And yet there's still a battle which periodically rages, as a desire to return to my own understanding arises again and again.
These past few weeks, temptation has come from all sides. I've fallen numerous times, and continue to struggle.
Even knowing on some level that it's His righteousness which matters, not mine. Because mine's insufficient from gaining any favor with God, regardless. It's Christ who makes me well, not my own efforts.
Grace.
Which...is all the more reason to strive against sin, for love of Him, desire to be conformed to His image. Even as knowing that He's the means by which all good comes to and perhaps through me...means that when I do things as a matter of pursuing fulfillment of my own understanding of what He wills, without regard to His leading, then still I'm being rebellious.
There's a depth to abiding in Him which eradicates anxiety, eradicates fear, eradicates doubt, and eradicates temptation. And it came clear for a good while, during fellowship with the Spirit over course of church service, a few weeks ago.
Just...picking myself apart, blindly and maliciously grieving myself over how absolutely prone to error and how full of sin I am, desperately longing to have it all gone, to have all sin entirely set away...
...and a moment of clarity, lovingly came...
...fixating on sin and my error feeds the anxiety. Fixating on how faulty and prone to wandering I am ends up magnifying my regard for those things.
Which...again, isn't to say that sin shouldn't be grievous to the heart of those who love God--it is...
...but it's not reason to look away from Christ, either. (Hebrews 12:2, Romans 8)
He saved, He will sanctify.
Not by works. Not by my will.
By grace, through faith.
And there've been so many thoughts on the nature of faith, lately, especially as a result of tuning in to one of Ravi Zacharias's coworkers, Michael Ramsden. Just...the consistency of faith isn't that of abject blindness nor of ignorance.
Faith is informed.
By belief, sometimes, yes. And beliefs don't always have legitimate substantiation, as to prove sound.
But...faith is informed.
By experience. By revelation. By all faculties available to us.
Even as we're to love God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind, that does imply that none of our faculties are exempt from seeking Him in greater and greater measures.
Not seeking knowledge for the sake of knowledge, then, but seeking knowledge for the sake of understanding God in some wider fashion.
Even as faith is informed by that sort of seeking.
Just...for each of us, there's some variation in the approach. We're individual. He meets us where we are. And draws us from where we were, to Himself.
But, even as He meets us where we are, He doesn't leave us there. So while for some, the substantiation of faith may come per a conscious, logical realization of the irrefutable existence of God in Christ, as established per ardent seeking of truth through a widely considered perusal of the historical accuracy of the Bible, in context of what can be known, even philosophically, of the universe. A revelation wrought by the Holy Spirit, still, even if come by way of the mind, first.
For others, perhaps it'll be a matter of having lived a life entirely devoid of pleasant emotion, until one day witnessing the hope and joy always evident in the lives of those who proclaim themselves Christian. A continuous observation of the love they share between one another and extend to all others they encounter, even being directly experienced as one such continuous recipient. And perhaps that experience yields to a revelation of the truth of love as a proof of the legitimacy of the life of Christ, of God, as presented in the Bible.
Maybe for others, it'll come by way of expending absolutely all one's perceived utility to the end of establishing sufficiency for self and others, then reaching a point of realizing the unavoidable limitations of self which simultaneously reveals the all-sufficiency of God. This, perhaps over course of experiencing a tragedy which completely devastates resources, unaccountably and unavoidably being confronted with the reality of a universe which doesn't begin and end at the expression of an individual's will, but which yet points to a God who does provide for His own.
Or maybe there comes a point of just experiencing what seems total spiritual devastation, by way of continually lurking in the darker corners of metaphysical reality (i.e., all those which aren't Christ, ultimately--no matter how seemingly benign). And simultaneous that devastation, a revelation of Christ as Lord which completely wipes away the darkness, bringing peace never prior considered possible.
Or anything along those lines. But just that there's a starting point which evidences a deeper truth, for those who come to know Him in spirit and in truth. And it's the revelation of the truth of Christ which substantiates faith. Not blindly. But in a way which is irrefutable as evidence to the one who comes into a saving relationship with Him. Even as there'll necessarily be so many things which aren't known and understood, then still the basis of faith is a realization of truth.
And that realization of truth incites a desire to know more, a desire to understand more, a longing for truth. Or, at least that's been my experience of Him. Having experienced a completely life-altering encounter with the truth of who Christ is, in such a way as increased direct fellowship with Him, inconceivably...
...there's been increased desire, thereafter, to understand the truth. As all things do relate to Him. He's the source and the means in which all things subsist. So all truth ultimately does revolve around Him, as the source of all which is.
So, increasing knowledge and understanding of Him increases faith. Increasing the breadth and scope of awareness of who He is increases faith. Increasing realization of His love and His person increases faith.
Not blind wanderings.
But focused discernment of truth.
Unto knowing.
That was the thing about the mustard seed, from last year. And I still really don't understand it, perhaps. But this line of realization, in terms of what faith really is...precisely accords.
Growing up, I'd always heard people talk about having "faith of a mustard seed," in terms of only considering the size of the seed. Not taking into account the nature of the faith, whatsoever.
What faith would a mustard seed have, though? ...or, maybe in order to look better at faith, it might help to delineate that which isn't faith.
What doubts would a mustard seed have, then?
None.
It has no thought of itself. It merely is what it is and does as is given, per its nature.
The faith of a mustard seed is so unwavering, then, as to only do what is known. To do according to its own nature, never questioning ability, resources, or results. But merely to be as it is, relying wholly upon all which is given as resource--drawing very life from the death it would go to, as a seed, then to spring up to the benefit of others.
Never questioning, though.
Being.
Trusting God implicitly, then. Without even so much deliberation, internal, as to require an explicit trust. Because there's no questioning. There's only knowing. Trusting. Doing. Being.
And how humble would be that seed?...as unable to question?
Small, wholly in that regard. Seeking not to be anything except what it is, not seeking to exalt itself against its Creator.
Wholly subject.
Content to be.
Content to serve.
Content to die, as to grow.
Never doubting.
And even then, that faith is not blind. The seed so wholly and simply is what it is that any knowing of purpose or doing arises wholly out of the essence of being. Thus, there's no tendency to deliberate, unto doubt. No tendency to question, as to stray. Because the seed simply is a seed and would not seek to be otherwise.
What would it be like, to be so completely, wholeheartedly, full-naturedly cemented in a complete and total knowledge of who we are in Christ?
Such that faith is so wholly informed and so completely secure in a true knowledge of God...that there's no longer doubt to even speak of. Such that doubt no longer arises as a possibility, because there's such total security in established, informed knowledge of God...that faith is the only possible course.
That, of being so secure in knowing who God is that there's no longer even any question of who you are. Because the entirety of your being is wrapped up in knowing who He is, so that there's no longer a delusion of self existing apart from Him.
To walk even as Christ walked, then.
Even as He said that it should be enough that a disciple would be like his teacher. And would be like his teacher, when fully trained.
So, yeah. I'm totally not going to fret over my church-going family telling people I'm demon possessed. All the more reason to pray for them.
And I'm not going to fret over being tempted to sin and over repeatedly failing to sufficiently draw near to the Lord, as to resist (food and cigarettes and a plague of thoughts and unnecessary speech). He'll guide me through, and get me to a point where it's no longer such concern...no longer such temptation.
Drawing nearer to Him, on the whole, it will flee.
It will have no choice. Drawing nearer to Him.
No comments:
Post a Comment