For my blog post I am going to put forward some ideas I've been exposed to recently...
shamelessly swiped from people's facebook statusses :)
Good doctrine alone is a poor substitute for true Christianity. Knowing more doesn't equate to being a Christian. But somehow we have made "knowing more" one of the major marks of becoming a better Christian. Read more books, know the answers to the questions, know the Bible better. All of which are good things.
But God isn't a set of principles we can know, and master. Knowing God isn't about figuring out the rules that he operates by.
Yet I know I have a tenancy to reduce being a Christian to following a set of principles to follow.
I know we can maybe relatively easily avoid this kind of thinking in our own personal one on one relationships with God. But what about things like worldviews and doctrine on the issues of society? Sometimes my approach to that looks a lot like trying to figure out the rules...
Just some thoughts :)
L
"But God isn't a set of principles we can know, and master. Knowing God isn't about figuring out the rules that he operates by." I only half agree with this claim.
ReplyDeleteTo know God is to learn and do what he commands.It is not even possible to speak of loving him without doing what he commands:1 John 5:3
"This is love for God: to obey his commands." "We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands" 1jhn2:3
I think that the problem is simply that we have a tendency to view commands and principles from our own poverty... for they were given after all for restraint and steming the tide of evil or the very least exposing it in us.
However, I think in Christ, the commands and principles of God are for maximising instead of restricting. For producing and pointing the way to bountiful freedom , instead of limitation.
So what if we came to every question concerning God and God in life with the thought "what bountiful word or way shall I release or embark upon?" instead of "oh dear ... I better get this principle right, or else..."
i think if we reduce the principles of God to neat little equations with no heart, we turn the very thing by which the world was created into a means of improsoning life. Yet, if we disregard the principles of God for fear of being religious... we will get no where and our lives will remain fruitless and small... for what are the principles of God if not the word, and aside from the word nothing was and can ever be created.
Of course! ;D
ReplyDelete(I'll reply properly tomorrow!)
Ah tomorrow came and went, I'm sorry!
ReplyDeleteAs you said, of course, I agree with everything you say.
I'm not sure it is worth saying any more, because I agree with you :)