i knew my life was too peaceful.
i also knew my life was going to be hectic this week and the next 8 or 10...
but really...i just wanted to teach...
however, amidst the chaos there are blessings.
For example, the Bible Study I am now attending.
This week was over Romans 9:6-29. Hehehehehe...what a place to jump into for a Romans Bible Study.
I was really impressed blessed though. I thought the questions were trying to lead toward a certain point of view on God's Election and Predestination. However, I turned out to be wrong and I was grateful. *goes to fetch notes for further explanation.
Somehow, i came to a happy, peaceful understanding of the principle of election:
"Spiritual birth does not happen naturally"--to which I start to thing, so what does naturally include? human aspects
The example used in the scripture to show this was the choosing of Jacob to receive the birthright--Jacob was chosen to show that it is God who plans and not "natural" tradition of firstborn. Now I do have questions about what looks like a self-fulfilling prophecy by telling Rebekah that the older would serve the younger...to make this happen...but God is God.
This inspired more thoughts in terms of defining supernatural--the ways of God: predestination and election are supernatural. We cannot explain supernatural in human ways...because supernatural means to beyond human logic (science)
God is sovereign over ALL's Destinies and has a purpose in everything he does. Election exalts God, not man, by being supernatural. God will use every person to display his Glory.
This, along with an interesting point of connection for the definition of love/hate between Romans 9:13, Matthew 6:24, and Luke 14:26. Love/hate isn't a feeling in these verses, and not quite how we think of love. Love is shown to mean the choice to serve another and hate would be choosing not to serve another. It really made Dr Watson's sermon last week on 1 Corinthians 13 come together so much more as the he explained that the love chapter is defining how we are to using the gifts God gives us--the gifts are useless if we do not love. In our gifts, we are choosing to serve God and others, which is love. If we aren't choosing to serve with our gifts, than we're not reallying using our gifts in love but probably instead to glorify ourselves.
Anyways, it was a really nice night of Bible Study after another long day of school and stress although right now school is stress.
Posted by Anna at January 30, 2007 09:25 PM | TrackBackThere's a lot of fairly thick and complex material covered here. While the stream-of-consciousness you use here does an excellent job reflecting what (at least I think) your thinking is as you work through all of this, it makes it somewhat difficult to respond to the original ideas rather than to your response to those ideas. In short, I think you ought to go back over your notes and what you've written and attempt to reconstruct things in a slightly less "random" manner to make it easier to see where you're going with this.
Posted by: Vengeful Cynic at January 31, 2007 05:43 PMI for one, would love to see your notes on the night. I had a little trouble following your thoughts, but am intrigued to know more about what specifically was taught. The thing that comes to my mind is how total the Sovreignty of God is. How not even 'nature' can thwart his purpose. How he uses even those who sin to not only accomplish his purpose, but also to be blessed by them. It gives me comfort to know, that because I am His, 'no man' (including myself) can pluck me out of His hand. And that He can use me inspite of myself.
The issue of election is always a sticky one, and I comfort myself in the thought that 'we see through a glass darkly' and that someday we will understand the hows and whys of it all. For now, I am content to live under His Grace.
Posted by: Mom Toad at February 3, 2007 03:04 PM