On 5 Aug 2004, at 8:28 pm, Dan Minette wrote:
I missed covering this earlier.
Several things gradually changed my self-acknowledged status; I've previously mentioned the issue of belief as a Gift, and my inability to accept that Belief is in itself a Grace or Gift, because that means that God withheld that Gift from some of my friends - good, honest and caring folk - why?
Not having Belief is like not having Alzheimer's - a great good. Why on earth would you wish a crippling brain-illness on anyone you liked?
I understand that the idea of double predestination has floated around
Christianity, but its support in scripture is tenuous at best. In a sense,
faith is a gift; but one that is freely offered to all. Detrich Bonnhoffer
gave a great statement about receiving this gift: from obedience comes
faith. In other words, we should not sit back and wait for God to grant us
faith, we should work on doing God's will, and that will open our hearts up
for faith.
Look at Matthew 25 for one discussion on those who really have faith.
Sick gobbledygook.
-- William T Goodall Mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web : http://www.wtgab.demon.co.uk Blog : http://radio.weblogs.com/0111221/
"It is our belief, however, that serious professional users will run out of things they can do with UNIX." - Ken Olsen, President of DEC, 1984.
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