how did you first come to studying reformed theology?

[reformedjason]

I was asked to teach part of the "baptist faith and message" . At this point in my spiritual jouney I was an arminian, as that was what I was taught in church. I got to a passage in ephesians chapter 1. A bell went off in my head and I started researching the doctrines of grace. I picked up a book titled " T.U.L.I.P." Then the sirens started going off. I then have continued to study these doctrines. I am now a 5 point calvinist. I love the doctrines of reformed theology. I preach and teach the gospel in prisons , but no longer try to push people to say the sinners prayer , like I was taught to. I question everything that anyone teaches me, and if it does not line up with scripture then I dont believe it.

 

[Weston Stoler]

At my IFB church their was an older gentleman (about late 30's) who had been getting active in the church and we had spoken for a while and he presented the doctrines of grace. I told him he was wrong, he said just prove it wrong. 4 years later I am a happy Presbyterian!

 

[reformedjason]

At my IFB church their was an older gentleman (about late 30's) who had been getting active in the church and we had spoken for a while and he presented the doctrines of grace. I told him he was wrong, he said just prove it wrong. 4 years later I am a happy Presbyterian!

amen, a friend of mine told me I was wrong, I told him " don't believe me, prove me wrong with scripture" he now is a calvinist.

 

[crimsonleaf]

I think it came originally from watching John Piper and (wait for it) Mark Driscoll vids online. I then started to do my own, proper research and for me, the rest is history.

 

[mhseal]

I was raised in a rabidly anti-Calvinist, baptist home; my father was a baptist pastor. When I was a senior in high school I read Ephesians and became convinced of the doctrines of grace. I went to a highly dispensational Bible institute, then to Liberty University. When I came out I was reformed. It was a crazy process, though.

 

[rookie]

At my IFB church their was an older gentleman (about late 30's) who had been getting active in the church and we had spoken for a while and he presented the doctrines of grace. I told him he was wrong, he said just prove it wrong. 4 years later I am a happy Presbyterian!

Thanks for that, now I feel old.....but anyway, I was part of the Brethren Assemblies, which are mostly Arminian, and while preparing for a sermon, I fell upon a Paul Washer video (2002 sermon on Youtube), and when I heard his preaching, I was like "That's the gospel!!!!!". Since the gospel at my church was so diluted, I started listening to him more and more. Then stumbled on Voddie Baucham, Tim Conway, John Piper and then fell on the old reformers.....

When I saw that reformed theology gave ALL the credit and glory to God....I embraced it.....

I heard a joke the other day at work, kinda made me laugh. I was discussing light theology the other day, and one of them said "Ray's a Calvinist, because he doesn't have a choice". It was said in humor....

 

[Pilgrim's Progeny]

While attending college our physics professor invited a bunch of us ministry students to a book study. We studied a book by Richard Belcher called A Journey in Grace I was never the same after that.

 

[Backwoods Presbyterian]

I was a first year student at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and a normal non-thinking "evangelical" in the PC(USA). Did a research paper for a church history course on worship in the Presbyterian church in early America. Read D.G. Hart's book on worship and the principle of Deut 12:32 blew my mind and everything was downhill from there. From that book I went and re-read the Institutes of Christian Religion and then Paul Helm's book Calvin and the Calvinists.

 

[rbcbob]

In the early 1980's I "stumbled upon" a book by a guy named Jonathan Edwards. One book led to another and .....

 

[A5pointer]

I had been a bible student and teacher for years in an independant with Arminian approach. A charismatic pastor friend gave me Boettner's book to read. I easily realized the bible supported only the DOG. Like many others I had zero exposure to the doctrines.

 

[Pilgrim Standard]

Came under conviction that my view of salvation was works based and man centered. I Frantically studied the scripture for answers and scoured the net in search of help. I stumbled on to this sermon online by Charles H. Spurgeon called "Human Inability" 143 years after he preached upon the text found in John 6:44 "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him." I had never heard do of Spurgeon, or the doctrines of grace, or even the reformation.

Then the journey began.

 

[Bethel]

It was a 2-part process for me. I was teaching through the Book of Exodus with my oldest son and trying to force free will into the text. It didn't work very well. Then I was looking at a literature program on-line and someone mentioned that it used the book Purpose Driven Life (like it was a bad thing). At the time I owned that book, so I started researching why it might not be good. I began to realize that all "Christian" authors were not equal and began listening to Piper, MacArthur, & Sproul, as well as reading the Tim Challies's blog. Since that time I've learned that all reformed pastors are not the same, so I've refined who I read and listen to further and found this board.

The PB has been a major factor in our sanctification process because it has caused us to study and make decisions about:

Which Bible version to use
Headcovering
Administration of the Lord's Supper
The importance of a Confession
Regulative vs. Normative Principle of Worship (and whether or not to celebrate Christmas this year)
Covenant vs. New Covenant Theology
The Lord's Day

Right now we are studying paedo-baptism vs credo-baptism.

I just love how God is working in our life!

 

[JM]

People kept calling me a "calvinist" so I had to find out what that was.

 

[PuritanCovenanter]

People kept calling me a "calvinist" so I had to find out what that was.

That is kind of close to my experience. I became a Christian reading the four gospels in a Navy barracks. The book of John became very important to me as it was the book that God used to reveal the deity of Christ to me. Then I read (Joh 15:16) "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you." I had no problem believing it. About a year later I found out my Pastor was teaching Calvinism and I became worried that it might be cultish because it was an ism. You know Buddism, Hinduism, and other isms that are considered to be cults. I just figured it was something I better find out about. I met with him and he defined the 5 points of the discussion at Dort and I just looked at him and said, "Well that is what the Bible teaches."

