God Caused My Lymphoma, Not the Raw Hot Dog: A Sermon From Bethlehem Baptist Church

We all know people who have been made much meaner and more irritable and more intolerable to live with by suffering: it is not right to say that all suffering perfects. It only perfects one type of person …… the one who accepts the call of God in Christ Jesus. –Oswald Chambers link

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Yesterday, all 5 baby bluebirds left the nest under the watchful eyes of Arthur And Alice Bluebird III. Today, the dad was teaching them how to swoop out of a tree in my backyard. I am so thankful that God gave me a special experience with them this year. It helps me to see God in the beauty of His creation when, so often, TWW deals with pain and suffering in this world.

Last week, I tweeted about this post after I read the sermon at the Bethlehem Baptist website. One gentleman claimed I was mocking Reformed theology but apologized when I told him I was merely discussing the difficulties of some of the harder beliefs in the Calvinista brand of theology. Another man began quoting Wade Burleson to me to prove that Wade is Reformed in his theology. When I said that it was no surprise to me, the guy got all hot and bothered and claimed I was *pigeonholing* him. When I asked him for specific proof, using my tweets, he backed off and said he was mistaken and apologized. 

Over the last few years, I have tried to convey that, although I am not a Calvinist in my thinking, I respect those who have come to this conclusion so long as they do not feel the need to beat people over the head with their gospel™ proof of the doctrines of grace. Unfortunately, many of these newly minted Calvin apologists scoff at theology that is not based in the T.U.L.I.P. ( I named my pug, Tulip, as a remembrance of my struggle with this issue.) So many derogatory statements have been made by  20 something dudebros such as "I was an evangelical but I was finally taught how to think." These are silly and irritating since it is evident that said person has never spent any time, as I have, in learning from those who would not classify themselves as Reformed. Yes, there is good scholarship in Arminianism. If it were not so, everybody would agree with CJ Mahaney, Al Mohler, John Piper and their friends.

For our critics: Please note that we post the link to the original post and we hope all of our readers will go there to come to their own conclusions. This post is looking at the doubts, disagreements, and struggles I have with the trajectory of the sermon.

The Question for Today: Do we truly understand the depth of pain and suffering?

In a post at Bethlehem Baptist Church, Learning to Lament Through the Gift of Lymphoma, Travis Myers shares the story surrounding his diagnosis with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Myers is a Assistant Professor of Church History and Mission Studies at Bethlehem College and Seminary. The Deebs call this sort of seminary a "boutique seminary" since it seemed, for quite awhile, every celebrity church was developing their own special seminary, complete with their own peculiar theological bent. See The Pastors College– CJ Mahaney's little store front boutique.

I am currently caring for my mother in law who is receiving hospice care at or home. She is dying from her neuroendocrine cancer. Also, my daughter was diagnosed with a large brain tumor when she was 3 and was given a less than 10% prognosis. She did survive. I decided that I am the right person to enter this discussion since I cannot be accused of being without experience.

Bethlehem Baptist Church is John Piper's church although he is retired from the pastorate. There is no reason to assume that his hard line theology has been muted. For example, this church recommends the following churches which gives me pause in how they may view various issues regarding abuse. It also gives me a clue about their theology of pain and suffering.

  •  9Marks
  • Sovereign Grace churches
  • Acts 29 network of churches
  • Founders-friendly churches
  • The Gospel Coalition

Myers was diagnosed with non Hodgkins lymphoma.

Myers claimed he was shocked because he believed he would never get cancer 

In March 2015 I was diagnosed with a type of cancer called B-cell follicular non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Basically, it’s a blood cancer that turns lymph nodes into malignant tumors. There are several types of lymphoma, together making it the 7th most common cancer diagnosis for adults in the U.S. The average age at diagnosis is 65.

… I had sometimes silently denied the possibility of it when doing something that some study out there supposedly showed is correlated with cancer rates, like eating a raw hotdog

Myers said it was very difficult to wait 11 days.

Like every other person who is told they have cancer, he was expecting the worse and praying for the best. I wonder how he would feel if he had to wait for years as he detreriorated like those who are afflicted with ALS?

There were 11 days between first hearing the word “lymphoma” and finding out 1) which kind of lymphoma it was, 2) what stage it was in, and 3) whether treatment was even an option. The valley of those 11 days was covered by the darkest and coldest shadow of death that I’ve ever experienced

Myers received great news at the end of 11 days.

 News that my kind of lymphoma was what this cancer doctor calls the “boring” kind. He actually said that if a person is going to have cancer this is the kind you’d want to have. It is a slow growing and relatively easy to treat type of lymphoma. The five-year survival rate is 70%. And my case was still only late Stage 1.

The 70/30 odds seemed good enough, though not great(!). The oncologist seemed confident he could cure me and I knew things were still in God’s hands. God would decide to heal or not, to make treatment effective, or not. While Susan drove us to the marriage retreat I phoned our loved ones to inform them that six months of chemotherapy and a spot of radiation after that were supposed to take care of the tumor. 

God chose to heal him.

He is now in remission after one year and he believes that he is healed. I am grateful that he is doing well and wish him many long years of health and joy. 

Where I agree with Myers

1. "The sinless Son of God is our sympathetic high priest who cares for us."

I believe that Jesus is present in our sufferings. I know that He weeps with all of us who struggle.

Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.—Isaiah 53:4

2. Myers rightly points us to heaven when all of this pain and suffering will be gone.

The Holy Spirit’s “felt presence” in us assures us of our own future resurrection to new life with bodies that will never die again, never even suffer at all.

The problem with applying Myers' theology and experience to many who suffer.

" Suffering is proof that God loves you and wants you to be holy."

Suffering proves that God is your Good Father in heaven who is giving you more of himself: a sweeter, more poignant taste of his grace as he proves your status as his true child. If the only beloved Son of God had to suffer, so will we suffer who are sons and daughters of God through him. God is training his children, through pain, to become more like their eldest brother, Jesus. 

Is that true in all circumstances? Here are some examples that should give any thoughtful theologian pause. Ask yourself how you would tell the families that God loved Jessica and made this happen so that little Jessica or the tiny children on the cancer wards would be holy.

A. Jessica Lunsford

Jessica was 9 when she was kidnapped from her bed in the middle of the night. She was raped, most likely buried alive, and murdered.

B. Little toddlers on a cancer ward or ICU

I spent one too many nights at Dallas Children's Hospital watching young children suffering from cancer and other difficult illnesses. How does a parent comfort a child who is frightened and in pain, constantly being poked, prodded and given chemotherapy that makes them terribly sick. Some must spend months in the hospital. Others go home to continue the treatment or to die on hospice. Tell me how you say that this suffering is making that child holy. How do you explain to a 3 year old that God really loves them and wants them to suffer like this? If anyone had said that to me during Abby's illness, I would have slapped them upside the head and then would have started to cry.

C. Children sold into slavery.

It is sure nice to discuss Joseph and his eventual rise to power. But many of these lost, kidnapped and forgotten children are tortured day in and day out for years. Many are then simply cast aside or die. Is this theologian really saying that this is exactly what God planned for them?

My views on God in pain and suffering

God knew, before creation, that we would rebel. A plan was put in place and Jesus was the answer. The sacrifice of Jesus was predestined before the beginning of time. God gave men and women free will and gave mankind the ability to choose to follow Him. This choice is not the instrument of salvation. We are saved only through Jesus Christ who is the author and completer of our salvation.

Our choice led to pain and suffering in this world. However, free will is not free unless the ability to choose the opposite of that which is good and right.

I believe there is a wideness in God's plan for us. We humans like the binary "either, or" choice. However, there could be billions of choices and all of them could fit into Gods greater plan. I believe that there are limits set in place. For example, I do not believe this world will be destroyed until Jesus returns, in spite of the science fiction scenarios that I so enjoy. I believe that God intervenes in miraculous ways now and then, but not usually. In other words, the vast majority of people who get a glioblastoma will die until, or if, mankind comes up with a treatment.

I believe that we can choose to marry a number of different people and all of those choices can fit into the God's broad plan. So, if Myers chose to eat a hot dog and it was definitively linked to his cancer, then that could fit into God's plan for Myers. In other words, Myers could die tomorrow or die when he is 70 and both of deaths could work in God's vast plan.

God allows us a choice and allows us to experience the consequences of that choice. As I watched my daughter suffer, I came to a better understanding of the pain of our fall from grace. I found Him in the midst of this terrible trial, not by believing He caused it but by believing that He was with my daughter and my family in the midst of that time. He is a God who gets suffering. 

God has allowed us to go our way even though it is not the right thing to do. Think of this scenario. We can teach our kids all we want about the consequences of drunk driving. If we really wanted to prevent it, we could. We would need to be in the car with our kids as they grow into adults. We would have to limit their freedom and never let them leave our clutches.

God could have stood guard next to the tree and stopped Adam and Eve from going down that road. He didn't. Free will was part of the plan and I believe that God gave every woman and man the capability to choose right from wrong. Never forget, He was the perfect Father and yet His kids rebelled.Yet, He stuck with them and loved them in the midst of their rebellion. Remember that when you have difficult time with your own children.

I would love to hear from all of you on this difficult issues of pain and suffering. How do you see God? Is He the cosmic Grand Master, moving the chess pieces into positions to ensure the win or could it be that there is no specific chess board and He is present and in control, no matter what happens to the Queen?

Comments

God Caused My Lymphoma, Not the Raw Hot Dog: A Sermon From Bethlehem Baptist Church — 320 Comments


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    HA! First! Complementarism wins again!


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    two ish


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    Our infinite God has an infinite capability to plan for all of the choices we could make and for all of the various events that result from those choices. I do not believe that God causes evil — mankind and the devil are fully capable of more evil that we could ever imagine. But for every person and every evil, God has a plan to redeem us if we will chose to recognize Him, accept His gift of Grace in Jesus the Christ, and try to follow Him.


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    I’ve had chronic migraine for more than ten years. I gave up a successful medical practice because of the pain (and side effects from medications). I have been down every rabbit trail there is to try to understand why I’m the lucky one to have chronic pain. And I’ve decided that I’m not meant to know. I don’t think I’m specially chosen to become some spiritual giant because of my pain and suffering. I certainly haven’t been able to do anything special because of it – for heaven’s sake, I have a migraine 3 times a week!

    I’ve learned to walk with Jesus through the high pain days and the low pain days. I’ve learned that God’s love is with me all the time and everywhere, even when the pain is bad and I’m throwing up my guts in the ER.

    After ten years, I’ve given up trying to understand. I’m less certain about anything except the love of God. “In this world you will have trouble; but, take heart, I have overcome the world.” John 16:33


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    @ Catherine:
    I have chronic pain as well. Nerve damage from a car wreck caused by a drunk driver at about 4:45 pm on a Saturday. Medicines caused some permanent consequences that I will live with until I die, and the pain is still there. I had hypnosis therapy for it many years ago, but the hypnotherapist, a really great Christian guy, retired and I need periodic retreatment. And now the pain has returned, like someone slowly turning a lag screw into the bones four inches below my elbow and steaming my thumb and forefinger. Makes concentrating on work very difficult.


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    God is not the author of evil. God is not the author of death. That said, God can use what humans do–i.e. evil–and even death to accomplish His purposes. He is in the business of redemption. Just because God can redeem an experience (e.g. Joseph’s brothers selling him into slavery) does not make the experience good or something God authored.

    For example, God did not cause my first wife to commit adultery and abandon me. However, He has redeemed much of that pain to minister to others through my blog and as well through my professional work as a chaplain.


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    And I would add that attributing all suffering to God demonstrating love in developing intimacy with His true children is far too simplistic an explanation for suffering. Why people suffer is complex and ultimately mysterious in many cases…something we may never fully comprehend.


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    If I can here are some articles I wrote about pain and suffering.

    The first one is about Joey Feek. This country music singer recorded a song called “When I am Gone.” Its about how life would go one after her death. The song was ominous as a couple of years afterward she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. This is a reflection on death and dying in evangelical culture.

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/11/28/joey-martin-feek-faces-her-death-that-was-foreshadowed-in-her-single-when-im-gone-exploring-the-issue-of-death-and-dying-in-evangelical-christianity/

    I wrote this while I was trying to get through a false accusation that took aim at my name. Dee Parsons knows the challenges I had to deal with. The false accusation came from a Care Group Leader at Eric Simmons Redeemer Arlington. This article is how four different people look at pain and suffering. Those 4 are Ben Petrick, Scott Hamilton as well as Derek and David Carr.

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/10/19/thoughts-on-pain-and-suffering-differing-perspectives-from-scott-hamilton-ben-petrick-and-derek-and-david-carr/

    Did you ever think you would deal with all the pain and suffering in your life? Did you ever think that your child would be diagnosed with cancer? Or learn that your spouse had an affair?

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/07/09/did-you-ever-think-this-would-be-the-story-of-your-life/

    This is an article about prosperity theology and how pain and suffering makes the problems worse. This came from a NY Times op-ed from a person dealing with terminal cancer who is a Duke Theology Prof who studied the prosperity gospel crowd.

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2016/02/27/the-prosperity-gospel-reflection-on-a-ny-times-op-ed-called-death-the-prosperity-gospel-and-me/

    This deals with other people suffering invading your life.

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/06/01/when-other-peoples-suffering-invades-your-world/

    This is about my mother’s pancreatic cancer and how she survived it. I gave me Mom John Piper’s pamphlet on cancer. Deeply hurt my mother I learned about it years later in my faith crisis.

    https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2015/03/10/my-mothers-pancreatic-cancer-john-piper-and-me/


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    So many derogatory statements have been made by 20 something dudebros such as “I was an evangelical but I was finally taught how to think.”

    “I was an adventurer but I took an arrow to the knee.”


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    Suffering proves that God is your Good Father in heaven who is giving you more of himself: a sweeter, more poignant taste of his grace as he proves your status as his true child. If the only beloved Son of God had to suffer, so will we suffer who are sons and daughters of God through him. God is training his children, through pain, to become more like their eldest brother, Jesus.

    On so many levels this is twisted… To me this comes from the same root of “philosophizing” that gave us weird little tulips.


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    Few things infuriate me more than people who elevate suffering as some sort of gift. (John Piper, anyone) What I’ve noticed, is the people who spew this baloney are the ones who have NEVER experienced a life altering tragedy; I’m talking one that hurts and affects you every day for the rest of your life.

    I had a daughter die suddenly and unexpectedly almost eight years ago. And while I’ve learned to press on, I will never be completely healed from that until I draw my last breath. I think of other tragedies I’ve known – one we discuss frequently here on TWW is people who were molested as children. (I have family members who were molested by clergy, so I’ve seen the effects of this up close) Or many of us have known soldiers injured in the service, permanently disabled and in chronic pain, every day, for the rest of their lives. The suffering list goes on and on.

    The religious schtick is to say suffering is a “gift” and it’s all to “transform me more into Christ’s likeness”. I’ll say it straight up – I would give up every single bit of Christlikeness I’ve gained to have my daughter back. If someone would like to challenge me on that, I say, which one of YOUR kids would you send to heaven in order for you to have more Christlikeness? Which one of YOUR children would you want molested in order that THEY gain more Christlikeness? Which one of YOU or YOUR children would you want to experience fill-in-the-blank-life-altering-tragedy in order to gain more Christlikeness? Suffering is no gift. It is something we endure on this side of eternity.

    As long as we’re on this earth, we’ll never understand. Piper and his other suffering mongers should just say, “I don’t know exactly why God allows such suffering, but let me walk beside you through this.”

    Think about the beginning of the book of Job. For all the bad behavior Job’s friends exhibited later, EARLY ON they did what was right. In Job 2:11-13, Job’s friends came to be with him. They cried with him, sat with him and said nothing. They shared sorrow with their friend in silence. GOOD CALL – that sums up how we help people who are suffering.


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    M. Joy wrote:

    “I don’t know exactly why God allows such suffering, but let me walk beside you through this.”

    Exactly.

    ‘Nuff said.


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    I try not to think about stuff like this too much because it’s depressing and there are no good answers. I don’t know why I have Asperger’s and major depression. (The diabetes, there’s probably a reason, maybe genetic as both parents developed late-onset diabetes.) But if I think too hard about this, it’s not so much that I’ll think about me, but that I’ll think about my mother, who is a paranoid schizophrenic. And then I’ll be back to 14 years old and asking why my mom tried to kill herself. Now, 40+ years later, I have a better idea as to *why* and am thankful for the great developments in medication.

    But I swear, if John Piper were to say that God allowed this to happen to my mother as a test of some sort, I can’t say that I wouldn’t respond with highly inappropriate hand gestures. There are a lot of things I don’t know, and this is one of them. But having someone who has never had to deal with some of the stuff I saw as a child, teenager and adult, even as recently as two years ago, I wouldn’t be nice in my rejection of Piper’s nonsense.

    It wouldn’t be the first time I was called rude, either.


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    M. Joy wrote:

    The religious schtick is to say suffering is a “gift” and it’s all to “transform me more into Christ’s likeness”. I’ll say it straight up – I would give up every single bit of Christlikeness I’ve gained to have my daughter back. If someone would like to challenge me on that, I say, which one of YOUR kids would you send to heaven in order for you to have more Christlikeness? Which one of YOUR children would you want molested in order that THEY gain more Christlikeness? Which one of YOU or YOUR children would you want to experience fill-in-the-blank-life-altering-tragedy in order to gain more Christlikeness? Suffering is no gift. It is something we endure on this side of eternity.

    Amen!

    Sometimes I think I’m turning into Grumpy Christian. I’ve been in a horrible situation, asked God to help me love others despite how badly they treated me, clung to all the verses on deliverance and believing prayer, and the worst still happened. Now, after that, how do you trust God again? I roll my eyes at the Psalms now and hate those verses on believing prayer. Thoughts that God cried with me during the suffering or that there’s always heaven one day does absolutely zilch for me. Sometimes I think we Christians expect too much from God. After all, think of those Christians who were torn apart by wild animals in the Roman arena. (I’m really not as much of a grump as I sound here.)


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    Catherine wrote:

    I’ve had chronic migraine for more than ten years. I gave up a successful medical practice because of the pain (and side effects from medications). I have been down every rabbit trail there is to try to understand why I’m the lucky one to have chronic pain. And I’ve decided that I’m not meant to know. I don’t think I’m specially chosen to become some spiritual giant because of my pain and suffering. I certainly haven’t been able to do anything special because of it – for heaven’s sake, I have a migraine 3 times a week!

    Oh, Catherine, you and I are traveling a similar road. I got my first migraine in my late 20’s and I have never been totally free from it since that day. It flares into unbearable pain some days and dies back to a level I can mostly ignore in between times, but it’s always there, for over 30 years now. I wonder if you have faced all of the attitudes I have in the church- you must be “doing something wrong” or be in sin or this wouldn’t be happening to you. Or people who want to sell you some quack supplement they are sure will solve what numerous doctors have been unable to. The ones who want to lay hands on you and anoint you with oil, the ones who are convinced that God does miracles whenever we ask, and you feel you’re causing them terrible consternation by not fitting into their mold. Some are sure if you just traveled to visit some particular faith healer you’d be healed.

    Honestly, the most common attitude I’ve come up against in church is that people don’t want to bother with someone who won’t be a reliable volunteer for church projects.

    And, as Dee points out, the ones who believe God is hitting the smite button just because you’re special to him that way.

    So many want to pronounce judgment or ‘fix’ you, so few just accept you and love you as you are.

    One thing I will say is no one understands pain like the one who is in it. I count emotional pain as well. I’ve suffered both physical and emotional pain and I can’t tell you that one is worse than the other, they are both excruciating.

    There are some people who feel closer to God when they are suffering, to the point they actually revel in it. I do not feel that way. I feel closer to God when I’m out in the sunshine, free from pain.

    I’ve had plenty of opportunity to practice it but I just don’t get the thing of feeling close to God in pain. I’ve come to trust that pain will pass and to be patient, is all. When people speak like suffering is a special gift from God I start wondering, if that’s what God loves and thinks is valuable, what if heaven is just a big suffer-fest? Perish the thought.

    The crux of the matter to me is, there are things which the mind of man cannot understand and which God has not revealed. When human beings take what is revealed and try to extrapolate laws about things that are not revealed, when they become dogmatic about their conclusions, they lose part of their humanity and become abusive to others.

    As soon as suffering becomes part of your standing with God- for good or for bad -the body of Christ becomes a caste system.

    My dear husband has an incurable form of cancer. They cannot give us a prognosis as to time, it may be years or… it may not. He is the love of my life, my faithful friend, my soulmate. Watching someone you love suffer is worse than suffering yourself.

    All I can tell you is that suffering came into this world through sin and every person who lives in this world must partake. No one escapes suffering. Some get more than others or suffer younger than others but we don’t know why. What we do know is that it won’t always be like this. The apostle Paul said the the sufferings of the present time are not worthy of being compared to the glory that is to be revealed to us. Jesus said “in the world you will have tribulation but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” We know that the whole creation groans under a burden of suffering and we know that it will someday be lifted. And we know that we are to comfort one another until that day.


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    @ M. Joy:

    Amen to everything you said.


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    Back when I first became a “Christian” the Holocaust was a big topic to point out total depravity of the human species, God’s sovereign wrath of rebellious vile sinners, a special wrath of God on people of the Jewish faith. I did mention in these conversations was that there were more than people of the Jewish faith slaughtered with no mercy what so ever killed in the Holocaust. Atheists, JW, Catholics, Gypsies, Russians, Polish, political prisoners, people who were gay etc. That too was the wrath of God being poured out on a rebellious world. It was not just God removing His sovereign hand of protection and allowing sin to takes its course, God was actively involved in the torment by sending deceptive spirits, allowing Satan to reign like in Job 1-2 etc. This was all in God’s control every single act of barbarism and it was all to His Holy Glory. When True Christians suffered the same fate in this case it was to test their faith, a tempered type of wrath to point out their sin as well, so God could glorify Himself like in Job or when Steven was allowed to be stoned to death in those cases it was for different reasons though it looked just exactly the same way. After all this then there was hell which would make all this suffering look like a cakewalk here again God’s eternal wrath would be poured out for all eternity, and this would not just be a passive wrath it will be an active white hot eternal wrath for ever and ever…

    I could go on but that about sums it up that went for child cancer, child abuse survivors, childhood schizophrenia, near drowning victims, car accidents, etc. One thing was very clear God’s wrath and His anger at His creation was evident, deserved and even in this with all this pain of God removed His hand of common grace it would be far worse and totally deserved because of our personal rebellion in Adam. This did something to me as a person, I have managed to stuff it down and bury it like a Christian should but its there. Why would God do this just to prove a point, I have read Job many times and it does not soften the blow.

    Why I still believe in God, because in all this suffering, in all this pain and grief and anguish there are lights of the Divine that shine through, usually through the actions of other people. Simple acts of Grace, a smile, and a laughter reaching a student and having a minute of lucidity in the hours or days of psychosis, those precious moments of eternity I have found on my sojourning in this life. I will never believe God is the author or active agent in evil even though that pov was shoved down deep in my soul back when I first became a member of the faith. I think people bring up the wrath side of God so much because they are angry and full of rage, I know I am a bit like that in reverse. No doubt the fallen world leads to pain and the evil of humanity is truly profound, what some in the faith do not see is that for every guard at the camps or vile act there were / are hundreds if not thousands of acts of courage to stop such injustices and evil. This is one reason I became a universalist to some degree because “right belief” seems to be the most shallow subjective criteria to decide such a vital / permanent judgment.

