Smile like a Calvinist

During dinner, my daughter said that when she looked at pictures of me in the past, I looked like an Arminian. I asked her why? She said, "You never looked like you were at peace. You always looked like you were unsettled about something. But now, you look like a Calvinist. You don't have that discontented look anymore. " Another interesting thing she said was "Now you smile like a Calvinist, not just because someone told you to say cheese."

I definitely was an Arminian prior to 2008. A change took place where now I love the doctrines of grace and find such peace and joy in God's sovereignty. The change is so great it is almost akin to being born again, again. The means of that change was the break up of my marriage. This is actually the first time I am even writing about this rather than just alluding to some nameless trial. But then again, our trials are not nameless, amorphous things but very acute and specific griefs. Why the Lord would do such a thing, I don't know. But I know the change began to happen when I looked past myself, my circumstances, and saw that God is on the throne completely sovereign over everything in the universe including my life. The change began to happen when I stopped telling Him "This isn't Your will. This isn't supposed to be happening to me." and let Him be God, even if it meant suffering in this way.

It can only be the supernatural grace of God that can use something so tragic and heartbreaking to bring me to a peace that I had never known. It is only grace and the Holy Spirit's work that could transform a discontented, fearful Arminian into a restful Calvinist.

~ Soli Deo Gloria