Truth be told

The next several blogs are going to be hard for me to write.  I know how I am going to come across and I know how this is going to sound.  Who am I to question some of the foundations of our teachings?  Who am I to call into question teachings provided by accredited professionals and biblical scholars?  Who am I to call into question teachings that have really made a difference in people’s lives?  The reality is that in this world of accreditations, PHDs, and higher education programs I am a nobody.  I am a general contractor; I have spent my life building buildings.  I don’t have a PHD, I have not had extensive training in biblical understanding, historical context, psychology, sociology, or any other form of human interaction or spiritual development.  So where do I feel justified in questioning what I am being taught, what I have read, and what is being preached?

When I listen to sermons or read books I have a tendency to look for what I disagree with more than what I do agree with.  I hear things and contemplate those things that don’t make sense to me, that just don’t add up, and that just don’t seem to be truth.  I actually believe that this process is a fantastic attribute of my design, the pride and arrogance that has gone along with it is not.  Right now, at this very point in time, God is just beginning to shine a powerful light into a deeper understanding of what this means, how humbling myself to the pride aspects while embracing the nature of how my mind works is the key to the next phase of my discipleship training.  The spirit has used a series of events to bring this realization into light.  I have embraced what He is trying to show me.  My hope is in a future where I know His strength will deliver me into a man capable of fully appreciating the work of others, seeing where what they have produced is not only valuable to others but valuable to me, profitable for my journey, and that what they have provided are the keys to unlocking something deeper that God is asking me to see, understand, and share.

The reality is that we all have been designed with this attribute and that most of us have a tendency to struggle with the pride issues surrounding how we go about expressing what we see, hear, and disagree with.  Because of this we tend to see this tendency as “bad” and work to eliminate it from our thought process.  What I am beginning to understand is that this simply isn’t true.  What I am beginning to understand is that this attribute is actually one of the most important parts of our God nature.  It is the part that helps us discern what is truth and what is not even though we have never had anyone teach us, show us, or share with us anything different.   It is this nature of our design that allows God to speak to us through circumstances of life and the teachings of others.  I think at some point it transitions from an “attribute” to the “voice of the Spirit”.  I would say this is the point where the pride is let go of leaving us empty enough to discern where truth ends and something else begins.  The Spirit helps us use what others have produced to teach us what God wants us to see and know; First by stretching our understanding in what He has shown them, then by showing us what comes next.  The challenge is to share the revelation while extending credit where credit is due…..the work He has done in and through others that He is using to do in and through us.

Let’s take a look at my claim; that this attribute of how our minds work is a “fantastic attribute”.  Many would argue that point.  The reality is, if we didn’t have this attribute we would approach every circumstance with the heart of a naive child; we would accept anything that we were told.  Obviously this attribute is the very thing that protects us in a harsh and dangerous world.  It also is what makes us stop, think, and consider what we are being told and even trying to convince ourselves of.  This aspect of our design is what leads us to deeper understanding as we process and own the truth aspects of what we are being “sold”, and what protects us from “buying” the lies that simply don’t add up.  If we truly understand the nature of things we come to realize that it is this very aspect of our design that not only facilitates our growth and protects us in the here and now, but it is in the observation of the here and now that allows us to use this attribute in growing and protecting us on our spiritual journey as well.  It is the embracing of this attribute that opens the door for us to hear and discern what the Spirit is attempting to tell us, where it is attempting to direct us, how God is working to grow us, free us, and what opens the door for Him to transform our lives.

Let me ask you a question;  What do you think is more dangerous to you and your loved ones, the obvious lie or something that is 99% truth with just a hint of lie in it?

Here is how I see it.  The obvious lie we typically avoid because it is simply so obvious.  The almost truth is a bit tricky.  We have a tendency to do one of two things. 

·         Believe it, accept it, follow it, and share it because at quick glance it looks true, or

·         See the embedded lie and reject the entire teaching as a lie.  In other words, we tend to throw out the baby with the bath water.  This typically happens when people see that the lives of those claiming to follow a teaching are not examples of what that teaching claims to provide.

When we do the later we (and those watching us) are prone to turn to the obvious lies because, well….from that perspective there is no truth anyway.  Please read that last sentence again.  If that doesn’t help you see the importance of taking this seriously I don’t know what will.

The reality is, there are blatant lies, truth with a hint of lie embedded, and ultimate truth itself.  Almost everything we are exposed to falls into this middle category.  Very few teach what will lead to obvious pain, suffering, and death.  At the same time none of us are God and we are limited by our Human understandings.  As such, we simply can’t see what is beyond our understanding.  If we can’t see it, we can’t understand it, and as such we can’t teach it.  This is why Christ’s teachings were so different.  He could see and understand what man cannot see and understand.  It is the process of leaning on God and His Spirit that help us see the lies embedded within what we are being taught that leads us to the revelation of the very essence of what He is attempting to deliver us into.  When we get a glimpse of it we can’t put it into words because it is really beyond words.  This is where the indwelling of the Spirit “should” help us be delivered through the same scriptures that left the cumulative lot of the chosen people turning back to the lies of the world.

