That last post was long and a lot to think about, so now I give you something easier. A turtle with two heads!!

Embracing the Paradox

Just before starting my freshman year of college, I went on Wheaton's High Road experience. It involved tromping around the woods for a couple weeks with some other incoming freshman. I remember that it was during this period that I met my first real life Calvinist. Somehow I had never been exposed to the whole predestination, elect, TULIP type stuff that is part of this tradition, and was somewhat surprised that there were Christians who actually believed these things.

One good thing about encountering a new idea through a friend that you respect and find intelligent, is that it encourages you to search for the truth in that idea. Although the ideas of Calvinism seemed somewhat strange to me, I thought there must be something to them. Some people love to argue back and forth over these issues, but I eventually came to the conclusion that there was truth in Calvinism as well as what I was more familiar with (Arminianism?). Although the views are somewhat paradoxical I now understand them as describing different aspects of the same thing. Sort of like describing a statue from the front and the back. You can't get the full picture from just one view.

Now for the past year or so there has been a theological question bouncing around in my head. The question has to do with a perceived paradox of God's will for my life vs my own free will for my life. That question can simplify down to issues like, "Does God's will include a specific job for me or am I just supposed to pick a job I like?". "Was it God's plan that I got a speeding ticket and was late to work, or was that just a consequence of my actions?".

This question was coming to the surface largely because of my cynicism toward frequent talk I heard in Christian circles about finding/doing/knowing "God's will" or how such and such a thing was "part of God's plan". In truth I think these are catch phrases that can get thrown around in church too frequently, and I was getting somewhat fed up. I didn't want to attribute all of life's details to God's will or God's plan, and the implied determinism. Instead I wanted to make God's will much more general, "offering a gift of salvation through the sacrifice of his son", leaving the details of life up to our own making/choosing.

To cut to the chase a bit, I don't know why I didn't see this question as the same old thing I was thinking about in the Calvinist (predestination/salvation) issue. The truth not being either or, but a combination of both views (Read Millinerd's Response to my question). In this issue, as in many others, I think that if you cling to tightly to one view then you can miss out on truth that the other side contains. In my case, clinging to the free will part was making me very cynical towards people who were leaning towards the God's will part. Maybe even closing myself off to God's leading in my life (whatever that may look like).

This is just a good illustration of how we needn't always be so Western in our thinking about Christianity. Trying to work out questions of faith as if they were Geometry problems where every little contradiction throws the whole thing off. Well, at least that's what I'm thinking right now, and I'll end this marathon post at that.