Like many of you, it bothers me to no end when I don’t understand the reason behind an upsetting or frustrating event. ‘If only I knew why it happened, I’d be able to get some closure’ is a lie I tell myself frequently. My dissatisfaction with bad things in my life has much less to do with not understanding why they happened, and more to do with me being angry at God for doing something outside of my little plan.
There have been many instances in my short life so far that have made me question God’s authority and sovereignty. I’m almost certain you can agree. We spend a great deal of time constructing our feeble plans only to see them changed, bent, and sometimes flat-out blown to pieces. My first instinct when God wrecks my plan is typically to demand an answer. Psalm 74 - Asaph is Spicy Mad We see this sort of reaction all throughout the Psalms, but one chapter that I can particularly identify with is Psalms 74. Asaph isn’t too cheery in this one, so buckle up, because things are about to get rocky. “1 O God, why do you cast us off forever? Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?” P 74:1 “10 How long, O God, is the foe to scoff? Is the enemy to revile your name forever? 11 Why do you hold back your hand, your right hand? Take it from the fold of your garment and destroy them!” P 74:10-11 I’d encourage you to read the entire chapter, of course, but for the sake of length and America’s ever-shortening attention span, I highlighted just the zestiest parts of Asaph’s Psalm 74. In order for you to really pick up what I’m laying down, we’re going to need to get into Asaph’s head. Let’s look into the context of these verses. Nebuchadnezzar (king of Babylon, seriously rude dude, overall kind of trash) has just destroyed the temple where God’s people went to worship and to pray. Asaph, along with the other Israelites are justifiably furious, and Asaph begins to plead with God. He practically demands answers from Him. In the midst of turmoil, we like to ask God for a reason, an answer, or something we can desperately cling to separate from God’s sovereignty and omniscience. Asaph may have felt better if God would have answered in an audible and booming voice, “My people idolized the temple and have forgotten the reason for its existence. I allowed the king to destroy it for your good and my peoples’ benefit.” but Asaph didn’t get an answer. In the middle of Psalm 74, we see a change of pace. Instead of crying out to God and questioning His allowance of the temple’s destruction, he glorifies and praises Him. “Yet God my King is from of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.” P 74:12 “Yours is the day, yours also the night; you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.” P 74:16 He stops the questions, pauses the challenges, and relinquishes his need to know ‘why’ to praise God. How interesting. I’ve decided to put a pin in that idea for a moment because Asaph gets right back to his frustration and drops this line at the end of chapter 74: ““Arise, O God, defend your cause; remember how the foolish scoff at you all the day!” P 74:22 Yikes. I started asking myself something I’m sure Asaph was asking himself in Psalm 74. What do we do if something catastrophic happens and God does (seemingly) nothing? How should we respond if something feels wrong and we don’t understand why it happened? Hebrews 11 - Prepare to Be Peeved This brings me to a lovely and ferociously convicting chapter I read last night - Hebrews 11. It was the answer to the question I’d been asking God for so long - what do I do when I have no reason, no answer, and no ‘why’? If you’d like to take a quick break and read Hebrews 11, I’d encourage you to do so now. If not, I’ll give you a little overview with some of the basics, but I promise you, it’s an interesting chapter. In Hebrews 11, we take a trip down memory lane and remind ourselves of some Bible stories and how the people in them responded to God’s plan for their lives. It mentions how Noah when building the ark, Abraham when offering up his son, Moses when walking through the split red sea, Rahab when she provided safety for God’s people, and many others followed God’s plan because they had faith, not because they knew all of the answers. That’s the thing - we’ll never know it all. Never once in our life will we be able to fully see the light at the end of the tunnel. No matter how hard we try to understand or how much we desire to know God’s purpose in everything, we will never have the full picture. This is where faith, trust, and a close relationship with God have to surpass our need for answers. If they do not, we’ll find ourselves stuck and unwilling to accomplish all of the beautiful things God laid out for us in our plan. The verse in Hebrews 11 that first struck me was H 11:13. It mentions that many of the people God used to further the gospel never saw the fulfillment of God’s promises and never got their ‘why’. “These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar” H 11:13a All of those people died before they saw the end of the story, and unfortunately for me and my fleshly need for answers, I probably will too. I’ll probably die before I fully understand why God allowed this pandemic, why He let bad things