Moving from theory to application I want to make an example.  Let’s take a look at just how important this is.  There are a few ways to express this, I am going to use the example of a virus.  Thanks to the help of my oldest daughter I got some help with this.  She told me that a virus works on a cell kind of like a mosquito bite.  The virus “pokes” the cell with a virion.  The virion is very small when it is introduced into the healthy cell.  It then uses the reproductive properties of the healthy cell to spread itself throughout the body and make the entire body sick.  As teachers we need to take this very seriously.  One little lie embedded into a really healthy thing can lead to a spiritual pandemic.  Ouch!!

One more example before I get to the meat of what I want to look at:  If you were hired to build a road through a mountainous region and you decided to build a tunnel through one of the mountains why would you do it?  I would think it would be for a few reasons, it would be the least expensive, and best way to help those traveling on the road get from one side of the mountain to the other. 

Now, take a step back and picture the sun coming up on the horizon of the exit side of the tunnel so that the entry to the tunnel is shaded by the mountain.  With that image in your mind picture yourself driving on the road.  You probably have your headlights on because the sun is just breaking the horizon on the other side of the mountain, it is morning, and you have been driving all night.  Your headlights guide your way into the darkness of the tunnel.  As you progress through the tunnel you are relieved to find that there are additional lights mounted along the walls and ceiling to help guide your way.  In the distance you see a small almost insignificant glow.  As you travel through the midst of the tunnel you notice that what was a glow is becoming a light.  The closer you get to the end of the tunnel the brighter the light gets.  Soon you can’t even see the impact of your headlights as the light overpowers their intensity.  Soon you reach the end of the tunnel but you don’t even realize it because the light is so blinding that even the tunnel walls themselves disappear.  As you leave the tunnel the light is so bright that you hardly even notice at which point you left the tunnel.  As your eyes begin to adjust you look around and see a completely new landscape around you.  Instinctively you know it was there before you entered the tunnel but you also know that it was the journey through the mountain that had to occur for you to see and understand all that was there around you from the beginning.

Now, picture your spiritual condition before you were born into this world as the mountain, the tunnel the circumstances of your life experiences, and the road as your spirit’s journey through infinity.  The sun is the true, pure, clean, selfless love of God.  In essence, the tunnel is everything that God uses to help your soul grow beyond its spiritual limitations through the experiences of this life.  Every aspect of it is created by Him for the purpose of delivering you into His light.  If this aspect of God is ultimate love, than this journey, this life, is about a spiritual transformation that delivers our soul from that which blocks us from understanding that love to one that sees, understands, and embraces it, that love, God Himself.

Here is the point.  God wants for us is to experience the very essence of basking in that light, His love.  He wants us to become one with the very nature of that love.  The interesting thing is that the only thing that keeps us from seeing His light sooner is the fact that we are relying on our own lights and the lights on the walls of the tunnel.  The truth is that if we would stop relying on all those other lights, turn them off, and let our eyes adjust, His light would be more than enough to help us find our way.  In fact, with the light shining onto the walls instead of from the walls the image of the tunnel itself would totally change.  Instead of being blinded by the light coming from the walls, His light would shine forth in such a way to actually see the realty of the tunnel itself.

This is where most teachings fall short.  Most teachings remain focused on doing what we are supposed to do in the tunnel because “the sacrifice” is worth the promise of being delivered into His light once we leave the tunnel, or to make God happy, or…...  If we come to let ourselves fully trust His light, the viewpoint totally changes, we begin to see and understand what we never saw or understood, and we find that looking at life through His eyes changes everything.  We begin to find that the “sacrifice, or the works” was nothing more than an opportunity.  An opportunity to meet someone where they were so we can impact their lives, and an opportunity to feel what Christ felt the first time we let Him meet us where we were at.  And this is the progression of breaking the chains of bondage this world has on God’s most precious possession…mankind.  He wants us to feel His love from His perspective; as we give it to others.  This is what it is to be “one with Him”.

The interesting thing is that it is the very process of turning off our lights and looking away from those other lights that allows God to show us what we must come to understand.  As we begin to see and understand we start to glow with His light, and we start to impact the walls around us.  As we impact the walls around us we begin to find ourselves immersed in a pool of others just like us, once embedded in the wall, now glowing with the love of God, moving along the road, shining His light on those still stuck in the walls around us.  Together we continue pressing on as we begin to see and understand more and more about the very nature of the light that is now emanating through us.  This is the process of being transformed into His image, this is the process of being delivered from the false intimacies of this world into the true love of God.    It is where we begin to understand what “God’s will” is “for us” instead of what He expects “of us”.  It is where we begin to realize that “love is a feeling” not just a “commitment”.

Over the next several weeks we are going to take a deep look into what we have been taught about “love”, relationships, and false intimacies.  We will develop an argument that looks at our own headlights and the light coming from the walls as “false intimacy”, we will consider that there is really only one true form of intimacy and that is the true nature of God’s love.  We will look at what we have been told about various “forms” of love, and teachings that tell us that we were each created with different “love needs” and that these “love needs” are a part of our unique “love identity”.  We are going to try to remove the lies embedded in our teachings, build a foundation with the truths that remain, and build a house on the expanse of what is possible. 

In the mean time I pray that you have a God filled week, that this blog has helped you see and understand something that you previously missed out on, and that you look forward to experiencing a new love, one like nothing you have ever known before.