I'm finding recently that Christianity is less of a way to think and more as a driving force. There is a tendency to beat yourself up so easily if you consider yourself as someone trying to follow Jesus but not thinking about him enough. Unless you continue remember that you're a damned sinner saved entirely by grace, you think, there is no chance I can live such a good enough life to model who I'm suppose to be following. And because you're not thinking about it enough you feel completely condemned and even more of a sinner. So it kind of works.
The trouble with the whole idea that you have to remember things about this, Truth and all that, is that in the end you're bound to forget so much of the time. The first thing you think about when you wake up is yourself. That's mainly because you are a major part of your life. If you didn't think about yourself how would know where to go, for example? The interesting paradox to this is the famous summing up of the Gospel by Tim Keller:
“The Christian gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering and sniveling. I cannot feel superior to anyone, and yet I have nothing to prove to anyone. I do not think more of myself nor less of myself. Instead, I think of myself less.”
— Timothy Keller, The Reason For God, New York, NY: Dutton, 2008, p. 181.
The trouble with the whole idea that you have to remember things about this, Truth and all that, is that in the end you're bound to forget so much of the time. The first thing you think about when you wake up is yourself. That's mainly because you are a major part of your life. If you didn't think about yourself how would know where to go, for example? The interesting paradox to this is the famous summing up of the Gospel by Tim Keller:
“The Christian gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering and sniveling. I cannot feel superior to anyone, and yet I have nothing to prove to anyone. I do not think more of myself nor less of myself. Instead, I think of myself less.”
Where do I go from here? Well, the ultimate point I get to is when you stop trying to win intellectual arguments about whether God exists or not. The fact is there are people out there in the world who can prove that He doesn't exist, and there are other people out there who can prove that He does. But it means the argument stops being about whether or not God exists and becomes a competition about who is the cleverest. Someone would denote stupidity to believe in something invisible, only to be told they are closed minded and shallow for not believing in something unless they can see it. It leads to attacks on each other rather than being about what it's supposed to be about. The arguments about God finished a long time ago, and the people who really care, leave other people to write books and make movies, so they can live their lives in peace.
Belief is knowledge moved six inches downward. It moves from something else to put on the list of things worth knowing, and placed into a heart issue. A driving force that lets people live their lives. The basic premise of the Christian gospel comes down to a deep set knowing that you are loved so deeply it cost everything to have you. This sits in your heart and lets you live your life in confidence, as Keller says, thinking of yourself less and less. Jesus becomes ever more real as He reveals Himself to you, and you seek a relationship with a living God. This unchanging God has always been wanting relationship, and it comes to a head when you can see community after community transformed from people seeking God rather than their own success. Their heart has been transformed.
My heart has been transformed. I finally realised I don't need to be thinking about God 24/7 to know that He loves me. What I need to know is live with the confidence I have nothing to prove, and just work, silently, for the God who loved the whole world He sent His son into it. He's not a detached God, He never was.
Belief is knowledge moved six inches downward. It moves from something else to put on the list of things worth knowing, and placed into a heart issue. A driving force that lets people live their lives. The basic premise of the Christian gospel comes down to a deep set knowing that you are loved so deeply it cost everything to have you. This sits in your heart and lets you live your life in confidence, as Keller says, thinking of yourself less and less. Jesus becomes ever more real as He reveals Himself to you, and you seek a relationship with a living God. This unchanging God has always been wanting relationship, and it comes to a head when you can see community after community transformed from people seeking God rather than their own success. Their heart has been transformed.
My heart has been transformed. I finally realised I don't need to be thinking about God 24/7 to know that He loves me. What I need to know is live with the confidence I have nothing to prove, and just work, silently, for the God who loved the whole world He sent His son into it. He's not a detached God, He never was.
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