Shadowlander: LOL! Didn't I mention chicken, vegetables, and bread before? But you want details. Men [yes, you are stereotypical in my book ]... Okay, I had CB's delicious Sunday homestyle chicken [fried and boneless ], fried cabbage and green beans [both with little bits of ham], some buttered biscuits and cornbread, and sugary lemon water ... yum! Click here and scroll to the bottom for a picture of the chicken.

Gladius: I don't care for catfish. I prefer grilled salmon. But I love CB's green beans, mashed potatoes, and root beer! I also like their hashbrown casserole and fried apples.

GB: auras, eh? My aunt can see auras around people's heads, but I don't know if that's a good thing spiritually. [She's not a Christian, btw.]

Fencer: awesome testimony! And excellent scientific examples! I'm still in awe of laminin ... in the shape of a cross, with what looks like a snake entwined around it [Numbers 21] holding me together!

I too am Pentecostal, or at least I attend a Pentecostal church, I have fallen victim to more reformed doctrine then my fellow church members adhere to but besides that, they have prayers answered all the time and they are very sincere in prayer. Denomination has nothing to do with prayer, it is all really left the the sovereignty of God and his desire for the future. I am sure you know that, at least the denomination bit.

Yes, prayer has nothing to do with denomination. What amazes me is that this particular Baptist church I'm describing and regularly attend seems to have more faith in God than the particular Pentecostal church I also regularly attend. The latter has a reputation for being alive but they're dead. My favorite Pentecostal church? Brooklyn Tabernacle in New York City ... they're not dead! Thanks for the input.

Argh! Now I am really hungry. I like eating at Cracker Barrel but where we live now the closes one is aprox. 122 miles away! (Since you were nice enough to post the link, 220chirsTian, I figured I would check it out.) No, Shadowlander, I do not remember what my favorite thing to eat there is. It probably included mashed potatoes and gravy though. One of the reasons we like to eat there is because they offer skim milk. They also have those peg games on the table and a store to explore. I don't think I've ever had catfish but I love salmon.

On the topic of food, a few pages back we were discussing when people started to eat meat and that God gave Noah permission to eat meat after the flood. (Or something along those lines. I'm not going to sort through all of the post to find it ). In Genesis 7, it says that Noah brought seven pairs of clean beasts and only one pair of unclean beasts. A footnote says, "The five extra pairs of clean animals were for food, and for sacrifice later." I know that footnotes can be wrong but this one does seem to make sense. Also, how did they know which animals were clean and unclean? All of the rules of eating, aren't given until after God saved the Israelites from pharaoh.

The other day my sister looks at me and randomly asks, "If Adam and Eve hadn't sinned, would God have made it warm enough that we wouldn't need clothes? Because I wouldn't want to be naked right now even if I didn't know I was naked." (The temperature was in the thirties). Then she wonder how there would be enough room for everyone in the garden and if it would expand to fit all the people. Next, she wanted to know if the garden was on Earth or if Adam and Eve came down to Earth. I told her it was on Earth and that because of sin the world became less pleasant. She wanted to know if Adam and Eve really could have had that much power. We were unable to continue the conversation because she had to get back to her homework, but it got me thinking. What did happen to the garden? The last we hear of it an angel or some heavenly being is gaurding the entrance.

Wow! Nobody's posted anything in 3 days! So do I just tend to squelch discussion?

I don't think it is you. It is the way this thread runs. It seems to either be feast or famine. (i.e. a lot of posts in rapid succession so that it is hard if not impossible to keep up or no post. I think slow and steady would be nice.) Any on the subject of food, I have to go make dinner or my sister might eat me.

Just checking in.

Been a while since I posted here, so here's a few updates:

Life: I was suicidally depressed for a while, which prevented me from...you know, having the interest to muster a post, and then I checked myself into an in patient clinic for a while. I just got out Monday. No longer in such a deep funk as I was, but still feeling pretty bad, and trying a different medication.