 

[Herald]

I made the "mistake" of studying Romans which led to my embracing of the doctrines of grace. That move exposed me to Reformed theology. The rest is still history in the making.

Sent from my most excellent Motorola Atrix

 

[Rich Koster]

I was in an Arminian SBC that was shifting to NAR type leadership & charismania. People were teaching conflicting things. I decided to study for myself and unknowingly started my Reformed drift after studying Ephesians. It started at Ephesians 2:20 and how they were twisting it to support their power structure and their full continuationist position. It expanded from there. The only thing I heard about R theology, before this, was a negative sermon that mentioned it as some old backwards beliefs.

 

[hammondjones]

I was living in S. America and didn't know Spanish enough to follow the sermons at church. But, I did have an ipod, and I listened to John Piper's sermons through John, even though I knew what he taught was not what I believed. I always had a high view of scripture, but began to see what it actually said. Started listening to Renewing your Mind and that was that.

 

[JML]

I made the "mistake" of studying Romans which led to my embracing of the doctrines of grace. That move exposed me to Reformed theology. The rest is still history in the making.

I was an Associate Pastor of a Southern Baptist Church. I was in my office studying Romans 9 with an Arminian commentary in hand. I didn't buy their explanations of the text because it was clear that what the text was saying wasn't lining up with what the commentary said it was saying. At the time I started believing the doctrines of grace I didn't even know if there were other people out there that believed like I was starting to believe. Thankfully I found out there were. Then it all made sense that when I was considering seminary some 4 years previous, the pastor of the SBC church that I was a member of recommended going to any of the SBC seminaries EXCEPT for Southern. I went to New Orleans but became a Calvinist anyway!

 

[JS116]

Believe it or not..Christian Rap..yes christian rap(which seemed like an oxymoron to me at the time).

my favorite christian rappers ChristCentric,Flame,Voice,Da Truth and others introduced me to reformed theology through their music.

Da T.R.U.T,H. exhorted me to study forefathers of the reformation history by saying this..

"People ask me questions like,how come yall never talk about Martin(luther king) and Malcolm(X) but yall always talking about Calvin and Luther? Because these are the guys that introduced us to truth and the fruit thats produced in us is the outcome."

I responded thinking "Who in the heck is Luther and Calvin?!) so I searched it up and it went on from there.I joined a christian forum, called the 116 Clique Forum for fans of christian hip hop provided by Reach Records(Record label of christian rappers,Lecrae,Trip Lee,Tedashii,Sho Baraka etc.) surprisingly the admins on the forum were confessionally reformed guys, one a WCFer and the other a 1689er and they introduced all the members to Reformed Theology and Reformed Pastors.Then in 2009 I bought my ESV and a book called The Reformed Faith:Exposition of the Westminster Confession by Robert Shaw,by the Lord's grace I have been reforming ever since.

 

[Gord]

Some 3 months after This Thread was started by the Arminian Baptist who started is, was going to teach his followers the Truth of Calvinism, I Finally got it. While he was posting all his arguments, I was googling, reading, reading, and reading, In my new found freedom in Christ, I couldn't believe my good fortune to be taught the Truth by a staunch Arminian.

 

[SolaScriptura]

I was a babe in Christ, my pastor decided to disciple me and to that end he had me read the 2 vol McNeill edition of Calvin. Oh yeah. That started it.

 

[RobertPGH1981]

I entered a Christian program in 2007 called Teen Challenge. One of the pastors there taught us mainly from Romans. I never heard of some of the things he said, and thought of him as a lunatic because I was more Arminian if you wanted to consider me anything. This caused me to "prove him wrong" and it had the opposite effect.

 

[dudley]

I was a Roman catholic and began to think that there were contradictions to scripture in their teachings and I came to the point of no longer believing in the pope as the Vicar of Christ. I left and became a Protestant at the invitation of friends who were Episcopalian. I decided however to begin to explore all the mainline Protestant denominations by attending worship with them and taking classes and studying their doctrines and teachings . I was Lutheran , Methodist , and then finally discovered the Reformed faith; I explored Baptist congregations and Presbyterian congregations, it took several years. However I finally came to believe and was convinced that the Reformed churches have the fullness of truth and I decided to become a Presbyterian and submit to the Westminster confession of faith.

I began an intensive study of Protestantism and the Protestant Reformation. I began to believe the Reformation was establishing and returning the Church and the Gospel to the way it was in the early church. My studies and exploration of the Protestant Reformation and the mainline Protestant denominations also lead me to firmly believe in the doctrines of the Protestant reformation. As one who believes in the doctrines of the Protestant Reformation i.e. the authority of the Bible alone in all matters of faith and practice and that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone and all Glory and Honor is for God alone I knew I had become a Protestant.
After studying John Calvin I also became convinced that the Protestant doctrine of Justification by faith alone in Christ alone was biblically correct and I became very interested in the Reformed Protestant theology. When I accepted the authority of the Bible alone in all matters of faith and realized that salvation is by grace alone I could no longer say I was a Roman Catholic. I fully understood that only Christ heads his church.
I wanted to find a Protestant denomination that I believed had the purest form of the Gospel. It was in that search I became a Presbyterian in faith not only a Protestant. In August 2010 I began worshipping with the First Presbyterian Church of Manasquan I was received into full membership in the church on October 24th 2010 by public affirmation of faith before the congregation who then affirmed my acceptance into the Presbyterian church by public affirmation.
I am now Protestant in conviction and Reformed in doctrine.
Sola Scriptura—The Scriptures alone for matters of faith and practice
Sola Fide—justification by faith alone
Sola Gratia—by grace alone
Solo Christo—in Christ alone
Soli Deo Gloria—all to the glory of God alone