I think the combined impact of my recent posting, and an email I wrote to her, have terrified my mother. I'm pretty sure she's sent her prayer warriors after me. Which I appreciate, of course.
I'm not exactly sure who is the author of the comment on the post, "indignation," but I want to respond to her (i'm pretty sure it's a her because the comment was linked to a women's organization) claim that Truth is the color or Jesus. I understand that to mean that we can realize Truth through an understanding of Jesus. Sounds good...
So then, in who's understanding of Jesus should I rely? Is Jesus the beginning and ending of Truth? Is it possible that Jesus contains Truth, and Truth contains Jesus, but they are not entirely the same thing? I mean, is it possible that in Jesus is everything True, and in Truth is all of Jesus, but there is Truth outside of Jesus, and there is Jesus outside of Truth. What is Truth? AHHHH the anarchy and chaos!!
I have other, more heretical questions. Questions, notions, and ideas that I fielded to my mum and I think I frightened her. Sorry mommo.
I've got something even more heretical rolling through the space between my ears...
I don't believe my salvation lies in a formula of trite phrases, dare I say cliches, based on the opinion of interpreters of interpreters of recorders of Jesus' words. I believe Truth lies within every human heart as it is in the image of God and my salvation lies in my faith and response to that Truth. I believe Jesus is the most perfect way our weak minds can deal with how to respond to Truth and that he was a living representation of Truth.
Heretic thought #429: I think we, the Christian church, have missed the forest for the trees. I think we have stopped responding to Truth because we've been too busy analyzing and trying to figure out what it is in some sense we aren't even meant to understand. I want to simply believe that Truth exists and act on it, respond to it.
Why do I keep capitalizing truth? I'm referring to ultimate Truth, the kind that is etched into your soul. I will make the heretic claim #378 that God is Truth (that's not the heretic part, i know) and that one of the ways to understand God and participate in His nature is to try to seek Truth in our actions - respond to it. How? Think of a big T Truth... All men are created equal, for example. So, if you believe that, do you act on it? Do you try to repair inequalities between people groups? Here's another: All men have the innate right to life. Do you fight to protect life all over the world? Or do you prefer to bicker over what life is? I'll refrain from soapboxing here. By seeking to act in a True way we act in a Godly way, in a way Jesus showed and all the scripture before that sought to mete out through laws.
Maybe this God thing is so much less complicated than our dogma leads us to believe.
I know this post is already chaotic enough, and should be divided up and well organized (maybe some day i'll get ejermacated and write meself a book), but I have one more thought for tonight, and that is a fear. I love this constant questioning and longing of the soul. A quest in which every conclusion raises more questions. I fear some people will doubt my wisdom and authority because I prefer raising questions to giving answers, and think less of me.
Who am I to give answers?
There is an arrogance so foul in the claim that one has a complete grasp on anything of God, which is by default, anything in existence and anything conceivable, since God created all things and is in all things. But that claim is one which the church all over the world and through all of her history has made. This attempt to shackle God into our feeble realm of conceivability is, to my understanding, more blasphemous than anything I have asserted.
Please, do not take from me the mystery of God.
I'd love to hear your thoughts... I brace myself for your criticism, if even to say my thoughts are too muddled to understand.
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5 comments:
Dear indignant,
While i certainly appreciate an inquiring mind awake, I would also offer the following:
In all of philosophy, there is a 'given'. A common ground of foundation on which adherants
may agree as a starting point. The same could be said for the "Christian' body in
existance today. Though many may disagree on 'forms' through which the church universal
expresses itself, to be a true follower of Christ means to apply
ourselves to the study of the Master' teachings. Not the extra-biblical forms of men...however well intentioned
or noble their intent. Of course, by the Word of God Himself, He has not only presented Himself as the object
for that study, but has clearly stated, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the
the Father except through me". Sounds clear enough to me. In the letter to the Hebrews, the Spirit says to us,
"In these last days, God has spoken to us in Son"...in Jesus. Would you not agree that if that if God intended to
add something else to that statement, He easily would have. Is there some truth outside the expression of God, in Jesus?