Religion: Back in the Roman Catholic Church. The reasons I left now seem trivial to me, though so do many of the more apologetical reasons I converted. In the end, I decided to go back because I found beauty there, and truth, and it's the only church that's really felt like home to me. Plus, I think a lot of questions, e.g. how to approach predestination, are just going to frustrate me with not-wholly-satisfactory answers forever. I think some questions are the kind that aren't answered. They just show us the limits of human experience and knowledge.

So, I'm back, back here and back in Rome. Hi.

Try to engage you guys at a later date, but for now I have to run, so laters and peace.

On the topic of food, a few pages back
The other day my sister looks at me and randomly asks, "If Adam and Eve hadn't sinned, would God have made it warm enough that we wouldn't need clothes? Because I wouldn't want to be naked right now even if I didn't know I was naked." (The temperature was in the thirties). Then she wonder how there would be enough room for everyone in the garden and if it would expand to fit all the people. Next, she wanted to know if the garden was on Earth or if Adam and Eve came down to Earth. I told her it was on Earth and that because of sin the world became less pleasant. She wanted to know if Adam and Eve really could have had that much power. We were unable to continue the conversation because she had to get back to her homework, but it got me thinking. What did happen to the garden? The last we hear of it an angel or some heavenly being is gaurding the entrance.

Well, God knew that Adam & Eve would fall into Sin, so He A.) didn't need to adjust the temperature for naked people , and B.) didn't have to worry about expanding the garden, for He knew only Adam & Eve would dwell in it. And yes, of course, the garden was on the Earth, the garden was protected by an Angel, but, I believe, it was simply washed away by the Flood, like everything else was, God really did start over everything. Adam & Eve did not have the power to make sin enter the World, it was in God's Will, and under God's sight and control, if He did not want to allow Man to make this decision, He would have stopped them, for if God did not plan letting them bring Sin into the world, what sort of God would that be? A God who has no rule over men and simply weeps in heaven over Man's actions. So, yes, Man did have their own free choice to take the bite of that apple, but, it was all under God's Will.

Oh, and I'm back.

LITD

In regards to prayer and faith. I was watching/listening to a sermon by Adrian Rodgers on TV a couple weeks ago and he had a really cool sermon on faith. And the way he explained it, really brought out the meaning of what Jesus meant by saying "if you have faith the size of a mustard seed". First you have to know what faith is.

Faith is NOT belief. It is related, but it is not belief. Faith requires an object. You don't believe that the chair you are sitting in as you read this post (in my case, type) is going to keep you from sending your toosh to the floor. You have faith that it will. Here is an even better example. Airplanes. You can believe that an airplane will fly, and you can even get the scientific proof of how it occurs. But it is not until you actually get on that plane that you actually demonstrate faith. You may not entirely trust it (as a lot of people are very nervous about flying), but you have faith, regardless of the amount, in that plane holding you up 35,000 feet above ses level.

When it comes to prayer, it does not matter how much faith you have, as long as you have faith in the right object. The man who brought his demon-possessed son to Jesus in Mark 9 had faith that Jesus really could do what he ended up doing, and said "I believe. Help my unbelief". This man had tried everything and even though he had faith in Jesus, he still had doubts. It doesn't matter if we have a lot of faith or just a tiny amount of faith. If we place whatever size faith we have in Jesus, we are putting it in the right place and miracles will happen.

As to why one church is having a lot of miracles and another isn't, let's be realistic here. Just because God is moving one way in one location, that doesn't mean he should do the same for the other. One of the biggest dangers in church is attempting to replicate the setting of a senario in which God moved. Here is an example. Last Spring, International Family Missions (the missions organization my parents work for) brought down three teams from Colorado, Idaho, and Wyoming (through a local church in each state). The Sunday the Idaho team arrived, my parents, the team leaders, and I went to church en route to picking the team up from the airport (my dad was the bus driver). God told the team leaders to talk to my pastor about setting up a worship service during the week. It was a pure spur-of-the-moment thing, and two days later, on a Tuesday night, my church worship team gave up thier afternoon for a 1 1/2 hour worship service. The team came back to the US from Juarez, MX hot and tired from their day of ministry and the service competely refreshed the team and the last three days of ministry were amazing. The Wyoming team heard about that and asked about doing the same thing. We seriously considered it, but felt that to do so would make it and 'us-thing' and not a 'God-thing'. What worked for the Idaho team was not meant to work for the Wyoming team.

