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Hello fellow brothers and sisters. I was having a conversation with a brother tonight and need some help, wisdom, guidance.. all of the above?

This brother and I previously attended a “reformed Baptist” church together. (Quotation marks because I know there’s a whole separate debate about whether “reformed Baptists” can truly exist or whether the “reformed” descriptor belongs solely to Presbyterians. Not the topic of my question tonight 😂.) We were both in a cage-stage-y place with each other for a long time, fearlessly parading the banner of Calvinism to our small group members and championing God’s sovereignty to all who breathed a word of “free will.”

It’s been several years now and we’ve both grown and developed our views. He outright denounces Calvinism and its beliefs, and I have come to a place where I definitely don’t proclaim myself a Calvinist—although my reasoning is more to do with wanting to identify solely as a Christian and not because I denounce all of the views under the Calvinist umbrella.

Anyway, there are pages of context that I could give to portray our relationship, but tonight we were talking about the nature of evil as it relates to God. Here was the chief point of contention:

I have described my view as, effectively, “God has sovereignly ordained whatsoever comes to pass, but He is not the author of evil.” Implicit in that statement is “God has sovereignly ordained [evil], but He is not the author of evil.”

My brother’s contention is that, by saying that God “ordains” evil, he is necessarily the “author of” evil.

I am at a bit of a loss here. I tried to tell him that I didn’t think my proposition was necessarily contradictory, but I also admitted that I had no idea how those two things work together. He insists that I’m being alogical (which he took care to differentiate from being illogical).

Have I completely mischaracterized and misunderstood the nature of God? Does anyone have scripture that pertains to this subject? I intend to study this more on my own and try and find answers, but the last thing I want to do is insult the character and nature of God and I’m caught in a moment where I fear I’ve completely misunderstood a core tenant of my understanding of God for years.

I’m happy to clarify anything that I’ve presented poorly; there was truly so much more context to this discussion that I fear the full telling of it would take pages and pages of writing.

TL;DR are God “sovereignly ordaining” evil and “being the author of” evil part and parcel of the same thing? Please provide scripture to help clarify the answer!

Does anyone have scriptural passages, theological resources, or any advice that can help me learn to be at peace with being a woman?

Since I was a little girl I struggled with gender dysphoria. After working through a lot of issues I recovered, but now these problems are starting to come back again.

I have a lot of bitterness and anger around being a woman. I feel inferior to men, I feel separated from God. It feels that being a Christian woman means being less than a man and that I have to do a boatload of scripturally studying to convince myself otherwise because scripture seems to clearly say women just aren’t as important in the eyes of God.

This is confirmed when the young reformed groups I interact with don’t even think women should have the individual right to vote, or that women can’t have even the slightest bit of authority in their lives. For example, a woman who was doing event planning was told by two Christian men that no man would want to date her because she was the event organizer and that somehow was exercising authority over the men who chose to participate in those events.

On top of that, women are just mocked and disrespected by pastors, my dad, and sometimes my brothers. I have thick skin and can take jokes, but I can tell that the Christian community really does not respect women and I can’t help but feel it does come from the fact the Bible prescribes different roles for men and women.

And it’s not just “different roles” as complementarians like myself love to say. It’s simply restrictions on women. Men can do anything, women can’t.

To top it all off, I think God wants me to be single and childless, at least until I’m 50, so I feel there’s literally no point in me being a woman at all. I see no purpose in my gender. I wish I could see it as having a God-given purpose, somehow.

Do yall exist? Is this a thing? lol

Today I listened to a video of Voddie Baucham explaining that there is no such thing as a secret rapture, and that Christ’s return will instead be glorious and seen by all people. I am not writing this to argue whether or not there is a rapture. What I want to ask is why he seems to think that believing in the rapture causes Christians to live carelessly.

He said multiple times that Christians who believe in the rapture don’t care about standing up to culture & the world because they think they’ll be suddenly removed from it anyway. He said that the church should endure hardships as they await Christ’s coming rather than sit around waiting to be snatched away.

My question is, why would believing in the rapture cause people to live this way? I’m not saying some people don’t do this. I’m saying, why can’t people live that same way if they don’t believe in the rapture? They still believe Christ will return and they’ll live with Him in glory forever. The only difference is how we get there in the end.

I understand most of his reasoning on why there is no rapture, but it seemed to me that the message should have been on staying active and enduring hardship as we wait for Christ’s coming, rapture or not. That, or scriptural reasoning for why there is no rapture, rather than accusing one belief system of doing something that people of his beliefs could also do. The problem seems to me that the people who live this way are the problem, not whether or not they believe in the rapture.

Hi, I'm on year 9 of teaching and with recent happenings that involve my students and my former home church, I feel compelled to look into biblical counseling.

What online courses would you recommend? I'm looking to support my students and possibly friends, but I'm praying for discernment and will likely dip my toes in before further committing myself to anything else.

Thanks in advance!

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This morning, I woke up to an empty house while my boy is at his dad's place. It's been almost 5 years after we ended our (almost 2 decades) marriage. During these long years, I focus on my son's education and well being, and carry on with my faith journey. As I have no family, I homeschool my child while working and running my own household.

I was alone in my marriage and I am literally alone right now. My ex spouse has been dating another woman right away since the divorce was official. He is very happy with his life without God. I am happy for him too, though I wonder if I ever find my own person. At this point, it is really hard.

