Fez Posted October 15, 2010 Group: Royal Member Followers: 3 Topic Count: 683 Topics Per Day: 0.12 Content Count: 11,128 Content Per Day: 1.99 Reputation: 1,352 Days Won: 54 Joined: 02/03/2009 Status: Offline Birthday: 12/07/1952 Share Posted October 15, 2010 God, God, God. Just because I feel like shouting His name right now. Holy, Eternal, God! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winsomebulldog Posted October 15, 2010 Group: Diamond Member Followers: 1 Topic Count: 20 Topics Per Day: 0.00 Content Count: 732 Content Per Day: 0.14 Reputation: 113 Days Won: 5 Joined: 03/26/2010 Status: Offline Birthday: 04/30/1971 Share Posted October 15, 2010 Here is my take to my own question - "What if you were one of the miners...?" If I had been one of the two miners, I would be thanking the Lord for that butterfly! I might even be thanking Him for sending the butterfly, or causing it to be there at just the right spot at just the right time. If someone were to challenge me on that, I would respond that Scripture tells us to "Give thanks in all circumstances," and if I can't thank the Lord for good things or when good things happen, how can I find the strength to thank Him in the bad? Now if you want to thank a fluke of nature for the distraction that had saved my life, go ahead. But I will thank my God who rules and reigns over all! ~~~~~~~~~~~ As far as attributing to God things that turned out horrible, I can appreciate the concern. But remember who it was that told Samuel to anoint Saul as king. Sometimes the Lord grants us our prayer requests even though the end result is not what we were expecting it to be. Other times . . . well, we could get into the whole God's sovereignty debate on who are what is or is not responsible for things that go bad - God? Satan? God just let circumstances run their course apart from Him? So, did God send or cause the butterfly to be there. Unless we hear directly from Him, sure our natural minds will never know. But how can you be thankful for their lives being spared without acknowledging the elements that caused their lives to be spared - including being distracted by something they never expected to see that far down the mine? So whether the Lord put the butterfly there or not, I thank Him that it was there - at just the right place, at just the right time. ~~~~ One more thought - What if the occurrence with the butterfly gave these men, and perhaps the other miners and the families, an added faith that the Lord would see them through this? (i.e. If He sent a butterfly to spare our lives, He'll bring us out in the end.) I'm just with you all the way on this one, neb. I can't help but see the hand of God in this particular event. Like you, if I had been one of those men, I'd be thanking God for that one instant of something unusual and out of the ordinary that caused me to slow down and hesitate, thereby saving my life. But then I have a tendency to think most of us go through every day not even seeing the little miracles that surround us. God is so amazing, so BIG! He touches everything in our lives, guiding us to the path He has laid out for us. Sometimes He uses a nice strong shove, maybe because we're too wrapped up in ourselves to respond to anything else. And sometimes He uses something seemingly tiny and insignificant (a small white butterfly, perhaps?) to slow us down just long enough for His perfect Will to be accomplished. I believe that people sometimes want to give God credit for things He perhaps had no hand in. By that I mean things WE tell ourselves He is doing because that's what WE want to believe. Using an example set forward earlier, how many of us have wanted desperately to find the "right" person for our lives? Sometimes we want it so much that we'll reach out for and cling to the "wrong" person while telling ourselves that God is answering our prayers. It's easy for us to convince ourselves that what WE want is what God wants for us. That just isn't always the case. As the old Garth Brooks song says, "Sometimes I thank God for unanswered prayers." Though there is no such thing as an UNANSWERED prayer, God does tell us NO sometimes. But, like neb said, He will also occasionally give us what we're so insistent that we need, just so we can learn the lesson that we don't actually always know what's best for our own lives. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winsomebulldog Posted October 15, 2010 Group: Diamond Member Followers: 1 Topic Count: 20 Topics Per Day: 0.00 Content Count: 732 Content Per Day: 0.14 Reputation: 113 Days Won: 5 Joined: 03/26/2010 Status: Offline Birthday: 04/30/1971 Share Posted October 15, 2010 God, God, God. Just because I feel like shouting His name right now. Holy, Eternal, God! Amen, Amen, Amen! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
~candice~ Posted October 15, 2010 Group: Royal Member Followers: 5 Topic Count: 955 Topics Per Day: 0.16 Content Count: 11,318 Content Per Day: 1.89 Reputation: 448 Days Won: 33 Joined: 12/16/2007 Status: Offline Share Posted October 15, 2010 So whether the Lord put the butterfly there or not, I thank Him that it was there - at just the right place, at just the right time. Neb, I can be thankful in all things without attributing those things to Him, so I can give thanks for the butterfly without having to conclude it was a direct intervention of His. This is what you are saying in your bolded sentence, so we aren't that far apart in our understanding here. God bless, Candice Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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