Holy God.

How often do people not do things, even though they could? This is not weakness, at least in men, but quite often wisdom! Quite often, in fact, it is goodness - when a person COULD commit a crime to hurt another, and chooses to not do that thing.

First, let me reiterate - we are NOT mere pawns. In an earlier post I read that IF we are God's pawns, then life seems a cruel game. How true! (true IF we are but pawns... but we are not).

Study Numbers 14 and related chapters, like the book of Hebrews, and see that when God said "How long will it be until they believe in me?" that He was asking how long until they quit blaming me for all the bad things.

That is what they did - and you know, I felt sorry for them reading about it.

They wept, Numbers tells us.

But, if we are supposed to stomach the cruelty (which is not true) of God, then this might be much easier to stomach - that God was angry because they thought He would kill them! They said that God had the nature / inclination / desire / predetermination / choice / whatever - to KILL them. But God said, "They have not known My ways."

Is God angry with Christians today, who say the same things about him? Israel had a negative expectation about God (a belief that God was cruel), and THAT made God angry.

This ought to tell us something - that when we today say God destroys his people, then possibly we, like Israel of old, don't know His ways.

I am not trying to criticize any theologian, but to get across a positive point - that God is good! We are commanded to have faith by Jesus. How can we expect anything good from God, when we believe God is the source of all our problems?