    I see God as the great reconciler, and one day there will be the great reconciliation where all things will be made right in Him who died and rose again to reconcile all things unto Himself. Sorry if this is to long but after reading the article it just sort of came out. God bless all.


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    @ M. Joy:

    and I’m so sorry about your daughter. I’m so sorry.


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    brian wrote:

    This was all in God’s control every single act of barbarism and it was all to His Holy Glory. When True Christians suffered the same fate in this case it was to test their faith, a tempered type of wrath to point out their sin as well, so God could glorify Himself like in Job or when Steven was allowed to be stoned to death in those cases it was for different reasons though it looked just exactly the same way.

    Amazing how there’s all these different explanations for the same thing happening, isn’t it? It seems like people are just playing mind games with themselves.


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    This is a fallen world. We are a fallen people. We need a Savior, a redeemer. I do not know all that God knows. I do not even know a smidgen of what God knows. I believe the little I know from His word and my life as a believer. Through many painful, impossible, and difficult trials that I have been through, ones that I don’t know the purpose for or lack of purpose, He has been there for me and made the unbearable bearable. I know I was not forsaken. I still don’t know why and may never know and that is where the trusting Him comes in…


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    M. Joy wrote:

    The religious schtick is to say suffering is a “gift” and it’s all to “transform me more into Christ’s likeness”.

    I don’t care to put my political philosophy on a bumper sticker, I sure not going to fit the mysteries of our existence onto one.


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    @ M. Joy:

    I am very sorry for your loss.

    Everything in your post is spot-on. I could have written it myself (though I lost a mother, not a child).

    Your post covered every point I wanted to make.

    I especially appreciated the part about how Christians ought to minister to those who are in pain: empathize with them, sit silently with them as they work through the pain. No Bible verse quoting, no criticizing, no platitutdes.

    I also tire of other variations of the Christian spiritualization of suffering.

    Not only do some Christians get into the “this pain will cause you to become more Christ-like,” but some of them get into stuff like, “This is for God’s glory.”

    At this stage in the game, I don’t care about God’s glory. I don’t want to suffer because it makes God appear more glorious.

    Regarding troubled or abusive marriages: the Christians who say: “God uses marriage to make you holy, not happy,” o,r “Marriage is to make you holy, not happy.”

    I’m a single lady who’s never married, but that just annoys me. It makes marriage sound like a punishment one has to endure, rather than a friendship with another person to be enjoyed.

    Then there’s the general, “God doesn’t want you to be happy” Christian line.

    I’ve never understood that. Jesus said he wants you to have an “abundant life.” Does that not imply some level of happiness?

    I reached this conclusion some time ago as well:

    As long as we’re on this earth, we’ll never understand. Piper and his other suffering mongers should just say, “I don’t know exactly why God allows such suffering, but let me walk beside you through this.”

    The best answer: “I don’t know why God allowed your suffering, but how can I help you through it”.


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    Patriciamc wrote:

    I roll my eyes at the Psalms now and hate those verses on believing prayer.

    Here’s another post I totally agreed with and related to and could have written myself!

    About the part I am quoting above, from your post:

    My now most-hated part of the Bible (this has been true in the past several years) is Romans 8:28. The verse that says God works all things to do for those who love him.

    I found during all my years of clinical depression, and the years after my mother’s death (and other bad things that happened), Romans 8.28 got quoted at me the most by Christians.

    I also noticed Ro. 8.28 is probably one of the single most over-used Bible verses uttered by TV preachers in general sermons pertaining to topics such as worry, suffering, disappointment.

    You know what really sticks in my craw about Ro 8.28 now?
    Something like my mother dying years ago (and a few other pretty heart breaking or difficult things that happened in my life) are supposed to result in good (I assume this refers to THIS life time?) – it’s been years, and SQUAT good has come of any of it.

    Not only is it annoying as get-out to hear Ro. 8.28 quoted all the time in response to hurt and tragedy, but then the verse does not even come true. That adds a whole other level of annoyance to things.

    And, like you, I am so burnt out on prayer. I’m only kind of holding on to the Christian faith, but I still sometimes pray, but it’s become a chore. I don’t see any good come out of prayer.

    Quote:
    “(1)Thoughts that God cried with me during the suffering or (2) that there’s always heaven one day does absolutely zilch for me.”

    To a degree, I can kind of appreciate the first half, but that point and the second don’t, in the end scheme of things, help me now, either.


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    The Open theology is what Dee is describing. Greg Boyd is a leading and popular proponent. Boyd frequently tangles with John Piper over questions of theology. Boyd has written a number books including:
    God of the Possible: “A Biblical Introduction to the Open View of God” and “Is God to Blame?: Beyond Pat Answers to the Problem of Suffering”. Boyd is pastor at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul and his sermons are online at: http://whchurch.org/sermons-media/sermons


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    2 thoughts: (well, for starters, at least)

    1) I think God can work with scenario a, b, c, d, e, and so on. during my time at 1st Church of Dysfunction, the idea of hitting the bullseye of what God wanted was drilled in to me. not only did we have to find God’s perfect will (for any and all situations), but hit it dead center. oh the stress.

    eventually it was what I imagined being dropped in the middle of Sahara would be like — which way do I go? as I shuffle in place in a circle. hundreds of choices, followed by another set of hundreds of choices with each new step.

    i guess i’ll…. just sit here. choice paralysis.

    but the drilled-in fear & shame of missing God’s will, and the bullseye of God’s will… these pressures from within, and choice paralysis from without….

    (I believe I had PTSD for quite a while after i got out of 1st Church of Dysfunction. for this and many other reasons)

    i remember in college a friend who told me, “you know, it’s easier for God to direct an object that’s in motion than one that is standing still.” i think that’s pretty wise.

    All in all, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s not curtains if i choose door number 2, when i could have chosen doors number 1 or 3. I do believe God can work with any of the options.
    ——————–


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    here’s my second thought (and a question):

    2) “We all know people who have been made much meaner and more irritable and more intolerable to live with by suffering: it is not right to say that all suffering perfects. It only perfects one type of person …… the one who accepts the call of God in Christ Jesus”. –Oswald Chambers

    shut up, mr. chambers.

    my mom is dying what appears to be a slow death, full of tortuous pain, the increasing loss of all movement, and sleeplessness. there is no better Christian than she. yet she has become utterly mean, irritable, and intolerable to live with because of her suffering. she didn’t reject the call of God in Christ Jesus, mr. chambers. what a callous, insensitive, small-minded assertion. & i didn’t keep your sanctimonious little book.

    …that’s done…. and now for the question:

    I too am involved as caregiver to my mom. even with my help & my sister’s help, it’s taking an enormous toll on my dad. my mom refuses to take something to enable her to sleep (which would help on many levels — we’re quite desperate). I’ve tried to insist on it, to not avail. (dementia comes & goes to some degree). in the near future i have to try to insist on it again.

    if she refuses, we can’t physically force it on her. it’s not impossible that we could sneak it into her food (crushed up) at dinner time. but that would cause a new set of challenges and does not seem ethical.

    any ideas from people who have walked this road or are walking it now? i responded to Oswald so i AM on topic, but i’ll look on the open discussion if anyone wants to respond there. (just advice on the sleep-aid refusal dilemma, please)


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    @ siteseer:

    “The crux of the matter to me is, there are things which the mind of man cannot understand and which God has not revealed. When human beings take what is revealed and try to extrapolate laws about things that are not revealed, when they become dogmatic about their conclusions, they lose part of their humanity and become abusive to others.”

    Yes. When we think we know what God has NOT revealed, we become “experts” on why such-and-such happened to so-and-so.

    What God HAS revealed most clearly is that He was willing to have His Son suffer for our sake. I realize that when we are suffering even this may not seem to be such a big deal. But it’s hard to deny that He is for us, not against us, and, further, that He loves us – even when the evidence doesn’t seem to back that up.


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    Daisy wrote:

    Regarding troubled or abusive marriages: the Christians who say: “God uses marriage to make you holy, not happy,” o,r “Marriage is to make you holy, not happy.”

    That’s the theme of a popular author of Christian marriage books. Gary something? Anyway, I really don’t find his line of reasoning in the Bible.


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    Daisy wrote:

    You know what really sticks in my craw about Ro 8.28 now?
    Something like my mother dying years ago (and a few other pretty heart breaking or difficult things that happened in my life) are supposed to result in good (I assume this refers to THIS life time?) – it’s been years, and SQUAT good has come of any of it.
    Not only is it annoying as get-out to hear Ro. 8.28 quoted all the time in response to hurt and tragedy, but then the verse does not even come true. That adds a whole other level of annoyance to things.
    And, like you, I am so burnt out on prayer. I’m only kind of holding on to the Christian faith, but I still sometimes pray, but it’s become a chore. I don’t see any good come out of prayer.

    Hey Daisy. Hugs for you! Sometimes, life just sucks (Book of Patricia, 1:1). These are the thoughts I’d love for ministers to see and do sermons on. The really hard stuff, not just fluffy platitudes.

    Like you, I’m not much into prayer right now. For better or for worse, my attitude is that God’s going to do whatever he wants no matter what I pray. I do know, though, that on one hand, I’m definitely still a child of God, but on the other hand, I’m the whiny, ungrateful child who doesn’t call home enough – that’s where I am right now. And what’s worse, I don’t feel like reaching out to him. This might sound bad, but I feel like it’s his turn to reach out to me. Is that a lightening bolt coming my way?


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    When it comes to suffering, one thing I think the church in general doesn’t do enough of is preparing people for hard times. I know when I was young, I had not experienced suffering much beyond a hard algebra test, so I probably wasn’t open to hearing about suffering, but someone really should have stressed it. Sort of like spiritual disaster preparation because the disaster is coming. People need to know that it’s coming, and here’s what they need to do, and something beyond the armor of faith. I don’t know about you, but that stuff never meant anything to me.

    Oh, and don’t even get me started on the word of faith people! Grrrrr


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    elastigirl wrote:

    2) “We all know people who have been made much meaner and more irritable and more intolerable to live with by suffering: it is not right to say that all suffering perfects. It only perfects one type of person …… the one who accepts the call of God in Christ Jesus”. –Oswald Chambers
    shut up, mr. chambers.
    my mom is dying what appears to be a slow death, full of tortuous pain, the increasing loss of all movement, and sleeplessness. there is no better Christian than she. yet she has become utterly mean, irritable, and intolerable to live with because of her suffering. she didn’t reject the call of God in Christ Jesus, mr. chambers. what a callous, insensitive, small-minded assertion. & i didn’t keep your sanctimonious little book.
    …that’s done…. and now for the question:
    I too am involved as caregiver to my mom. even with my help & my sister’s help, it’s taking an enormous toll on my dad. my mom refuses to take something to enable her to sleep (which would help on many levels — we’re quite desperate). I’ve tried to insist on it, to not avail. (dementia comes & goes to some degree). in the near future i have to try to insist on it again.
    if she refuses, we can’t physically force it on her. it’s not impossible that we could sneak it into her food (crushed up) at dinner time. but that would cause a new set of challenges and does not seem ethical.

    Hear, hear! Mr. Chambers deserves a big lump on the head! I’m so sorry you’re going through this with your mother. I assume you’ve talked to the doctor about sleep medication. Have you also tried melatonin? You can tell her the truth that it’s a supplement that might help. If you have sleep medication, can you just put it in with her nightly round of medication and not say anything? I assume she has several pills she takes at night like my parents do.


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    Piper has been going on about this for at least ten years ago. Ten years ago during conference in the UK Piper preached this theology of suffering. He implied that if your son died in a car accident, you were lucky because God had given you a chance to suffer. Also, if you’re not suffering, then you can’t really be holy.

    I was profoundly uncomfortable with it. But everyone else thought he was fantastic, wise, a brilliant preacher.

    Anyway, what does Piper really know about suffering? Has he suffered the loss of a child? If not, perhaps he should shut up.


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    patriciamc wrote:

    Like you, I’m not much into prayer right now.

    I guess that we’re at least three here on a similar situation regarding prayer. For a long while I’ve found it difficult to pray… I may get to say a short prayer here and there during my day, but it’s definitely nothing like the longer, more dedicated prayers I used to do. It is also often hard to pray at church, except for the Lord’s Prayer. That one comes out quite easily and I feel quite happy saying it.

    I’ve recently decided to move from the conservative church I attended for the last 6-7 years, and at the moment I’m going through an exploratory phase. I’m visiting various churches around where I live, but the truth is that I don’t know where I may end up settling or how long it may take. Quite happy about it, actually…


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    M. Joy wrote:

    “I don’t know exactly why God allows such suffering, but let me walk beside you through this.”

    THIS is Jesus.

    I’m not quite sure why we think we can understand suffering. Or God for that matter. These things are too big for our peon brains. Besides, we were taught our job is to love. Love Him and love others. Why must we waste our time doing anything else?


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    siteseer wrote:

    The crux of the matter to me is, there are things which the mind of man cannot understand and which God has not revealed. When human beings take what is revealed and try to extrapolate laws about things that are not revealed, when they become dogmatic about their conclusions, they lose part of their humanity and become abusive to others.
    As soon as suffering becomes part of your standing with God- for good or for bad -the body of Christ becomes a caste system.

    Amen! Especially for me, “The crux of the matter to me is, there are things which the mind of man cannot understand and which God has not revealed.”

    I’m terribly sorry to hear of all your suffering. I’m terribly sorry to hear that your husband has cancer. I wish I could remove your pain from you and the cancer from him. I wish you could live the rest of your life without any form of pain, at all.


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    @ M. Joy:
    Oh M Joy, I can’t even imagine. I’m sad that you’ve had to experience such grief and pain.


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    @ Daisy:
    Daisy, I’m sorry for the suffering you’ve experienced, too. Thank you for having the bravery to share your thoughts on this topic as I suspect it may not be easy to say some of this stuff with other Christians about who may slam you down for not fitting into some “I’m happy to suffer” box. (Not that I suspect most on this site would but you never know with us Christians.) I wish life could be different for you. I used to think someday we’d understand. I just hope someday we won’t care to even look back at this whole mess we call our lives.


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    @ elastigirl:
    Holy crap, elastigirl! I’m so sorry for what you and your family are suffering. I WISH it weren’t so for you. (And it seems many on this board are suffering, too. Oh, how I wish Jesus would have come and removed all our suffering a long time ago. And if someone pipes up that he has, well, please keep it to yourself right now. We know the “correct” answer, but that doesn’t help a thing right now.)

    I’m sorry you’re hurting and that your mom is hurting and that you and others have had their suffering INCREASED by those of us who try to “fix” things or “correct” things. I’m sorry your mom’s hurting. I’m sorry this world sucks so badly. I’m sorry this is not going to get better on this side of the veil. I’m sorry we can’t all take your pain and the pain of everyone else here away by some hugs, though those hugs are still mentally being sent your way. I’m sorry each of us who have lost loved ones or never had loved ones, have suffered more than we can ever put into words. I’m sorry that pain can sometimes be a constant companion. I’m sorry that we stupid humans quote things we think can help. I’m sorry that upon the sudden, unexpected death of her healthy 18 year old, my mother-in-law heard more than once, “At least you have 6 other kids” from numerous people. I’m sorry that we are horrible at comforting those in need. I’m sorry we are horrible at knowing what to say, even to ourselves sometimes.

    Thank you to each of you who have shared last night/today. Thank you for teaching us/reminding us of the more stupid stuff what not to say. I hope I haven’t made your suffering any worse.


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    Daisy wrote:
    Quote:
    “(1)Thoughts that God cried with me during the suffering or (2) that there’s always heaven one day does absolutely zilch for me.”
    To a degree, I can kind of appreciate the first half, but that point and the second don’t, in the end scheme of things, help me now, either.

    On this particular day, Daisy, I am in your shoes. My response to the Christianese that says, “But one day it will all be over and there’s heaven,” is, “Exactly how does that pay the rent or put food on the table?”

    I have been having the feeling lately that the bullies always win. Christians are supposed to “win” in the end, but right now, I feel like I’m on the losing side in just about everything. I have this vision of me lying on the mat in a boxing ring, the referee has just shouted, “Ten!” and I’m not able to get up because I’ve been beaten to a pulp.

    I don’t need to hear, at that point, about my “ultimate victory in Christ.” I need to be helped off the mat, to the locker room, or maybe to the hospital. I need medical treatment: ice packs for my bruises, stitches for my cuts, and maybe a day or two of rest while I heal. Then I need to meet with a coach and figure out how to win the next match. Do NOT give me this “Christianese” about my “ultimate victory”. Help me figure out what to do next!


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    I would be with what Divorce Minister said above. I think we probably don’t have free-will in the libertarian sense for philosophical (as well as theological) reasons.

    Piper’s issue is slightly separate – it flourishes within a certain form of New Calvinism – but its fairly easy to envisage it flourishing within other contexts (Pentecostalism for instance). Even Jesus (Luke 13) when asked the ‘why?’ question discouraged attempts to ‘look behind the veil’ and find a neat theological answer.


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    On April 5th my wife had what was to be “routine” (it may be routine for the surgeon, but it is never routine for the patient) gall bladder surgery. The doctor found cancer and proceeded no further. The type and cancer and its stage, IV, is very aggressive. I will hear his words, “It’s cancer,” every day for the rest of my life.

    When he gave my wife the news after she came out of recovery, she said, “Well, if you live long enough you’ll die of something.”

    So far her only problems have been the results of the chemo. Her curly silver hair is gone. She tires quickly. HOWEVER nothing but good has come out of all of this so far.

    Is God testing her? Is He testing me? Nonsense! He is with us now just as He has always been and always will be.

    So what’s going on?

    Simple.

    It’s called Life.


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    You know what I want to say to people who are willing to ascribe to God the greatest evils humanity has witnessed?

    Two words:

    “Jesus wept.”

    When his best friends met him, draped in mourning clothes, faces drawn with suffering, wracked with grief over their brother’s death, he shared their agony.

    Not forever, though. (But it matters so much that he doesn’t shush them and tell them not to worry, he’s gonna raise brother Lazarus again, so they can stop crying. FIRST he’s with them in their suffering. This is a gift to all of us who suffer, who don’t understand how God could let something terrible happen.)

    One way or the other, sooner or later, this isn’t the end of the story. And until things are fully set right, fully restored, he is with us. I often imagine him as closer to us than the air we breathe. When I lost my daughter in utero (a sixth miscarriage) I remember thinking that there was no evil, no danger, no suffering, no pain that I wasn’t willing to put my body in front of, to interpose myself between it and my darlings. I couldn’t believe my God who is Love could bear to do less for me. So if I was pierced with grief and loss, those sharp barbs only got to me after they’d gone through Jesus. After he’d allowed himself to be pierced by my pain. I wasn’t alone. He wouldn’t let me be alone.

    That’s my theology of suffering.


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    This hits close to home for me. I have had close to 50 surgeries so far, and I am not 60 yet. It’s been hard, but I survive with the grace of God getting me through. Have I had my moments of wanting to cry out and rage, of course. But I go on. I am almost 3 weeks post op now from my last foot surgery. I don’t recommend having 3 foot surgeries in 7 months. It’s super painful. Do I expect people to understand my pain? I would only hope they would, but most people don’t. I hear so often from other Christian, that God can just heal you, just pray hard enough. I don’t answer them on that. Yes, God can choose to heal my broken body, but I don’t have to pray hours on end for him to do that. I just rest in the peace that he gives me. Roman’s 8:28 is my favorite Bible verse. I have clung to it. Knowing that he is in all things. He doesn’t cause things, but he is there with me thru it. Daisy, I don’t mean to offend you at all on this, I’m just stating what works for me. I played my keyboard the other day. One of my favorite songs – “Holy, Holy, Lord God all mighty. It ministered to me. I just need to remember that God is Holy. We don’t think I’ll ever walk again more than a few feet at a time, or around the house. I could be bitter, but I’m not. I don’t choose to live my life that way. I hate being in pain. I hate that my foot hasn’t improved much pain wise in almost 3 weeks. But that is just life, and if this happens to be my life, then ok. I do know one thing, that because of all I’ve been thru, I have become more compassionate minded. I understand pain more when other’s go thru it. Would I have naturally been this way, I want to think so. It just came earlier than later. I want people to know that I have a caring compassionate heart. I can’t stand to see people in pain both physically and emotionally. God has given me more than my fair share of grace. I just can’t explain it. I continue praising God thru my pain not for it. I don’t believe God is like that. Now I must stop and do the painful job of washing my hair. Life goes on.


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    brian wrote:

    I could go on but that about sums it up that went for child cancer, child abuse survivors, childhood schizophrenia, near drowning victims, car accidents, etc. One thing was very clear God’s wrath and His anger at His creation was evident, deserved and even in this with all this pain of God removed His hand of common grace it would be far worse and totally deserved because of our personal rebellion in Adam.

    “For God so Hated the World that He…”


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    “I found Him in the midst of this terrible trial, not by believing He caused it but by believing that He was with my daughter and my family in the midst of that time. He is a God who gets suffering.”

    I can identify with this. We don’t find God in the ‘suffering’ itself, He is found in the reactions to suffering: the caring, the compassion, the love itself.
    It is said in my Church this: ‘Christ does not cause suffering. He came to be a Presence in its midst.’

    For those Calvinists locked into a ‘faith’ that blames God for evil and suffering, I can only feel sadness. Their ‘faith’ is a cruel one, bereft of the Christ who looked upon those ‘without a shepherd’ and felt compassion for them.


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    elastigirl wrote:

    if she refuses, we can’t physically force it on her. it’s not impossible that we could sneak it into her food (crushed up) at dinner time. but that would cause a new set of challenges and does not seem ethical.

    I’ve been where you are twice with my parents, facing the terrible choices that must be made. When the choices seemed impossible, I had to focus on what was the most loving for my parents, regardless of the things they said or did which were due to their disease progression. And, actually, regardless of what I had thought previously or what other people said about it. I would not hesitate to put the medication in your mother’s food or otherwise. It preserves your ability to be a better caregiver and some good sleep would probably help her quality of life as well.

    Just my opinion, but know that many of us have faced those ethical challenges and understand your struggle.


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    @ Loren Haas:

    Yeah, he was unfortunately branded and dismissed for his “Open theology” stance. While I personally do not agree with Open theology, I am sympathetic to why Boyd arrived in that camp in the way he did. Interestingly enough, that is the one theological stance that would prohibit one from being an EFCA minister. Generally speaking, I like Boyd’s work. He is a fellow Yale Divinity School graduate as well 😉


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    God bless you, Uncle Dad.

    I believe that there are passages in the bible that are meant to help us through hard times. I do not believe that that means god wants or causes us to suffer. I reject that utterly. If you do not look at the bible, and particularly the new testament, with the idea that god loves us and that we should love god and each other you are looking at it wrong, imo.


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    patriciamc,

    “Like you, I’m not much into prayer right now. For better or for worse, my attitude is that God’s going to do whatever he wants no matter what I pray.”

    Yeah, I know the feeling. Even within old school Calvinism, I have trouble seeing how one avoids determinism in the end. I know that’s supposedly just a feature of hypercalvinism, but if you really follow Calvin’s theology to its logical conclusion, it seems inevitable. Lutherans simply say, we hold to both predestination and free will because the Bible teaches both, and they don’t try to square the circle. In a way, I can understand the appeal of that approach. Day by day I live with the hope that God’s mercy is infinitely greater than my sin and frailty.


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    JYJames wrote:

    M. Joy wrote:
    “I don’t know exactly why God allows such suffering, but let me walk beside you through this.”

    Exactly.

    ‘Nuff said.

    Yes. And the verses that can help walk us through tragedies, can also be used by people with this ‘god wants you to suffer’ mentality to hurt people deeply instead. And that is not what god would want.


