I just wanted to share why I became a Calvinist (Feel free to share!)

By the way, is that "Gamecock" as in the South Carolina Gamecock's?

God bless

Well, let's see....I started to study more when I realized my in-laws who are JW's, had way more "knowledge" about the bible than I did. I decided to see if anything they had to say was true. It all sounded good on the surface, but something wasn't right. I was very uncomfortable with the emphasis they put on "our" part in our salvation, and the fact that none of them will ever really know if they've been good enough. I had always believed that you could lose your salvation, but not by just messing up, or not doing good enough...I had always thought it had to be a deliberate "turning away". Then I realized that that didn't even make sense, and I didn't even truly KNOW what I believed anyway.

I joined CF to talk to the JW's, and debate a little, but they were running circles around me. I knew they were wrong, but I couldn't prove WHY.

I prayed one day for God to show me the truth, to help me to understand what I was reading better, to put in me a desire to learn the Word. It wasn't even a couple of days later that I started exploring the different denominational subsites here, and ran across this room. To be honest, I think the only reason I actually came in here is because my three year old's name is Calvin and it amused me.....LOL

As soon as I started reading what "Calvinists" believe, I knew emmediately that I had stumbled across the truth. I started going to all the sites that Cygnus sent me too, and looking up stuff on my own. I was amazed that all those difficult passages in the bible just opened up. I can't believe how obvious Reformed belief is, and why I never saw it before. Actually, I think maybe I had always known it in my heart, but just didn't know it in my head. I was always very uncomfortable with the image of a God dependent upon our actions, or a God that wasn't completely omniscent or omnipotent. Looking back, I realize that I was never truly taught the deeper things of God. I never wanted to learn. I was a surface christian. I knew I believed, and I trusted that God would look after me, and for a long time, that was enough.

God led me to my present church a little over 2 years ago. I was raised Quaker, but the Quaker church I was going to offered nothing in the way of personal growth. I just wasn't learning anything. So I checked out this church(it's a community church) I love the church and it's focus and reason for being(it's a very outreaching church). But when I accepted the Doctrines of Grace, I was worried. I didn't want to leave but I didn't know what they taught about this, and I was scared to ask. Ignorantly, I assumed that because the focus is so heavy on outreach and evangelism, that they taught the arminian view(I still wasn't sure how Calvinism effected evangelism). I spent some time in prayer, asking God to help me out, to give me strength to confront the leaders and see just what they believed--because if they didn't teach the reformed view, I was going to have to find a church that did, and frankly, I didn't want to leave this church. Again, God answered my prayers. About a month ago, Tim, the pastor, started a series called "Grace" He is now in the middle of the series and he's explaining the Doctrines of Grace very clearly and without apologies. I can only sit back and praise God! Because of course He KNEW I would come to accept the reformed view, and had my church all picked out for me!

I don't even know how to explain the peace and joy I feel now since accepting the Doctrines of Grace. I'm just so happy that God has led me to this place, and I look forward to seeing where He leads me next!!!!!!!!

All praise to God!

I was saved in 1992 in a small, rural Baptist church. The pastor there always had bad things to say about Calvinism, so not knowing any better I accepted what he had to say.

In 1998 we moved to a different state and we started attending another Baptist church. The pastor was pretty much the same in his views on Calvinism. Then I started getting involved in the religious discussions on a different forum and I was confronted with the truth of what Calvinism taught and not my own spoon-fed caricature of Calvinism.

I still rejected Calvinism, but now it was willful and not out of ignorance. As time went on and I was confronted with more and more evidence from Scripture as to the Predestination and Election of the Saints and God's Sovereignty over His creation. I didn't have an answer for them.

As the debates raged on I got more and more turned off by the twists and turns that the non-Calvinists had to take in order to explain away what Scripture clearly said.

Finally, I took the plunge and accepted with my heart what my head had already understood: that salvation is indeed of the Lord.

I was saved in 1976.
I had been confronted with the scriptures for the 1st time in my life.
So I was sitting in my bathtub and i asked God, who He was and who Jesus was.