happen to the people I love, and why some people never get to experience Him, but instead die apart from God. Not knowing the answers used to drive me insane. (By ‘used to’ I mean before last night, so don’t worry - I’m new to this too.) I’d like to share another section of the chapter that just slapped me in the face and launched my sinful desires out the window. “They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated - of whom the world was not worthy - wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.” H 11:37-40 What a lovely passage. I simply love reading about faithful Christians being killed in various gruesome ways. I feel so blessed. Oh - and when it says “stoned”, it doesn’t mean high off their rockers. It means they were killed with rocks. Honestly, the chapter ending this way was somewhat aggravating for me. I felt like there was no resolve. It seemed like there was no happy ending for these people. But there was. All of those people died after living a life devoted to God. Their lives were full of joy from his never ending cup of satisfaction. Their hearts were full of contentment because they knew He was all they needed. Like the last verse says - apart from God, we can’t be perfect. With God, we can be made perfect, and that has to be enough for me. I can challenge God like Asaph, I can wrestle with God like David, and I can cry with God like Jesus, but I am not entitled to an answer. It’s not the questioning that’s sin, it’s the idolization of my own curiosity. My heated prayers to the Lord asking ‘why’ aren’t wrong - but loving God only when I understand His plan is. To feel fully content, I have to resolve to walk in faith when I’m given no answer. To experience joy the way He wants me to, I have to remind myself that God knows the answers, even when I don’t. To trust Him with everything I have, I have to have confidence in His ‘why’ even when I can’t see it yet. What are some questions we do need to know the answer to before we can whole-heartedly follow God? I need to include this section because there are some things that blind faith should not be covering in your walk with God. Some questions you need to feel confident in the answer to are listed below: Is Jesus the son of God and do you believe He died and came back to life to save us from sin? Do you believe that we are in need of saving and that we can’t be in the presence of God without Jesus’ sacrifice? Do you know who God is and desire to follow Him? Is it true that God’s plan for your life is better and more beautiful than you could ever imagine, despite some incredibly terrible things that happened to you as a result of the world’s sin? There are questions like these that are incredibly important to know the answer to. When I say I am striving to surrender my need for answers, I do not mean the answers to these questions. I mean that I don’t need to know why God takes certain people out of my life, why God lets people hurt the people I love, or why we’re in a global pandemic. Those things, while very significant and important to me, do not determine God’s goodness in my life. I can see that even though I don’t have those answers, God is in control and is sovereign. Moving Forward As I move forward, I am actively working on seeking answers, but not demanding them. I have been working on trusting His plan for a great deal of time, and it’s time I start listening to His call without wondering if my way is better. I’m working on taking steps of faith, even when they seem risky. I very clearly hear the Lord’s voice in my life (which I could get into in another one of my writings), and I need to start responding to his voice with faith instead of hesitance. I’ve delayed so many good and wonderful things in my life because I wasn’t willing to make that scary step into the dark. I need to understand that even when I can’t even see the next step in front of me, God sees the entire path. He is my guide, and as long as I pursue Him fully and trust His goodness and grace, I don’t require the why. Moving forward, I’ll be working on relinquishing my need to know the ‘why’. Links that aren’t cited in MLA or APA because I didn’t want to do so: Psalm 74 ESV: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%2074&version=ESV Psalm 74 commentary by Charles H. Spurgeon: https://www.christianity.com/bible/commentary.php?com=spur&b=19&c=74 Information on what Asaph was angry about: https://www.universal.org/en/bispo-macedo/the-destruction-of-the-first-temple/ Hebrews 11 ESV: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=hebrews+11&version=ESV John Piper’s Sermons on Hebrews 11: https://www.desiringgod.org/scripture/hebrews/11/messages Vocab definitions for some extra clarity: Relinquish: verb (used with object) - to renounce or surrender (a possession, right, etc.): - to give up; put aside or desist from: - to let go; release: Discontentment: noun - lack of contentment; dissatisfaction. - a restless desire or craving for something one does not have. Sovereignty: noun - the quality or state of being sovereign, or of having supreme power or authority. Omniscience: noun - the quality or state of being omniscient. - infinite knowledge. - (initial capital letter) God. Idolize: verb - to worship as a god.