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    I have huge issues with this topic. For some reason we have come to view God as this big bellhop in the sky who will reverse diagnosis or a tyrannical monster who sends suffering to make one more holy. (I cannot even begin to count the ways that thinking is so wrong but Dee touched on one or two in the OP.

    When I think of what it means to be a believer, this topic becomes very real to me as I suffered tragedy as a child. I can relate to Dee mentioning ALS.

    Here is what I think: as Christians part of our identity is to alleviate suffering as much as we can. Suffering is inevitable in this life . So we must approach it with that in mind but also with the hope that accompanies fighting it or our kindness in seeking to alleviate it to the best of our ability .

    This can play out in so many ways that I think Evangelicals have totally ignored . Why aren’t we encouraging our young people to seek cures, create new products and services and even better ways to deliver services. But no. We teach them to go into ministry. But what can be more Pastoral than seeking to alleviate suffering? Or justice for those suffering from horrors inflicted by humans. (Well, I see them as less than human, actually)

    I think this issue defines who we are as Christians and not because we have it all figured out but because we know what Jesus Christ would want us to do for others who are suffering.


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    As for Travis Myers…

    “Suffering proves that God is your Good Father in heaven who is giving you more of himself: a sweeter, more poignant taste of his grace as he proves your status as his true child. If the only beloved Son of God had to suffer, so will we suffer who are sons and daughters of God through him. God is training his children, through pain, to become more like their eldest brother, Jesus.”

    If this is true, then Christians ought to desire and seek out suffering instead of avoiding it when possible. Luther must have been wrong in his criticism of the things monks did to themselves in his day. Maybe instead they should have gone preaching to the Muslim hordes, so they could really suffer and perhaps even attain martyrdom. In fact, maybe somebody can offer these Neocals some plane tickets to Baghdad, so they can get busy preaching the Law, divine judgement, and the Gospel to ISIS. God knows they need it.


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    Uncle Dad wrote:

    She tires quickly. HOWEVER nothing but good has come out of all of this so far.

    Is God testing her? Is He testing me? Nonsense! He is with us now just as He has always been and always will be.
    So what’s going on?
    Simple.
    It’s called Life.

    “The mystery of God hugs you in its all-encompassing arms.” (Hildegard of Bingen)


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    Uncle Dad wrote:

    So what’s going on?

    Simple.

    It’s called Life.

    I absolutely concur


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    Lydia wrote:

    Why aren’t we encouraging our young people to seek cures, create new products and services and even better ways to deliver services. But no.

    It’s a shame that we send our best and brightest to seminary, and not to medical school, or engineering or art or even IT school.

    How much suffering has been prevented by science? Not enough sadly, but more than seminary.


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    Derek Martin once visited my church and preached on suffering. He said he wanted to “wring the neck” of a pastor who told a sick congregant that ascribed the illness to deficiencies in that person’s spiritual life. In Martin’s accent, that was a memorable statement. I don’t see how the idea that something as horrible as cancer is a gift meant to sanctify can be stated without the implication that God punishes bad Christians with cancer, which any Reformed pastor should reject. I believe that God works an things for HIS glory, but not necessarily the individual victim’s, and thus bad things that happen to us are still bad.

    Although, as for John Piper flirting with dangerous extremes of charismatic theology, what else is new?


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    I guess this is as good a place as any to ask this question, I went back and looked on this blog, but could not find who it was…..so here is my question…

    Who was the Calvinist theologian/pastor that suggested that he could not tell his children that either God loves them, or that we can’t be certain of their salvation???


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    Wow, I was just trying to explain to my sister-n-law over the weekend just what I believed about all this. You said exactly what I was trying to say, but could not quite get it out right. Thank you, now I have something written perfectly for her. Thankyou Dee.


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    GSD wrote:

    It’s a shame that we send our best and brightest to seminary

    It’s probably taking to say I don’t actually think we do send our best and brightest to seminary…although I’m sure a few bright ones made it in. If things were working well, I think people who have a love for others but not a gift for science would go to seminary and act in a true pastoral manner.


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    That should have been ‘tacky’ not taking. Ugh.

    K.D. wrote:

    Who was the Calvinist theologian/pastor that suggested that he could not tell his children that either God loves them, or that we can’t be certain of their salvation

    I want to say it was Leeman, but I’m not sure…


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    Lydia wrote:

    This can play out in so many ways that I think Evangelicals have totally ignored. Why aren’t we encouraging our young people to seek cures, create new products and services and even better ways to deliver services. But no. We teach them to go into ministry.

    Just like Saudi, where 2/3 of all college degrees are in “Islamic Studies”.


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    Christiane wrote:

    For those Calvinists locked into a ‘faith’ that blames God for evil and suffering, I can only feel sadness. Their ‘faith’ is a cruel one, bereft of the Christ who looked upon those ‘without a shepherd’ and felt compassion for them.

    I’ve heard it said that “Calvin Islamized the Reformation”.


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    Lydia wrote:

    This can play out in so many ways that I think Evangelicals have totally ignored . Why aren’t we encouraging our young people to seek cures, create new products and services and even better ways to deliver services. But no. We teach them to go into ministry.

    Or Late Medieval Spain, where everybody tried to become a Priest, Monk, or Nun (that time’s version of “Full Time Christian Ministry”). Lasted until all the free gold & silver from the Americas ran dry.


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    @ Divorce Minister:
    I believe Open Theology goes a long way towards resolving the problem of evil. It helps people who have have experienced terrible injury come to or maintain a faith in a loving God.


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    @ Catherine:

    Hi, Catherine. what you describe sounds very tough. chronic pain’s a b!tch, having to give up your medical practice…. so hard. peace to you.


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    @ An Attorney:

    i’m very sorry for the stupid pain. acupuncture?


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    A. Stacy wrote:

    On so many levels this is twisted… To me this comes from the same root of “philosophizing” that gave us weird little tulips.

    Much of reformed theology is approached philosophically and not biblically. Such is the case of classical Calvinism when it comes to suffering. New Calvinists like Piper have taken on the spirit of Calvin in this regard, even though many in the reformed movement are not so rigid in their stance on God-ordained pain and misery. A hyper view of God’s all-determining sovereignty is out of sync with the whole of Scripture about the character of God.

    There is an SBC-YRR church plant near me, where the 30-something “lead pastor” essentially encourages church members to suffer in one form or another in order to truly get in touch with the heart of God. So, the young folks go out looking for something to suffer over! To believe that God designs, ordains, and governs suffering in a Christian’s life through divine determinism is stinkin’ thinkin’!


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    @ M. Joy:

    i’m so very sorry for the loss of your daughter. I can’t imagine anything more difficult. i wish i could make it better for you. a homemade pie could be a positive.


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    Lydia wrote:

    what can be more Pastoral than seeking to alleviate suffering?

    Heck, you can’t even get the YRR pastors in my area to go visit sick folk in hospitals or church members confined to homes with chronic illness! I suppose they figure there is nothing they can do to help alleviate suffering by being there as their pastor and praying with them. And, in their sick reformed state, they would be right! There is no power resting on their ministry. May God give us more “transformed” pastors, rather than reformed!


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    I had to work through some ideas about evil and suffering and just what sort of god-if-there-is-a god would it be considering all the mess out there. Of course, it was when I was in middle school that our men walked into the concentration camps and pictures became available. But I really dealt with it after a crisis in my family of origin which left one person dead and the rest of us left to deal with not only that but also to deal with the fact that we had to give up some of our own self delusional thinking as to the contributing factors. So, I arrived at a couple of possible reasonable conclusions, either there is no god, or else he is helpless, or else he does not give a rat’s *** about it all. Or else, we just do not know and possibly cannot know and that same god-if-there-is-a god had some reason for not giving us workable explanations on this matter, and the better question is where do we go from here?

    I got through that. It took a long time. How I got through that is not the topic of this comment. That was then and this is now. Now I have both lived through and seen more stuff than I like to think ought ever to have been part of what it is to be human. Now I have concurrently four conditions which either might or else will kill me, certainly sooner rather than later, including but not limited to a moderately aggressive stage 3 malignancy and residuals of treatment for that. And, and this is the point, I have no theology or philosophy of suffering, no commitment to any specific theory, and no cherished bible verses on this issue. I do not think that it is wise to have some theory, because it is sure to be either incorrect or at best incomplete, and nothing is more effective in hiding the truth from oneself than thinking that one already knows the truth. One can find enough in scripture to document and justify several different ideas, and many have done so; it is a real cottage industry with theologians. We can let ourselves get bogged down with why/why/why or else instead we can take that cognitive and emotional energy and utilize it for constructive purposes as the need arises. Remember that old song about we’ll understand it better by and by? There I am thinking is where we, or at least I, have to leave it. The concept of mystery can be a powerful and empowering concept.


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    GSD wrote:

    It’s a shame that we send our best and brightest to seminary, and not to medical school, or engineering or art or even IT school.

    Not to worry, from my experience that isn’t happening. While I agree that many place “ministry” students on a higher plane I can’t say that I have seen the best and the brightest go to seminary. While I have met many fine and wonderful people in “ministry” I have unfortunately run into far too many dysfunctional types. If seminaries were shut down I’m not sure where NPDs attracted to the limelight would end up, I doubt it would be engineering.


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    @ mirele:

    a challenging road you’ve traveled. i’ll take rude over saccharine passivity any day. you do the highly inappropriate hand gestures, i’ll do something scathing with words. what are the chances that would be a first for him?

    (I have a feeling the anger he engenders is kept within the confines of online expressiveness — Christians don’t know what to do with strong justified feeling)


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    GSD wrote:

    It’s a shame that we send our best and brightest to seminary, and not to medical school, or engineering or art or even IT school.

    How much suffering has been prevented by science? Not enough sadly, but more than seminary.

    Bingo! And as we encourage them in these endeavors we should send them off with Matt Redmon’s book, “God of the Mundane”.


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    @ mirele:
    I always brace myself for the meaningless platitudes about God’s plan when Christians show up at the Funeral home.

    Older and wiser now, I can say sweetly, oh no, this was not His original plan at all.

    And that brings blessed silence.

    Why can’t they just mourn with those who mourn during a mournful time?
    That


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    @ Patriciamc:

    I understand. I went for 3 or so years without praying… the disillusionment and ultimate betrayal. the only reason I started up again was overwhelming concern for challenges my kids were facing — and a enough of a ‘well, just maybe…’ to say to myself ‘sigh…. alright, let’s go.’ It was an emotionally exhausting and painful in ways I can’t describe to attempt it again.

    if I had simply written out an honest, reasonable prayer and read it to God it would have been an easier re-entry.


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    @ Max:
    The plague victims were begging Calvin to come pray over them. Calvin refused saying his demise would hurt the church.

    One of his protégés, Castillo went. The first breach that would eventually get him banished and ruined financially.


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    @ Bill M:
    It used to be seminary after secular college, for most. Now, the seminaries are operating colleges. They get them young. Right out of youth group at church.


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    @ siteseer:

    “no one understands pain like the one who is in it. I count emotional pain as well”
    +++++++++++++++

    very true. i’m so sorry for your own chronic pain, and what you are going though with your husband. i want to be able to bring consolation, but nothing seems adequate. i hope for experiential peace.


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    @ K.D.:
    I have heard Piper say something similar. Which I always found strange because he excommunicated his son Abraham. Wouldn’t that mean he was judging his salvation?


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    @ Daisy:

    depression’s a bit(h. and the loss of a loved one, so hard. amazing how unhelpful the bible can be at times. I think it can stay on the shelf or in the drawer or the recesses of the garage or get purged and God’s not offended.


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    Lydia wrote:

    They get them young. Right out of youth group at church.

    The younger the better if you are going to indoctrinate! An SBC-YRR pastor I know refers to the seminary professors he had as “influencers.” Yep, those reformed profs did a great job influencing the poor guy – he bought the lie with his whole heart.


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    NJ wrote:

    Suffering proves that God is your Good Father in heaven who is giving you more of himself: a sweeter, more poignant taste of his grace as he proves your status as his true child. If the only beloved Son of God had to suffer, so will we suffer who are sons and daughters of God through him. God is training his children, through pain, to become more like their eldest brother, Jesus.”

    Everyone suffers it is a part of life. Believers and non-believers, the just and the unjust suffer. Response to one’s suffering is individual how unfortunate that there is not a universal response to anyone suffering…rather than judging or using the Scripture to support a view which has little regard for the person suffering, why can’t we just lift up our heart and love them without reserve and without reward.


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    @ elastigirl:
    My dad has dementia, but we’re still early in the process. All I can offer is encouragement. I used to have a lot of nursing home patients and I worked with families as their loved ones walked through the dementia process. It’s hard. If your mom has dementia, I don’t think it’s unethical to put meds in her food. Remember, the brain of someone with dementia is not making good choices. What would she have thought if she were in your position? Just a thought for you.


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    A young man from our community was killed in a car crash. He was speeding on a rural road and lost control on a curve and overturned; with no seat belt on, he was thrown from the car. There is a law in physics known as centrifugal force – an effect that causes an object moving in a curve to be pushed away from the curve’s center. A driver can control this force by operating his car at the recommended speed for a curve, but loses his ability to control the vehicle at an excessive speed. To push this law of physics to its limit will result in a predictable consequence to a bad decision … a certain outcome to a willful act. God didn’t kill that young man … He didn’t ordain, design nor govern the accident that night … his tragic death and the suffering of his family had nothing to do with a determinist God.


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    “I was an adventurer but I took an arrow to the knee.”

    I love you man!Max wrote:

    Much of reformed theology is approached philosophically and not biblically….

    Could of not said it better.


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    This is the kind of fearful, willful misunderstanding of God’s sovereignty that makes me glad the Book of Job is in the cannon. Job, the righteous, doesn’t get any neat, pretty answers. But his “friends” come in for some serious judgment when they try to make his suffering somehow his fault because their theodicy is being threatened.


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    Lydia wrote:

    The plague victims were begging Calvin to come pray over them. Calvin refused saying his demise would hurt the church.

    If God wanted Calvin to get the plague or protect him from it, it wouldn’t matter if he visited the tormented victims … according to Calvin’s belief system. Good Lord, it has been 500 years since his demise, and he’s still hurting the church!


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    Melissa wrote:

    This is the kind of fearful, willful misunderstanding of God’s sovereignty that makes me glad the Book of Job is in the cannon. Job, the righteous, doesn’t get any neat, pretty answers. But his “friends” come in for some serious judgment when they try to make his suffering somehow his fault because their theodicy is being threatened.

    Yes. The blind man from the NT too. He’s not blind because he sinned or his parents sinned.


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    Can’t believe the timing of this post. Just sat through a sermon on Mother’s Day where the pastor yammered on and on about how suffering is all part of God’s plan and we are better for it.

    Was preaching in Luke regarding the woman with the curved spine for 18 years, but had us in Job for almost as long.

    Couldn’t believe it.

    Later that day I asked my two children and wife what the thrust of the sermon was. All of them said it was our suffering for God’s glory. The irony is that the pastor made sure to leave the verse that follows regarding the Pharisees getting pissed about healing on the sabbath out until next week. Therefore, I told them that the thrust was that we had a gracious saviour who healed, even when it wasn’t the right day. I also mentioned that people get pissed at Jesus for doing the right thing.

    I was pissed because I am sick and tired of going to churches that just beat up the sheep and expect more out of them. Church is to rejoice and praise God for our salvation and sit around and beat each other up. We are supposed to bear each other’s burdens. BUUUT NOOOOOO! More, you are worms that deserve Hell. OK, I might not say it like that to an unbeliver, but sure, unbelievers need to hear the good news. The congregation should be rejoicing and praising God. Instead, all it has become is a guilt trip for everyone and I for one am getting sick and tired of it.

    Where is the gratefulness over what God has done for us. Instead, all these churches try do it make everyone feel worse. And even worse is that everyone eats it up. Oh, I feel so convicted today. Oh, that was such a convicting sermon. Oh, you weren’t convicted, I see. What the H? Is that all this is about? How about rejoicing in the Lord. NOPE. Can’t have that among the body.

    And then to top it off, nothing but maybe a few seconds about the woman being healed. Whole sermon….suffering…..Job and then a little about healing. What the heck, this woman was healed and I get seconds at the end of the sermon about that and nothing about Jesus being glorified for the healing. Nope, just God being glorified in the woman’s suffering. Talk about unbalanced and biased interpretation of scripture.


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    What’s funny, but not really funny, is that throughout scripture, God and Jesus never say, oh well, it is all your fault and I am not going to heal you because it is my plan to make you suffer that I might make you more like my Son and glorify Me more.

    Yet, these hucksters get away with every day and have built monuments to this line of thinking/preaching.


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    Max wrote:

    If God wanted Calvin to get the plague or protect him from it, it wouldn’t matter if he visited the tormented victims … according to Calvin’s belief system. Good Lord, it has been 500 years since his demise, and he’s still hurting the church!

    Consistent practice of the Calvinistic construct of determinism is impossible. They have a loophole for such free will decisions called compatablism.


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    @ OCDan:
    I am so glad you are discussing the sermons with your kids! We must encourage thinking and questioning what we are taught at a young age.


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    @ OCDan:

    Dan, at the end of the day, the problem is in having a system in which a class of people can set themselves apart like Old Testament priests who alone hear from God, then transmit the word to the people, none of whom have the Holy Spirit living within and thus are in desperate need of the priest intermediaries.

    Such a system has been defunct for almost two millenia and anyone who’d seek to assume that head leader role is by very nature either: 1). Ignorant of the fundamental meaning of the New Covenant, 2). Knowledgeable but self-serving and up to no good, or 3). A full scale sociopath or NPD who quite literally hates God and takes pleasure in abusing His people.


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    GSD wrote:

    Lydia wrote:
    Why aren’t we encouraging our young people to seek cures, create new products and services and even better ways to deliver services. But no.
    It’s a shame that we send our best and brightest to seminary…

    Who in the world are these “best and brightest” going to seminary? I can name on one hand the number of really stellar intellectual powerhouses who could’ve done whatever they wanted in quite a number of fields but instead chose seminary. Nah, it doesn’t take one hand, it takes one finger: Greg Boyd.


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    Lea wrote:

    It’s probably taking to say I don’t actually think we do send our best and brightest to seminary…although I’m sure a few bright ones made it in.

    You’re right, of course. I should have said that in some circles, certainly the ones I was indoctrinated into, being a pastor or missionary is held up as something to which the best of us should aspire. A secular calling was something one might settle for. Professional Christianity is the best choice, the highest calling.

    In reality, I wonder what sorts are wondering around various sorts of seminaries. I’ve seen a Seminary education mess up a fellow who had previously been a rather good minister. On the other hand, we have some church leaders around here with almost no understanding of theology, and no formal education.

    Sorry to go off-topic, but it’s easier than dealing with the questions of suffering and sovereignty.


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    2 fingers. NT Wright. Agreed on Boyd.


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    Lydia wrote:

    @ mirele:
    I always brace myself for the meaningless platitudes about God’s plan when Christians show up at the Funeral home.

    Older and wiser now, I can say sweetly, oh no, this was not His original plan at all.

    And that brings blessed silence.

    Why can’t they just mourn with those who mourn during a mournful time?

    Amen. Death is an ugly and evil intruder in this world. To all those who said or implied that God was complicit in my son’s death, I say NO. God doesn’t work in partnership with death, our enemy. God must hate death even more than we do, or Jesus wouldn’t have suffered and died to conquer it.

    I read here every day, but I almost never leave a comment. Thank you, all you dear people who bare your hearts and try to help others–especially Deb and Dee who make these conversations possible. I’m grateful for all of you who offer compassion instead of empty advice. You have helped to save my sanity and my faith.


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    Lydia wrote:

    The plague victims were begging Calvin to come pray over them. Calvin refused saying his demise would hurt the church.
    One of his protégés, Castillo went. The first breach that would eventually get him banished and ruined financially.

    What a guy.


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    GSD wrote:

    On the other hand, we have some church leaders around here with almost no understanding of theology, and no formal education.

    That guy from gateway gave himself a phd or something! You know, for some reason the idea of a minister of a tiny little country church with no seminary degree bothers me less than a pastor of a church of 10-20k. The latter feels a bit more like a motivational speaker who wondered into a church instead of a conference center…Maybe because I think the small country church minister probably at least knows his congregants and maybe visits them in the hospital and so on and so forth…


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    Lydia wrote:

    The plague victims were begging Calvin to come pray over them. Calvin refused saying his demise would hurt the church.

    Whoa. I think we know where our modern day folks got their arrogance!


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    patriciamc wrote:

    And what’s worse, I don’t feel like reaching out to him. This might sound bad, but I feel like it’s his turn to reach out to me. Is that a lightening bolt coming my way?

    Hugs back to you. I’m right there with you on this.

    I’ve heard so many Christians try to cheer up those who are suffering by telling them that God is with them in the midst of the heartache or strife, and God will allow you to feel His presence at those times.

    That has not been so in my case. I have not felt or sensed God near, or in the middle of the pain.

    Even the simplest of requests made in prayers I have made the last several years (some things I’ve been praying for far, far longer) have not been answered.

    Many Christians like to say Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and God wants a relationship with you, me, and everyone.

    In my experience, that does not seem to be lining up, because the relationship seems to be one-way on my part. And relationships are supposed to be a two-way street.
    I’ve been doing all the praying and reaching out, and yet, I don’t hear anything from God (nor do I feel his presence).

    In what other relationship would anyone think it normal, or put up with, a family member or friend, who, no matter how often you send them cards, e-mails, or leave them voice mail on the phone, they never write back, or return your phone calls?

    You’re supposed to just take it on faith that the person cares about you and is “there for you.”

    I wouldn’t put up with this sort of negligence in a regular, “flesh and blood” relationship with another human being after so many weeks or months, but we’re told in a lot of Christian sermons or blogs I’ve seen that we should tolerate this behavior from God.

    Why does God get off the hook for this stuff when a regular person would not? Shouldn’t maybe God be better at reciprocating in a relationship than a person? Shouldn’t God be more reliable than regular people?

    I’ve seen the usual comments by Christians on other sites about how we’re supposed to ‘walk by faith not by sight’ (so we shouldn’t get upset or angry or whatever if we feel we are being ignored by God).

    I’m sorry, but that does not cut it after so long, not for me. I need to see results or actions in my life now, not just “take it on faith” that God cares and is probably listening to my prayers.

    That brings up another point that bothers me. The Bible says (in the NT) that Christians are to help people; do not just tell some guy to be warm and well fed, but give him a blanket and a sandwich.

    So, if you are a follower of Christ, God expects you to do something practical now (like give a hungry guy a sandwich for example).

    Okay, but why, when it’s God in this role, he gets excused for not giving a person help right now when they need it?

    There seems to be some kind of double standard there, where God expects humans to meet some kind of rule or behavior towards others (meeting their needs) that He himself not always willing to do himself towards people.


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    Bookish wrote:

    Amen. Death is an ugly and evil intruder in this world. To all those who said or implied that God was complicit in my son’s death, I say NO. God doesn’t work in partnership with death, our enemy. God must hate death even more than we do, or Jesus wouldn’t have suffered and died to conquer it.

    Exactly!


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    May wrote:

    Anyway, what does Piper really know about suffering? Has he suffered the loss of a child? If not, perhaps he should shut up.

    I agree.

    Sometimes preachers and other people mean well but sometimes say things that can be very hurtful.

    I had a Christian person in my family (who used to work as a preacher, to boot, so you would think he would know better) pull this Joel Osteen move on me (that you see my linking about below).