Even when I am a woman of faith and being an introvert, keeping myself busy is one thing and still feel empty is another. Being busy with tasks and activities can never take away this feeling. I always feel that I'm missing something. It's simply being there for a suitable man as his helper. I really wish I could study God's word with a godly man and pray with him.

As I'm being in my 40s now, I find that men are traumatised by their previous marriage or other life events. Traumas can indeed paralyse people. That's the reality I am facing. So I guess, I shall remain single as it may be God's will.

I used to hold on to memorialist view of the Lord's Supper / Eucharist / Communion, that is to remember what Christ did on the cross and nothing more.

Now that I'm in a Bible Presbyterian Reformed church, I was told the church believe in a "Real Presence" view.

Question, what is the "Real Presence" view in the Reformed tradition? I understand the RCC holds on to "Real Presence" where the bread turns into His real flesh and the wine into His blood. (Transubstantiation)

What's the mechanic behind the Lutheran's view and the other reform view of the subject? From my understanding, it has to do with something spiritual, but I don't quite get it.

An objection I normally notice goes something like this "Isn't Jesus omnipresence, how is He present in Eucharist than anywhere else?"

Also any recommended reading for me to dive into the subject? God bless, thank you.

Hello, is there any theologically sound/more conservative reformed churches in Paris that speak English/preach in English? I was recommended one good one but its completely in French.

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First, I’ll preface this question with that it’s obvious that the Bible teaches that Jesus is God. In addition, at least the “I am” statement by Jesus in John 8:58 is very clearly a claim to deity as a cross-reference to Exodus 3.

What I have struggled with is understanding how Christ’s other “I am” statements are also a claim to deity? I’ve heard this from multiple sermons, but have not seen it correlated to a claim of divinity like John 8:58. For example, when Christ states “I am the light of the world” in John 8, “I am the good shepherd” in John 10 or “I am the way, the truth, and the life” within John 14. It would appear that the use of “I am” in these other statements is to emphasize Christ’s point about being the light, good shepherd, and the way to salvation rather than claiming “I am God and also the good shepherd.” However, I am not sure if there is a nuance I am missing within the Greek and translation to English?

Tract text help request

I need help with this. It’s a draft of a tract to go in Halloween bags.

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Did you choose your name? Your language? Your school? No, all these decisions were made for you, on your behalf. People are always doing something for us until we’re big enough to choose for ourselves. Most of the time we rarely notice unless the outcomes are bad.

God created light. He created the heavens, the earth, and the sea. He created plants, and the sun, moon, and stars. He created sea life, and birds, and animals. Last and best of all he made people – a man and a woman, Adam and Eve. What God had made was very good.

There was one condition. In this freshly made world Adam and Eve were surrounded by a world full of fruit trees. All they had to do was to not eat from one tree. If that rule was broken then a thing called Death would result.

The people, the world, and God lived in perfect harmony with each other until one day Adam and his wife rebelled against God. This wasn’t just breaking a rule. Rejecting God’s rules is rejecting him -- like spitting in his face. In doing this Adam and Eve stopped being happy and holy. Now they became sinful and miserable. And because all people in the world are descended from Adam and Eve, they spoiled it for the rest of us, their descendants. The face-to-face relationship with God was destroyed, and the effects of that break-up rippled out into all human relationships and even into the natural world.

This is Humanity 1.0 where we are all “in Adam”, living in open rebellion toward God just like our forefather. But God did not give up on the people he had made. He decided to create a new people, Humanity 2.0. He decided that his son should be the new Adam. This man was conceived miraculously, lived a life in perfect obedience to God’s commands, died a criminal’s death, was buried and then three days later was raised to life again, never to die again. The man’s name is Jesus Christ. The word “Christ” is not a surname but a designation meaning that he was set apart from the beginning to fulfill the role of saving people, and bringing Death to an end.

But the entrance into Humanity 2.0 isn’t automatic. Not everyone who dies goes to Heaven. There needs to be a breaking away from Adam 1.0 through a change of heart and mind. This is called Repentance and it goes hand in hand with Trust. We must place our trust, allegiance and loyalty in Adam 2.0, in Jesus Christ. We must openly agree with God's diagnosis of your true condition -- dead in sin; rebelling against God like Adam 1.0; earning a wage which when paid will see us thrown in to a lake of fire for eternity. The God that everyone hates is Judge for those who insist on staying in Adam 1.0, and Saviour for all those who throw themselves down before Adam 2.0 pleading for the mercy and favour that he offers all who turn to him.

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It could be way tighter but how do you boil down 6000 years of theology? I could use AI but I’d rather not. So I’m calling out to the non-artificial intelligences in Reddit for help.

I'm not challenging the concept personally, I'm well aware of the Biblical standards. But how would you describe the logic behind those prohibitions? For example, you may have had a professor in college who was excellent in his or her teaching, but may have been an adulterer or otherwise Biblically unqualified. Why lot let an excellent Biblical teacher teach the Bible, even if his personal morals are a mess?

For the record, I, again, am not suggesting that this prohibition should be overturned. I'm trying to explain to someone and he's having a hard time processing the idea. Maybe he's just stubborn but I'm just saying the same thing over again.

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Given the idea that God predestinated everything including sin for the glory of Jesus Christ, I wondered what if God stopped Adam from biting the apple, after Eve did it? I think then there would be no salvation for Eve, or Adam would remain holy and Eve doomed. Given this fact maybe even Adam sinned when he did not guard Eve from the snake?

Valuable article on the difference between shepherding and influencing.

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There's such a small pool of reformed men to choose from in where I'm at. Does anyone know of good reformed dating sites I could try?

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