Rebecca Jaquish

I live for memes, books, and chocolate

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Bradley_Cude @CWilson2197 It’s beautiful. 😭 what might have been

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Lordoftheringsu I always thought it should be a tv show titled “The Silmarillion” and each season adapts one of the stories. My favorites are Beren and Luthien and The Children of Hurin.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Ben_XI0 I think that whatever magic Odin used to make Loki look Asgardian somehow actually changed his DNA a bit. When Loki changes to look blue at various points in the first Thor movie it always changed right back after he stopped contact with the object.

[Joseph Spurgeon @Joseph_Spurgeon]

The Calvinism debate can be boiled down to one stubborn question that the Noncalvinist never really answers.

Imagine two twin brothers. Same home. Same parents. Same basic upbringing. Both hear the same gospel. Both are told they are sinners. Both hear that Christ died and rose again. Both are commanded to repent and believe.

One believes. The other rejects Christ. What made the difference? That is the question. Not whether the believer really chose Christ. Calvinists believe that he did. The question is: Why did he choose Christ when the other man did not?

Maybe you say one understood the gospel better. Fine. Why? Maybe one was more humble. Why? Maybe one had experiences that softened him. Maybe certain conversations, sufferings, relationships, memories, warnings, or circumstances prepared him to respond differently. Ok Why?

Because now you are talking about providence.

God put this man in this family, at this time, in this place. God brought these people across his path. God ordained these circumstances. God caused him to hear this particular preacher proclaim this particular gospel message at this particular moment.

So did those providential differences explain why he believed?

If yes, then God’s providence made the difference. And now you have to ask why God gave one man the providential influences that brought him to faith and not the other.

But suppose you deny that. Suppose you say none of those things actually explains the difference. Both men received sufficient grace. Both were equally able to believe. Their circumstances did not determine it. Their experiences did not determine it. Their understanding did not determine it.

Then what did?

Maybe you say the believer had stronger desires for Christ. Then where did those desires come from? If his desires explain his choice, then they are part of the explanation for why he believed.

Maybe you say it was his character. Then what shaped that character?

Maybe you say it was his nature. Then why did his nature move him toward Christ while the other man's did not?

Every time you give a real explanation for why this man believed rather than rejected Christ, you are identifying something that actually made the difference. And then we can ask where that difference came from.

But to escape the difference being God's decisive acts, the non calvinist eventually refuses to let anything explain the decisive difference.

Not providence. Not nature. Not character. Not desires. Not understanding. Not circumstances. Not differing grace.

So what finally explains why one man believed?

His will chose to. Why did his will choose Christ rather than reject Christ?

Because it just did.

That is not an explanation though. Its just arbitrariness. This is the fatal problem with what is called libertarian free will: the will becomes the unexplained explainer.

The libertarian can give you all kinds of reasons the man had for believing. But here is the question that matters: What was the choice-specific reason he believed rather than rejected Christ? If precisely the same nature, desires, reasons, circumstances, influences, and grace could have produced the opposite choice, then none of those things explains why this choice actually occurred.

Everything could remain exactly the same, and the will could simply fire the other direction. This is by definition arbitrary and rationally unintelligible.

The Reformed view does not have this problem because we do not imagine the human will as some autonomous little god floating above the man’s nature, affections, desires, and reasons.

Men choose according to what they want. Their choices are real. Their desires are real. Their reasoning is real. Their willing is real. But the will belongs to a person, and fallen man, left to himself, does not want God. He loves darkness rather than light. He will not come to Christ that he may have life.

So why does anyone believe?

Because God makes the difference. God chooses. God governs providence. God sends the preacher. God brings the gospel. And through that gospel, by the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit, God does not merely stand outside the sinner begging an autonomous will to make the right choice.

God gives life to the dead. He takes out the heart of stone and gives a heart of flesh. He renews the will. He opens blind eyes. He changes what the sinner loves. Christ, whom the sinner once rejected, is now seen as glorious and desirable.

And then the man chooses Christ. Really chooses Him. Freely chooses Him. God does not believe for the sinner. God does not repent for him. God does not drag him into the kingdom against his will. God changes the man, and therefore the man comes willingly.

So put the two brothers beside each other again. One believes. One does not.

Why?

The noncalvinist eventually says, “Because one will chose one way and the other will chose another,” and when you ask why, the explanation finally evaporates.

The Reformed Christian has an answer. God made the difference. And therefore the believer does not finally look at his unbelieving brother and say, “We received the same grace, but I arbitrarily supplied the decisive difference.”

He says with Paul: “By the grace of God I am what I am.”

That is the difference between Calvinism and NonCalvinism. One ends with an autonomous will that has no rational explanation and yet did the most vital work for salvation.

The other ends with grace. From beginning to end, sovereign grace.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@RevivedThoughts While I think there may be more to the situation regarding all the drugs she was prescribed, I agree that the only way this happened was due to a sinful world. As Christian’s, we need to advocate for justice while also praying for Lindsey’s salvation.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Strangeland_Elf @kel93934 Yeah. It’ll be interesting to see what Marvel decides to do.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Strangeland_Elf @kel93934 What if both of them have a slow aging mutation?

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@Strangeland_Elf Oppenheimer

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@1696suisaisakka It looks so peaceful ❤️

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@HarveyRivers17 Honestly, I love cars 2 the way it is. James Bondesque action spy movie in the cars universe was a great idea. My family has easily seen this move a few dozen times times over the years. It’s a household favorite.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@didi_daisukedoi It reminds me of a Ghibli movie. ❤️

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@pirooooon3 As an American, I would say that people need to purchase something from the shop if they are going to be sitting there for an extended period of time. They also need to be mindful of how busy the shop is and if they are in the way of people who are there to purchase something.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@brodigan It was a fantastic movie! I took my family to see it and we had a blast!

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@misskass @alkine0 @pentabutabu Thank you!

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@pentabutabu Thank you!

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@TodAshby We are born with a sinful nature and spiritually dead. While the law convicts us, our nature is to live in disobedience. Without Christ, we can never change our own nature to be one of obedience.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@TomBuck Absolutely. When our children stray from the Lord, sometimes all we can do is pray and be ready to give biblical counsel to them.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@NASAAdmin My favorite memory of her was watching “Day in the Life of an Astronaut” videos she use to make on the ISS. You could tell she loved what she did and had a ton of fun.

[Rebecca Jaquish @BeccaJaquish]

@ry_pacific Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” And they marveled at him. Mark 12:17