eh?

So here I am being a good thinker a few days ago and trying to use my brain for the task at hand: understanding how relationships grow.

Well, today I’m again, being a good boy and going to church, and hear a message I usually embrace and adore: “Jesus is enough” (enough for all my fears, questions, issues, thinking, relating, doing, etc. That is, I don’t need to have ‘5 steps to being a better christian’)

Now the centrality of the simple gospel is what I love about my church. But I was a bit concerned today. Was he calling me out on my thinking about relationships the other day? Did I somehow ‘dis’ God by not letting him be the glorious solution to whatever I defined as the problem?

So I got to thinking (duh?!).. mostly while conversing over this with a fellow thinker. If Jesus is all I need for all my issues and problems, then (1) what the heck does that mean and (2) how does that relate to me and my thinking processes? Here’s what we came up with:

• Jesus knows the details of all of our lives, and is ready/willing/able to communicate to us about what we should be doing in those circumstances. (By ‘communicate’ I refer to John 16.13, and all it entails.)
• I am human and don’t know all circumstances.
• My lack of complete knowledge results in generic statements about what I perceive to be ‘normal’ for all ppl reading/hearing me.
• Therefore, he knows you and your story and what ought be done more than what I can try to generalize, so listen to Jesus not me.

Now, that’s a valid & sound argument in my mind. But I’m not happy with it. Cuz I wanna say that I’ve come up with something here that is profitable (albeit not absolutely applicable). And I wanna say that my mind and thinking can be a God-glorifying enterprise. So I gave it another go:

• While I don’t know all circumstances, I do know something about my own.
• While I don’t know all truth, I do know what is communicated to me by Jesus (re: His Spirit/His words while on this planet).
• God wants our lives to be lived in accordance with truth; this is glorifying to Him.
• It then is glorifying to Him to understand my circumstances and understand His truth.
• Furthermore, it is glorifying to Him for me to bring my understanding of my life and His truth into unity in how I choose to live. That is, my life and his truth ‘eclipse’. (Think Venn diagrams..)
• Therefore, I need to use my rational processes to understand His truth and my circumstances.

Ok, now all that in English: I think. That’s a good thing as long as my thinking is constrained to understanding the elements and details of my life and how it “works” and what I’m doing and why I choose what I do. Likewise my thinking is a good thing in terms of having a coherent view of His truth, and it’s correspondence to my life. That is, I cannot live as Jesus without using my rational process. I can perhaps “look like it” or “pretend”, but I will be acting without understanding/knowledge. I will be little different than a commanded soldier. “Don’t ask questions, just do.”

Now, some will rebut, “Christians are to submit to God’s direction, and yes, should not ‘ask questions’ but should just go ahead and do as commanded clearly! That is what faithfulness is!”

Right.

So much of me wants to scream out towards that mindset, “But you’ll miss the glory of God in knowing Him!” But they would only yell back, “but you’ll miss out on His glory displayed because you have not acted!” So now that that has gotten us nowhere, let me proceed in another vein:

What was presented a minute ago could be setup like this:

• All God has communicated is commands for His followers.
• All God’s commands are to be followed by His followers.
• All God’s commands are clearly understood. “You read it, You do it”
  • As a corollary, “None of God’s commands take intellectual effort to comprehend.”
• Therefore, none of God’s communication needs nothing more than be acted upon.

If that is all the gospel is, where is Jesus? The whole point of this blog was recovering rationality to christian living in light of “Jesus is all I need.” While I see no need for rationality in the above argument, I do not also see any Jesus, nor need for Him. I only see man acting in his own power.

The sad part about this the above argument is that it is a christianity without ability to communicate with anyone other than those who already know God’s commands. What is to be said to the one who is depressed? Who is addicted to _____? Who keeps up with the Joneses?

Thinking gets people into their messes, yes. That is not a problem with thinking. It’s a problem with prioritising their thinking as a legit problem-solving method in stead of Jesus.

Keeping up with the Joneses is a problem Jesus called out. But what do we do with it? Just “stop it”? That’s an irrational responce. Rationality comes alongside Jesus’ words to the Rich Young Ruler and says, “Your priority is not eternal. Your priority is not Jesus’ glory but your own.”

Depression can have multiple causes, that is truly debated. But for a number of people I know, it has been caused by hearing messages in the back of your head and assuming they’re (1) from within your own mind and (2) truth when they are not.  Rationality comes and understands those 2 points and looks for the solution in Jesus, who has said there is an enemy who comes to kill, steal and destroy (John 10.10, as well as 1 Cor 12.5.)

Rationality is the glue between what I know and do and what someone else says about what I know and do. The solution is always Jesus. My need is always Him. But it takes rational effort to understand my need, and to understand how He is the solution. Do I have to always know how He is the solution? No, but I know Him more by knowing how, and somehow knowing Him is all that matters (Philippians 3).