Just because God doesn't work in big areas like physical healings and other miracles, doesn't mean he isn't working in other areas that we don't see. For about four years, I went to a Christian Reformed Church (unaware they were Christian Reformed for two years). This was a church that was pretty inwardly focused, in that their concerns were about taking care of thier church body and what was left over might go outward. Big things weren't happening, but while my family was there, God worked. He used my family to awaken them to look beyond themselves, and now they have their own employed missionaries, and even have had two recent church plants. Again, we never saw miracles like healings taking place that I am aware of, but God still moved. As Aslan in PC (movie) said, "Things never happen the same way twice." If you want prayer, if you want revival, don't pray for a revivial like this one or that one. Pray that God will move (which I could safely say he already is) and pray that he will show you how and where he is moving. If you join what he is already doing, not only will you be successful, but you may get what you wanted in the beginning, even if not in the form you expected.

Okay, I had CB's delicious Sunday homestyle chicken [fried and boneless ], fried cabbage and green beans [both with little bits of ham], some buttered biscuits and cornbread, and sugary lemon water ... yum!

See? And had you mentioned that the first time around... . It's been a while since I was there, but I seem to recall they make a mean country-style steak. As for sides I'll take mashed potatoes with gravy, greenbeans, and a big ol' honkin' pile of collards if they're available.

Shadowlander, I knew you were going to start talking about food! As soon as I saw 220's post I knew you were going to ask what she ordered.
(For the record, my favorite item on the menu is the catfish dinner with mashed potatoes and green beans, and a bottle of that awesome root beer.

But I've never eaten Catfish before. I wonder what it would be like to eat an "interim" species . I bet they are tasty.

I don't think I've ever had catfish but I love salmon.

I enjoy catfish, although I've never had it from CB. My mom didn't cook us foods she considered to be subpar in nature...catfish are "bottom feeders"...they eat the ickiness and sludge at the bottom of the river or lake, and so that was on the "ewww gross...banned food" list. So many of the foods I always wanted to try I ended up having to wait until when I was in the USAF and deployed to different places. I've been on several trips down to Louisiana, and I'm here to tell you brothers and sisters, catfish is gooooooooood. It has to be done right, of course, like anything else. I don't much care for tartar sauce (mayo is undeniably evil ) so I usually just toss on lots of hot sauce! Mmmm.

And sweet tea for the win!

Life: I was suicidally depressed for a while, which prevented me from...you know, having the interest to muster a post, and then I checked myself into an in patient clinic for a while. I just got out Monday. No longer in such a deep funk as I was, but still feeling pretty bad, and trying a different medication.

I don't really post in here much anymore because I feel like a man armed with a BB gun in a room full of spiritual Navy Seals, and thus I can't really guide you as well as these folks can. But please, if it ever gets to the point where you're thinking of that, don't hesitate to come on here and ask for someone to talk to. Many nights I'm in here late or in the very early morning (long after everyone else has hit the hay) and I'm more than willing to just talk to you. I lost a sister to suicide, and had an "almost moment" with it myself many years ago, and so I understand, at least in some part, what you're going through. Just please, if you need to chit chat, let us know and we'll try and figure it out and work through it.

[quote="LITD":3v4wiuv4] Adam & Eve did not have the power to make sin enter the World, it was in God's Will, and under God's sight and control, if He did not want to allow Man to make this decision, He would have stopped them, for if God did not plan letting them bring Sin into the world, what sort of God would that be? A God who has no rule over men and simply weeps in heaven over Man's actions. So, yes, Man did have their own free choice to take the bite of that apple, but, it was all under God's Will.