I find no such proclamation or instruction to look elsewhere in the Word of God. If you have, please share that with me.
I would like to investigate and pursue such a source.
I would say, there is much angst and anger in your posts. However, I agree that the focus of the 'church' at times
and through certain ages.has been woefully short sighted and and self driven. She is imperfect even in her most
redeemed and enlightened self. However, her Head is perfect, and above reproach. Is He real to you, or simply a doctrine
to be argued with for the sake of argument? We walk softly in the shadow of those who have come before us...who have
sought the Truth and found it, and attempted to share His light within them. However, we reverence no man...only God.
You speak soundly that your salvation is not found or based in trite phrases, or rites, or rituals. Salvation is
a person. The person of Jesus. Nothing more...nothing less. Not in praying, fasting, seminary, works, good behavior,
or anything else in addition to the Lord Jesus alone.
In fact, He who grabs ahold of the real truth will know...He cannot do anything but say "Yes" and allow God to live
within Him. He cannot save the world, but allow Him who has offered salvation to the world to live and work
through him. He cannot cause others to reconcile until the example of his reconciation is seen by his fellow men.
If we are seeking to act...we're acting. If we are seeking Him...we will find Him. In finding Him...we see Him. By
seeing Him, we are transformed to His image. If these are trite phrases, then God himself must stand accused of
wasting your time. But that is speaking as a fool...for God is the gound of our being.
Truth? The truth is, we can become tortured by the failures of others around us, instead of seeing the excellence of
Him...the only truth. We can become dissapointed with people and ideas, and reject the only relationship that really matters.
Salvation is a person. Truth is a person. He cannot lie, and He cannot fail. Men fail. God does not.
For all our shortcomings, He has been made sufficient. For the true follower, the old covenant has passed away. Only the
person of Jesus fits the bill. When we decide all the other is deceptive, distracting, and dissapointing, we can find the
truth. It is for freedom we have been set free.
I do not just belong to some women's organization. I belong to Jesus...He's alive. He's alive in me...I've found the Truth.
I've settled the issue. It's not a crutch...it is my ground of being. His is the very life within me.
I have enjoyed sharing these thoughts with you. I pray you will receive them in the spirit in which they are shared with you. You may 'unbrace' now. There is no critism here...but there is more...so much more.
Blessings, dear one.
Thanks for the time and thought you've put into this response.
A few quick comments:
-when i mentioned Truth outside of Jesus, i don't mean some gnostic gospel or uncanonical text. i mean Truths that exist in creation that were not a part of Jesus' recorded ministry or any of the commentaries in the Bible regarding that ministry. to answer your question, i believe there is "truth outside the expression of God, in Jesus" in uncountable many places. the wonder of creation shows the Truth of God's magnitude. Man's capacity for reason, compassion, and love make clear the Truth that we are created in His image; each of us, regardless of whether or not we choose to acknowledge that Truth.
-while i certainly accept the Bible to be Holy and inspired, i will not accept that anything in it is simple and clearcut. the beauty of the Bible, to me, is that with a genuine spirit we can each come to our own understanding of the intended meaning. Jesus said he is "the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through me." and we have made interpretations of that meaning. those interpretations change regularly, first through the apostles, then through different deciding bodies. the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox, Protesants, and even within them there are differences, all believe something different while all concurring that the key lies in Jesus. i do not differ on the common point. i wonder to differ on the details.
-perhaps there is angst and anger in my posts. i wish, with the tragedy, hate, violence, murder, rape, brutality, MASS GENOCIDE, going on right now, today, more Christians would rise up in righteous anger and do something Christian to end such poverty and violence.
Maegan,
I must first admit to you that I find no truth outside of Jesus for this reason...