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By: Annabelle C. Lee
If you've come here expecting this to be about why optimism is the best ideology and is superior to realism and pessimism, you've come to the wrong place. I claim to be (and believe I am) an optimist, but this article is a critique of my past and current ideology, not a place for me to convince you of my beliefs. I've lived a long time thinking optimism was better than realism and pessimism, but I've been wrong in many areas. I sat down at my computer today to explain my journey through the process of learning what works best for me. I don't know what works best for you, but maybe this will give you a little information about the not so happy-go-lucky side of an optimistic outlook. What is Optimism? You probably already know the answer to this question, but just for the sake of clarity and being thorough, I'll explain what I mean when I reference optimism in this article. I am using the definition from the Merriam-Webster dictionary that defines the word as "an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome". That's what I've been doing for a long while - anticipating the best possible outcome in every situation. Now that you understand exactly what I'm talking about, get ready for me to absolutely flame this ideology. Why Optimism is Toxic I believe wholeheartedly that an optimistic worldview is what's best for me and my general happiness, but I've come to understand (as of very recently) that it can affect me and others very negatively. There are three major ways in which I've seen my optimism lead me into bad situations that were otherwise avoidable. First, anticipating the best possible outcome has oftentimes blinded me to the worst and the just-okay outcomes. A pessimist's main argument is that if you always expect the worst, you'll never be disappointed. I see what they mean in that regard, and while I don't agree (it seems to me that pessimists spend a very long time being disappointed while they wait to see whether or not they'll be disappointed), I see where they're coming from. When hoping for the best and getting the worst, my first reaction is to search desperately for the good in the situation. "Yeah I just crashed my car, but now I've learned a valuable lesson." "I got a D on this assignment, but I can use this as an opportunity to meet with the professor and show them that I care." "We're in the middle of a pandemic, but at least I can use this time to grow my relationship with God and write more." These 'silver lining' findings are not bad by any means, but what I've learned recently is that sometimes God doesn't want you to ignore the bad things. Sometimes you have to look straight at them, process them, and accept them. Instead of telling myself that the car accident was really a good thing, maybe I should just let myself be upset. I don't have to wallow forever, but letting myself be sad about things that are inherently sad things is healthy and necessary for growth. I still need to hope for the best outcome (that's ingrained in me at this point and isn't going anywhere anytime soon), but when that worst outcome comes, I have to be okay with it. Searching for the good in all things helps me maintain my joy. Ignoring the bad in all things leaves me in ignorance and stunts my growth. I've done my fair share of both searching and ignoring. Second, I've learned that sometimes people don't want to be cheered up. They want to cry, scream, and be fully and completely sad for a little while. Earlier this year, the pastor at my church preached a sermon in which he described how communities and churches must come together in times of suffering. It completely changed how I looked at helping people through hard times. This verse in particular hit home for me: "Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep." Romans 12:15 When the people I love are happy, I can and should celebrate with them. We should rejoice together because God gave them something beautiful and they're excited about it! The second part of the verse is the part that I really struggle with. Weep with those who weep. My pastor spoke that phrase again and my eyes were opened. I am called by God to empathize with the hurting, love them, and weep with them. My desperate attempts to remind sad people of happy things, make them laugh, or help them find the good in their sad situations were unbiblical. When I'm upset, I like to find what God wants me to learn, cling to something I can be happy about, and find joy again as quickly as possible. My second core value - second only to Serving the Lord - is Finding Joy. That is not the case for everyone! Some people's second core value may be understanding suffering, growing through difficult times, experiencing the bad and good parts of life, or who knows what else! When someone comes to me clearly upset about something, the best thing I can do is set aside my personal worldview, try to understand them better, and weep while they are weeping. Lastly, my optimism has been destructive at times because it feeds into the false idea that I know better than God. When I am unhealthy, I try to handle things on my own. When I am healthy and my relationship with God is solid, I look at a difficult situation and pray about it. I usually pray something like this: "God, what am I supposed to learn from this?" "How should I handle this situation?" "Why did you do this to me?" David cries out to God a lot in the Psalms. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest." Psalm 22:1-2 Yikes! I believe God wanted us to read the Psalms, see how David deals with anguish and suffering, and learn this valuable lesson: it's okay to be upset. When David is in turmoil, he begins praying. He asks God why he's struggling. He often times seems to be yelling at God. The Psalms are so very human. God knows what is best for us and does what is best for us 100% of the time. When things don't go how I wanted/expected, I immediately start diminishing the suffering, trying to handle things by myself, and shoving any emotion that seems slightly negative out immediately. If sadness was wrong, God would never feel sadness. If anger was wrong, God would never be angry. Why after learning this do I still cling to an optimist worldview? I don't believe that finding the good in bad situations is always bad. Staying sad when we're meant to be growing is not healthy. Crying out that God has forsaken us and then never asking Him what we should be learning is not healthy. Here are a few examples of how I've been trying to change my optimism to be healthier: Instead of: "This isn't really bad at all!" I tell myself: "This hurts, this sucks, and I hate this, but I see what God is doing." Instead of: "I don't want my friend to be upset, so I'm going to talk to them about all of the things we can be happy about." I remember: "God is putting my friend through this for a reason, and it's not my place to tell them they should be focusing on other things. I need to pray with them, weep with them, and pray for them." Instead of: "God wouldn't want me to stay upset about this, so I'm going to ignore it and focus on happier things." I tell myself: "God would want me to grow from this, so I'm going to talk to him about it and focus on it until I've learned and grown." These are just a few examples, but these small changes have transformed my faith. Most of the findings I've written about in this article are recent, and I'm still working through all of this. Understanding something and living it out perfectly are not the same, so please know that while I've learned this, I'm still working on it. Optimism is a part of who I am - it is ingrained in my personality, my ideology, and my faith - so it won't be going away any time soon. However, I am taking my first few steps to becoming the healthy, happy, and honest optimist God has called me to be. Verses: Romans 12:15 Psams 22:1-2 By: Annabelle C. Lee
We have been given the gift of free will by God, and until He takes this gift away from us, we have the ability to make every choice we come upon. There are several points in this statement that are arguable, and Christians like to hotly debate this topic, so let’s discuss why and how we have full and complete free will. What is free will? In order to understand why and how we have free will, we must first understand the concept of free will itself. Free will is the ability to make decisions for ourselves. It is the idea that God does not choose our actions for us, but rather, allows us to do so. This is described throughout scripture, so let’s analyze some of these verses and passages. “But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15 I’m sure many of you have heard the line “as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord”. You’ve probably seen it on a very cute sign at Hobby Lobby or Target. This part of the verse is very important, but I want us to focus on the first part: “if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve”. What an interesting statement God is making here! He is giving His children complete permission to choose another god if they do not want to follow Him. He gives us free will to choose to worship false gods and idols with the hope that we will instead choose Him. This is the essence of free will. Let’s look at another verse. “Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteousness of their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and He will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.” Isaiah 55:7 In this verse, God is telling the wicked people (that’s you, me, and everyone on Earth) to forsake, or to walk away from their wicked ways and thoughts. Why does God not simply force us to be good? Why does He ask us to leave our wicked ways when He could snap His fingers and make us all do only good things? The answer to this complicated question is He gave us free will. From the beginning of our existence (when He gave us the choice to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil), we were given free will. This includes the choice to do wicked things, and the wonderful choice to turn away from such wicked things and follow the Lord! It is up to each and every one of us which choice we want to make. Why were we given free will? Has your mom or dad or someone you know ever asked you to do something for them that suddenly became the last thing on earth you wanted to do? It could’ve been a chore, a favor, or an errand - really anything that you didn’t particularly want to do. They told you you had to do it, so when you did, it was against your will and your attitude was probably not the cheeriest. Now I want you to think back to a time where you voluntarily did something for someone. Maybe you washed the dishes when it was your sister’s turn, you spent a great deal of time helping a friend with homework, or even something like you paid for someone to go to college. You did these things because you wanted to, which made them infinitely more special than if you were forced to. When you made the