Insincere Questioning in Order to Reject God

 

The following quote from Paul Little explains what to be aware of when people hostile to Jesus ask questions: 

“With many questions, it is more important to discern the root problem than to become involved in discussing a twig on a branch. This is especially true of questions about miracles. The questioner’s problem is generally not with a particular miracle, but with a whole principle. To establish the miracle in question would not answer the question. The controversy is with the whole principle of the possibility of miracles. 

The real problem goes even deeper. It is not with miracles but with the whole concept of God.” 

Putting the Past to Bed, Never to Wake it up Again

 

Warren Wiersbe has some helpful and encouraging words for those who, though forgiven by God for past failures and mistakes, and though having forgiven others for real or perceived wrongs, still struggle with shaking off the offending psychological hangovers of yesterday:

"To 'forget' in the Bible means no longer to be influenced by or affected by," he writes. "So, 'forgetting those things which are behind'...means that we break the power to the past by living for the future. We cannot change the past but we can change the meaning of the past..." 

One of the ways I have "broken the power to the past" so that I can and am living in what I like to call the present-going future is through examining, objectively, the context of individual people and events that for months or years would trouble my peace of mind when I remembered them. 

For instance, if it is past interactions with a parent that continues to haunt us, we can stop and think about their upbringing, their perspective, and the reasons they act or say what they do. 

We also may notice, as we pull our heads out of our inner sandbox, that we weren't the only ones who were receiving this ill treatment or disfavor. And as sad as that is, it helps us to take those past treatments less personally. 

The reasons we discover as the underlying cause for someone's less-than-ideal behavior do not have to make sense to us, and often will not. 

But what soon will make sense is found in that "Ah-hah!" moment when it dawns on us, finally, exactly why things are the way they are between ourself and that other person. This occurs through our taking the time to put aside our self-righteousness and hurt so that we can see only them, and see them as they truly are and also how they got there.  

This usually results in compassion, and the accepting of a new reality that confirms that we can't change them (the Lord Himself knows we've tried!) but we can change our approach and expectations going forward. 

And we can do this, because the past, now revealed in all its transparency, no longer stymies. We have the full picture now; the past--and that person--no longer looks the same to us. It is that difference which brings a stop to our revisiting and regretting that which is now over and done with. 

We turn again to Wiersbe for a Biblical example of this very experience:

"There were things in Paul's past that could have been weights to hold him back (1 Tim. 1:12-17), but they became inspirations to speed him ahead. The events did not change, but his understanding of them changed..."

Our perspective transforms because we are no longer looking at all that has transpired from our own viewpoint alone. 

And when we not only see, but also accept the other person's perspective--again I emphasize that accepting does not equal condoning or agreeing with--then the perspective we have held all these years regarding that person's treatment of us alters. It becomes an entirely new perspective that says "even though that person should have known better;" "even though that person should have grown up;" "even though that person should (fill in the blank)" we now come to terms that they didn't know better and they didn't grow up and they didn't (fill in the blank). 

And now we realize why (because we've looked at the entire context of their life up until now), and we forgive them. 

And at the very same time, at least this happened with me, we also forgive ourselves for harboring an internal perspective that couldn't see the actual foundation behind the other person's words and actions. 

The result is that now we can heal: from whatever it is or was that the person did, or did not do, that hurt us, and hurt us immensely. 

We get it now. 

We see the logic that, for them, it might actually be surprising if they weren't the way they are. And so we readily adapt to living in a reality-based attitude, engaging with them in the new paradigm of what is. 

Again, we can't change people or what has already transpired. But we certainly can forge a fresh start in how we interact with people in the present through realistic and well-managed expectations. 

"Too many Christians," Wiersbe laments, "are shackled by regrets of the past. They are trying to run the race by looking backward!...'The things which are behind' must be set aside and 'the things which are before' must take their place."

Which brings me to a final thought: the attention I gave to these past nemeses, or recurring conflicts, or repeated misunderstandings was way out of proportion to their actual importance in my life relative to the positive experiences such as God's growing of faith, motherhood, marriage, creative endeavors, and all of the people with whom I share daily life in joyful simpatico (each person can fill in the blank as to their own specific blessings and positives). 

These are the things and people--current and future--no longer elbowed by fruitless goings-over in my mind of what has been. 

This life, these people, fully fill in where the past, now dealt with, leaves off. I choose to live in this present completeness, at liberty now to go forth in God's gracious cleansing of all offense--mine, and that of others. 

copyright Barb Harwood

The Process of Transformation That Leads, Increasingly So, to Harmony

Again quoting Paul Tournier, who reflects, in the following passage, about how being transformed by God is not a one-time event, as if the moment we are “born again” we have God, ourselves, and life in general all figured out.

If an individual, Tournier says, “is the fruit of a special creative act of God he is responsible before God, and remains dependent (on God). He (the individual) may use the gifts which God grants him—liberty, power, reason—but only within the limitations of the will of his Creator, limitations which he can know only to the extent that God reveals himself. At that price he (the individual) will find harmony in his person, in society, and in his relationship with nature.” Paul Tournier

Christian growth and maturity is a process, which, thankfully, comes with a guarantee from God Himself through Christ that when we fall and fail along the way—when His path is still so new to us even after many years—He will lovingly teach us through our blind spots so that we eventually look back on them with wisdom, grateful for God’s provision of progress into the current day. 

