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Meanwhile, on Oakland's Nextdoor (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sorry for the textwall. Bible context and explanation, y'know.

John 21:3-12:

Simon Peter said, “I’m going fishing.”
“We’ll come, too,” they all said. So they went out in the boat, but they caught nothing all night.
At dawn Jesus was standing on the beach, but the disciples couldn’t see who he was. He called out, “Fellows, have you caught any fish?”
“No,” they replied.
Then he said, “Throw out your net on the right-hand side of the boat, and you’ll get some!” So they did, and they couldn’t haul in the net because there were so many fish in it.
Then the disciple Jesus loved said to Peter, “It’s the Lord!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his tunic (for he had stripped for work), jumped into the water, and headed to shore. The others stayed with the boat and pulled the loaded net to the shore, for they were only about a hundred yards from shore. When they got there, they found breakfast waiting for them—fish cooking over a charcoal fire, and some bread.
“Bring some of the fish you’ve just caught,” Jesus said. So Simon Peter went aboard and dragged the net to the shore. There were 153 large fish, and yet the net hadn’t torn.
“Now come and have some breakfast!” Jesus said.

Jesus never told them to give away their net or boats. It was through the fishing equipment they had and the work they did that he provided for their needs.

My laptop and internet connection are how God provides for my needs, by allowing me to have work as a programmer and enough income to survive and pay for my college education, which will in turn allow me to get better pay so I can give more to the poor. That, and it gives me access to the largest mission field I'll ever reach.

Excess possessions should be given to the poor, yes, but wisdom is required in all things. I can do more for the Kingdom with the internet than I could with the few hundred dollars I might earn by selling my laptop.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Gotcha. How convenient for you. Your moral code requires you to act exactly how you want to act.

Do you get it now? You want a computer programming degree and your god wants you to have a computer programming degree. They always match up! You didn't align yourself with the Bible, you quote mined to find the text that backed up the decision you were already going to make.

And hey I am not even judging. I was a theist. I did the same thing. Turned out God wanted me to become a Biblical Scholar and then God changed his mind and decided I could serve better an as engineer. Which coincidentally happened the moment I found out what the pay difference was. I remember exactly how you feel now. Feeling like the creator of the fucking universe gave a shit if I jerked off or not.

Do what you want. Prayer is just talking to yourself. Hope you see the light one day. Face existence, cold unfeeling, indifferent, but real.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Unironically, thanks for the reminder of the life I don't want to slip into.

I chose a computer science degree because I've been a programmer from a young age. I haven't felt a divine calling towards a profession, just my natural interest and talent (the latter of which does qualify as a gift from God,) and the knowledge that whatever work my hands find to do, I can do it to the glory of God in some way.

I never saw a verse in the Bible say you need a divine calling before you choose your profession. God calls people sometimes, but sometimes people mistake their own feelings for God, which I guess can happen if you haven't heard God. The way I learned to recognize Him speaking to me started with discerning whether the message lines up with the Bible and whether it's something I want to ignore because it's inconvenient or hard.

I'm sorry you went through what you did. I can't say with certainty that being a biblical scholar wasn't actually a divine calling, but if you couldn't tell the difference between that and the "call" to engineering, there's a good chance that you got it from being swept up in a moment at church or some retreat.