decision to do something for that person, you showed them that you really loved them. This is similar to how it works with God! When God gives us the choice to choose the things of this world or to choose him, He is allowing us to make the choice to love Him. When we follow His law, we are showing Him and others that we love God and we want to do these things for His glory. If He forced us all to do good things, we would not be doing them out of our love for him, we would be doing them out of necessity. This is the basis of why God gave all of humanity free will. So what about the people who say God predestined some of us to go to Heaven and some of us to go to Hell? Are some of us fated to go to Hell even before we are born? This is an extremely layered question, and is one I hear quite often in Christian and non-Christian conversation. We’ll dive deep into the meaning of this question, so just hold on tight - hopefully it will all make sense soon! First of all, no one is predestined to never receive salvation before they are born. All people are given the chance to accept or deny God before they are placed in Heaven and Hell, so the idea that some people are destined to go to Hell and can not avoid this destiny is false. When God gave us the gift of free will he gave all of us the chance to choose Him. A well-known verse highlights this truth for us: “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16. This verse shows that anyone (whoever) believes in Jesus will have eternal life and live in Heaven with God. I’m sure many of you have heard this verse before, but I wonder if you’ve heard the next few verses. Let’s continue… “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” John 3:17-18 You see here that we are given two distinct choices: believing in Jesus or not believing in Jesus. It is our own free will that determines our destiny after we die. But if God is all-powerful, shouldn’t he be able to send people to Hell even if they didn’t choose that for themselves? The answer to this question is absolutely yes. The thing is, God would not do this. When God gave us free will, He gave us the ability to make this decision on our own. “Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God” John 1:12 He gave us the right to become His children, and He will not take that right away. It is not in the character of God to break His promises, so we can rest assured in the steadfastness and grace of God, knowing that He will not take this freedom away from us. It is not in His character. It is not who He is. What about people who never hear about God, and don’t know about the Gospel like babies or people who don’t have the ability to comprehend the Bible? Babies do not have the cognitive ability to understand that Jesus is their Savior and make the decision to follow Him; neither do some people with cognitive disabilities or people who do not have scripture translated in their language and have never heard the Gospel. These people have not been given the ability to choose to follow or deny God yet, so if they were to die, they would not be sent to Hell. I know this is a very controversial topic in the church, but the scriptures I have read and verses I have pasted below should clear this up. Don’t stop after the first one - you must read through all three before making any decisions about this topic. Promise? Alright, go on ahead: “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” Psalm 51:5 Before I give you the answer to why babies do not go to Hell, I ought to give you the verse many people use to say that they do! It is absolutely true that we are all born into sin. Babies hit their mothers, toddlers scream ‘mine!’, preschoolers lie to their teachers and steal from their friends. We see anger, selfishness, lying and stealing in tiny children! This is because we are all born into sin. What this means, is our inherent nature is actually to sin, not to be perfect and do wonderful things! This makes sense psychologically and biblically. So shouldn’t people who haven’t had the choice to choose God be sent to Hell because they’ve already sinned? Prepare to be mind-blown. “And the little ones that you said would be taken captive, your children who do not yet know good from bad—they will enter the land. I will give it to them and they will take possession of it.” Deuteronomy 1:39 Did you catch it? This verse explicitly says “your children who do not yet know good from bad”, showing that young children do not know the difference between good and bad things yet! This means that they are not yet cognitively developed enough to make the decision to follow or not to follow God yet, so if they die, they will certainly not suffer the consequences of someone who chose to go against God! Now I want to make an important distinction here before you get too excited. The ‘land’ the children will enter in this verse is not Heaven. The good news is, we know now that there is a time in a child’s life that they did not know right from wrong. Be encouraged! I’ve got another verse! “He will be eating curds and honey when He knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, for before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste.” Isaiah 7:15-16 Aha! “Before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right” clearly states that this boy does not have enough information to make the right choice. This applies not only to small children, but also to anyone who does not know “enough to reject the wrong and choose the right”. John 3:16 says “whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”, but how can someone who has no idea who God is, what Jesus did, or even how to spell the name 'Jesus' believe in him? These people are can not make this decision for themselves before they know enough to make their choice. Phew! That was a hard one! Isn’t God letting someone die before they are saved technically Him damning them to Hell? What an excellent question, Annabelle's doubts! The answer is no! If this person heard the Gospel, chose not to follow God, and died in this status, God did not send them to Hell… they did. Agh! This is such a nasty subject, I know. People really, really, really hate talking about Hell and anything having to do with it, but the reality is this is extremely important to what we believe. If a person is given the chance to choose God and they do not, they are, as the not as popular John 3:18 says, condemned. God gave us His son to pay for our sins so we could have a relationship with him. If we choose the things of this world instead of Him, after we die we can not go to Heaven. God can not be in the presence of sin, so an unsaved sinner, still dead in their sin, can not be in His presence. He is heartbroken to see one of His children die unsaved because it means He can not have that relationship with them any more. There are only two choices after death, Heaven and Hell, and He sits in Heaven, unable to be in the presence of sin, meaning an unsaved human can not come in. This is just an absolutely horrid thought - and God thinks so too. God despairs when He can no longer be in relationship with His children, but He is a righteous and fair God, and He must do what is right. To remind you how much God loves you and how much He desperately wants to see you in Heaven, read what He says here: “This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and He will give you many years in the land He swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Deuteronomy 30:19-20 God has placed before us two choices: life and death. He pleads with us - choose life so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God. He desperately wants all of us to choose Him, and He gave us free will so we may do so. A young teenager may die in a car accident without giving their life to Christ. If they hear about Jesus and understand it even just one time, they are responsible for their choice - there are only two options. Because of this, if they had the choice and did not choose God and they die, they can not enter into His presence. This means we have a very heavy responsibility… What is our responsibility, as Christians, to help others make the right choice to follow God with their free will? It is an incredible gift to have the option to choose or not to choose God. However, it is a big responsibility. Our mission, as Christians, is to show others who Christ is and let God bring them to Him. We never can know when our days will be cut short and the decision we made on earth will yield eternal joys/consequences. Live in a way that shows everyone around you who Jesus is and what He is like. It is difficult for people to believe in something they can not see. Be the part of Jesus that they can see. Show them how Jesus has worked in your life and how you’ve been able to see Him! Tell them why you made the choice you did and talk to them about who God is. Tell them that they have been given the gift of free will and they can choose to be with God, a loving, all-powerful, all-knowing, merciful, perfect and holy Father forever. After seeing and talking to you, making the right choice should be a little bit easier. What if I haven’t made the choice yet myself? I would encourage you to think about your decision carefully - it’s a big one. The Bible tells us that a Christian’s life will be no cake-walk. You’ll run into hardships and difficult times like everyone else because this world is corrupt. Luckily, if you believe in Jesus, this world is the closest thing to Hell you’ll ever see. Through faith in God we can get through any trial or tribulation. He gives us peace that surpasses all understanding. He grants us joy unimaginable. In Him, we are given strength and wisdom freely so that we are equipped for every storm that comes our way. Read the Bible. It is all breathed by God, which means it is written by Him. He chose many different people throughout history to write down what He told them and share it with the rest of the world. If these words were written by regular people the chances are good we would not still be reading it today. The Bible is not only still being read today, it is the best selling book of all time. Furthermore, it is the best selling book of the year… every year. It lives up to the hype. Some good places to begin are Ephesians, Romans, Acts, and Matthew. Why is my best advice to you to read the Bible? Because God is a lot smarter than me, a lot wiser than me, and He knows you quite a lot better! I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this in-depth explanation of what free will is, what it means, how to defend the idea, and how it applies to us. If you have a friend that you think would be interested in reading this article, please pass this link along to them. Thank you for taking time to learn and explore more about Christianity and God’s Word! Love you :) Verses (if you’d like to read more on the topics!) Joshua 24:15 Isaiah 55:7 John 3:16-18 Psalm 51:5 Deuteronomy 1:39 Isaiah 7:15-16 Deuteronomy 30:19-20 |
Annabelle C. LeeThank you for checking out my work! ArchivesCategories |