I was suddenly overwhelmed with the sure knowledge that I was a terrible sinner and that Christ was my Savior.
I fell on my knees and gave my pathetic life to Christ.

I had never heard a sinners prayer or understood what it meat to be born again.

I often joke now that I remember the next day thinking I needed to joining a Presbyterian church because they believed in Predestination and I KNEW that this was fully the doing of God.

But time passed and I found my way into a mega church near my home.I put the predestination thing out of my mind.I thought that my salvation was just a little different than all my friends that did altar calls.

Time passed and I got a computer and began to post on a large news forum that had a lot of Calvinists posting.
I would see their thread titles as I scrolled by them. i never wanted to get involved in that fight.
I wanted to be "nice" and "loving" and have people tell me how great a Christian I WAS.I wanted nothing to do with those threads.

One day I wandered into a thread on Pelegianism. I did not even know what that was. But it did not take me long to get up to speed.
Before I knew it I was in full battle mode with the "evil Calvinists"
It made me study doctrine and church history... and scripture, lots of scripture.
Even as I was battling them I was hearing and learning the doctrine so I could refute it.
After almost 2 years of the battle the threads ended.
I was a much more knowledgeable Christian as a result of that ongoing debate.

BUT then the Holy Spirit stepped in.
One night as I sat doing my bible study the words jumped off the page at me. i started seriously searching the word. Putting aside my bias and really reading what it said.
I was looking at how God acted with men from the beginning, over and over I saw the sovereignty of God and the election of men.

How could I have been a serious student of the Bible and missed it for all those years.
I told one of the pastors that had participated in the debates that I was now a Calvinist. I knew that I knew. One of them was a physician that had lost hope that i would ever "get it" asked one of the younger posters to talk to me to see if I had indeed gotten it.

That young Orthodox Presbyterian told me he never had a doubt that I would one day become a reformed believer, because I have a love and passion for the word of God. He knew I would see it.

I have often hear that "converts" often have the most passion. I know that is true for me. We have a most gracious God that loved me before the foundation of the world... how amazing is that ??? me ....a real zero.... loved of God

Well it seems that i may well be heading down the Calvinist road, from the little that I know of his teaching (and the more I read the NT, the more I am convinced of these arguments. I am only just beginning to attend a Westminster Presbyterian Church here and boy O boy, the pastor sure does hold up the Bible there. I was led to Christ by a Baptist guy a number of years ago, and for some reason ended up attending a Pentecostal church for a few years before leaving town. Hmm, well after relocating, I attended a small number of churches, but what really put me off, was seeing very self concious efforts by the preachers to present a more entertaining? style of preaching/teaching, which just made me cringe, God Bless them though! So I really like my new church, where the singing is plain and simple and the Bible is held up and taught from in a plain way. I sure hope that the Calvinist view is the same as "the faith that was once delivered to the saints". I believe it may well be!

This is extremely similar to mine, except all of the Baptist stuff. It was basically through the work and persistence of the Lord through a few members of this forum. My change to reformed theology is extremely recent.

Well it seems that i may well be heading down the Calvinist road, from the little that I know of his teaching (and the more I read the NT, the more I am convinced of these arguments. I am only just beginning to attend a Westminster Presbyterian Church here and boy O boy, the pastor sure does hold up the Bible there. I was led to Christ by a Baptist guy a number of years ago, and for some reason ended up attending a Pentecostal church for a few years before leaving town. Hmm, well after relocating, I attended a small number of churches, but what really put me off, was seeing very self concious efforts by the preachers to present a more entertaining? style of preaching/teaching, which just made me cringe, God Bless them though! So I really like my new church, where the singing is plain and simple and the Bible is held up and taught from in a plain way. I sure hope that the Calvinist view is the same as "the faith that was once delivered to the saints". I believe it may well be!

This is extremely similar to mine, except all of the Baptist stuff. It was basically through the work and persistence of the Lord through a few members of this forum. My change to reformed theology is extremely recent.