    This family member of mine spoke of my grief over losing my mother, and the hard time I had dealing with it, as being “self-pity.” I bit my tongue and said nothing to him, though I was pretty offended and hurt by that.

    This person who said that, and the rest of the family, did nothing, nada, to help me through the loss, not even after I tried phoning or e-mailing them a few times asking for help.

    I had to go it all alone, so I find it pretty rich when any of them criticize me in HOW I handled the grief, or how LONG it took me to deal with it.

    Normally, I don’t have anything against Osteen, but he handled this topic very wrong (it’s a variation of John Piper’s bungling of the topic):

    Joel Osteen: Grief is Not Self Pity
    http://www.charismanews.com/culture/50246-in-open-letter-this-woman-demands-joel-osteen-apologize-to-millions-of-people-around-the-world

    Snippet:

    by Lynda Cheldelin Fell

    “I forgive you [Joel Osteen] for using grieving parents in your book ‘Your Best Life Now’ to illustrate your point that some people thrive on self-pity, or worse relishing the attention it brings,” she continues.

    …”Pastor Osteen, your idea that the bereaved need just a few months to ‘let go of their grief'” is a gross assumption bearing little resemblance to the truth,” Fell writes.

    … “And much like you, many well-meaning family and friends walk away, quit coming, quit calling and start avoiding the bereaved because of the notion that mourning is only acceptable for a mere few months.

    It’s true that in the initial weeks following a loss, delivered meals and untold hugs are abundant. But the grieving process has barely begun when the meals stop coming and the last visitor leaves.”

    …”By perpetuating the belief that sorrow lasting longer than a few months is nothing more than self-pity, you invalidate the grief of millions of bereaved souls, robbing them of the very hope needed to survive.


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    @ Stunned:

    Thank you, Stunned.


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    @ Tina:

    I agree with everything you said. 🙂

    I find the older I get, I may prefer being helped currently with whatever issues I have now, as opposed to thinking of how the afterlife is supposed to make everything a-OK.


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    Lydia wrote:

    But what can be more Pastoral than seeking to alleviate suffering? Or justice for those suffering from horrors inflicted by humans. (Well, I see them as less than human, actually)

    This also gets into Christians or certain denominations that shame and discourage Christians from using medications, or from seeing psychologists or psychiatrists.

    I used to have depression, and the vast majority of teaching by Christians I heard or read discouraged people such as myself from taking medication for it, or seeing a mental health professional.

    Doing things like relying only on prayer, Bible reading, or going to church are typical pieces of advice given, if someone has some kind of mental health problem.


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    Lydia wrote:

    @ mirele:
    I always brace myself for the meaningless platitudes about God’s plan when Christians show up at the Funeral home.

    Older and wiser now, I can say sweetly, oh no, this was not His original plan at all.

    And that brings blessed silence.

    Why can’t they just mourn with those who mourn during a mournful time?
    That

    Because like Calvin and Job’s Counselors, they Have It All Figured Out and HAVE to Remind You Of That.

    How else can you Count Coup on the Lukewarm for being So Spiritual?


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    Max wrote:

    So, the young folks go out looking for something to suffer over! To believe that God designs, ordains, and governs suffering in a Christian’s life through divine determinism is stinkin’ thinkin’!

    No. No. No. Unless you have a really charmed life, or are under the age of 25, you have already, or you are, going to come across suffering all on its own.

    It will come to you. You won’t have to hunt it down.

    Life is like this Tanya Tucker song (or it can be worse):
    Some Kind of Trouble
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANIFJ_IYXpA


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    @ patriciamc:

    hi, patriamc — thanks for kindness & the melatonin suggestion. i’m reading up on it. formulating a best approach here. she’s very aware of everything, in a heightened way, it seems.


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    God Caused My Lymphoma, Not the Raw Hot Dog

    As a complete aside, that headline makes me wonder if preacher-boy got the “You Gave Yourself Cancer Because YOU ATE MEAT!” treatment from Vegans waving their Veganism as a magick shield against cancer. I bring this up because I encountered similar shtick during my prostate cancer scare 2-3 years ago.

    (A year later, I told one guy who’d just been diagnosed that if he went to any prostate cancer support group to pack a baseball bat for Attitude Adjustment. Because he WAS going to hear a LOT of stupid reactions to the news.)


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    @ Stunned:

    you’re so kind, stunned. no one has been obnoxious in their desire to help. everyone has been just great. no verses quoted at us. just sincere kindness and helpfulness.


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    @ Gram3:

    thanks for the advice, Gram3. it’s goin in my pipe for smokin. formulating my approach. totally uncharted waters here. like making our way through an ominous jungle, sounds of predators, creeping things, tangles to hack through. mixing metaphors as I go…


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    @ elastigirl:

    Another thing that’s not uplifting if you’ve been asking God for years for this, that, or the other and have not received a response from God:
    the Christian programs that get letters from Christian viewers explaining how God granted them their answers to prayers quickly, and how they wanted them answered.

    I think that sort of content is meant to be encouraging (‘if God did it for this guy, he can do it for you’).

    After watching hours and hours of Christian TV, I find it has the opposite effect (on me anyway):

    I ask myself why God is answering every Christian Joe Blow’s prayer on these shows but not mine, and not those of some other Christians I see on the internet?

    I really do not recall these Christian shows addressing all the people who have prayed for healing, financial help, or whatever, and they either got a “No” as an answer, or no answer at all.

    It’s as though a lot of Christians do not want to grapple with that, or to acknowledge it happens.

    They only want to advertise or hear the positive, “Yes, God answered my prayer, and within the ten minutes I prayed about it” testimonies.


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    Lydia wrote:

    The plague victims were begging Calvin to come pray over them. Calvin refused saying his demise would hurt the church.

    If that is indeed historically accurate, it would mean that (at least at that point in his life) Calvin knew nothing of God, and was grandly and disastrously deceived in all directions.


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    Melissa wrote:

    This is the kind of fearful, willful misunderstanding of God’s sovereignty that makes me glad the Book of Job is in the cannon. Job, the righteous, doesn’t get any neat, pretty answers.

    But his “friends” come in for some serious judgment when they try to make his suffering somehow his fault because their theodicy is being threatened.

    I agree… but I notice how frequently most Christians IGNORE the book of Job and/or its lessons. The ones who ignore it like to victim-blame hurting people.

    They also like to ignore passages such as…

    John 9
    2 His disciples asked Him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
    3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened that the works of God would be displayed in him.

    Luke 13
    4 Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam collapsed on them: Do you think that they were more sinful than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you. But unless you repent, you too will all perish.”…
    ——–
    Those types of passages really do get in the way of the sort of Christian who likes to tell you that your problem (whether it’s sickness, financial, relational, etc) is all your fault because…

    You don’t pray enough, you don’t tithe, you lack faith, you ticked God off somehow, you are supposedly harboring unforgiveness in your heart (-insert any of the other one billion religious victim-blaming cliches here-)


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    OCDan wrote:

    Where is the gratefulness over what God has done for us. Instead, all these churches try do it make everyone feel worse.

    I applaud your entire post, am in agreement with it, and especially like that part I quoted.


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    Lydia wrote:

    Consistent practice of the Calvinistic construct of determinism is impossible. They have a loophole for such free will decisions called compatablism.

    It’s been awhile since I watched this lecture, but I think the guy in the video mentions that stuff (and I first saw this video from someone here or at Julie Anne’s blog linked to it):

    What’s Wrong With Calvinism by Jerry Walls
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Daomzm3nyIg&feature=youtu.be


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    As a complete aside, that headline makes me wonder if preacher-boy got the “You Gave Yourself Cancer Because YOU ATE MEAT!” treatment from Vegans waving their Veganism as a magick shield against cancer.

    There are a lot of people who believe a lot of odd things. I don’t much care as long as they leave me alone about it. I’m never going vegan, though, that’s for sure!


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    Daisy wrote:

    It’s as though a lot of Christians do not want to grapple with that, or to acknowledge it happens.
    They only want to advertise or hear the positive, “Yes, God answered my prayer, and within the ten minutes I prayed about it” testimonies.

    Part 1 of 2: the myth of the “positive”

    Lesley and I have faced a storm of opposition over the last 18 months or so (though it’s been building for around a decade) as we’ve worked at establishing what we informally call “God’s job-centre” – something that creates decent jobs for the unemployed and the working poor – and I’ve found that the Psalms have been (to mix a metaphor) a revelation. * Of course we’ve all read them, but I suppose that – as with most songs – they speak to you best when the writer’s mood resonates with your own.

    They contain songs flowing out of every mood you can think of, from exhileration to the darkest despair. It’s no coincidence that Jesus – the Man of Sorrows, acquainted with grief – quoted a Psalm (“My God… my God… why have you forsaken me??”) on the cross. There’s no cause there to believe that God only listens to happy people.

    * Reminds me of a Sam Goldwyn quote – “Gentlemen, this atom-bomb is dynamite!”


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    @ okrapod:
    Hey Okrapod, I didn’t realise you were suffering such poor health – I’m really sorry to hear it & would want much better things for you than that. You’re a Doctor aren’t you? (I hope I’ve remembered that rightly) Does that make it better or worse for you? I’m not surprised you had to make peace with the tough stuff in the world because you medical people (like Dee) see it all. My Mum was a Nurse for 47 years, & it made what turned out to be terminal illness for her, easier, as she had walked with so many down that path that it was not a mystery for her. Other medical personnel walked with her on her & she reaped what she had sown. I hope you are getting great care too.


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    *on her path


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    @ Max:

    “… you can’t even get the YRR pastors in my area to go visit sick folk in hospitals or church members confined to homes with chronic illness! I suppose they figure there is nothing they can do to help alleviate suffering by being there as their pastor and praying with them”
    +++++++++++++++

    is it the association of suffering with ‘God’s glory’ (as if anyone even knows what that is)? is it possible they don’t see it a priority to seek to ameliorate suffering since it’s been talked about in such glowing, cheerful terms by their gurus?


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    @ Daisy:
    Daisy, reading about your family is killing me.


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    what we informally call “God’s job-centre” – something that creates decent jobs for the unemployed and the working poor

    That’s lovely.


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    Part 2 of 2: the answer, “No”

    A lot of the time, of course, we don’t get quick answers, and by the same token, you often hear people say “We prayed and the answer was ‘No’ “ when they actually mean, “We prayed and nothing happened”. I remember an occasion, though, when God really did say “No”.

    A lady in the church we were in at the time was in the very last stages of terminal cancer. (She remains, to this day, one of the most Christ-like people I’ve ever met.) On a particular Sunday, we were all – over 200 people – praying together for her, in the knowledge that even for her to survive for many more weeks would take an extraordinary miracle. But we’d seen some extraordinary miracles (fractures disappearing overnight, arthritis likewise, even AIDS * going into remission). So we prayed in great earnest. But after a minute or so, a silence gradually descended over the room. Nobody made any announcement or gave any explanation, but we all knew, all together, that God was not going to heal Jeanette. We also knew that, somehow, everything was all right. We’re all mortal, and this was simply God’s time for her. (Let it be said, also, that she had led a full and rich life.)

    This remains a high-water mark in my own experience of corporate encounters with God. Why it doesn’t happen more often, I don’t know.

    * Trust me here: I know the difference between HIV and AIDS. This was AIDS.


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    @ okrapod:

    Not sure how I missed this earlier. You have great points. I am so sorry for your illnesses and would have never known the extent but for this comment. I have been encouraged by your comments that almost always force me to think a bit harder even when I disagree!


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    A. Stacy wrote:

    On so many levels this is twisted… To me this comes from the same root of “philosophizing” that gave us weird little tulips.

    Very twisted. Another lie from the father of lies.

    “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?”
    — Attributed to a beautiful young Rabbi from Nazareth —


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    @ Nick Bulbeck:
    I agree with you about the Psalms but I feel like what happens with a lot of people is that they have not been reminded they are “man talking TO God in poetry”. Often the Psalms are positioned as: God making the man say what he says in them. Thus, ruining most of the meaning and beauty.


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    Stunned wrote:

    Daisy, reading about your family is killing me.

    And you only have to read about them, I get to experience them first hand and personally. 🙂

    I don’t want to get this thread so far off track, but I’ve written more about my family on other posts or sites, like here at Julie Anne’s blog (what I say about my father here is pretty true of my sister, as well):
    https://spiritualsoundingboard.com/2016/04/30/todd-friel-warns-christians-about-adult-coloring-books/comment-page-1/#comment-332983


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    The term Reformed implies they were trying to reform the Roman Catholic church, which is where this suffering fixation is coming from. Many people don’t know that Mother Theresa withheld painkillers from suffering patients, because their suffering would being them closer to God. I see this as a holdover from the gnostic, Platonic god of the Roman Catholic church. He’s a very impersonal god, you see, he requires priests and celebrities and books, yes other moneymakers to get you poor lowly plebes to understand his true sovereignty.

    Sovereignty- supreme power or authority. Notice it does not say absolute control in any dictionary. I have authority in my home, but the kids still color on the walls.

    Satan is the one who seeks to kill steal and destroy, NOT Father God. His plan to undo all the death and chaos was the Cross. Meanwhile, Satan is the god of this world (2 Cor). He offered Christ the kingdoms because they were in his possession. We’re stuck down here with him for the time being and he’s really wratcheding up his anti- human agenda.

    My church has a YRR pastor and I’m debating on how/if I want to stand up. So sick of all the Churchian garbage!


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    A lot of the time, of course, we don’t get quick answers, and by the same token, you often hear people say “We prayed and the answer was ‘No’ “ when they actually mean, “We prayed and nothing happened”. I remember an occasion, though, when God really did say “No”.

    I’m very sorry for the loss of your friend.

    About the part I quoted from your post.

    The more I ponder this, the more I wonder if it’s a distinction without much of a difference.

    I’ve been praying for several different things, some for about the past 2 years, some for a few decades, and one thing for about 6 or 7 years.

    Every day or week God does not send me whatever I am praying for is a “No,” from my vantage point.

    At times it seems to me that a “Yes, but wait longer” is still the same as a “No” right now, and it drags out for months or years. If God does want to say No, I wish he would just say so and let me let it go.

    I’ve actually said that in prayer:
    “If you don’t want to do X for me, or don’t want to send me X, or do X for me, fine, but can you just tell me plainly right now, that your answer is No.”

    But all I get is more silence. I don’t get a feeling either way as to what God’s mind is.


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    @ Daisy:

    I have seen it and a bunch of his other stuff. Cracks me up that lecture is sponsored by the society of Christian philosophers .


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    elastigirl wrote:

    (just advice on the sleep-aid refusal dilemma, please)

    I would do whatever necessary to get those night meds into your mom.

    Poor sleep and sleeplessness is an issue for people w/PTSD, so I’m acquainted with its consequences. Not sleeping increases pain. Research show that after 3 nights’ little sleep, the body will start aching, and already-there pain increases. I’ve found that to be so.

    Plus it makes a person somewhat irrational. Your mom can’t make good decisions for herself for a number of reasons, lack of sleep among them. If I were her, I’d be (eventually) grateful that someone who loved me made a good decision for me, to get me out of a hole. IMO

    My sympathies to you and your family.


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    May wrote:

    Ten years ago during conference in the UK Piper preached this theology of suffering. He implied that if your son died in a car accident, you were lucky because God had given you a chance to suffer. Also, if you’re not suffering, then you can’t really be holy.
    I was profoundly uncomfortable with it. But everyone else thought he was fantastic, wise, a brilliant preacher.

    GASP. Just when I thought my opinion of Piper couldn’t go any lower.


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    May wrote:

    Piper has been going on about this for at least ten years ago. Ten years ago during conference in the UK Piper preached this theology of suffering. He implied that if your son died in a car accident, you were lucky because God had given you a chance to suffer. Also, if you’re not suffering, then you can’t really be holy.

    I was profoundly uncomfortable with it. But everyone else thought he was fantastic, wise, a brilliant preacher.

    Anyway, what does Piper really know about suffering? Has he suffered the loss of a child? If not, perhaps he should shut up.

    I noticed Flutterhands was quick to seek medical treatment when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer many-many years ago. Maybe he should have let the cancer take its God-Predestined course and gotten Really Really Really Holy.


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    If Travis Myers wants to consider his lymphoma a gift—he uses the phrase “gift of lymphoma” over and over—that is his privilege. He is, however, preaching a sermon, and this plain fact implies that all who hear him should consider their suffering to be a gift too. Everything in life is supposed to build our faith, right? That message comes perilously close to saying that it’s all about us.

    Oddly, the preacher shies away from any earthly explanation for his own survival. Having lived through a scare or two, I have asked myself in more than one ER, “What, if anything, is going to keep me alive this time?”

    A big part of the answer is mundane and cruel: access to good medical care. The preacher has the high privilege of living in the United States at a time when an oncologist can call a certain type of lymphoma “boring.” Where is his rejoicing in the human love of human life—a love that inspired scientists to build up their understanding of cancer? We can give God credit for that, of course. But what we have here is the story of a “gift” that is given and then taken away, with scant credit to the human minds that identified the gift and the human hands that slowly, patiently, removed it.


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    Myers said it was very difficult to wait 11 days.

    I had to wait FIVE MONTHS between the detection of high PSA/low Free PSA and the twelve-core biopsy, then two weeks more for the negative results.


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    Daisy wrote:

    But all I get is more silence. I don’t get a feeling either way as to what God’s mind is.

    Yes; that’s probably the single hardest thing to deal with in the Christian life. You could put up with just about anything if God were at least saying something about it in real time. I don’t like that either.

    IWTWH…


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    Max wrote:

    Heck, you can’t even get the YRR pastors in my area to go visit sick folk in hospitals or church members confined to homes with chronic illness! I suppose they figure there is nothing they can do to help alleviate suffering by being there as their pastor and praying with them.

    Remember their beloved Calvin when the plague hit Geneva.
    He proclaimed himself Too Important to Risk.


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    elastigirl wrote:

    @ M. Joy:
    i’m so very sorry for the loss of your daughter. I can’t imagine anything more difficult. i wish i could make it better for you. a homemade pie could be a positive.

    Thanks, elastigirl. I’d surely let you bring me one if we lived close enough! As a matter of fact, shortly after my daughter died, a lady at my church (I only knew her casually) called and said, “I love to make cheesecakes and I’d like to bring you one.” She showed up at my house with a huge, homemade cheesecake. We sat and talked for awhile, and she told me about memories she had of my daughter. That meant more to me than any rote bible verse or sermon on the meaning of suffering.


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    Daisy, I know all about that “it’s not a religion, it’s a relationship” bit of folk theology. Usually this idea is held by Christians who are caught up in some form of mysticism, even unwittingly. During the time I had friends in an AOG church in my late teens, I temporarily got sucked into that whole thing of practicing silence to listen for any inward impressions that the Spirit might send my way. After all, I’d grown up in the C & MA, hearing from various sources how God wants an intimate relationship with you, He thinks about you all the time, just can’t wait for you to talk to Him, etc. What I eventually realized was how easy it is to mistake our own thought patterns and desires for hearing from God. There seems to be no shortage of Christians who will insist on that as their own experience, however.


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    I noticed Flutterhands was quick to seek medical treatment when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer many-many years ago. Maybe he should have let the cancer take its God-Predestined course and gotten Really Really Really Holy.

    If I’m not mistaken, Piper also wears eyeglasses. He should stop wearing them and walk around like Mr. Magoo.
    Mr Magoo – Military Magoo
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbB7mo9dbEo


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    @ NJ:
    It’s weird. I keep going back to this:

    He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

    So, are we just to get on with it as best we can? They are good things to do and be.

    I have been rereading up on the Jewish concept of sin: The breaking of Shalom. It is a huge topic but really makes one really see Jesus Christ differently from the typical Protestant position.


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    Some random thoughts from perhaps the last person in the world who should comment:

    – The Bible reveals a lot about the who, a little about the what, but no so much about the why. The closest we seem to get to the question of why is the question of “to what end.” In the story of the blind man in John 9 we get this: “And His disciples asked Him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.’” And then Jesus healed him. This gives support to earlier comments that God wants us to participate in meeting people’s real needs rather than explaining theological reasons for suffering. I don’t believe it gives support for the idea that God is glorified in some kind of abstract way when we suffer. Rather, God is glorified (or not) by the way his followers invest into the healing/grieving/restoration process.

    – Jesus’ first miracle required human participation. He could have done it all on his own. But he got people involved in filling the jars rather than including that as part of the miracle. Same with the feeding of the 5000 and 4000. There must be a reason for this. It seems that he wants us to be a part of the healing and restoration process rather than being bystanders who offer only words. I would think this also means it’s honorable to pursue careers and hobbies that foster restoration and the building up of people and culture.

    – We have a real enemy and we are in a real battle with real casualties. In the parable of the tares among the wheat we are told in Matt 13:28, “An enemy has done this!” We are also told that the farmer did not fix the tare problem because he did not want any more damage to the wheat. He validated the extent of the problem without saying anything about the tares being there to strengthen the wheat or to glorify the farmer. It was bad and he called it bad. Maybe it means if God were to fix all of our problems now the result of his intervention would make life even more unbearable than it already is. Perhaps there is a hidden mercy in him not fixing everything now.

    – Jesus wept (John 11:35). He did not proffer theological explanations. Maybe weeping is more important than explanation at times.

    – Death and suffering are not about punishment or God’s glory. It’s a consequence of man turning from his only source of life. In Genesis God warns Adam, “for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” If death was a punishment he would have told him so. If it was a punishment he would have said “for in the day that you eat from it I will surely kill you.” God hate’s what our fallen condition does to us, he does not hate us for being fallen. Our theology of suffering needs to be based on the truth that God is for us, not on the lie that he is out to punish us.

    – We need to be mindful of the extremes. It seems very wrong to go down the path of trying to find a “Godly” explanation for all pain and suffering. But it seems just as wrong to go down the path of fatalism, where God, if he exists at all, can or will do nothing.

    Much more could be written, but I’ve probably already gone beyond what I’m qualified to write.


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    NJ – I grew up in the AOG and now I’m Baptist. I honestly can say I don’t agree with everything they teach (gasp). But I can’t state it as I have family members that are in the ministry of the AOG.

    Catherine – I am also a chronic pain sufferer. I recently found out that I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. For anyone suffering with chronic pain, I feel for you. I don’t understand why some of suffer so bad from chronic pain. I wish I knew. I don’t believe it’s from God though. I know he wouldn’t give this to us just to watch us suffer. But God is still on the throne, and he is greater than my pain.


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    I recall some childhood friends who were Catholic and showed me their Martyr cards and how at first chance they were going to escape Christianity before that happened to them. Then my daughter who went to a Christian school upon the required reading of Foxes book of Martyrs decided she was out of there.

    I can relate to Jonah (being in the belly of the fish for 3 days before deciding to pray) and then sulking on the edge of town. Suffering for my sins never got me anywhere.. certainly not HOLY and like so many in the scriptures I flunked being a super saint. I have experienced grief so severe that I thought I would die but also had times where I was given a grace in the midst of something.
    Job didn’t have a clue as to what was going on and I can sure relate to that.

    I’m sure when I did they’ll find me with my foot in my mouth but I have gotten way more cautious with platitudes and more sensitive to others suffering.

    Recently a Christian woman lost her only child to a heroin over dose. The person who told me about it said “I didn’t do anything right because when she started crying I just sobbed and sobbed and couldn’t stop”. Probably the best response.


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    M. Joy wrote:

    She showed up at my house with a huge, homemade cheesecake. We sat and talked for awhile, and she told me about memories she had of my daughter. That meant more to me than any rote bible verse or sermon on the meaning of suffering.

