I liked the Life On The Way Devotional I received in my Inbox today (it's great, now the one automated message I get each day is a devotional and NOT an SAT question of the day)
Paul wrote, "I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It's not important who does the planting, or who does the watering
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I guess the only thing I would add to this discussion is the element of free will. I believe that God gave us the ultimate gift (and responsibility) of free will. God does not want a bunch of mindless robots that automatically do the right thing. God wants us to choose to love him and to love our neighbor as we have first loved ourselves, not because we have to, but because we choose to. Hence the gift of free will. This is a very dangerous gift because if you watch the news, every day you see people abuse this gift and act selfishly, but what the news rarely covers is the thousands of little acts of kindness that happen every day when people actually do choose to love their neighbor as they first have loved them self. Unfortunately our media does not consider this news, but this is the gift (and the choice) that God offers us every day.
So, is God responsible for how we use our freedom? No, I don't believe that God is responsible for the good things that happen to us (getting in to a good college for example) just as God is also not responsible the bad/selfish things that people do (like crime.) All Christ promises us in the gospels is that he will be with us in the midst of whatever comes. Even when we must face the consequences of our bad choices, Christ will not take away the consequences that we have earned, but he will be with us and give us hope and grace and peace in the midst of whatever challenge we face.
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So I want to write a clarification. What I do is not what God always wants. That's because I have that choice, that free will as Paul said in his comment, to do what I want. It's up to me to decide whether I will listen to God. Where I am and what happens to me is not what God always wants. But no matter what happens, He will always be there.
What I also mean is that what I do and what I say and who I am morphs me into the person I become. And I think that statement is already interesting as it is, without any sort of reference to God. It's funny to think about that I could be this other person, but I'm not because I have not led the life they have led and met the people they have met and experienced their experiences.
When I write in lj, I probably don't make sense all the time and are saying things that I might not 100% believe in because they can be interpreted in many ways. I'm simply pouring out the thoughts of my head. I am not trying to convince anyone of my thoughts. People can comment on what they think about what I'm thinking, but it's not like I'm publishing a book or anything. I'm just writing about whatever's in my head and sometimes I might type something that I later realize I don't actually agree with, which is shown in this case because I realize that I don't agree with Ben's statement anymore because I am not going to hold God responsible for the actions I choose to make. I am not God, as I said in an earlier comment.
Just thank you Paul, once again. I needed someone else to step in because I really am not the right person to explain all of these things. I hope to someday become more educated. But for now, I'm just trying to slowly figure out what I believe and don't believe.
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