Peace and confidence is built up over time through an inner open-minded commitment to step outside of ourselves and our religious and political posturing and spiritualizing to instead be truly led and enlightened by God. Through the brains he alone equipped us with, He is then able to train us, not in what to think, but in how to think about all that he reveals through His Spirit, and has revealed through Jesus Christ. 

Copyright Barb Harwood

A Perspective on "Canceling"

This quote from Paul Tournier pretty much sums up the reason why many of us step back--or completely step away from--all, or certain kinds, of interactions with specific individuals. And yes, it also explains why others have sometimes done the same with us.

Tournier writes:

"We must...beware of our reaction of resentment when people turn away from our influence. It is because it has been too oppressive, too possessive, since it has been poisoned by our unconscious will to power. The thirst for power enters without our being aware of it into all our conflicts."

The above quote can also be stated this way:

"We must beware of other people's reactions of resentment when we turn away from their influence because it has been too oppressive, too possessive...." 

Most of us have spent time on both sides of this coin. 

The Tournier quote perfectly explains the times that I have had to dial it back from people who routinely make it a point to force those around them to see or hear what it is they want others to see or hear (often through their flaunting of their expertise, knowledge, accomplishments, opinions or recent learning).

As Tournier points out, these need-to-influence folks may not even be aware of the possessive and self-promotional motivation that prods them to engage this way. 

It is possessive in that they are attempting to impress, and thus, befriend (often in an unhealthily exclusive manner); or it is so that they can take individuals under their wing in a way that allows them the superior upper hand. It is possessive also in the arena of thinking that they can, and must, change people's minds.

It is self-promotional due to a lack of confidence that would enable them to engage more quietly and let others share the floor on equal footing.

The lack that underlies both the need to impress and the need to self-promote is that of affirmation. The less we perceive that we are receiving affirmation from others, the more obnoxiously desperate our attempts become to receive it. 

This results in a decidedly one-way relationship--in which one person is so consumed with their side of the relationship--their receiving attention, accolades, credit, compliments, assurances--that it overpowers the two-way of "us.". 

These are the most difficult sorts of friendships, dating relationships and acquaintances to extricate one's self from because of the needy nature of the other person: no matter what we say, the hints we send, or the gentle, constructive and well-timed honesty we speak in kindness, it will end badly (many of us have learned this through the hinting, setting of boundaries and speaking honestly!). Our only recourse then is the logical (and, I believe,  most compassionate) response of simply, quietly and without fanfare or drama, walking away. 

If this is "cancelling," so be it. 

It's happened to me and I'm sure it's happened to everyone. 

And when I look back at the times I have been "cancelled," I can usually see now how the person was justified, and how I was so needy that it really would have been worse if the person would have confronted me. I am grateful now that the person simply allowed me to figure it out for myself--something I was able to learn better through their albeit at the time hurtful and confusing leaving--than if they had confided their concerns to me only to ignite my defensiveness. 

And if I search my heart before God, and find there is nothing I can put my finger on that would reveal why someone no longer wants to be in my company, then I do the compassionate thing and understand that, for whatever reason on their part, they simply can not remain in connection with me. I allow them to do what they feel they must do for their own personal peace, and harbor no grudge or victim-ruminations of blame and animosity. I choose to live in the reality that, sometimes, life is very very difficult--beyond our ability, each one of us, to functionally cope--and I treat them as I would want to be treated: with the respect that allows each of us to go our separate ways in loving, neutral, impartiality. 

copyright Barb Harwood

We Are Who We Are TODAY

 

“Don’t let the past remind us of what we are not now.”

Suite: Judy Blue Eyes lyrics by Crosby, Stills and Nash

On Disappointment and Science

 

Paul Tournier writes:

"We are disappointed, I think, because we embraced exaggerated hopes. We are disappointed with politics,...with the churches, and most of all with science."

"Science has more than kept its promises. I do not understand my colleagues...in their severe criticism of official scientific medicine. We meet people every day who would be dead without it, and that is sufficient justification for it. But other diseases are spreading--the neuroses, which are so symptomatic of the disorganization of our age."

Setting the Record Straight on the Biblical Interpretation of Husband

 

Many sincere Christian Bible readers and church attendees, along with those who’ve never set their fingers on a Bible, have a warped, immature or agenda-ized “understanding” of the Biblical, and thus, Godly Husband.

Many who have never read the Bible, much less have a desire to do so, will perpetuate their negative assumption about the Bible’s revealed Word on the role and purpose of the Husband in order to justify their animosity towards Christians, and faith itself. 

Others, who claim to be followers of Christ and the Bible, go along with a pastor or denomination’s teaching on the Husband and err in not testing what the pastor or denomination is teaching against what the Bible actually says and teaches (Test everything: 1 Thessalonians 5:21).