    Isn’t an Irish Wake the group version of that?


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    NJ wrote:

    Daisy, I know all about that “it’s not a religion, it’s a relationship” bit of folk theology.

    I heard it so many times (usually as a “You have a Religion; *I* Have a RELATIONSHIP!” Jesus Juke) that I wrote it (and my reaction) into some of my fiction. Let’s just say I’m very hostile to that whole “bit of folk theology”.


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    M. Joy wrote:

    elastigirl wrote:
    @ M. Joy:
    i’m so very sorry for the loss of your daughter. I can’t imagine anything more difficult. i wish i could make it better for you. a homemade pie could be a positive.
    Thanks, elastigirl. I’d surely let you bring me one if we lived close enough! As a matter of fact, shortly after my daughter died, a lady at my church (I only knew her casually) called and said, “I love to make cheesecakes and I’d like to bring you one.” She showed up at my house with a huge, homemade cheesecake. We sat and talked for awhile, and she told me about memories she had of my daughter. That meant more to me than any rote bible verse or sermon on the meaning of suffering.

    M Joy, that’s beautiful.


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    Harley wrote:

    I recently found out that I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

    I am so sorry to hear that. I absolutely agree with you that God did not do this to you and He does not enjoy watching people suffer. Chronic pain is a terrible thing to have to deal with. Are your physicians able to help you with the pain?


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    @ Headless Unicorn Guy:

    I used to hear “it’s a relationship not a religion” from people engaging in apologetics. And to a degree, I get what they mean by it and am even a tad sympathetic to it.

    However, I’d still like to know, if I am in this relationship with God, why, when I pray, does God not answer?

    I would think it’s normal in a relationship that when you phone someone, they’d occasionally pick up the phone and answer, or call you back when you leave a message on their voice mail. When you “phone” God, though, more often than not (in my case at least), I don’t hear anything back.

    It’s not much of a relationship, IMO, if you keep calling and writing, and the recipient never answers. The whole “take it on faith” thing also rings hollow.


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    GSD wrote:

    2 fingers. NT Wright. Agreed on Boyd.

    Agreed on Wright.


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    M. Joy wrote:

    Few things infuriate me more than people who elevate suffering as some sort of gift. (John Piper, anyone) What I’ve noticed, is the people who spew this baloney are the ones who have NEVER experienced a life altering tragedy; I’m talking one that hurts and affects you every day for the rest of your life.

    Yes, very much so. The problem is that suffering and evil threaten a world view in which God must be in control of everything by eternal decree. It isn’t enough for some of these knuckleheads to just learn from Job and shut up and sit with the suffering.


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    Patriciamc wrote:

    I’ve been in a horrible situation, asked God to help me love others despite how badly they treated me, clung to all the verses on deliverance and believing prayer, and the worst still happened. Now, after that, how do you trust God again? I roll my eyes at the Psalms now and hate those verses on believing prayer. Thoughts that God cried with me during the suffering or that there’s always heaven one day does absolutely zilch for me. Sometimes I think we Christians expect too much from God.

    Of course. This is a normal experience. It drives some to be grumpy, some to lose faith, others to sort of live in cognitive dissonance. For my part, I agree with you. If there is a God, we definitely expect to much of him.


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    Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:

    The problem is that suffering and evil threaten a world view in which God must be in control of everything by eternal decree.

    I’ve read some of the folks who believe in this say that it brings them a sense of comfort to think God orchestrates everything and is behind even awful things.

    I don’t see why it would bring comfort. Why would it bring comfort to think it’s God behind it, rather than just some random, awful thing or person?

    I guess the assumption is that if God is behind some horrible thing or caused it, there must be some great, wonderful, reason for it that you may not know in the here and now but may learn in the afterlife, and knowing that a tragedy had a purpose makes it better or easier to take?


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    Though I am deeply Reformed, in these situations (and in the suffering I have faced in life), I turn to Philip Yancey rather than any reformed scholar. The book “Where is God When it Hurts” is wonderful, as are so many of his others.


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    @ Ken F:
    I think your comment was beautiful!


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    Daisy wrote:

    Why would it bring comfort to think it’s God behind it, rather than just some random, awful thing or person?

    I have heard people say this, too. John Piper is one of them.

    Some people truely find peace in believing that God causes everything. I don’t understand this. They seem to fear the unknown and randomness and would rather ascribe ALL events to God. Others, like me and you, find it horrifying.


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    Many years ago I read Petitionary Prayer: a Problem Without an Answer by C.S. Lewis, a chapter in the book Christian Reflections. I should probably reread it, along with Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, which I have not yet read.


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    Wow, I would have never thought about how “It’s not a religion, it’s a relationship” could have an impact on people. I’m sure I’ve said it many, many times in my life. I have found great comfort in it, but now I can see how it could cause pain in the right/wrong circumstances. Thank you for making me aware.


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    Stunned wrote:

    It’s not a religion, it’s a relationship

    And that was heard and said much in SGM.


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    If there is a God, he is not without a sense of humor. I’ve been watching a Christian network this evening (sometimes flipping to a Tattoo competition show, then back again).

    The last hour, on the Christian network, there was a sermon by a guy who was addressing suffering and why does bad stuff happen to good people.

    In this hour, the host is interviewing a Christian couple who is discussing prayer, and why they feel prayer is important, and they are insisting God really does listen to and answer prayer.

    In other words, most all the stuff I was thinking about in this thread is being discussed on these Christian shows tonight. I just found this kind of funny.


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    Stunned wrote:

    Wow, I would have never thought about how “It’s not a religion, it’s a relationship” could have an impact on people. I’m sure I’ve said it many, many times in my life. I have found great comfort in it, but now I can see how it could cause pain in the right/wrong circumstances. Thank you for making me aware.

    It’s not something I get deeply offended by or anything if I hear a Christian say that. I do think there is a lot of truth in that statement.

    I do think all- to- most of the religions in the world present God as this deity you have to work to please, and keep a bunch of rules, but in Christianity, it’s saying God wants to be your friend. So, to a point, I’m fine with that “it’s a relationship, not a religion” comment.

    I’m just expressing my personal pain and struggle along the lines of, if I’m in a relationship with God, why does he seem to be ignoring me and ignoring my prayers?

    In most relationships I have with people, they will answer the phone if I call, but if they regularly ignore my calls or letters, I stop trying to contact them after awhile.

    I have a hard time continuing with prayer, when I don’t hear anything from God for months/ years. If God is supposedly so keen on having a relationship with me, I would assume he would pick up the phone and answer once in awhile.


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    Martos wrote:

    For a long while I’ve found it difficult to pray… I may get to say a short prayer here and there during my day, but it’s definitely nothing like the longer, more dedicated prayers I used to do. It is also often hard to pray at church, except for the Lord’s Prayer. That one comes out quite easily and I feel quite happy saying it.

    Without a prayerbook & those prayers I know by heart, I wouldn’t be able to pray for long periods at a time.
    (Clinical depression does that to you)…….


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    M. Joy wrote:

    She showed up at my house with a huge, homemade cheesecake. We sat and talked for awhile, and she told me about memories she had of my daughter. That meant more to me than any rote bible verse or sermon on the meaning of suffering.

    Isn’t an Irish Wake the group version of that?

    It is.
    Lots of food, lots of drink, lots of music, lots of (gasp!!) dancing. And everybody tells stories. I mean everybody.


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    Bridget wrote:

    Some people truely find peace in believing that God causes everything.

    I think they’re nuts. To use the technical terminology, they spend a lot of time in the belfry, feeding the bats…..


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    Isn’t an Irish Wake the group version of that?

    zooey111 wrote:

    It is.
    Lots of food, lots of drink, lots of music, lots of (gasp!!) dancing. And everybody tells stories. I mean everybody.

    I have only heard about Irish wakes, but never attended one. Sounds like a wonderful way to remember a loved one!


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    zooey111 wrote:

    they spend a lot of time in the belfry, feeding the bats…..

    LOL


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    I heard it so many times (usually as a “You have a Religion; *I* Have a RELATIONSHIP!” Jesus Juke) that I wrote it (and my reaction) into some of my fiction. Let’s just say I’m very hostile to that whole “bit of folk theology”.

    It’s a standard refrain (the ‘relationship’ thing) in the Calvary Chapel world. There was a time when I exhibited a kind of hostility toward the juke too. But no longer, I actually wish them well on their journey. I have serious doubts though, that they’d wish me the same.


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    Muff Potter wrote:

    It’s a standard refrain (the ‘relationship’ thing) in the Calvary Chapel world.

    Calvary Chapel. Why am I not surprised?

    From the time and place where I heard it, very probable it was Calvary Chapel influence. SoCal in the Seventies and Eighties, Ground Zero of Calvary Chapel. Calvary Chapel dominated local Christianese AM radio at the time — probably 40-50% of the airtime was various Calvary Chapels.


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    Ken F wrote:

    Some random thoughts from perhaps the last person in the world who should comment:

    No, that would be me.


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    Ken F wrote:

    Some random thoughts from perhaps the last person in the world who should comment:

    No, that would be me.

    Give it up guys, both of you are providing excellent food for thought. Comment more, not less.


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    Well, then…
    Interlude: Fitba’.

    If Sunderland win their game in hand tonight (at home to mid-table but out-of-form Everton) they will guarantee their Premier League survival, and Newcastle and Norwich will be relegated.

    IHTIH.


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    ION:

    This evening is the 2016 Dumyat Hill Race, which I’ve entered (albeit as a fun-runner). The course is simple: starting in the grounds of Stirling University and following a fine path through woodland to the open hillside and the summit, then coming back the same way.

    High pressure remains dominant over Scotland and the weather is set fair: warm, sunny with a strong breeze. The only downside is that it’s a strong easterly breeze, meaning that we’ll have a headwind running uphill and a tailwind running back down. In an ideal world you’d want it the other way around. But that’s a minor gripe; I ran the route one evening last week and it’s a non-stop delight. A headwind is better than horizontal sleet (which we had two weeks ago)!

    Should be a great evening. As a matter of interest, my time last week running on my own in non-race conditions was 54’36”; I rounded the summit beacon on exactly 33′ which, while not exactly stellar, was at least faster than last year’s overall winning time. IOW, at least the winner would not have finished before I even reached the top.

    IHTIH


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    @ Nick Bulbeck:
    One questions, Celtic or Rangers?


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    Just a word on why some people may find comfort in the idea that God causes suffering for his glory – and this is decidedly not my point of view; I find it deeply unsettling – perhaps they feel that if God himself has done something, they need not exert themselves to change it.

    No need to go out of your way to help anyone, no need to minister to the sick and dying, no need to make hospital visits, no need to feed the hungry or weep with those who weep or visit the prisoner.

    All you have to do is preach the gospel. And don’t forget to preach it to yourself. Those who are meant to hear will hear, those who aren’t, won’t, and all who suffer, whether they belong to God or not, bring him glory because…..well, somehow.

    It’s the ultimate cosmic cop-out.


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    Daisy wrote:

    I’ve been praying for several different things, some for about the past 2 years, some for a few decades, and one thing for about 6 or 7 years.

    Hi Daisy. I often read your posts with interest as I’m also single and out of my 20s and took a peace out time from church for a while. I had a relationship question last year and prayed for clarity…and got it. It wasn’t good, but it was clear! But other things, yeah. I think we have to be careful thinking that god is going to just give us what we want. I haven’t found that to be the case.

    Sort of unrelated to this post but definitely to this blog, just yesterday I saw a news story about a local pastor (former now, but only after it was discovered) who was busted for child porn. Awful. I went to the website while looking to see which church he went to and looked at the staff listing…four men, all ‘such and such’ pastor, two women, ‘executive something and graphic artist’. Ugh. This is why I’m not Baptist anymore (although I’m not sure if they are actually Baptist they may be non-denom). I’m so tired of that.


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    Friend wrote:

    If Travis Myers wants to consider his lymphoma a gift—he uses the phrase “gift of lymphoma” over and over—that is his privilege. He is, however, preaching a sermon, and this plain fact implies that all who hear him should consider their suffering to be a gift too. Everything in life is supposed to build our faith, right? That message comes perilously close to saying that it’s all about us.

    Oddly, the preacher shies away from any earthly explanation for his own survival. Having lived through a scare or two, I have asked myself in more than one ER, “What, if anything, is going to keep me alive this time?”

    A big part of the answer is mundane and cruel: access to good medical care. The preacher has the high privilege of living in the United States at a time when an oncologist can call a certain type of lymphoma “boring.” Where is his rejoicing in the human love of human life—a love that inspired scientists to build up their understanding of cancer? We can give God credit for that, of course. But what we have here is the story of a “gift” that is given and then taken away, with scant credit to the human minds that identified the gift and the human hands that slowly, patiently, removed it.

    Such a good comment that the whole things bears repeating.

    And I agree, his use of the word “gift” is troubling. I share your view that it’s perilously close to his experience, described as a “gift” was something specially, thoughtfully, chosen, picked out by God just for him.

    Where is the distinction? I’ve noticed there are people who assume they’re suffering as a result of their faith, who attribute things like disease, aging, or even a disagreement on Twitter as evidences of sharing in the suffering of Christ, when it’s nowhere near related.

    You couldn’t be more correct in your analysis, Friend. God has worked through the lives of many in the medical profession over the centuries, enabling doctors to be instruments through which suffering is reduced and in some cases eradicated. I’d say in this preachers case, he owes a word of thanks to God for all that. It seems to me that that is where the gift lies.


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    @ Daisy:

    Daisy I have a response to you about prayer that got stuck. I prayed for ‘clarity’ a few months ago and got an answer (not one I liked but it was clear!). But things I want? I don’t agree with the word of faith type people. I think you have to go out and search and even still sometimes things don’t happen.


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    Bookbolter wrote:

    Just a word on why some people may find comfort in the idea that God causes suffering for his glory – and this is decidedly not my point of view; I find it deeply unsettling – perhaps they feel that if God himself has done something, they need not exert themselves to change it.

    Predestination begets Passivity and Fatalism.


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    Bridget wrote:

    Some people truely find peace in believing that God causes everything. I don’t understand this. They seem to fear the unknown and randomness and would rather ascribe ALL events to God. Others, like me and you, find it horrifying.

    I don’t understand it either. I do think it’s fear of the unknown. The random.

    I am comfortable not knowing certain things. I am comfortable with the idea that I may be wrong if it is something that is more theoretical or doesn’t impact my day to day I don’t worry about it. Like ‘young earth’. Why is that important? If you are a scientist, sure, you need to actually care about science. But for me it’s all theory. It’s not what’s important, which imo is how we relate to each other and live our lives.


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    Bookbolter wrote:

    Just a word on why some people may find comfort in the idea that God causes suffering for his glory – and this is decidedly not my point of view; I find it deeply unsettling – perhaps they feel that if God himself has done something, they need not exert themselves to change it.

    Predestination begets Passivity and Fatalism.

    Writing a future blog on Calvinism…..may I use this Headless?


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    @ K.D.:
    When you publish, share a link. I want to read it, please.


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    @ Bookbolter:
    It is called fatalism.


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    Not to get too doctrinal but it seems to me that attributing cancer to God is a perfect example of taking the Lord’s name in vain. That commandment was understood by the Jews as attributing things to God that are not from God.


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    Lydia wrote:

    @ K.D.:
    When you publish, share a link. I want to read it, please.

    My blog is too rough for most readers on here….It’s not just theological, and I get ” off the rails” from time to time…


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    Friend wrote:

    If Travis Myers wants to consider his lymphoma a gift—

    If Myers considers lymphoma, and John Piper considers cancer, to be gifts from God, why did they see doctors and get rid of those “gifts”? Why didn’t they keep their precious “gifts”, treasure them, and thank .god for them every day?


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    “God Caused My Lymphoma, Not the Raw Hot Dog: A Sermon From Bethlehem Baptist Church” Travis Myers

    Dear Travis –

    FYI hotdogs are precooked to begin with. I’m pretty sure you never ate a raw one. Please let God and hotdogs off the hook 🙂

    HTIH


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    Lydia wrote:

    That commandment was understood by the Jews as attributing things to God that are not from God.

    Exactly. Looking at that from the opposite direction there is also the matter of failing to recognize the hand of God in some circumstance. I don’t see some law regarding that failure to recognize, but if one becomes too philosophically materialistic how does one make a place for the actual involvement of God in human affairs? And how does one know where to quit some utterly materialistic path of biblical understanding for example. In my stay with the methodists I ran upon quite a few people who understood (nuanced) some biblical passages to the point that they were left without some of the more day to day experiences of the divine that are more seen in people who do not do that.

    For myself, I hesitate to see something as being the will of God or else not being the will of God. I do think there is scriptural evidence to drop the all or nothing reasoning however. There is no real reason to think that God does the same thing, makes the same decision, interacts in the same way every time with every person in every circumstance. We don’t have it all figured out and we are best advised to be cautious, I am thinking.


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    okrapod wrote:

    I hesitate to see something

    Let me reword that: I hesitate to see some circumstance as necessarily being or not being…
    Of course there are circumstances which are heinous to humanity and some which while not heinous are specifically spoken of in scripture–I am not talking about those things. I am talking about those things on which christians might disagree.

    Sorry for my confusion this AM.


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    Well, then…
    Interlude: Fitba’.
    If Sunderland win their game in hand tonight (at home to mid-table but out-of-form Everton) they will guarantee their Premier League survival, and Newcastle and Norwich will be relegated.
    IHTIH.

    Thanks for reminding me. Will be watching later…Three years ago if you’d told me I would be watching Premire League Fitba’ instead of Major League Baseball, I would have told you that you were nuts….


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    @ Lydia:
    Yes, it is exactly fatalism. But my experiences with these people have been that when faced with the term fatalism, or the term determinism, or the term Gnosticism, they backpedal furiously, accuse me of not understanding the terminology, of not having studied Early Church Father So-and-So. I have clearly not been “called” to ministry (being a woman) and am not responsible to lead God’s people by proclaiming his Word. I lack a full understanding, see? And that’s the pastor-types. The regular people just smile and say Well, I just believe in the Sovereignty of God. And that’s how the pastory ones usually finish it off, too. I never get anywhere arguing fatalism.


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    “fate”, fatalism, pre-determination in its Calvinist definition, determinism …. all crawl out of the same hopeless hole

    it’s the negativity and the hopelessness inherent in this thinking that gives it away as coming straight out of the darkness


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    I just saw a post on Facebook where a woman praised God because her father’s surgery went better than expected. She noted that, “God is all over this one!” Would God have been all over it if it didn’t go well? That is the question.


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    K.D. wrote:

    My blog is too rough for most readers on here….It’s not just theological, and I get ” off the rails” from time to time…

    I’d like to read it too. “Off the rails” in some cases a good thing, because it can give readers an aha! moment they wouldn’t normally get if the rails were adhered to slavishly.
    Too rough for some folks? Well yeah, I can see that, but wtf? If their poor virgin ears are offended, they’re not required to read it.


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    Christiane wrote:

    it’s the negativity and the hopelessness inherent in this thinking that gives it away as coming straight out of the darkness

    You won’t find the young Calvinists singing “The Joy of the Lord is My Strength.” They would rather suffer. Yep, a tinge of darkness in their ranks for sure.


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    I may be missing the idea here but here is what I seem to be hearing as strains of opinion.

    That the world, the material universe, does it’s thing, hence the cause of whatever is determined by the processes of nature.

    Humans have free will and hence humans can intervene with the processes of nature: let’s hear it for the doctors.

    God does not micromanage all the details, especially not the nasty details.

    What I am not hearing is what it is you think that God does do. Other than requesting adherence to a set of concepts, conditions and procedures and especially attitudes, and other than being warm and fuzzy, where is God in all this? I get the impression that God may not actually exist outside of the human mind in this scenario.


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    K.D. wrote:

    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    Bookbolter wrote:

    Just a word on why some people may find comfort in the idea that God causes suffering for his glory – and this is decidedly not my point of view; I find it deeply unsettling – perhaps they feel that if God himself has done something, they need not exert themselves to change it.

    Predestination begets Passivity and Fatalism.

    Writing a future blog on Calvinism…..may I use this Headless?

    Sure. I have a few other zingers as well.


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    Max wrote:

    You won’t find the young Calvinists singing “The Joy of the Lord is My Strength.” They would rather suffer.

    More like stay comfy as The Elect and leave the suffering to their Inferiors.

    Like Calvin when the plague hit Geneva — Too Important for The Cause to Risk.


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    Lydia wrote:

    Not to get too doctrinal but it seems to me that attributing cancer to God is a perfect example of taking the Lord’s name in vain. That commandment was understood by the Jews as attributing things to God that are not from God.

    And of doing evil and claiming “GOD Saith!” as justification.
    Like God was saying “You do your own dirty work. Don’t drag Me into it!”

    “If you question anything I do
    YOU REBEL AGAINST THE FATHER, TOO!”
    — Steve Taylor, “I Manipulate”


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    okrapod wrote:

    I may be missing the idea here but here is what I seem to be hearing as strains of opinion.
    That the world, the material universe, does it’s thing, hence the cause of whatever is determined by the processes of nature.
    Humans have free will and hence humans can intervene with the processes of nature: let’s hear it for the doctors.
    God does not micromanage all the details, especially not the nasty details.
    What I am not hearing is what it is you think that God does do. Other than requesting adherence to a set of concepts, conditions and procedures and especially attitudes, and other than being warm and fuzzy, where is God in all this? I get the impression that God may not actually exist outside of the human mind in this scenario.

    These are all excellent questions, and this is were I am right now. I definitely believe in God, Jesus, etc. I’m just not sure what they do in our times of crisis. Frankly, I don’t want to pray, get my hopes up, and be disappointed.

    By the way, I read you post describing what you’re going through right now, and I’m sending you a virtual hug!


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    my time last week running on my own in non-race conditions was 54’36”

    My poor US-issued brain is trying to figure out how the 40-yard dash got to be 54 feet + 36 inches… and converted from distance to time. This must have to do with the space-time continuum.


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    @ Friend:
    Omitted the emoji: 😉


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      __

     Good Samaritan : “…fourth and forty at the home ten yard line, perhaps?”

    hmmm…

    (or tough questions Christians face:suffering & the problem of evil)

    “When I don’t have all the answers I return again to the cross. And there I see the God-Man (Jesus) suffering and dying on my behalf. I can worship and trust a God like that…” – D.A. Carson

    John MacArthur:  “Why Does God Allow So Much Suffering and Evil?”
    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6LFzk1afiD8

    “One of the most pressing challenges to Christianity is the problem of evil. Unbelievers are quick to ask how Christians can believe in the existence of a good God in the face of so much evil. “- Ligonier Ministries
     __

    https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL30acyfm60fUh-75cdv5S8NoSpN2zDfOP


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    41 years ago, I had a ringside seat to my mother’s losing battle with small-cell lung cancer (Stage III or IV at diagnosis, and the suffering from the chemo was as bad as from the cancer). Anyone who uses the term “cancer” and “God’s gift” in the same sentence needs to be punched in the junk.


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    @ Burwell:

    In my faith crisis when I had rejected absolutely everything I had largely in time come to embrace many atheist authors and speakers. For example I listened to Seth Andrews, r5ead William Lobdell, watched Greta Christina, and was enamored with Christopher Hitchens, even though he had dealt with cancer and was dying when I discovered him.

    Again all that I read a book by Philip Yancey called “Disappointment with God.” I started to read it because I thought it was an atheist book. After all who is disappointed in God? I never heard that be taught or exclaimed. When I realized what it was, I was still engaged because of how riveting it was. The guy I knew from Sovereign Grace tried to get me off Philip Yancey and instead read Randy Alcorn. That never happened and I am grateful it didn’t occur.

