So let me get this straight. When the Church uses a term in English, and I quote from the dictionary, that's a straw man. I will keep that in mind. :)
FK: "So, if no one had prayed, might they have survived?"
No, but this proves my point that Calvinists see prayer as an obligation which has no effect on anything.
Then you don't read all of my posts to you. It has a direct affect on the one praying. I answered this in detail directly to you in 9,954.
[About the miners:] They prayed for life and they received death. And your own quote from Phil 4:19 says "And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus" suggests that they did not know their needs.
From this we can draw two possibilities: (1) the verse is not true but misinterpreted or (2) those who truly believe will not pray because we (robots) don't know what our needs are. Number 1 is very likely. Number 2 is Calvinism 101.
For someone who doesn't declare Bible verses "wrong" you are fooling a lot of us. :) The first option is out the window because the Bible is true. The second is out the window because whether we know our needs is irrelevant to whether we should or will pray.
The correct answer is that of course none of us knows all of our specific needs at any given time. For all Christians, at some point it becomes our need to be with the Lord. Who among us can know exactly when that is? We can't. God does (since He determines our needs) and He brings all of us home at that time. Needs are both physical AND spiritual.
If this life is so short of "glorious riches in Christ Jesus" then why are all Calvinists still around on this filthy earth, and why are they not hastening their departure? (David Koresh and Tom Jones alert!)
Suicide is not a rational option for Calvinists because He forbids it. We know that God will bring us home when He decides it is time. While on earth, one of the primary needs of the Christian is to serve Christ. When that service is complete, our need is to be with our loving God, so He brings us home.
***Suicide is not a rational option for Calvinists because He forbids it. We know that God will bring us home when He decides it is time. While on earth, one of the primary needs of the Christian is to serve Christ. When that service is complete, our need is to be with our loving God, so He brings us home.***
Philippians 1 says to live is Christ and to die is gain. Paul answered his own question and desire here. His desire was to be with God, but God’s need was for him to be here.