So, in order to help set the record straight, I quote John R.W. Stott, who has written what my intensive study not only of the Bible, but of this specific issue, would affirm as the best exposition I have yet to read on what, exactly, the Bible is saying regarding the husband:

“…we must be very careful how we interpret the husband’s ‘authority.’ The word is by no means a synonym for authoritarianism. Nor can it be taken to express any ‘superiority’ of the male or ‘inferiority’ of the female. For—centuries in advance of his time—Paul emphatically declared that in Christ ‘there is neither…male nor female’ (Gal. 3:28). He also drew a profound analogy between the relationship of husband and wife in marriage and the relationship between the Father and the Son in the Godhead (1 Cor. 11:3). This suggests that the husband’s ‘headship’ is not incompatible with their equality, any more than is the Father’s ‘headship’ over Christ. Perhaps the husband’s authority should be understood in terms rather of responsibility than of autocracy, the responsibility of a loving care.” (emphases mine)

John R.W. Stott

Proud Self Confidence

 

Quote for the day:

"Sometimes our growth in understanding is inhibited by a proud...self-confidence."

John R.W. Stott

Because It's the Right Thing to Do

When we know the right thing to say or do, but our pride, fear, or keeping-score rises up to squash what we know to be right—in other words, what we know to be Christian, meaning what God would have us do—we, because of God through whom we are supposedly maturing, must do the right thing anyway.

Having struggled mightily in this, as most do, I do not say the above lightly. Pride is a warm and fuzzy friend with whom it is so easy to pacify ourselves. 

Because we so often do not want to do the right thing (especially when it comes to forgiveness, second chances and acknowledging the positives in a person with whom we struggle), and would not choose to do so if left completely alone to go about our day however we prefer, God has given us His Spirit to overcome this self-centeredness.

And although we can do the right thing to merely assuage guilt (which, let’s be honest, is still a form of self-centeredness that doesn’t procure increased maturity, but which, to be fair, is a good beginning), the better way is to do the right thing for the sole purpose of living out what God has wisely taught us all these years. 

What is the point, in the end, of our “prayer life,” church attendance, knowing the Bible inside and out, charitable works to strangers, if, when it comes to letting God rule truly both our heart and mind, pride wins? 

To own this objective reality of God—this doing the right thing—is to go beyond our lawyerly sense of reason and justice. It is what it means to be free of self dominance over our not always trustworthy inner heart and mindset. 

It means that, even if we sigh as we do the right thing, we can sit back after we do it and, in humility, know by our conscience before God, that it was indeed right, because it was of God, no matter how the doing may sting even a little bit. 

When we decide to give God His say in matters that conflict us, our conscience, if we are sincerely wanting God to lead, will reveal any motivation that lets us know when we are defying His wisdom.

Over time, this actually becomes joyful. Because I don’t know about anyone else, but living in my own jurisprudence is not a thriving, peaceful, or fun way to live. 

Whatever comes after our doing the right thing—responses, reactions, resentment, unforgiveness, continued or new misunderstandings from others, or—surprise!—peace, goodwill, closure, respect between us and others—God will contend with that too, all the while continuing to offer love, support, encouragement and guidance every step of the way.

Copyright Barb Harwood

The Inside of the Cup is the Point

Jesus, as I understand Him, isn’t about getting people who believe in Him into heaven.

It’s about His power and desire to transform the inner world of each one of us.

I recently listened to a podcast attempting to flesh out religion, and in one way the discussion succeeded: the participants almost never talked about Jesus or an individual’s need to inwardly be made mature. In that regard, it stuck to its topic of religion.

I find it frustrating and fascinating at the same time that the world still continues to not get the memo: Jesus came for the inside of the cup—souls—to cleanse them—not to get us into heaven, but to get us to personal peace and freedom that, only then, can reverberate to the wider population.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.” Matthew 23:25-28


In all the hustle and bustle of religion: liturgy and colors; incense and icons; Saint’s Days and corporate church worship and ritual; rote fasting and prayer—the direct addressing and prioritizing of the inside of the cup is so often neglected for the smoke and mirrors of attempting to get there via the power of suggestion through tradition and outward practice of tenets and commandments.

And Jesus stands on the outskirts of this mentality and behavior, looking over it, saddened that so often we are still harassed and helpless in our religion, so unwilling to go deeper—or just allowing religious righteousness, group-think or duress to continue to hide “the things which make for peace” (Luke 19:41-42).

Jesus doesn’t require or desire weekly, rote and repetitive sacrifices directed at Him (Matthew 23).

What does he require?



"With what shall I come to the Lord

And bow myself before the God on high?

Shall I come to Him with burnt offerings,

With yearling calves?


Does the Lord take delight in thousands of rams,

In ten thousand rivers of oil?

Shall I present my firstborn for my rebellious acts,

The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?


He has told you, O man, what is good;

And what does the Lord require of you

But to do justice, to love kindness,

And to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:6-8


If we do not currently find our own inner and outer self in Micah 6:8 (or sincerely beginning to open our minds to get there), and we have been very religious, then that being religious has not gotten us very far.




Copyright Barb Harwood