    But reading Philip Yancey was a lifeline and his material stood up to so many others.


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    Ken P. wrote:

    One questions, Celtic or Rangers?

    One word: no.


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    @ K.D.:

    Welcome aboard! As of the noo, Sunderland are 3-0 up with about 20 minutes left, so although Norwich are 4-2 up on Watford it will – barring a truly spectacular turnaround on Tyneside – be they and Newcastle who join Villa in the second tier next season.

    Meanwhile, we’re a goal down at home to Chelsea, though I can’t help feeling Jürgen and the boys have at least half an eye on the Europa League final a week today.


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    Friend wrote:

    My poor US-issued brain is trying to figure out how the 40-yard dash got to be 54 feet + 36 inches…

    54’36” could be 57 feet… or 54 minutes 36 seconds.

    Anyway, I’m just back home from the actual race, in which I came home in 50:54 (if you prefer). A great way * to spend a sunny May evening in the heart of Scotland.


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     __

    “Has authentic doctrine of the Reformation has wreaked havoc on the church?”

    hmmm…

    “When God is seen as completely sovereign in sanctification, ideological conclusions are then drawn from what actually happens in real life.”

    huh?

    “Rape is God’s will, and the perpetrator is seen as one who is acting out expected behavior where God has not intervened…”

    What?

    ‘But for the grace of God, there go I?’

    “We have all said it. No? All of grace in salvation—all of grace in sanctification.”

    “The only difference between you and a rapist is grace; therefore, who are you to judge?”

    Skreeeeeeeeeetch !

    Even if you are the victim. 

    bump.

    “Luther and Calvin thought righteous indignation a joke, and Calvin called justice, ‘mere iniquity.’ ” 

    “Luther’s theology of the cross deemed suffering as the most valuable asset of the Reformation’s inner-nihilist theology:

    ‘He, however, who has emptied himself (cf. Phil. 2:7) through suffering no longer does works but knows that God works and does all things in him. For this reason, whether God does works or not, it is all the same to him. He neither boasts if he does good works, nor is he disturbed if God does not do good works through him. He knows that it is sufficient if he suffers and is brought low by the cross in order to be annihilated all the more. It is this that Christ says in John 3:7, »You must be born anew.« To be born anew, one must consequently first die and then be raised up with the Son of Man. To die, I say, means to feel death at hand… ‘(Heidelberg Disputation: Theses 24).”

    “Note that this constant seeking after suffering and self-deprivation leads to being “raised up” in the Christian life. This constant seeking after death leads to joyful rebirths when Christ’s obedience is imputed to us. This is the basis of John Piper’s Christian Hedonism which also implements Theses 28 of the Disputation. As you can see, it’s what they call the new birth. The new birth is something that continually reoccurs in salvation when Christ’s obedience is imputed to us.”

    “The indifference towards suffering that this theology breeds cannot be overstated.”

    “It is such that Calvin’s beseechment of the Geneva counsel to have a detractor beheaded rather than burned with green wood is a supposed act of compassion that is Reformed folklore. And be absolutely positive of this: the roots of authentic Calvinism are 99.99 % responsible for the spiritual tyranny in the contemporary church—especially among New Calvinists.” – pptmoderator


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    Daisy wrote:

    And you only have to read about them, I get to experience them first hand and personally.

    🙂


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    Daisy wrote:

    I have a hard time continuing with prayer, when I don’t hear anything from God for months/ years. If God is supposedly so keen on having a relationship with me, I would assume he would pick up the phone and answer once in awhile.

    🙁


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    57 feet… or 54 minutes 36 seconds

    That would be about my time on certain days: 57 feet in 54 minutes. On other days, there’s chocolate 58 feet ahead of me and I win.

    Congrats on your time! Sounds like you had fun.


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    I came home in 50:54

    You beat your old time! Wahoo!!!! Congrats.

    I was in Sterling 2 years ago. Such a pretty area. You from there originally?


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    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    @ K.D.:
    Welcome aboard! As of the noo, Sunderland are 3-0 up with about 20 minutes left, so although Norwich are 4-2 up on Watford it will – barring a truly spectacular turnaround on Tyneside – be they and Newcastle who join Villa in the second tier next season.
    Meanwhile, we’re a goal down at home to Chelsea, though I can’t help feeling Jürgen and the boys have at least half an eye on the Europa League final a week today.

    Watched here from my den….sort of glad to see Sunderland stay up….and sort of sad to see the Canaries go down…


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    I so appreciate this topic.

    In 2015, my family was struck was something very painful. My daughter became incapitated by a long illness, and I had to figure it out myself, right down to requesting the right study. My daughter had a malignancy, and we faced a potentially terrifying diagnosis, given the type of cancer this was. Her health was restored and she does have very good odds, but not perfect. But I have now become a part of the world of pediatric cancer. Even though our diagnosis was favorable, there are things you cannot unknow once you enter this world.

    I think Mr. Myers’ is exhibiting quite a bit of ugly self-absorption over his “suffering”. I’m glad things turned out well for him but he just has no clue, and he’s waving around the cancer word like its some sort of special club. There are parents who have young children who will not be cured and what little time they have with them is managing relapse to relapse knowing that that their cancer will some day win. There is a brain tumor called DIPG, a devastating diagnosis. It cannot be treated and radiation might buy you a few months, but these parents are told prepare for your child to die and make the most of what time you have while they can still do things. And then don’t even get me started about neuro degenerative disorders like ALD in kids. I’m glad Mr. Meyers got through that agonizing 11 days. If that was agony, he surely couldn’t have survived the six months it took us to find out why our daughter was so sick and then have it culminate with an oncologist.

    I can attest to the awful platitudes people offer in these situations. It’s best to just say your sorry and cry with them. I don’t think the Calvinists understand that when you speak of suffering and God’s glory, you are creating atheists. Who would want to worship a God so focused on his glory that he would allow you to suffer to for it? This also seems very incongruous with Jesus, God incarnate, who sought no glory. But I think one reason Calvinists don’t care about how their stupid statements might impact someone seeking faith is that when it is all predestined, you don’t have to worry about how your words or actions impact the seeker. How convenient.


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    Bunsen Honeydew wrote:

    I don’t think the Calvinists understand that when you speak of suffering and God’s glory, you are creating atheists. Who would want to worship a God so focused on his glory that he would allow you to suffer to for it? This also seems very incongruous with Jesus, God incarnate, who sought no glory.

    Bunson Honeydew, I’m so sorry to hear of you and your daughter’s suffering. I can’t even imagine what it must be like. 🙁


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    Dave (Eagle) wrote:

    Again all that I read a book by Philip Yancey called “Disappointment with God.

    I’m going to have to check this book out. Thanks!


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    Anyone who uses the term “cancer” and “God’s gift” in the same sentence needs to be punched in the junk.

    We here at TWW really need to write our own book of Proverbs.


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    Martos wrote:

    I’ve recently decided to move from the conservative church I attended for the last 6-7 years, and at the moment I’m going through an exploratory phase. I’m visiting various churches around where I live, but the truth is that I don’t know where I may end up settling or how long it may take. Quite happy about it, actually…

    Good luck! It took me a while, but I finally found a good one.


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    patriciamc wrote:

    We here at TWW really need to write our own book of Proverbs.

    HEADLESS is a legend in his own time. 🙂


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    It’s so sad all the grief and pain many of us here are in at this time in our lives. I’m not going to try to make sense of it but my heart goes out to all of us in pain or watching our loved ones suffer or having lost loved ones. 🙁 Tragedies, sickness, pain, and sometimes life, sucks.


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    @ Stunned:

    Thank you. We are incredibly fortunate. Most kids diagnosed with this cancer have metastatic disease. She was a Stage I, but the histology wasn’t good. She is being watched closely. To be honest, I deal with survivor guilt. I thank God for the outcome but it is hard to deal with your child surviving and others who don’t.


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    Daisy wrote:

    Many Christians like to say Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and God wants a relationship with you, me, and everyone.
    In my experience, that does not seem to be lining up, because the relationship seems to be one-way on my part. And relationships are supposed to be a two-way street.
    I’ve been doing all the praying and reaching out, and yet, I don’t hear anything from God (nor do I feel his presence).
    In what other relationship would anyone think it normal, or put up with, a family member or friend, who, no matter how often you send them cards, e-mails, or leave them voice mail on the phone, they never write back, or return your phone calls?
    You’re supposed to just take it on faith that the person cares about you and is “there for you.

    Does anyone know where this relationship stuff is in the Bible, or is this just an idea created by the Christian publishing industry to sell books? I have had a pet peeve about the whole relationship with Christ for a long time. I think it sets Christians up to fail because God isn’t going to call me on the phone, go to a movie with me, and frankly, it’s really hard to hear God in prayer. Like you said, most of the time, I hear nothing. Is this relationship stuff just another way for us to play mind games?


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    @ Bunsen Honeydew:
    I’m sure many of you have read “Humans of New York”. They’ve been doing a Pediatric Cancer series and the stories are unbelievably heart wrenching. http://www.humansofnewyork.com/post/144209076156/if-theres-a-chance-then-its-worth-a-try-even
    For example, Dr. La Quaglia of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, shared this:

    “The absolute best thing in the world that can happen to me is telling a parent that their child’s tumor is benign. I live for those moments. And the worst thing that can happen to me is telling a parent that I’ve lost their kid. It’s only happened to me five times in thirty years. And I’ve wanted to kill myself every single time. Those parents trusted me with their child. It’s a sacred trust and the ultimate responsibility is always mine. I lose sleep for days. I second-guess every decision I made. And every time I lose a child, I tell the parents: ‘I’d rather be dead than her.’ And I mean it. But I go to church every single day. And I think that I’m going to see those kids in a better place. And I’m going to tell them that I’m sorry. And hopefully they’ll say, ‘Forget it. Come on in.’”


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    Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:

    Patriciamc wrote:
    I’ve been in a horrible situation, asked God to help me love others despite how badly they treated me, clung to all the verses on deliverance and believing prayer, and the worst still happened. Now, after that, how do you trust God again? I roll my eyes at the Psalms now and hate those verses on believing prayer. Thoughts that God cried with me during the suffering or that there’s always heaven one day does absolutely zilch for me. Sometimes I think we Christians expect too much from God.
    Of course. This is a normal experience. It drives some to be grumpy, some to lose faith, others to sort of live in cognitive dissonance. For my part, I agree with you. If there is a God, we definitely expect to much of him.

    Yeah, and I don’t mean that in a foot-stomping, door-slamming way, but in a Biblical way. Have Christians in general created an image of God that is not really portrayed in scripture?


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    Okay, now a followup on my own comment. Nobody seems to be saying what it is that God actually does. I threw out the question and there it sits unanswered.

    I think this may be one reason that people find comfort in what Piper et al are preaching. The idea that God does everything including the really bad stuff at least is based on the assumption that there is a god and that this god is involved with humanity. I don’t agree with Piper or with calvinism, but I do see how some sort of bizarre comfort could be drawn from the idea of a god who is not absent, not just some idea, not the proverbial absent parent.

    Some people have said that one reason for some bad childhood behavior is that it may be better to be treated badly/punished for the bad behavior than to be ignored. Perhaps people find it easier to deal with the bad stuff than to deal with the ultimate awfulness of the absence or indifference of God.


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    okrapod wrote:

    Nobody seems to be saying what it is that God actually does.

    Maybe we are looking for God in the wrong places. Jesus, God incarnate, was rejected by the masses because he did not fit their idea of how God should show himself in the world. So they crucified him. Are we any better today? Are we doing the same when we expect God to act according to how we think he should act? I’ll post more later.


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    I think the theology is a terrible topic of discussion for suffering people. But even worse is being stuck in bad beliefs about God and about ourselves while trying to find a way to endure suffering. Wrong beliefs make suffering worse.

    People walking away from belief in God based on all the unanswered evil and suffering is an understandable but fundamentally flawed reaction. If there is no God then there is no moral lawgiver and therefore no moral law by which to judge events as good/bad or good/evil. If there is no God then everything (including suffering and pleasure) exists only by chance and has no ultimate meaning or direction. If there is no God then there is no moral reason to claim that anything is good or bad. There would be no moral grounds to oppose slavery, genocide, abuse. There would be no grounds to praise integrity. The worst and best imaginable acts would amount to no more than mere neutral preferences with no moral relevance. How cheery. The only way to reject God based on evil and suffering is to first believe that such a God exists who makes evil and suffering relevant to begin with. True atheists must admit that there is no distinction between good and bad or good and evil because there is no moral lawgiver to set a moral standard. Running away from God means running toward complete meaninglessness. An atheist who holds out any hope for meaning in life is a false atheist.

    The only logical alternative to complete fatalism and meaninglessness is theism. But that opens up the Pandora’s box of why God allows so much pain, evil, and suffering. And it’s where believers can cause so much damage in trying to explain why God does what he does.

    The story of Job might be the best place to look. His friends did well for the first week. But then they started trying to explain the “why” and it all went downhill. Job complained bitterly against God, and God seemed to handle it just fine (but he was pretty angry with his friends who tried to defend God through their lofty theology). It shows that we humans cannot grasp why God does things the way he does, which validates our complaints. God seems to be able to handle our complaints without flying into a rage. Maybe he does not care about his glory as much as some people tell us? I’m not sure that God telling Job to “brace yourself like a man” was either gentle or comforting. But through the process Job went from hearing about God to seeing him. I think the take-away is that God has this figured out in a way that we don’t, and that one day we will be able to see it the way he sees it and we won’t be disappointed. And I think it also means that God is not offended by our anger toward him while the process unfolds. Could it even be possible that our yelling at him with clenched fist is a sign of faith, a sign that we believe he exists and hears us?

    Yesterday I commented about the verse that says, “Jesus Wept.” This morning it hit me that his weeping must be taken in the context of John 5:19 – “Therefore Jesus answered and was saying to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner.’” And John 14:9 – “Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, “Show us the Father?’’” And Hebrews 1:3 – “And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power.” If Jesus weeps, then it must be because God also weeps. How often are we told that?

    Over the last year I’ve been learning how much of what I believed about God was wrong. But it was what I was taught by well-meaning people who were taught the same. Throwing away bad beliefs feels like running with scissors because I’m poking at so many sacred cows of the reformation. I’m learning that getting a right view of God is critical. I’m still on the journey, but right now the path seems to be going back to what the early church believed about the nature of the Trinity. This is an article that recently helped me sort through some of this: http://perichoresis.org/on-the-death-of-our-blessed-lord-jesus-christ-2/. It’s about the why of Jesus’ death rather than the why of our suffering. But it’s related.


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    patriciamc wrote:

    Does anyone know where this relationship stuff is in the Bible, or is this just an idea created by the Christian publishing industry to sell books? I have had a pet peeve about the whole relationship with Christ for a long time. I think it sets Christians up to fail because God isn’t going to call me on the phone, go to a movie with me, and frankly, it’s really hard to hear God in prayer. Like you said, most of the time, I hear nothing. Is this relationship stuff just another way for us to play mind games?

    It’s like a lot of ideas that come into use because someone thought it would help get people into the church. The ends justify the means, never mind if it’s accurate.

    When I was a new Christian it was real common to hear messages saying that if you come to Jesus, he will solve all your problems. Yes, it sets people up to fail and to feel betrayed when it turns out not to be truth.


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    41 years ago, I had a ringside seat to my mother’s losing battle with small-cell lung cancer (Stage III or IV at diagnosis, and the suffering from the chemo was as bad as from the cancer). Anyone who uses the term “cancer” and “God’s gift” in the same sentence needs to be punched in the junk.

    My mother had cancer (a different type) and died from that and other complications.

    I suspect that the sorts of people who do what you mention in your post think they can find some solace in grief and tragedy if they can see some meaning in it… which can only be done (in their minds) if God was behind the tragedy, if it was for some greater good.

    I think I’ve pretty much accepted that horrible stuff happens (even to good people), and it’s pretty random and senseless.

    In some ways, thinking God was ultimately behind something bad makes me feel more depressed about it, not more comforted. But it seems to be the reverse for other people.

    I think when I was younger, I sort of understood that tendency, but as I grow older, not as much. I don’t know.


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    Dave (Eagle) wrote:

    In my faith crisis when I had rejected absolutely everything I had largely in time come to embrace many atheist authors and speakers. For example I listened to Seth Andrews, r5ead William Lobdell, watched Greta Christina, and was enamored with Christopher Hitchens, even though he had dealt with cancer and was dying when I discovered him.
    Again all that I read a book by Philip Yancey called “Disappointment with God.” I started to read it because I thought it was an atheist book. After all who is disappointed in God?

    One of the things I enjoy about reading some atheist (or ex Christian) material (by the level-headed ones, as opposed to the militant ones who seem to have this irrational hatred of all things theist or Christian), is that they honestly wrestle with the problem of evil and suffering. They don’t sugar coat things or pretend that suffering doesn’t happen.

    A lot of Christian stuff I see about suffering tends to water it down, come up with rationales like “God was behind it, so take comfort in it”, or some Christians are so vested in making excuses for God (so God doesn’t look like a big, insensitive Meanie for allowing nasty things to happen), the responses aren’t satisfying and are victim-blaming (if you didn’t get a healing, it’s because you didn’t have enough faith, etc).

    Anyway… I often find Non-Christian material on suffering or problems in life (e.g., how to deal with depression or anxiety) to be more to the point, helpful, honest, and useful.


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    @ okrapod:
    I have wrestled with this a lot. For one thing, I have seen waaay too much purposeful deception from too many in ministery. It is a great place to hide who you are and most pew sitters would not believe most of the stuff anyway. Or they make excuses. So it grows like a cancer while wearing Jesus lipstick.

    I mean if God is going to direct and control some things in life why wouldn’t he start with people who claim they are the light of the world but are really Darkness? Why not there? I used to tell people that I could explain the unbelievers to my kids but I cannot explain the Believers to them! I really worried for a long time what their perception of Jesus Christ would be if we stayed in that deception and darkness. You can’t unsee stuff and you can’t unknow stuff. At some point you have to make a decision which road you are going to travel. It is an extremely lonely place, too.

    I came to the conclusion that the cross and the resurrection had to be enough. Beyond that why wouldn’t the rest be our wheelhouse, so to speak? I could quote Jesus right now but I won’t.

    It really comes back to faith and trust. That if we are who we need to be that he rewards that, eventually. But right now here on Earth it is about being the kingdom as much as we possibly can.

    Personally I feel that most of Western evangelicalism has gotten almost everything upside down. I am included in that, of course. I can only imagine how arrogant that sounds which is why I don’t like to talk about it very often. It is very personal and I do not feel like I have the right to make any claims.

    I have had two very real encounters in my past that are very real for me but would not be for anyone else. I am about as far as you can get from the “encounter” type. But life did not get any easier because of them. if anything, it got much harder. Which was a bit hard to take.

    So when people tend to focus on what God is doing… in a humorous sort of way I like to think of him shaking his head over what the heck we’re doing. :o)


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    Bookbolter wrote:

    @ Lydia:
    Yes, it is exactly fatalism. But my experiences with these people have been that when faced with the term fatalism, or the term determinism, or the term Gnosticism, they backpedal furiously, accuse me of not understanding the terminology, of not having studied Early Church Father So-and-So. I have clearly not been “called” to ministry (being a woman) and am not responsible to lead God’s people by proclaiming his Word. I lack a full understanding, see? And that’s the pastor-types. The regular people just smile and say Well, I just believe in the Sovereignty of God. And that’s how the pastory ones usually finish it off, too. I never get anywhere arguing fatalism.

    It’s not just the pastor types who do that. It’s also the young wannabee ‘theologians’ who think they’re really smart because they simply spew out all they absorb from the head honchos without actually thinking for themselves. The acolytes – those are the really crazy ones….


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    Patriciamc wrote:

    I just saw a post on Facebook where a woman praised God because her father’s surgery went better than expected. She noted that, “God is all over this one!” Would God have been all over it if it didn’t go well? That is the question.

    I know, and where does it put those whose surgery didn’t go so well?


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    @ patriciamc:

    The other thing that bothers me is the Christian teaching that while God may not remove painful situation “X” from your life, he will walk alongside you through it, or carry you through it, or you will ‘feel his presence.’

    None of that has been true for me, including losing my mother, which was a huge blow for me.

    My family was a huge “fail” in helping me – they got irate when I went to them during my time of grief asking for help.

    I sure as heck did not feel God’s presence during any of that time. I feel like I went through it all on my own – well, I did.

    But Christians that talk about how God won’t remove X from your life but help you through X? I did not see that in my situation.


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    @ Bunsen Honeydew:

    I agree with everything in your post, and it was so well stated. I especially liked the last paragraph.


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    I decided long ago that a God who allows children to be raped, tortured and killed, inflicts horrible diseases on people, causes killing tsunamis and ear quakes, etc. and planned these events and victims before the earth was created, is a god to fear but not to worship. In fact, under Calvinism, worship does no good, your fate was sealed long ago.

    All of the Calvinist excuses for getting God off the hook from being the creator of evil and tragedy never made any sense. If God planned everything in advance down to the smallest detail, how did tragedy and evil slip through his hands?

    Instead, I think God created the world as self-sustaining, and disease, natural disasters, etc. are simply a consequence of all of the processes necessary for it to be self-sustaining. No idea exactly how that is, but it makes more sense than a good and loving God mapping out in advance all the horrors that occur in the world.


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    Btw, Melissa, I meant to comment earlier. May I just say, “A-stinkin’-MEN!” Jesus wept. Why we think we need to go farther than that, I have no idea. Probably taking a page from his book would behoove us all.

    When I was going through what was the most devastating time in my life, I was sitting on the little hill in front of my parent’s house. I was a wreck. My sister and her husband pulled up and parked. She walked into the house and he (not someone I was close to) got out of the car. He didn’t say a word. He came over to me and sat down and faced across the street where I was facing. We sat like that for about five minutes. I couldn’t speak. He didn’t try. It was the most respectful loving thing he’s ever done for me. I’ll go to the grave remembering that kindness. He couldn’t fix anything or fix me and he didn’t try. He just sat with me in my pain.

    Melissa wrote:

    You know what I want to say to people who are willing to ascribe to God the greatest evils humanity has witnessed?
    Two words:
    “Jesus wept.”
    When his best friends met him, draped in mourning clothes, faces drawn with suffering, wracked with grief over their brother’s death, he shared their agony.
    Not forever, though. (But it matters so much that he doesn’t shush them and tell them not to worry, he’s gonna raise brother Lazarus again, so they can stop crying. FIRST he’s with them in their suffering.


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    I wonder if it’s a case of what I read in the amazing theological tome, Yes, Please, written by the great theologian Amy Poehler. In it she said, “Good for her. Not for me.” Meaning, maybe it’s good for this other person and maybe it gives something to them, but it’s not for me. Maybe it’s that way with a lot of what people write or preach. Maybe they find comfort in something but possibly trying to apply it to everyone else is not the best thing. Maybe we just need to learn to take that which is good for us and not beat ourselves up over what’s not good for us. I know I spent decades believing things that ended up nearly destroying me. I don’t know but those words, “Good for her. Not for me,” have been wringing in my ears for the past two days.


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    @ Paula Rice:
    I follow Humans of New York on FB and have appreciated what they are doing to highlight pediatric cancer. Not to get on a soapbox, but pediatric cancer research is not funded privately, because in terms of numbers, it isn’t lucrative. So, where the government could make up the inequity, they won’t either. Less than 4% of federal cancer research money goes towards children’s cancers.


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    @ Daisy:

    Thank you for the kind words Daisy. I don’t comment regularly but I read regularly, and I enjoy many of your thoughts and insights.


