Mystery or Division
Posted by Scott Coombe
My little girl is just over one year-old and she has slipped right into the sibling rivalry role as youngster. Her brother is four and loves to play / tease her. She has no problem reaching over and pulling his hair or stealing his juice. She also has no problem crying out if he so much as looks at her in reprisal.
They love each other in the funniest of ways.
And we are often the same as adults and Christians, except we have a lot more armor on and a lot less love.
I am learning about the divisions we carry within our modern Christian dogma and I realize we have lost some very important – actually, integral – aspects of our Christian walk.
JOY! LOVE! MYSTERY!
Mystery?
Yes, and I'll get to it in just a second.
Somehow, our modern material world has a yearning for rational logic. And the problem we see here is that logic and rational thinking only work in certain areas of understanding.
Try and describe compassion in a modern mind-frame.
Now, feelings are not logical or rational. So you would have to scratch that out.
Statistical testing would find that some have it and some don't... and it is never the same from one case to the next... and worse, it seems to run out without recharge.
You would end up trying to give illustrations of compassion and maybe a feeble definition like “a disposition to pity.” (Webster's)
Now for the last millennium (and you could make the case for the last two) there has been a slide to bring something deep and heavy, like Christianity, under rationality and logic.
You would begin to define things like Trinity, sanctification and blessing under modern rational design. You'd develop biblical and systematic theologies to give understanding to every element of the Christian faith.
And what has it done?
We lost our joy in seeking God.
We become a people divided and divisive.
We split churches and whole denominations because of some blurred and incomplete definition that hardly illuminates the holistic view of the Scriptures.
Some churches have split because of the color of carpet that gets placed in the church. Some over sin in the congregation. Other's divide because of a woman or gay in leadership.
And I am guilty of promoting “my church is pretty darn great for such and such a reason” over all those other good churches in the neighborhood. And we drive past twenty other good churches to get to ours.
And a lot of the time we do this because of the little definitions we hold. The little bricks that we hold that has built our Christianity. And those bricks will often define which Church we attend and how much value our faith holds for us.
But carrying around all these bricks has often sapped our joy in being a Christian. We feel like we need to defend our faith and our position. We have our stake in the ground and a line drawn in the sand.
We are playing sibling rivalry with our churches and theologies.
But Jesus didn't do that.
He was always inviting. I have something that will bring you joy... and that is knowing the God in heaven... our Heavenly Father.
Then He promised our joy would be complete.
Then He promised our burdens would be light.
Then He promised we would have abundant life.
And I look at these three simple promises... and I feel bankrupt. I wonder if my bricks have blocked my view of God.
And I have to ask, “Did my bricks of understanding keep me from knowing / relating to God the Father?”
MYSTERY
There it is again. God is mystery to us just as much as He is justice and holiness.
What is it about the mystery banished from the modern world that could rescue us from a fading faith or divisions?
Do you remember reading mystery books or movies? You are kept in suspense thinking one thing or five things are going on, when BAM the story brings in new information that concludes the adventure or mystery.
We never had all the information until the very end. And that is life as we know it.
All that time we were held in suspense. Our attention fixated on what will happen next.
If our God were a God of mystery and we could drop the bricks for a while... would we be fixated upon Him like that?
Would we wait for... pant for God's next move in our life?
If God had our whole attention... would we receive some of those simple promises Jesus invited us to?
ARE BRICKS OKAY?Yes and No.
Some are, some are really not worth bothering over.
It seems like there are 4 levels of bricks.
Foundation stones
Mystery stones
Rubber Bricks
Dry Spaghetti
The first level (foundation stones) is the person and nature of God. The only place we can have assurance we are in the right is within the holy Scriptures. Only what God has revealed of Himself becomes a foundational stone.
Don't mess with it, don't drop it, don't doubt it.
The second level (mystery stones) are God's covenants and promises. Part of the nature of God is to make covenants and promises. These are powerful spiritual extensions into the universe we know that are totally unscientific and mysterious apart from what is revealed.
Some covenants are directed towards the Israelites only, some towards the church and others to all who listen (psalm proverb).
Now this God is the Creator and has the right to lay down the terms of mankind's relationship to Him.
He said to Abram “I am and will be your God. You are and shall be – you must be – my people.” And thus sprang the church and people of God (through the seed). God didn't enter a covenant with everyone, just Abram and things sprang from there.
The third level (rubber bricks) are the things said in the Scriptures. Often these things are incidental and indirect and implicit rather than explicitly stated. The reason these bricks need to be rubber is because there needs to be flexibility and give.
Let's take for instance the virgin birth. The prophecy from Matthew about the virgin birth actually comes from Isaiah 7 where the word virgin can have many meanings, one of which is simply a young maiden. In the first century context being born of a virgin meant that a woman became pregnant the first time she had intercourse.
So, if science finds with 100% DNA accuracy that Jesus had a father named Jake or worse it was Mary's father... would the virgin birth still be a core tenant or would the whole Christian faith crumble right there?
Don't get me wrong... I believe in the virgin birth, the inspiration of the Bible and that coveting is a sin. But there needs to be a little flexibility in our thinking when opinions differ. I am not going to divide my church because someone thinks we need a double helping of the Holy Spirit or if and when we get raptured.
And if you want to know something about me... I got saved not by confessing sins, not by accepting Jesus and not by any promise of salvation. I became saved by accepting “God existed” ...and I learned the rest later. I wrote a book about it (http://hope4glory.com/Leaked.aspx)
Can your paradigm allow it? Flex... God is doing His own thing inside and outside our boxes.
The forth level (dry spaghetti) are cultural constructs. This is where people get testy. These are disagreements on church spending, worship practices and church programs / traditions. I had a friend who was not let into his own church one sunny Sunday because he was wearing shorts.
I call these bricks spaghetti because as generations pass... they will cook and eat cultural constructs. It's too bad because as good as some of these constructs are... they are only to beautify the church's cultural appeal.
When the appeal is no longer there... remain relevant. Keep bringing life and light to the beauty of Jesus instead of burying Him in tradition.
All these topics are in the PoMo (Post-Modern) Gospel group on both MySpace.com and Facebook.com Feel free to add and participate and see how others have responded.