The scripture tells me that Jesus is the Word of God...the express image of Him in revealed form...He (Jesus) created all there is...upholds all there is...sustains all there is...and rules all there is. He is the only truth. (Hebrews 1&2, Gen 1, Gospel of John)
He is the only way to know God. He is God...the full revelation of God. What is the Word of God...but the whole communication and alphabet of God. The language of God...Jesus is that language. If God is truth, and Jesus is the whole language of that truth, then how can truth be found outside of Him. He is alpha and omega...beginning and end. A to Z. Nothing exists that is not made by Him and upheld by Him. Nothing! Nature may speak truth...but it speaks the truth of it's creator and sustainer, Jesus.
If we believe God can be known on any level, we must know Him on the level at which He tells us He reveals himself. That revelation includes nature...but all of nature points us back to Him. Could we know the sun without the rays of the sun? Can we know God without embracing the revelation of Him who He tells us is the specefic representation of Him? I wonder.
If the spirit of the living God is in us...what can we expect from that indwelling? Does He not give us revelation and instruction on the ways and nature of God? So, can God be trusted to rule the universe, but not be trusted to guide us into a knowledge of Him? I must admit to you that many interpretations of God and His ways
by commentators or fools, or even well meaning soul's, leave me with a sour stomach and bad taste in my mouth, in search of a good antacid.
But, when I search for Him, when I seek after Him, He has always kept His promise to reveal some aspect of Himself to me. He also has promised that as I look upon Him, (study Him, spend time with Him) I may be transformed to His image. Therefore I have learned to take my eyes off men and their foolish ways, and look unto Him. They cannot help me, or save me, or sustain me...only He can. His mysteries are safe...some things belong only to God. But He say's I can know Him...and as I take Him at His word, He proves to me that He is knowable. He stoops to match my infant steps...but that is the way of a loving Father.
Righteous anger is not necessarily a bad thing. Well directed, it may be a powerful tool in the hands of a righteous God. Taken out of His hands, it can destroy us. It can cause us to focus on the problems, instead of the problem solver. In the end, I have decided that God has offered something I dare not miss. I will not allow the whacked-out ways of men to take Him from my focus.
I would ask this...how would you like Christians to stop poverty and violence? What sort of action would you order, if you were given that power?
You are a thinker...I like that about you. However I wonder if you realize that as a true seeker of the Truth, you must take your eyes off men, and place them squarely on Him? Only then, may we know His mind and heart on such things.
Who is like the Lord?
Blessings, dear one!
All I can say is I'm very tired of ignoring "the ways of men," i.e. the horrible acts violence humanity commits against itself, and the injustice that the Church- the body created by God not to serve itself in its own search for enlightenment, but rather to act as the body of God and in His image- continues to ignore or in some cases facilitate. I want to be part of the action, not the ignorance.
i don't want to ignore anything anymore.
Sorry, but I don't think I used the word 'ignore' anywhere in my written thoughts to you. It's impossible to ignore what is going on in the world.
However, if you must lay the fault at the feet of someone, are we not all at fault? Are we not all culpable? For not seeking God and doing His will on earth as He has defined it? For not tending to the order of our own house, instead of focusing on the mess in someone else's? Of needing a Savior and redeemer just as much as the next person? Of straining to hear the voice of God to direct, console, and strengthen us? Of not seeking His wisdom, instead of judging everything by our own...or lack thereof? I fear, dear one, that the weight of the sins of the world you are trying to carry is not meant for your shoulders. Only One has been able to bear such a load. Perhaps you will let Him share yours.
There's an old saying..."it's not my first time at the fair". I have lived a good while. I know mankind is truly fallen. Without a real change in our hearts, we have no hope. But yet, there is hope...just not in men, but in God, living in the men and women who truly know Him and don't just follow 'the rules' but follow Him. But then, we are back where we started this conversation, aren't we?
Today, I thought of you, preparing again to search out your place...I hope when you come home...we will meet.
I hope we will be friends. I know I'll be praying for your safety, strength, clarity, and peace of mind.
May you see His sovereignty and sufficiency, dear one!
Wordwitness
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