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    Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

    Anyone who uses the term “cancer” and “God’s gift” in the same sentence needs to be punched in the junk.

    Not a gift. More like an armed robber. We learn from them too, eh?


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    Though I appreciate Dee’s attitude in her post, my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it. JeffS made a good go at it several years ago.


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    kin wrote:

    Though I appreciate Dee’s attitude in her post, my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it. JeffS made a good go at it several years ago.

    I had not given Calvinism much thought until it derailed my son’s faith. He was nearly suicidal from it. He survived, but it did claim the life of one of the other students in the same ministry. His suicide note confirmed it was the Calvinist beliefs that caused him to kill himself. But to be fair, it might be only new-Calvinism that did it. Once I started investigating Calvinism I found contradictions everywhere. I can understand now how it could make someone suicidal.

    As to the respect issue, I have found Calvinists to be among some of the most disrespectful of all people. The commenters on this site have valid complaints against Calvinism and need a place to vent. The Calvinistic websites are much harsher.


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    Catherine and siteseer…. I too have suffered from chronic migraine for over 25 years….I wonder if either of you have tried Trokendi??? It has been a lifesaver for me!!! I went from about 15 to 20 headache days a month to 2…. I hope you both see this post…… Migraines are horrible…..I certainly don’t believe God ordained my migraines to teach me anything….. Other trials yes….have taught me very very much… But God takes no pleasure in torturing us


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    kin wrote:

    my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it.

    I think many people here feel this way when they try to comment on a blog supported by Calvinists. My observation from reading Reformed blogs 😉


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    kin wrote:

    Though I appreciate Dee’s attitude in her post, my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it. JeffS made a good go at it several years ago.

    I actually attended a small fellowship many years ago with a wonderful pastor who, though he did not go by the label of Calvinist, was very strong on the sovereignty of God. He was a kind, encouraging person who truly cared for the spiritual welfare of those he ministered to. It was my best experience of church. He was nothing like these new Calvinists, though, and I do have to say that over time I have had a problem with some of the more Calvinistic things he taught.

    What I find interesting is that in the early 70’s, people would come to our fellowship and enjoy it but as soon as they found the pastor had a Calvinistic bent, they would be offended and leave. The attitude has certainly changed!


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    kin wrote:

    Though I appreciate Dee’s attitude in her post, my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it. JeffS made a good go at it several years ago.

    So, I guess you’re saying that we’re the problem. Kin, many of us here have actual experience that we’re basing our opinions on.


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    @ siteseer:

    Another time we attended a Presbyterian church that was verrry Calvinist. The pastor was a sincere, honest person but the messages were so depressing. One day I told my husband, I know this church believes in grace but when I leave here Sunday morning I feel like I need to just tell God, “God, I know Jesus died for me and that I’m saved through his blood, but I am so undeserving and such a failure in every way that the only moral thing for me to do is volunteer to go to hell anyway. Please just send me to hell. It’s the only right thing for me to do.”

    Heh, sometimes I think I should write a book about all our different church experiences. I can’t decide whether it would be a comedy or a tragedy, though.


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    kin wrote:

    doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it.

    I’ve pointed this out before, but I’ve found even civil back- and- forth with most Calvinists a big time waster, because 99% of them will say that you, the critic or skeptic of Calvinism, do not understand Calvinism.

    If you shoot out an argument by preacher or theologian X that is critical of Calvinism, the typical Calvinist will say, “So and so doesn’t even accurately represent Calvinism,” so he or she won’t even engage with X’s arguments.

    According to my experience with most Calvinists, there is not a Non-Calvinist living or dead who understands Calvinism adequately enough to offer a good criticism of it.

    Calvinist lay persons don’t even agree with other Calvinist lay persons about Calvinism.

    In times past, when talking to Calvinist Harry about Calvinism, Harry would say, “Oh no, you misunderstand what Calvinism teaches about topic Z.”

    I then say, “Then please clarify Z for me.”

    So Harry gives me his understanding of Z.

    So I say, “You’re telling me that is what Calvinism really believes about Z?”

    And Harry says, “Yes.”

    So, fast forward a few weeks or months later, and there I am debating Calvinist Joe about Calvinism.

    When I argue about Z using Calvinist Harry’s explanation of Z, Calvinist Harry says, “Ha ha, you have a laughably wrong view about Z! That is NOT what Calvinists believe about Z.”

    My response: “But that is exactly what Harry the Calvinist said Calvinism teaches about Z.”

    He says: “Harry is wrong about Z.”

    Calvinists have set up Calvinism so that nobody anywhere can, to their satisfaction (or each individual Calvinist), disprove it.


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    siteseer wrote:

    Another time we attended a Presbyterian church that was verrry Calvinist. The pastor was a sincere, honest person but the messages were so depressing. One day I told my husband, I know this church believes in grace but when I leave here Sunday morning I feel like I need to just tell God, “God, I know Jesus died for me and that I’m saved through his blood, but I am so undeserving and such a failure in every way

    Maybe those sorts of churches should give out free Prozac or Zoloft after each service? 🙂


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    @ Debbylynn:

    Debbylynn, I’m so glad you’ve found something that is working for you! It looks like Trokendi is a form of the same thing as Topamax?
    I’ve tried so many things over the years. Sometimes they work for awhile. I’ve gotten where the side effects tend to be so bad that I can’t tolerate many things but at least at my stage of life I can take time off when I need to. Thanks for the heads up.


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    Daisy wrote:

    When I argue about Z using Calvinist Harry’s explanation of Z, Calvinist Harry says,

    The other name there should be “Joe.”

    The point being, “Calvinist A” and “Calvinist B” tell me in separate conversations that I, Daisy, do not understand Calvinism properly, but neither A nor B agree with each other on Calvinism. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


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    Daisy wrote:

    I’ve pointed this out before, but I’ve found even civil back- and- forth with most Calvinists a big time waster, because 99% of them will say that you, the critic or skeptic of Calvinism, do not understand Calvinism.

    *sigh* Daisy, you clearly don’t understand Calvinism. 😉


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    @ Ken F:
    Oh your poor son & his fellow student. I can understand why they got to that point but where were the college’s pastoral staff? I have to be incredibly careful with these topics as they amen me incredibly anxious – which is why I’m currently taking shelter under the wing of the theology of the earliest church. I’m going to start reading your blog site when I have time.

    And Kin, I echo what’s already been said. A lot of pain is what you hear when you come here.


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    *make, stupid autocorrect


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    @ Lydia:
    That isn’t what the historical record seems to show.

    The plague broke out again in 1543. On May 1, Calvin announced to the Council that Castellion, a minister, was ready to go as chaplain to the hospital. The Council accepted his offer, at the same time censuring some ministers who were unwilling to go to the hospital. This was on May 2, but on the 11th Castellion was superseded and Blanchet reappointed. Blanchet, however, died, and on June 1 the Council ordered the ministers to meet and choose a chaplain, ‘Mr Calvin being excluded, because he was required for the Church.’

    The following week a chaplain was appointed.

    Doumergue says we can understand that the Council did not wish to expose Calvin to the risk of infection in the hospital. The general who commands is not placed in the front rank of the battle. But if Calvin had been called, what would he have done? Doumergue’s answer is that he would have simply done his duty.

    He quotes from a letter written by Calvin to Viret in October 1542, at the beginning of the plague. ‘If anything happens [to Blanchet], I fear that after him it will be my turn to run the risk.… We cannot fail those who need our ministry more than others.… As long as we are in this charge, I do not see how we could excuse ourselves if, through fear of danger, we deprive of help those who need it most.’*

    https://zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com/2014/06/01/fun-facts-from-church-history-calvin-and-the-plague-of-1542-43/


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    Beakerj wrote:

    where were the college’s pastoral staff?

    That was my question. The college ministry pastor in that church was the one who was pushing it so hard. He still is.


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    Ken F wrote:

    And I think it also means that God is not offended by our anger toward him while the process unfolds. Could it even be possible that our yelling at him with clenched fist is a sign of faith, a sign that we believe he exists and hears us?

    I remember watching a scene from “The West Wing” some years ago. It takes place after the funeral of the President’s secretary Mrs. Landingham, who was killed in a traffic accident. President Jed Bartlet loves her dearly, and her death during a very difficult period of his tenure. After everyone has filed out of the church, Bartlet just unloads on God — takes all of his pent-up anger and grief, and lets Him have it. He calls God names, accusing Him of hurting his loved ones, and punctuates it all by stubbing out his cigarette on the floor of the church.

    When looking back on this scene, I can imagine the angels reacting to Bartlet’s tirade with horror and indignation, ready to take up their swords and vindicate the Lord’s honour. God’s response (in my imagination)? He sighs and waves them off, saying, “Siddown. Cool off. He doesn’t mean it. You don’t know what kind of pain he’s in.” I have no doubt that God knows how to take our anger and pain. If he can’t, I don’t see why we should worship Him.

    If Jesus weeps, then it must be because God also weeps. How often are we told that?

    One source of comfort for me is the picture that Lewis paints of Aslan in “The Magician’s Nephew”, when he commiserates with Digory, crying with him over his dying mother. Aslan’s words in that scene always hit me hard.


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    @ lowlandseer:
    Yikes! That quote is from BB Warfields book praising Calvin. I would expect no less from him.

    The site you link to is named for Zwingli. Now here is a guy that gave up his own students to be hunted down and “rebaptized” (as in drowning) because they dared to facilitate believers baptism amongst themselves.

    Off the top of my head one of my sources is Stephan Zweig, an agnostic Jew who committed suicide, who wrote “A Right to Heresy”.

    The problem is Calvin had a pattern of behavior that one can trace not only from his letters but from other people’s letters and the official archives, official documentation of meetings and such.

    For Castillo, we have to go to Basel archives and some of the deliberations that happened there as some of those City fathers eventually started to turn against Calvin’s authoritarianism reaching into their parts.

    Castillo suffered a lot for his eventual views on religious tolerance and freedom of conscious.

    Another problem is that the official archives of the state church were not really flung open to American scholars until after the war. So most of what was written before that was the official position of the state Church machine. It took a lot of effort to piece together information from the letters and other archives.

    One American Scholar who did this in the 1950s is Leonard Verduin. He was a Dutch reformed calvinist so he is safe for you to read. :o)


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    siteseer wrote:

    patriciamc wrote:
    Does anyone know where this relationship stuff is in the Bible, or is this just an idea created by the Christian publishing industry to sell books? I have had a pet peeve about the whole relationship with Christ for a long time. I think it sets Christians up to fail because God isn’t going to call me on the phone, go to a movie with me, and frankly, it’s really hard to hear God in prayer. Like you said, most of the time, I hear nothing. Is this relationship stuff just another way for us to play mind games?
    It’s like a lot of ideas that come into use because someone thought it would help get people into the church. The ends justify the means, never mind if it’s accurate.
    When I was a new Christian it was real common to hear messages saying that if you come to Jesus, he will solve all your problems. Yes, it sets people up to fail and to feel betrayed when it turns out not to be truth.

    Why don’t we just tell people the truth? “If you become a Christian, brace yourself. Your life is about to get a whole lot worse!”

    Because there are cases in which that’s true. (Note: What I’m about to write is *how I feel*, it may not necessarily be *the truth*.)

    I became a Christian in an abusive religion where we were expected to invite “everything that moved” to church and shamed when we didn’t “bear fruit” (i.e., convert people). I left that group and eventually wound up in another group where they tried to get away from the teaching that I’d been under . . . and they went so far in the other direction, they turned out to be just as bad. The #1 reason my husband and I moved to where we are now was to get away from that group.

    My dad died of ALS four weeks before my wedding. I, at times, fail to see how that could have been “good”. And I have kicked myself for not arranging, somehow, for him to see me get married (maybe by getting married earlier or by arranging to get married in my hometown instead of where I was living at the time.)

    I had trouble getting pregnant and used medical treatment to get pregnant (ended up taking a round of Clomid). There are those who teach that that’s somehow a sin, to use medical procedures to help with pregnancy. Did I somehow commit a sin by using Clomid instead of “trusting God” for a child?

    My son has autism. That presents its unique set of challenges. Although my son has been a big blessing to us and to our church, I have wondered, did God punish me for using modern medicine to get pregnant by allowing me to have a child with autism? Was his autism the result of me using Clomid? (i.e. did the Clomid affect his development in the womb?) And one of my griefs is rather selfish–the fact that he will probably never marry and have children, and thus, I will never have grandchildren. Most of my friends are having grandkids and bragging about them, and that will probably never happen for me.

    I dealt with bullying as a child, was told that I shouldn’t fight back because I will be the one getting into trouble, and that’s one of the issues that has sent me into therapy multiple times. That, and spiritual abuse.

    And I’m not happy about current events in this country, and I think things are going to get a LOT worse. (Which is all I’ll say, because I know there’s a variety of opinions on current events and there are other places I can discuss those in depth.)

    No, Christianity and Jesus are NOT going to solve all your problems. In fact, they may add a whole new layer of them!


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    Ken F wrote:

    kin wrote:
    Though I appreciate Dee’s attitude in her post, my (fallible) observation after many years of keeping up with discussions regarding Calvinism on the WW is that this arena (comment section) doesn’t often produce enough respect and understanding for those who hold to a Calvinistic viewpoint to feel comfortable in discussing it – so the result is often a lopsided argument against it. JeffS made a good go at it several years ago.
    I had not given Calvinism much thought until it derailed my son’s faith. He was nearly suicidal from it. He survived, but it did claim the life of one of the other students in the same ministry. His suicide note confirmed it was the Calvinist beliefs that caused him to kill himself. But to be fair, it might be only new-Calvinism that did it. Once I started investigating Calvinism I found contradictions everywhere. I can understand now how it could make someone suicidal.
    As to the respect issue, I have found Calvinists to be among some of the most disrespectful of all people. The commenters on this site have valid complaints against Calvinism and need a place to vent. The Calvinistic websites are much harsher.

    Ken, I am so sorry!!!


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    Ken F wrote:

    Beakerj wrote:
    where were the college’s pastoral staff?

    That was my question. The college ministry pastor in that church was the one who was pushing it so hard. He still is.

    That’s awful. I’m so sorry.

    It would probably help if it weren’t so fashionable in certain circles to reject mental health care.


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    @ Ken F

    I saw some similar problems in youth groups. The teens who are deep thinkers OR come from dysfunctional backgrounds, with not a lot of Parental support who take this teaching to heart, can be severely affected. Can you imagine being taught during tender teenage years that God wanted you to be born into an abusive family for His Glory?

    I even have an adult friend who was a career missionary and totally turned her back on her faith after her child was killed in a freak accident overseas. They were committed calvinists. Her attitude was, ‘if that’s God’s idea of Grace and Glory, no thanks.

    Recently my former Sunday school teacher who stayed in the church taken over by the Neo cals, became extremely worried about her twelve-year-old son who had been baptized. He is one of those deep-thinking kids but also comes from a very supportive loving family. So you can imagine her concern when he kept obsessing about not being broken enough for his sin to know if he was really saved. She blamed herself and her husband for not modeling Christ well enough. I suggested she start sitting in on youth group teaching. Because the sbts guys that took over that church are all Piper all the time with some Pink thrown in the mix. A fatalistic cocktail!

    Most decent well-meaning people are not connecting the dots of what is going on or the logical implications of that teaching. The mainline Calvinists pretty much went Social Gospel for a reason. I predict serious fallout from this Neo movement over time.

    * my view is that it is hard to adopt the deterministic State Church Calvinism to freedom of conscience and freedom of thought that became foundational to American thinking. Therefore a move to practicing a more Social Gospel made sense.


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    @ numo:
    I have enjoyed reading his blog. So far I have only read “Genesis for Normal People” with Jared Byas and it is an excellent place to start for a really big picture! It is not too long and it is affordable. I want to read some of his other books eventually. But my stack of “to reads” is already too high. :o)


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    @ Lydia:
    I’m totally that type Lydia, & I think it’s reprehensible that those doctrines are not introduced with a ‘this is one of a range of views held by Christians, & in fact a minority view’ each & every time.


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    Lydia wrote:

    The teens who are deep thinkers OR come from dysfunctional backgrounds, with not a lot of Parental support who take this teaching to heart, can be severely affected. Can you imagine being taught during tender teenage years that God wanted you to be born into an abusive family for His Glory?

    I saw this depicted in a mild sense in the book “Jacob Have I Loved” by Katherine Paterson. Halfway through the book, the protagonist (a teenaged girl) reads Romans 9, and is convinced by it that God hates her, and has destined her to live forever in the shadow of her younger twin sister. It takes her a while to break out of that despair, and the paralysis it causes.

    That was my introduction to the harm that deterministic theology can bring.


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    I thought that this article was pertinent to some of the things some of us were discussing on this page:

    Why Self-Compassion Works Better Than Self-Esteem

    http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/05/why-self-compassion-works-better-than-self-esteem/481473/

    Snippets (the whole article is pretty long but illuminating):
    ————-
    Boosting your ego won’t make you feel better. Instead, try talking to yourself like you would your best friend.

    …One component is self-kindness, which is in a way the most obvious. But it also entails a recognition of common humanity—in other words, the understanding that all people are imperfect, and all people have imperfect lives.

    …Self-compassion also entails a mindfulness. In order to have self-compassion, we have to be willing to turn toward and acknowledge our suffering. Typically, we don’t want to do that. We want to avoid it, we don’t want to think about it, and want to go straight into problem-solving.

    And in fact, I would argue that self-compassion also provides a sense of self-worth, but it’s not linked to narcissism the way self-esteem is.

    … It [self compassion] helps people cope with divorce, pain, age [and PTSD, helps motivate people more, also helps in dealing with failure better].
    ———


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    patriciamc wrote:

    *sigh* Daisy, you clearly don’t understand Calvinism.

    I just so enjoy how the Calvinists who tell me this don’t agree with what other Calvinist tell me about Calvinism each, which tells me that none of them really understand it, either.

    I actually think I understand most of it just fine, but I find some of its logical outworking repulsive, and I think it bothers Calvinism that I find aspects of Calvinism repulsive.


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    Tina wrote:

    I became a Christian in an abusive religion where we were expected to invite “everything that moved” to church and shamed when we didn’t “bear fruit” (i.e., convert people).

    I’ve always been a very big introvert and don’t feel comfortable at stuff like that. I’ve worked as a sales clerk off and on (in the years before getting a professional job), and some of those jobs required us to do add on sales.

    Where we try to convince the customer to buy stuff they didn’t need or want. I didn’t feel comfortable doing that, either.

    This page I just linked to, the lady interviewed (or someone on the page) has a son with autism she mentions and how having self compassion helped her, when she felt like beating herself up as a mother:

    Why Self-Compassion Works Better Than Self-Esteem
    http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/05/why-self-compassion-works-better-than-self-esteem/481473/


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    Daisy wrote:

    And in fact, I would argue that self-compassion also provides a sense of self-worth, but it’s not linked to narcissism the way self-esteem is.

    I think both are necessary and a healthy self-esteem is not really narcissistic (although obviously can be taken to extremes). Maybe a feeling of self-worth is what we’re really talking about. You need self compassion probably most when things aren’t going as you hoped or when you make an error. That can be almost higher to deal with when you have a good self-esteem, maybe.


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    @ Tina:

    I think it’s natural or normal for a lot of people to want to marry and/or have children. I think a lot of Christians and denominations have made both into idols, so it’s very mean-spirited of them for criticizing Christians who try to get either one.

    When or if you try to get married, or have children, you will be criticized by Christians who adhere to a certain mindset:
    the ones who believe if its in God’s will for you to have either, he will wave his magic wand and they (a spouse or children) instantly will appear in your life.

    If you’r a single adult, like me, who wants to marry, and yet you try dating sites, or having friends fix you up on dates, those Christians who hold the “magic wand” view will chew you out for “not trusting in God”.

    They do this, of course, as you mentioned, with couples who have trouble conceiving. You’re supposed to just sit there content as-is, just pray, and hope God allows you to have a child eventually.

    I used to kind of adhere to this “magic wand” view in my younger years, but as I’ve aged, I’ve really taken to questioning all this.

    It looks to me as though if you want X, you have to go after it yourself and make it happen.

    Anyway, I think it’s very hypocritical that so many Christians revere marriage and parenthood, but if you’re someone for whom that did not happen easily or naturally, they shame you for it.

    You’re not supposed to use dating sites or fertility treatments or anything like that, according to those insensitive clowns.

    These are probably the same people who scream against using psychology or medication for mental health problems: you’re supposed to just use Bible reading and prayer and keep your fingers crossed the God waves his magic wand and cures you. (That approach didn’t work for my anxiety or depression either.)


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    @ Lea:

    There are actually Christians (one or two who sometimes post to this very blog, too) who misconstrue having self-esteem (or just the concept itself) as being egotism or as selfishness, and who seem to think it’s a sin to have self esteem.


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    @ Tina:

    dang, tina — all of what you describe sounds so tough. I agree — becoming a ‘christian’ sometimes makes everything much harder and more miserable. thanks to stupid ‘christians’ and their institution.

    My view is that God is not a rules person. That there is enormous freedom with God in how we live our lives and the choices we make, bounded by treating others with kindness, generosity, the way you yourself would want to be treated. As to what faith looks like in our day-to-day, week-to-week living, I don’t believe that’s for anyone to say. Too huge and individual. God is not cruel, in any way, in any sense, on any supposed lofty level beyond our comprehension.

    may live crickets of all kinds infest the bedrooms & persons of the stupid Christian in your past.


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    @ Daisy:

    Did I ever have a lot of typos in that post and one of the other ones I just made a few moments ago.

    Hopefully people can decipher what I meant, even though I inadvertently used the wrong words or typed stuff wrong.


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    @ Tina:

    I am sorry about your Dad, but you do not need to blame yourself. In all probability your actual wedding ceremony was much more important to you than it would have been to him, given his condition. Infertility can be a nightmare and Clomid is not a sin, though I think that some reproductive technologies are over the line. God did not smite your son to punish you for taking meds to get pregnant. You did not cause your son’s condition by some sin against God. The jury is still out as to cause/causes of autism. I am so sorry about your son, but you need to let yourself off the hook on that one,

    I too think that things are going to get a lot worse, and the church in the US is not remotely prepared to help people deal with it. This matter of the church having it’s head attached to the wrong anatomic site has the potential to be catastrophic for people. We are in the earlier stages of problems which will make the issue of who does the dishes seem ludicrous.

    But you did not do any of this, you are not at fault, not to blame, and you sound very savvy and courageous.


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    @ Beakerj:
    That is really the bigger problem. Because many churches were taken over stealthily by the Neo Cal movement, the people in them really had no clue that some of the same words they knew were being used very differently by young pastors graduating from seminaries they have supported financially.

    I tried to talk to some young restless and reformed pastors about this and the response I got was ‘if people are too stupid not to ask the right questions then it is their fault. I am teaching biblical Christianity’.

    It took me awhile to realize that the Neo Cal movement does not want people to research Calvinism.

    So to add to the problem most people in churches did not really understand what they were dealing with.


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    Patriciamc wrote:

    So, I guess you’re saying that we’re the problem. Kin, many of us here have actual experience that we’re basing our opinions on.

    That’s it. The truth about a theology is seen in the fruit, OR in this case of neo-Cal abuses, the rotten fruit. And ‘seen’ means the rottenness of the fruit was directly experienced by the victims. It doesn’t get more real than that. Thank God for this blog and all the blogs that permit the victims to have a voice so people will know the truth.


