I will be spending tomorrow with one of my friends as she is bringing a new life into this world, Ella Grace, I can't wait to meet her. It has been exciting waiting with anticipation for this day. She is going to have the greatest mommy and daddy, sister and brother that a girl could ask for.
My youngest son will be moving back home this weekend until he closes on his house, and I am going to be spending sometime in the mountains Saturday night for a Anniversary Meeting at my old church. Wow busy time here, if I miss a time or two on the blog this week I am asking for forgiveness in advance.
Today, I believe I was going to talk about our sense of (false) control. My question to you friends is this: Do you know, I mean, really know that no matter what it is that you do, which path you think you hone out for yourself that you are not really the one that is in control of your destiny? There are laws of nature that God has established and set forth since creation, there is cause and effect, and even though God has given us the ability to be free moral agents there are consequences (both good and bad) for the choices that we make. That is why many times in God's word we are told to choose, Moses, in his final appeal to God's chosen said in the words of :
Deu 30:19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
Deu 30:20 That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them. Why then do we always forget to choose LIFE? You see the only control that we have is the choice to choose, and most times we choose death, a curse, friends I hope that you see what I am trying to express...this IS the Love of Christ, God wants to bless us, he wants things to go right with us and yet we think that we make our own way (that is false control).
Let me give you an example, the young man who hung himself this weekend. ( I feel I can expound on this for I have been in this place before and I know what it is like). I can assure you that he thought that he was in control of his destiny when he made the choice to end life, but his destiny was already laid out before him before he got to that point. It was laid out through prior choices that set the pendulum of cause and effect in order, could it have been reversed, YES, I believe that with all my heart... he had the right to choose...to change course, to make a difference...did he know he could? I don't know. Sometimes I think that we let things get us so far down that we get to a point that we do not realize we can choose another way, we become prisoners to Death.
My cousin on life support, became prisoner to Death, through alcoholism, and friends if you do not think that there is things that come to us from generation to generation, then I encourage you to look at your family tree and get the information about what kind of lives your ancestors had. Did he have a choice, YES, but again another that became prisoner of death. I pray that when that life support system is taken off of him that he has another chance and if so then I want to be there to tell him to choose LIFE. Choose Life Michael. To choose life is this plain and simple:
That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: Any other way is death, and your life is recorded against you when you choose death, for we are known by our fruit (what our lives are producing), our lives show forth what we choose. We are not in control except for the choices that we make, all other is smoke and glass.
A dear friend of mine put a video up on her FB yesterday of an abortion survivor. When I first saw it I did not know that there were survivors. If you want to check it out go to youtube.com and type in Gianna Jennsen. She was giving her testimony before the government in Victoria, Australia. A powerful testimony to the fact that none of us have control over life or death, that God and God alone grants who lives and who dies. I can hear some rebuttals on that but if you look at the whole picture and not just the part you will be able to see what I am talking about. Even if death is for the purpose to show salvation and the glory of God to another. Life or death, a huge battle we are in friends. Meditate on this, let it sink into your heart and do not just take my word for it, search it out.
Thank you for reading today...I started out not to write much of anything, but this is what has transpired, what was on my heart.
Choose life today, and until we meet again, add a little randomness in your life :) God Bless.
OK Mom, you asked for some feedback and conversation with your blog and since no one else has helped you out, I guess I’ll have to bite the bullet. I have to say that I am intrigued by your post for several reasons, but mostly because for the last several weeks, I have been studying different theology concerning destiny. I have to preface this discussion by saying that I have not came to a personal conclusion as to how I feel about the questions that are asked. I am simply seeking discussion and insight as to how average everyday people reconcile the seemingly opposite theologies that are presented within your post.
ReplyDeleteYou begin with the question “Do you know, I mean, really know that no matter what it is that you do, which path you think you hone out for yourself that you are not really the one that is in control of your destiny? There are laws of nature that God has established and set forth since creation, there is cause and effect”.
Now if one just read this, it would come across as a very Calvinistic statement. Destiny is a very strong word that can and has been used by many evil people, to do many evils deeds throughout our history. There really isn’t enough room here to get into the Calvinist vs. Armenian debate and the biblical reasoning for each, and as I said I’m not out to correct, teach, or preach to anyone. However in brief this would lead one to infer that everyone’s life is predestined. All that has, does, and will happen was destined by God when he first thought us. This theology has some obvious dangers in that a person could reasonably ask the question “why does it matter?”. What is going to happen, will happen, so why should I care?
On the other side of the aisle we begin the free choice argument. This is the part were it can get rather confusing and a gray area begins to seep in. If you make the argument that God has decided our destiny, that every decision that we have , do, and will ever make will lead to the same result that is known by God, then is it really “FREE”. Do we flatter and boast in our own ability to supposedly make free choices. In the same way as before, this can also get rather dangerous. The power of free choice has also given rise to many an evil doer. Free will does give mankind the power to decide between right and wrong, good and bad. I have no doubt that the paths you walk down in this life very well lead to different destinations now and later. So again, did we really chose that path or did God take a breath and blow trees down on the other path so that his greater purpose could be served.
Again I don’t know exactly how I feel about the different questions that arise from either side of this debate. I have to say that personally I am probably somewhere in the middle of the two viewpoints even though they seem to contradict. I do believe that as debated as these two theologies are, they are not the way to heaven. I think most people from both would agree that there is only one way to the father, and sitting in a building men built and labeled a church, or feeding homeless people at Christmas, ain’t it. Both however are good things that we should do in order to spread his word.
first i think your responce is very good and ill add my opinion to this question.
ReplyDeleteMy question to you friends is this: Do you know, I mean, really know that no matter what it is that you do, which path you think you hone out for yourself that you are not really the one that is in control of your destiny?
i believe free will and predestination go hand in hand we do have free will to make our own choices and i believe god knows the choices we will choose not that he will make them for us but knows before we choose what we will do. so we are predestined but by our own choices.
Thank you, I do stand to be corrected,:) and that is the purpose of wanting feed back because I am learning to express what I am thinking and it does not always come out the way I intended. My heart in this matter is that we have a choice to choose between a relationship with or without God. Moses is saying in Deut, if we choose the blessed life which is to Love God, obey his voice and to cleave to him, then our lives will be blessed and we have the promise of life eternal and to choose not to do this is a life that leads to death. That is a life with out God for eternity. For me I have lived on both sides and I can say for myself that choosing to live my life for Christ is a much blessed and peaceful life than the life I lived before hand. I agree with you that going to church, and doing good works is not what is going to get you to the father. Jesus said that He is the way the truth and the life, and no one comes to the father but by him. The church as it is supposed to be is the place we gather together to worship, to pray for one another and to encourage and lift one another up in our most holy faith. And doing good works is because of our faith...I think that our lives are supposed to be a living Epistle, which is that our live should show forth Christ for all to see and to spread the good news (gospel).
ReplyDeleteI learned a little on the Calvin and Armenian debate in theology last year, I do not understand it completely and haven't had time to study it out, as you learn more I would love for you to share with me. I am beginning to go into philosophy of religion and I am interested to see what comes of my study because the school of philosophy is supposed to be the search for truth. Thank you again, I am indeed challenged to dig deeper.