Amen! I've been struggling over the apparent dichotomy between God's goodness and sovereignty for some time now, but I have finally accepted it as a divine paradox and believed it with faith. That said, though, there are some ways of looking at it that make it a bit clearer. In the Screwtape Letters , Srewtape describes God as living not in time, but in an eternal Now. And for a diabolical being, I think he stated it pretty succinctly. God's foreknowledge isn't quite what its name suggests; it's not really premeditated because it happened it God's present tense. Just because a thing is expressed for us in the past tense doesn't mean it is for Him; He sees a thousand years ago and today and a thousand years from today all at the same time: to Him they are all Now. What sort of time can there be in eternity, anyway? Time is for mortals.

Indeed, Gladius. However, I think the easiest way of explaining it, instead of all this talk of God being outside of time, is that Man has to have free will to a certain extent, so that we are not merely puppets and God is the puppet master. God also has to have sovereignty so Man is not just running around while God stays helpless in Heaven until Christ returns...

So basically, man can do whatever they want if it is under God's Will. It's almost as God is gravity, if God is the laws of Nature. Man (in an evolutionist's eyes) can do whatever they want, only limited by the laws of Nature, because Man cannot simply just grow wings and fly, that would be utter chaos! It is just like God does not let Man create utter chaos, for God is the only one who can truly restore order within the Universe, not the "brilliance" of Men.

True. But the paradox comes trying to explain how man's choices are free at all if they have been foreordained as the Bible says. The sovereignty of God and the freedom of man seem exclusive of each other, and from a purely philosophical standpoint I think they are. But our natural minds cannot perfectly comprehend that which is outside of nature; when it comes to choosing between Scripture and Reason, Scripture is always the right choice. This issue is one that we just have to accept as a both/and situation, and believe it by faith.

I think sometimes the questions we ask, as with the ones that surround, e.g., predestination, are not so much the kind that can be answered as the kind that mark the limits of human understanding. Certainly God is sovereign in some sense, but what does that mean for us? I believe in free will in a sense, and I believe in God's sovereignty in a sense, and I will explain both of those senses.

Free will: Man has the capacity to choose one thing over another. His choice, however, is constrained by his essential nature and the circumstances. Does that make him less free? Maybe, maybe not. I think he's still free, because if he was not, we wouldn't condemn him but lament his sad slavery. It seems, in fact, that we sort of do both, which is odd, but oh well. Anyway, what exactly it means for man to be free is up for debate, but it's not a particularly interesting debate to me so I'll move on.

God's sovereignty: God willfully permits all that does happen, to happen. He is not the direct cause of all actions, but nothing catches him by surprise. He foreknows and foreordains and predestines and all the rest. All evil things he turns to good use. All good things involve his grace in some way. It's rather like a man conducting a symphony, and some of the players go rogue and try to play a different tune, but the conductor is so savvy that he planned for that and incorporates the tune into his music to make one melody more rich and beautiful than either of the original two. They still went rogue, though, and I wouldn't want to be them when the symphony ends.

How God's will and man's will interact: this is where people always stumble, myself included. If God is predestining stuff, is man still free? In what sense? I think at this point it's necessary to refer to what I said above: "Sometimes the questions we ask are not so much the kind that can be answered as the kind that mark the limits of human understanding." And that's really all I have to say.

Hey 220, I totally understand what you were saying now. I hope I didn't come off too saucy in my post by the way Prayer is a crazy thing after all but very nifty I also hope you don't mind my postal intrusions lol. I just kind of jumped into your conversation there.

perspicacity, that's a great analogy. I'm a musician, so I naturally shudder to think of going rogue in the middle of a performance. My conductor's wrath would truly be terrible! Praise God that He can and does use our sinfulness for His glory, and the harmonization of His Great Theme.

Faolchu: it's okay.

persp: praying for you!

Shadowlander: update on my CB meal. I had green beans the Sunday before but this past Sunday I had turnip greens [with little bits of meat]. Still delicious! FYI: why do you not like mayo? I prefer it to ketchup! However, although I used to like tartar sauce at Captain D's, I now prefer cocktail sauce.

