repentance of passion-less-ness for truth
based on the comment a few comments about the need for a passion for truth, i found this video apropos:
as a.w. tozer said, "what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us."
has the cGgc lost its passion for truth? if so, how to we cultivate and encourage it? how do we get it back?
Labels: orthodoxy, repentance, theology
posted by John at 7:54 PM
5 Comments:
groovy, walt, groovy.
Good stuff. I would say that one thing we need to repent of is our lack of passion.
I like this, and it has me wondering... Is it possible that in our passion for truth we may, in fact, sometimes need to repent of our certainty?
I thought Bill’s macro/micro-repentance post was outstanding. But I have to admit that I get a little uneasy whenever people start to question the substance of people’s faith, what is or isn’t heresy, or whether churches are “worth” keeping open. I know what was being said, and it’s not that I totally disagree, but… I don’t know. I’ve been studying for my Easter sermon the accounts of Jesus’ closest followers going to the grave. The women were sure they would find his dead body; the disciples said they were nuts when they tried to tell them that he was risen; Peter went away “wondering to himself what had happened.” These were the very people closest to Jesus, and they had MISSED IT! I mean, we can study the Bible, read scholars, and think we’re as enlightened as they come, but these people were reading and hearing from JESUS and still didn’t get it. Would they need to be removed from our churches?
So, I’m all for passion. But I’m not always sure how to balance that with the humility required to follow a wild and crazy God who seems to like to do the unexpected.
dan h.,
interesting idea. i agree that we need humility to keep us from arrogance and an attitude of religious elitism. i also think that you can fall into a weird arrogance of uncertainty, that questions whether we can really know something that God has clearly made known to us. on a college campus, or anywhere that people have gotten drunk on postmodern thinking, you can see this arrogant "you can't really know that" attitude.
so i think there needs to be humility in understanding that we can misunderstand, and also humility in letting God's truth stand tall, whether we like it or not. we need to accept the fact that we are not the ultimate judge of reality, and can be proven wrong. but i would argue for tenaciously holding onto the truths that are most central to the gospel, which God has revealed, and to being humble enough to stand up for them. and if we're proven wrong, to humbly admit it and change.
i say this thinking of paul, who said that he was to be pitied above all men if he were proven wrong about the resurrection. and i think if he were proven wrong, he would have conceded and felt shame at his wasted life. but i also don't think we'll ever be proven wrong on that.
that's where i'm coming from, anyway. i also know my heart tends to lean on the prideful side when it errs, rather than the falsely-modest side, and so God still has work to do in balancing me. that's why i'm glad He brings guys like you and me together, to help balance each other: knowing what to hold tightly and what to keep an open mind about.
There is certainly a question of attitude and approach in situations of doctrine too.
On basic orthodoxy stuff - like Bill mentioned on the divinity of Jesus, the goal is not to kick someone out but to see them come to a knowledge of the truth. Not because we've decided ourselves it's truth, but because scripture teaches it.
The goal of discipline is unity and fellowship. And so opening the Bible together, asking questions about why that person is struggling with a belief etc, sharing the implications of it on the gospel...
Not because we're prideful, but because we'd rather please God than anyone else.
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