Sotuanduso

I've seen my fair share of non-jokes here, especially political ones.

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.

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.

I've been corrected by the Bible before. The big reason my beliefs line up with the Bible so well is because I've dedicated myself to following what it teaches and grew up around people who legitimately do the same.

The entire field of neurology backing you up on the idea that I reshape my idea of God to suit whatever I want to believe doesn't explain me reshaping what I believe to match God.

I meant in person. I haven't had trouble dealing with this kind of person online in the few times I've interacted with them, probably because they give me the benefit of the doubt for being a Christian myself.

I didn't think it was a joke.

Anti-mosquitoes first please. I have yet to hear a single good point in defense of mosquitoes (unless they just went down the memory hole.)

If I ever encounter someone making stuff up like that, I want to ask them to back it up with the Bible, because I have a very strong feeling they're going more on gut instinct than scripture.

I only hear about these kinds of people online, though. Well, except the one time I heard a guy condemning Magic: The Gathering, but he was at least making sensible points about it.

It wasn't brought back to Italy much?

That unwashed bowl is my culture.

You've violated the law!

Well, an infinite multiverse doesn't mean there's a universe for every concept, just that there's an infinite number of multiverses, and a quantum multiverse only guarantees a universe for every possible series of events (except those that necessarily lead to that universe's destruction.)

Except in the universes where that's different, of course : )