When I woke up
today, these thoughts came flooding out of me in the shower :). So I want to
share a few. This may come in installments..but hang on..here we go.....
First I think it is important to realize that God desires offspring that reflect
Himself. Of course He set the pattern with His first Son. Since God is a
supernatural being, He brought forth Jesus supernaturally. So now the rest of
His sons are also born supernaturally <since in Christ there is no male or
female..we are all sons, in a generic sense - heirs>. To be born of God means
to be born of His Spirit, so we, as sons of God now, have that supernatural
essence of God within our spirit. That does NOT mean we are God, but we
are (if born again), partakers of His Divine nature (II Pet. 1:4). We are also
joined to the Lord, and have become ONE spirit (I Cor. 6:17). Tell me that is
not supernatural?!!
Now, how does this fit into
the objective/subjective truth? In order to live the supernatural Christian
life, we have to "do" the impossible! That cannot be done by simply obeying an
objective truth. It MUST be done by abiding in a supernatural, intimate
relationship with our Big Brother and Father. This is all made possible by,
through, and in the Spirit. To me, that is very subjective!
Allow me to balance this a bit further. We each have different attributes to
offer. I will admit that I lean more to the subjective. I have a tendency to
float with my head in the clouds (maybe too heavenly minded to be much earthly
good). However, I do have friends that challenge me and keep me in balance by
pulling me back down to earth with their more objective perspective. This
is how we all need one another, and is one purpose for the body of Christ. It
brings us into balance with God’s heart desire - offspring that reflect
Himself. He also desires that we encourage one another as we get together.
We help one another grow in faith as we enjoy the Lord together, and share His
life (in us) with others.
With that said, I want to (perhaps) step on some toes <in love, of course :)>.
I think that if you emphasize ONLY the objective side, you will miss out on the
great adventure (we are called to walk with one another)! Religion wants rules,
laws, things to make an outward show. These are things that make us look good
when we "obey" and make others look bad cuz they fall short. That is not God's
heart!! He wants us to walk with Him (and each other); whether we fail or
not...the provision for failure has been made in Christ!
We have been called to walk by faith. Faith requires the supernatural. The
natural man cannot walk by faith or even comprehend the things of God. There
most certainly is an objective side to faith, but faith is to be experienced
also, and let me also say that our earthly "father of faith”, Abe, wasn't too
faithful at the beginning. He obeyed, but with his own concepts and plan
<example: Hagar & Ishmael>. Yet God continued to lead and nurture him. So even
our failures can be a way to learn more about God: His love, mercy, grace,
forgiveness, patience, longsuffering, etc.
If we live the Christian life ONLY by following the objective side, some will be
successful, some will not. Some are naturally more strong willed than others.
But the bottom line is, we THINK we can do it! And we judge others based on
that outward appearance. The Jews totally misunderstood the law that God gave.
They saw it as an objective list of do's and don'ts. In fact they added more
to the list. When Jesus came, He really blew their minds. He made sure that
to keep the law was impossible cuz He said if you hate your brother you are
guilty of murder. He also pointed out a new angle to adultery. The bottom line
is God is interested in the heart, not the outward.
God has put us all on level ground. He did that through the law. If you think
you kept the law, try to keep the addendum Jesus added. Now no one is fully
successful, for ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. So we all
start out on the same playing field :). God wants a relationship that begins
with the heart. That's why He said what He did about David. If we scored
David according to his outward actions, he would not get a passing grade. Yet
David loved the law, and wrote Ps. 119 extolling it, so there IS an objective
side also, but the objective without the subjective is falling short of God’s
desire. I believe God gave us the Bible to balance us. It truly does have many
objective statements and lessons. But, we all must realize that a great
majority of the Bible was also written from a very personal and intimate
standpoint by illustrating God’s love, forgiveness, long suffering and mercy
with many saints in the old testament. Remember Adam/Eve, Enoch, Noah, Abraham,
Jacob, Samuel, David, John (the baptizer), Peter, Paul, John the apostle (and
many more)? What is so unique about the Bible is that in sharing the
(subjective) relationship God and Jesus had with these folks in the Bible, God
did not “sugarcoat" their lives. They were all real people like us, with
failures as well as great victories and successes. But through both the
failures and successes, God maintained an intimate relationship with them. THAT
should give us all hope! God likes to involve Himself in our lives even when we
can’t live up to the “objective” commands of God’s law or our desires for Him.
charlie - 3-06