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    @ Serving Kids In Japan:
    Oh wow. I am not familiar with that book. Ironically, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who was raised very Calvinist, takes it on in a subtle way in “The Ministers Wooing”. Her father went through horrible time at Lane Seminary from fellow Calvinists and even went through an ecclesiastical trial of some sort.


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    Lydia wrote:

    I tried to talk to some young restless and reformed pastors about this and the response I got was ‘if people are too stupid not to ask the right questions then it is their fault. I am teaching biblical Christianity’.

    They sound kind of like slimy used car salesmen.

    I have this older brother who I don’t hear from too often. I’ve only gotten maybe about 3 phone calls from him in total in the years since our mother passed.

    In one of those phone calls – and I don’t remember the exact details – but my brother was saying something about how our mother allowed him to walk all over her (so he was blaming her for being the victim of his exploitation).

    He sort of admitted to taking advantage of her, but he blamed her, because she was naive or too loving.

    Then my brother told me how a friend of his took advantage of him and his wife financially. But he conveyed he and his wife sort of “deserved” to be ripped off for trusting this friend.

    The guy had a history of being unreliable on paying back loans, but my brother gave the guy a loan anyway, and the guy ended up stiffing him, did not repay. My brother blamed himself for loaning the money.

    I think taking personal responsibility is all well and good, but my brother’s attitude was like, people who are trusting deserve to be cheated. It’s their fault if they buy what you’re selling. It’s an attitude which I found deeply appalling and troubling.

    My brother should know that our mother was codependent (she was a doormat).

    She basically wound up that way due to having been raised in an alcoholic, abusive family. She felt that having boundaries and setting limits on people was “mean,” so any time my brother needed to hit folks up for money, he made a bee-line for our mom and asked her for money.

    He knew she would never say “no.”

    My brother blames our mother for being an easy touch, allowing him to take advantage of her – I’m like no, you’re a pig for taking advantage of someone who you know had this weakness.

    Certainly, our mother should have stood up to my brother and not loaned him money, but taking advantage of a codependent or trusting or naive person like that as he did, is, IMO, like a normal functioning adult stealing candy from a baby, conning a Granny woman out of her savings, or pulling one over on a mentally handicapped adult who has the I.Q. of a child.

    I recoil at people who have this attitude of, “oh well, so what, who cares,” or, “the victim of my actions is really to blame, not me since they allowed themselves to be duped,” if they manage to con or sucker someone who is trusting, wounded (and hence vulnerable), or a doormat.


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    <Christiane wrote:

    The truth about a theology is seen in the fruit, OR in this case of neo-Cal abuses, the rotten fruit.

    That is actual biblical Christianity, too. You cannot get figs from thistles.


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    Daisy wrote:

    I think taking personal responsibility is all well and good, but my brother’s attitude was like, people who are trusting deserve to be cheated.

    I am a bit hard on myself when I find that I’ve been too trusting, but I think that is completely different from taking advantage of someone yourself!


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    Daisy wrote:

    You’re not supposed to use dating sites or fertility treatments or anything like that, according to those insensitive clowns.

    These are probably the same people who scream against using psychology or medication for mental health problems: you’re supposed to just use Bible reading and prayer and keep your fingers crossed the God waves his magic wand and cures you. (That approach didn’t work for my anxiety or depression either.)

    What a cauldron of human misery they’ve cooked up! And the kicker? They’ll swear up and down that this is what “the Bible teaches”.
    My a$$. The Bible teaches no such thing.


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    Serving Kids In Japan wrote:

    God’s response (in my imagination)? He sighs and waves them off, saying, “Siddown. Cool off. He doesn’t mean it. You don’t know what kind of pain he’s in.” I have no doubt that God knows how to take our anger and pain. If he can’t, I don’t see why we should worship Him.

    That is exactly how I see it.


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    @ Stunned:
    OK, so I know it looks like I’m talking to myself, but hey, not the first time that’s ever happened. Anyway…

    I wonder if the Quakers/Friends are on to something. In their meetings they don’t have one person who gets up to preach each sunday. Instead they all gather together with God alone as the head. They sometimes sit quietly until one of the group decide to share scripture or what they believe God is doing in their lives. I wonder if that would be the healthier thing?


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    Lea wrote:

    I am a bit hard on myself when I find that I’ve been too trusting, but I think that is completely different from taking advantage of someone yourself!

    You know what I find funny or hypocritical about my brother’s take on this (which I think he got from years of going to A.A. meetings), is that while on the other hand, my brother (or A.A.) is big on the concept of personal responsibility, his view that the victim is to blame for ‘allowing’ herself to be conned is – a way of avoiding personal responsibility.

    How convenient that you feel you are off the hook for pressuring money from a mentally weak person because you ultimately feel the victim is to blame and not you for exploiting the victim’s known weakness.

    In my book, that is yet another instance of evading personal responsibility.

    If my brother wants to really and truly own up to his stuff, he would admit to me (or himself) that taking advantage of our mother as he did was plain wrong, period, end of story – regardless of why she allowed it to happen, or that it happened at all.


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    Muff Potter wrote:

    What a cauldron of human misery they’ve cooked up! And the kicker? They’ll swear up and down that this is what “the Bible teaches”.
    My a$$. The Bible teaches no such thing.

    Absolutely.

    I think the part that burns my biscuits the most are the several levels of hypocrisy that is going on with it.

    How the people who teach this stuff set these things (marriage, having children) up as all-important (idols) in the first place –

    Yet, if you’re someone who takes measures to make this stuff happen for you personally (e.g., you use dating sites, medical technology, etc.) they shame you for that, and also tell you that YOU are making that stuff into an idol. It is pouring salt into the wound.

    Some of the ones who say you should just pray and trust God to send you a spouse are the folks who met their spouse because a friend introduced them, or they met back in high school or college and asked the person out!

    Marriage did not happen magically for them, but they expect anyone past 25 years of age who is still single to hope on the “magical answer” route. Not dating, not asking anyone out, not friends fixing them up, but just “cross your fingers and hope” method.


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    @ Stunned:

    That might be healthier, and make for a more interesting church service.

    The older I get, I don’t get much out of the usual deal, where you sit in a pew for 30 or more minutes listening to some guy drone on and one with his interpretation of a particular Bible passage.


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    Stunned wrote:

    I wonder if the Quakers/Friends are on to something. In their meetings they don’t have one person who gets up to preach each sunday. Instead they all gather together with God alone as the head. They sometimes sit quietly until one of the group decide to share scripture or what they believe God is doing in their lives. I wonder if that would be the healthier thing?

    I think the Friends are on to something very sane and healthy. The absence of hierarchy puts everyone in a position to contribute.

    General info: not all Friends meetings are silent. Within the silent tradition, the faith differs from what many TWW regulars identify as Christianity, although the meetings I have known best were clearly populated with Christians. Quakers tend not to be Trinitarian, having a range of viewpoints about Jesus, and believing in the Inner Light rather than the Holy Spirit. Sacraments are absent: no day or time or ceremony is holier than another. Similarly, creeds and oaths are absent: all words should be equally honest.

    Quaker silent worship is not well understood and is therefore easily disrupted. Some meetings start with a silence of agreed-upon duration. People are supposed to speak only if they feel strongly led. Any following comments are supposed to build on ideas introduced by the first speaker. It is a good thing (particularly when disparate themes emerge) if an experienced Friend rises near the end of the meeting to draw themes together.

    Many Quakers believe that these remarks are God’s message to the meeting. At one meeting I recall, a man stood to speak at the very end, and said, “Our first speaker this morning reminded us…”

    What!? I thought, because this man was the first to stand. But he went on to say that the first speaker of the morning had said, “Daddy, hold me.” All of us had heard the squirmy toddler asking to be held, but not all of us had considered the toddler’s words to be God’s message.


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    Hi Siteseer… I’m not sure if it’s like Topamax… I will ask my neurologist…. I’m so glad you can take off when you have them…they’re horrible


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    okrapod wrote:

    @ Tina:
    I am sorry about your Dad, but you do not need to blame yourself. In all probability your actual wedding ceremony was much more important to you than it would have been to him, given his condition. Infertility can be a nightmare and Clomid is not a sin, though I think that some reproductive technologies are over the line. God did not smite your son to punish you for taking meds to get pregnant. You did not cause your son’s condition by some sin against God. The jury is still out as to cause/causes of autism. I am so sorry about your son, but you need to let yourself off the hook on that one,
    I too think that things are going to get a lot worse, and the church in the US is not remotely prepared to help people deal with it. This matter of the church having it’s head attached to the wrong anatomic site has the potential to be catastrophic for people. We are in the earlier stages of problems which will make the issue of who does the dishes seem ludicrous.
    But you did not do any of this, you are not at fault, not to blame, and you sound very savvy and courageous.

    In saner moments, I realize that my dad was suffering–ALS is awful, and that’s putting it mildly. And today, I heard of yet another “link” to autism–high levels of b12 and folate during pregnancy. You’re right; the jury is still out; in my opinion, I believe it’s very much genetic and no one knows how autism develops. (Life isn’t dull at my house. 🙂 )

    It only took me one round of Clomid to get pregnant. A lady at my church got pregnant on her LAST try at IVF. Her baby just turned a year old. (The baby’s name is Grace. I think that’s appropriate.)

    I agree with you on some reproductive technologies being “over the line”. I’m sure that there are some things I would not have tried had I been unable to get pregnant through Clomid. And as far as grandkids; there may come a day when we will “adopt” some. 🙂

    You are very kind. Thank you. ((()))


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    elastigirl wrote:

    @ Tina:
    dang, tina — all of what you describe sounds so tough. I agree — becoming a ‘christian’ sometimes makes everything much harder and more miserable. thanks to stupid ‘christians’ and their institution.
    My view is that God is not a rules person. That there is enormous freedom with God in how we live our lives and the choices we make, bounded by treating others with kindness, generosity, the way you yourself would want to be treated. As to what faith looks like in our day-to-day, week-to-week living, I don’t believe that’s for anyone to say. Too huge and individual. God is not cruel, in any way, in any sense, on any supposed lofty level beyond our comprehension.
    may live crickets of all kinds infest the bedrooms & persons of the stupid Christian in your past.

    I prefer fleas and cockroaches. 🙂


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    patriciamc wrote:

    Dave (Eagle) wrote:
    Again all that I read a book by Philip Yancey called “Disappointment with God.
    I’m going to have to check this book out. Thanks!

    I’ve read this. Yancey is one Christian author that refuses to resort to simplistic answers. I like that.


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    Lydia wrote:

    @ Serving Kids In Japan:
    Oh wow. I am not familiar with that book. Ironically, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who was raised very Calvinist, takes it on in a subtle way in “The Ministers Wooing”. Her father went through horrible time at Lane Seminary from fellow Calvinists and even went through an ecclesiastical trial of some sort.

    This particular book won the Newbery Award for best in children’s literature the year it was published. She’s also the author of Bridge to Terabithia. Both of them are worth reading!


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    Sorry for the delay…busy time of year.

    Every group I’ve been part of for the last forty years tended to get myopic in reference to outside/contrary views. Healthy criticism ought to be welcomed in a Spirit-led environment. Just simply pointing out what I’ve noticed over the past three or four years of reading here – healthy, constructive debate is frequently lacking on this subject. Sometimes we forget the lines that divide aren’t always as black and white as we present them to be – there is a spectrum of beliefs that often intersects/overlaps.

    I’ve stated this before, but will say it again – I have **greatly** benefited from the voices of women here on TWW due to the fact that for four decades of church-life I have been sheltered from hearing wisdom spoken from the opposite sex. So I’m not posting here to be contentious.

    As I write this I know I have not always been the utmost respectful in my comments – in particular a response I made on Todd Wilhem’s recent post about 9Marx I said I appreciated a lot of what Wayne Jacobsen has to say, but found his views on the wrath of God to be “goofy”. A better word choice would have been a bit more considerate. In all fairness, I had the privilege to a face-to-face conversation with Wayne about 12 years ago on this very subject. Enjoyed the time together and found he is a very gracious man.

    Lydia, I think you responded to my comment and I failed to process much of what you wrote as I was pretty much a zombie that week, greatly struggling with my heath, was only getting about 17 hrs. of sleep (for the entire week) on top of working daily at a very labor-intensive job.

    BTW, I don’t consider myself a Calvinist (disdain the term) but do have/had friendships with people who would, some of whom have suffered in this life tremendously, yet continue to acknowledge that the intimate prepositions FROM, TO, THROUGH are tied to the word ALL in Rms. 11:36 with unwavering faith. That I admire and respect.


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    What idiotic thinking. Cancer is no gift. It’s not even a walk in the park. What kind of parent purposely gives their child a gift well nigh guaranteed to kill them? Pathetic. Right in there with “unborn babies who die in the womb go to hell.” I have thus far survived stage 3 cancer. THAT is a gift. And all the subsequent life milestones and events which CANCER threatened to steal? – those are gifts. But not the cancer. Idiocy. These teachers have much to answer for.


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    @ kin:

    I am quite familiar with zombieism. :o) I sure hope your health is improving. Thanks for remembering!

    I think one convo stopper between Cals and non Cals is they read Romans (and most scripture but Romans is a biggie) with totally different filters. It makes Doctrinal agreement impossible. It is simply best to disagree and form alliances that focus on justice and mercy for victims. And believe me, there are bodies under the bus in the seeker world and all over evangelicalism. It is just the Neo Cals are the big bully on the block right now and eventually that will change, too.


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    Lydia wrote:

    It took me awhile to realize that the Neo Cal movement does not want people to research Calvinism.

    Here are some of the better links I found during my research:

    http://jonathanmerritt.religionnews.com/2014/05/20/troubling-trends-americas-calvinist-revival/
    http://blog.savetheperishing.com/?p=2911
    http://www.auburn.edu/~allenkc/openhse/calvinism.html
    https://www.discerningtheworld.com/2013/10/04/the-modern-day-pharisees-calvinism/
    https://www.discerningtheworld.com/2015/03/10/ej-hill-side-hillside/#more-21353
    http://www.thepoorinspirit.com/post/37486824724/my-journey-to-with-and-away-from-calvinism
    http://www.thepoorinspirit.com/post/87314855346/the-potter-and-the-clay-comparing-calvin-with
    http://www.thepoorinspirit.com/tagged/Calvinism
    http://micahjmurray.com/election/
    http://redeeminggod.com/john-6-44-no-one-can-come-to-me-unless-the-father-draws-him/
    http://orthodox-apologetics.blogspot.com/2011/02/biblical-doctrine-of-salvation.html
    https://www.christiancourier.com/articles/716-is-faith-the-gift-of-ephesians-2-8
    http://faithalone.org/magazine/y1989/89july1.html
    http://www.gotquestions.org/unlimited-atonement.html
    http://lhim.org/blog/2014/04/11/a-free-will-perspective-on-romans-9-and-predestination/
    http://lhim.org/blog/2014/02/06/three-arguments-against-total-depravity/

    None of these links are perfect, but after reading quite a lot a picture is emerging.


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    @ Ken F:
    Wow! I think the first book I read concerning the doctrines ( I did history first) was Lawrence Vance, “The Other Side of Calvinism”. Someone gave it to me. It was where I discovered that total depravity actually meant total inability and so much of what I had heard from YRR made sense at that point.


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    My list for Penal Substitution is much longer. I should probably try to pare it down.


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    Daisy wrote:

    I just so enjoy how the Calvinists who tell me this don’t agree with what other Calvinist tell me about Calvinism each, which tells me that none of them really understand it, either.

    I suspect Calvinism is whatever the powers-that-be want it to be in order to support their positions.


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    I apologize if someone has already pointed this out, but Christianity Today has an article on a doctor with the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism (ABWE) and how he was allowed to abuse women and girls for many years. Women he had affairs with were sent home from the mission field while he was allowed to remain or was transferred to another post. A 13 year old girl he seduced was questioned for over three days and made to sign a confession detailing her sins in the matter, and on and on and on, oh, and ABWE tried to stall investigations into their handling of this doctor.

    http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2016/may-web-only/missionary-donn-ketcham-abuse-bangladesh-mks-abwe-report.html


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    siteseer wrote:

    @ siteseer:
    Another time we attended a Presbyterian church that was verrry Calvinist. The pastor was a sincere, honest person but the messages were so depressing. One day I told my husband, I know this church believes in grace but when I leave here Sunday morning I feel like I need to just tell God, “God, I know Jesus died for me and that I’m saved through his blood, but I am so undeserving and such a failure in every way that the only moral thing for me to do is volunteer to go to hell anyway. Please just send me to hell. It’s the only right thing for me to do.”
    Heh, sometimes I think I should write a book about all our different church experiences. I can’t decide whether it would be a comedy or a tragedy, though.

    Pretty much sums up my experience with Reformed Christianity. I know it’s not all like that, but when you find a particularly dogmatic strain, it can be like this. I was so hung up on my own sin, and how awful I was, half the time I’d forget that he loved me enough to die for me in the first place. It’s good to be aware of the sin in your life, and how holy God is, but in most cases, I think Calvinists/Calvinism exaggerate it so much that God becomes almost inaccessible. This creates an feeling of unhealthy fear instead of overwhelming love.

    He is holy, yes. He frightened Isaiah in the temple, true. But Jesus also called his disciples “friends”, and he loved us, and died for us while we were his enemies. We must never, ever forget that.


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    patriciamc wrote:

    Women he had affairs with were sent home from the mission field while he was allowed to remain or was transferred to another post.

    Typical. So, so Typical.


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    Lydia – thanks, and my experience would have to agree with you concerning the Neo Cals. I’ve sadly let go of several relationships over the years with groups stuck in that mindset. Most of the people are dear and sweet, but have this unhealthy allegiance to those in leadership.


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    patriciamc wrote:

    I apologize if someone has already pointed this out, but Christianity Today has an article on a doctor with the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism (ABWE) and how he was allowed to abuse women and girls for many years. Women he had affairs with were sent home from the mission field while he was allowed to remain or was transferred to another post. A 13 year old girl he seduced was questioned for over three days and made to sign a confession detailing her sins in the matter, and on and on and on, oh, and ABWE tried to stall investigations into their handling of this doctor.

    Because he had a Penis and a Doctorate.
    WOMAN, SUBMIT!


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    Tina wrote:

    patriciamc wrote:

    Dave (Eagle) wrote:
    Again all that I read a book by Philip Yancey called “Disappointment with God.”
    I’m going to have to check this book out. Thanks!

    I’ve read this. Yancey is one Christian author that refuses to resort to simplistic answers. I like that.

    Yancey is one Christian author who lives in (and deals with) Reality.
    A rare occurrence these days.

    “God lives in the real world.”
    — Rich Buhler


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    patriciamc wrote:

    Daisy wrote:

    I just so enjoy how the Calvinists who tell me this don’t agree with what other Calvinist tell me about Calvinism each, which tells me that none of them really understand it, either.

    I suspect Calvinism is whatever the powers-that-be want it to be in order to support their positions.

    “Men of Sin” will glom onto any Cosmic-level Authority — Bible, Koran, Darwin, Marx, Freud, Nature — to get Cosmic-level “Divine Right” to do what they wanted to do anyway.


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    Lydia wrote:

    I tried to talk to some young restless and reformed pastors about this and the response I got was ‘if people are too stupid not to ask the right questions then it is their fault. I am teaching biblical Christianity’.

    If what they’re teaching is “Biblical Christianity” then “God Delusion” Dawkins has the right idea.


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    As a person who has struggled with Multiple Myeloma, and metastasized breast cancer, I could not disagree with these pompous pastors more. Having just come out of the hospital, after a five day ICU stay, these men’s words bring me no comfort.

    What/who comforts me? The Holy Spirit, reading the Psalms and gospels. I also am reminded of the scripture which states, all of creation cries out to be delivered. I live in a fallen world. ( creation) All manner of evil, suffering exists, everyone walks with them, experiences them in some measure. In my times of despair, I rest in the savior who wept, and weeps with me.


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    Mae wrote:

    Having just come out of the hospital, after a five day ICU stay, these men’s words bring me no comfort.

    Mae. I am so sorry. Thanks so much for your perspective.


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    okrapod wrote:

    I may be missing the idea here but here is what I seem to be hearing as strains of opinion.

    That the world, the material universe, does it’s thing, hence the cause of whatever is determined by the processes of nature.

    Humans have free will and hence humans can intervene with the processes of nature: let’s hear it for the doctors.

    God does not micromanage all the details, especially not the nasty details.

    What I am not hearing is what it is you think that God does do. Other than requesting adherence to a set of concepts, conditions and procedures and especially attitudes, and other than being warm and fuzzy, where is God in all this? I get the impression that God may not actually exist outside of the human mind in this scenario.

    God gave us doctors. (Like you, m’dear!) God led scientists to the principals that underlie modern medical science.
    And, sometimes, God–well, “God moves in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform”. Like in 1949, when I was dying under not one but TWO crashed cars, because no one had found me. And a friend of my father’s came along, recognized the car, & demanded that the rescuers hunt for me. They all assured him that there was no little girl in the car, that the tow truck could drag our car away, & this guy stood in front of said tow truck & thundered: “The hell you are! You will leave over my dead body!!!” And stood there, refusing to let them go anywhere.

    And then he found me, & he brought me out, & he went in the ambulance with me. I never saw that man, till the day he died without him giving me a little cuff on the shoulder, & saying, “Guess we showed them, didn’t we?”, beaming like a Christmas tree.
    OK, that’s my miracle. I would have preferred one that didn’t kill Daddy, that didn’t kill my mother, that didn’;t leave me with a bunch of lingering health problems. But you know what? I am here, all these years later, telling this story. Without Bernard, none of you would be hearing this…….


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    Friend wrote:

    Nick Bulbeck wrote:

    my time last week running on my own in non-race conditions was 54’36”

    My poor US-issued brain is trying to figure out how the 40-yard dash got to be 54 feet + 36 inches… and converted from distance to time. This must have to do with the space-time continuum.

    Thank God. I thought I had totally lost it.


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    zooey111 wrote:

    Without Bernard, none of you would be hearing this…….

    Wow, nice work Bernard. I’m so sorry for your accident & loss though.


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    zooey111 wrote:

    OK, that’s my miracle. I would have preferred one that didn’t kill Daddy, that didn’t kill my mother, that didn’;t leave me with a bunch of lingering health problems. But you know what? I am here, all these years later, telling this story. Without Bernard, none of you would be hearing this…….

    Wow….


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    zooey111 wrote:

    Like in 1949, when I was dying under not one but TWO crashed cars, because no one had found me. And a friend of my father’s came along, recognized the car, & demanded that the rescuers hunt for me. They all assured him that there was no little girl in the car, that the tow truck could drag our car away, & this guy stood in front of said tow truck & thundered: “The hell you are! You will leave over my dead body!!!” And stood there, refusing to let them go anywhere.
    And then he found me, & he brought me out, & he went in the ambulance with me. I never saw that man, till the day he died without him giving me a little cuff on the shoulder, & saying, “Guess we showed them, didn’t we?”, beaming like a Christmas tree.

    Oh my heavens, Zooey. I’m so sorry you lived through that. I’m glad he was there and I’m glad he stood there and I’m glad insisted they not budge until he found you and I’m glad he rode with you in the ambulance but I’m sorry you lost your mom that day and I’m sorry you lost your dad that day and I’m sorry you were so badly injured that day. Thank you for sharing.


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    Christiane wrote:

    patriciamc wrote:

    We here at TWW really need to write our own book of Proverbs.

    HEADLESS is a legend in his own time.

    Better a Legend in His Own Time than a Legend in His Own Mind.


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    @ zooey111:

    Now that Bernard is a man! Glad you are with us Zooey111!