How I've Been
Hey all,
each day, I ask God for something to memorise and meditate on. He's been good to show me what has been so relevant for walking through the challenges of this week! I'm being sharpened, to know what I ought to give ear to and what to discard. I've also learnt this week, a little better, more kinds of questions that don't edify one to ask. Been chewing on several verses this week, but I'll just post up one of them plus thoughts.
"Knowledge puffs up but love builds up. He who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know, but he who loves God is known by God." (I Corinthians 8:1)
Normally, the proverb is spoken as a subtle rebuke of a believer seemingly falling in love with knowledge because it brings forth arrogance. Some reason then that learning isn't a habit worthy of our love. According to many who voice this proverb, some learning is necessary, but the sole objective of study is practice: Doing, not thinking. Our goal as Christians is not to know about God--which sounds impersonal and academic--but to know God. We know far more about the Bible (we imagine) than we can possibly obey, and so our focus must shift from that of impractical, pride-feeding knowledge to application and ministry skills acquisition. Our rallying cry: Let's get spiritual (not academic)!
While the careful Bible student will refrain from developing a doctrine from one verse alone, he or she must also avoid excluding obscure verses from his or her system of theology. Perhaps 1 Corinthians serves as a better example of how we should understand this.
In this chapter, Paul addresses the issue of eating food sacrificed to idols. Three distinct levels of knowledge are delineated regarding sacrificed meat. First, 1 Corinthians 8:7 describes some who do not share in the knowledge that an idol is nothing at all. "They" consider food that has been sacrificed to an idol unclean, and so the eating of this food is defiling for them. Next, 1 Corinthians 8:1, 2, 10, and 11 describe the person who knows that there is no such thing as an idol, and so knows that food sacrificed to an idol is not ceremonially unclean (8:4-6).
According to 8:2, however, "He does not know to the degree that he needs to know." That is, his knowledge is deficient of proper love (8:1b, 3). He possesses the right knowledge pertaining to the status of sacrificed meat and his liberty to partake (8:10, 11), but his paucity of love blinds him from his weaker brother's sensitivity. His knowledge does not build up his brother, as it would were it coupled with love (8:1b). On the contrary, his knowledge devoid of love serves only to build himself up; it demonstrates his selfishness (cf. 1 Corinthians 13:2, "[if I have] all knowledge. . .but do not have love, I am nothing").
The final level of knowledge rests with those who understand that an idol is powerless and that the meat is not unclean. His knowledge of this information, however, coexists with enough love to refrain from eating (8:13). That is, he knows to the degree that he needs to know (8:2). He decides not to exercise his liberty out of consideration for his brother.
Doing what is right without love carries the immense potential to stumble others, making a testimony of themselves, only to carry others further from the heart of God.
To one stumbled in my recent experience I have this to say:
1. Brother it is not true that your pain means nothing to God. Don't believe a word of those who tell you this, for they do not yet know His compassion as they ought to know. Yes it is true that you can be so much more, but God wants to deal with all of you, not just the aspects profitably workable to the human eye. In Exodus, even of the poor man who shivers with cold, God says "When he cries out to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate." Of what profit is it to Him that He should suffer with the poor man? And yet He does this because of love.
So it is true that He suffers with you completely and thoroughly, just as much as He wants to teach you to hope in Him still for your salvation in every sense.
Sink not, into your inferiority complex. There are others around us who perhaps are much quicker in their healing from their wounds. But that is their journey, and you have your own to walk. And although God is a patient teacher, you will not get the answer you need by sitting down and making comparisons and feeling worse at how long you seem to be taking, or at how your bitterness makes you worse than someone else who suffered greater hardship. The answers are not found there.
You say yourself that God's been reaching out to you across the weeks. When you discern this, is it not already His way of opening your eyes and ears a little? Brother, if you run, how shall you see more and hear more? He's shown you step one. You're going to have to walk that before you see step two.
Look to Him, and find your release.
I am praying for you.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. (I Corinthians 13:4-7)
If I have all knowledge, but do not have love, I am nothing." (I Corinthians 13: 2)
| e.s.t.h.e.r in the arms of Jesus @
9/25/2005 09:58:00 am |
|
|