Fencer: thank you again for the excellent illustration of faith. RE: prayer / healing ... My problem with my home Pentecostal church compared with the Baptist one is that in the latter, when they hear a really bad report from the doctor, they have all-night prayer vigils! I can't remember the last time that happened at my home church. I don't know if it EVER has.

And yes, of course, the garden was on the Earth, the garden was protected by an Angel, but, I believe, it was simply washed away by the Flood, like everything else was, God really did start over everything.

Thanks for this. I never thought of it this way. People talk about Cain as though his descendants were still around, but his entire family tree was wiped out in the flood! You have a point. Maybe Eden doesn't exist anymore either.

I don't know if this will help much in the God's sovereignty vs man's free will discussion, but I love this quote by Spurgeon, which I think says a lot about the spiritual realities of both centrifugal force and laminin.

Our world has two forces; it has one tendency to run off at a tangent from its orbit; but the sun draws it by a centripetal power, and attracts it to itself. Oh! Christian, thou wilt never walk alright, and keep in the orbit of truth, if it be not for the influence of Christ perpetually attracting thee to the center [Song 1:4; Hosea 11:4]. Christ is drawing thee to himself, to his likeness, to his character, to his love, to his bosom, and in that way thou art kept from thy natural tendency to fly off and to be lost in the wide fields of sin. Bless God, that Christ lifted up draws all his people unto him [John 12].

—Charles H. Spurgeon, Daily Help (New York: Penguin, 2006), 2 February devotion

220 wrote:

FYI: why do you not like mayo? I prefer it to ketchup!

Why do I like ketchup and do not like mayo? Because. Why do I like catfish? Because.

Light wrote:

And yes, of course, the garden was on the Earth, the garden was protected by an Angel, but, I believe, it was simply washed away by the Flood, like everything else was.

There are several theories as to what "washed away" might have meant.

The majority theory is that the garden was south of Iraq and is now underwater. Secular scientists tend to endorse this theory. The reasoning is that Eden must have been a high place (mountains are mentioned in the vicinity), and that one river later split into four rivers, which rarely happens in other parts of the world. When Noah's Flood came, the waters of the deep emerged. As the water drained away, (flooded) Eden found itself sitting over a hollow cavern. The land could not support its own weight and collapsed into a massive sinkhole. This would cause the four rivers to actually flow backwards into the sinkhole, since backwards would be the new "downhill." The Tigris and Euphrates survived because there is a lot of meltwater in the mountains. They had enough water to flow backwards and continue to do so to this day. The other two rivers, Pison and Gihon, had been the water source for what are now desert regions. When the geography tilted the rivers backwards, these two rivers had no water and dried up. Satellite images record several "fossil rivers" that seem to meet the Tigris and Euphrates at a point that is now beneath the sea. Also, the region has a history of giant sinkholes, such as the one that swallowed the ancient city of Ubar.

Other theories are that Eden was in the neighborhood of Israel or Lebanon or that Eden was in Turkey, or sometimes either south of Iraq or somewhere in Armenia. And some list all possibilities in succession. Most of these theories depend on rift valley theories and to some extent plate tectonics.

So we find ourselves in the interesting position that secular science, which has fossil rivers and historic sinkholes on its side, embraces the short and severe and recent solution -- whereas some young-earthers endorse rifts and plates, which purportedly take more millions of years to come to pass than young-earth beliefs incorporate.

I don't think it is you. It is the way this thread runs. It seems to either be feast or famine. (i.e. a lot of posts in rapid succession so that it is hard if not impossible to keep up or no post. I think slow and steady would be nice.)

Thanks, Pattertwig!

Why do I like ketchup and do not like mayo? Because. Why do I like catfish? Because.

Because is fine, but I guess I didn't make my point regarding Shadowlander's comment clearer. Not liking something is one thing. Calling it "undeniably evil" is another. No food is evil. We should thank God for everything put before us, whether we like it or not. Read 1 Timothy 4:4-5.

FYI: I don't know that I care that much about Eden, i.e. where it is, assuming it still exists. Even if we found it, what would we find? An angel guarding the tree of life! We can't enter Eden, so there's no point!