God is the Potter, we are the pots

I believe we have totally overblown the word "choose".  How many sermons emphasize the word "choose".  "I choose to follow You" (Brian Doerksen), "Everyday, I choose my fate" (Switchfoot), "I Choose to Believe" (Phillips, Craig & Dean). Erwin McManus's sermons are loaded with the term. 

It's an insertion of the supposed autonomous will of man, that mysterious element I used to believe in which I called free will.  That thing fundamental to my being which motivates me to go in one direction or another.

But it's an illusion.  Free Will is nothing other than the ability to act according to ones biggest desire.  It is not this supposed random number generator that could choose one way or another, independent of the input influences.  The "I choose" concept, commonly understood by most Christians, is nowhere found in Scripture, and is an idol.

It doesn't give freedom anyway.  It takes it away.  What in the supposed autonomous free will of man causes him to choose one way or another?  If it's my decision that I'd rather be good than bad, or I'd rather put myself on the trajectory to Glory than the trajectory to horror and ruin, then what caused this decision?  Prior acts of the will, whatever they are.  I.e., are my choices determined?  If not, then they're random, and so they're at the whim of randomness, and "I" have nothing to do with it.  Too bad for me, if randomness sends me to Hell.  Lucky me, if randomness sends me to Heaven.  It's either good me/bad me or lucky me/unlucky me.  Neither of which is Scriptural.

There's another alternative.  God is the Potter; His providence, His hand, His power influences us in the way He wants us to grow, and is the ultimate cause of our destiny.  This is the essence of Monergism.

Women keep silent!

Did the law really say this?

Is 1 Cor. 14:34-36 an interpolation? See Philip Payne's article at his website http://www.pbpayne.com.

Is 1 Cor. 14:34-36 consistent with the rest of the letter?

Blessed be the name of Yahweh

I don't understand how people can get away with saying that Job's conclusion to the loss of his children -- "Jehovah hath given and Jehovah hath taken: let the name of Jehovah be blessed" (Job 1:21) -- is his own fallible understanding of God's ways and not an infallible statement. In the very next verse it says "In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong."

(What spurred this on? Listening to Jesus to a Child, by George Michael.)