The search for meaning
“I do not seek to understand so that I may believe, but I believe so that I may understand, and what is more; I believe that unless I do believe I shall not understand.” -Thomas Aquinas
This was my favorite quote of the semester. It reminds me of Romans 12:2 “be transformed by the renewing of your minds.” I have so many questions; what about the dinosaurs, how could Moses have lived that long, did God really kill all the Egyptian males, and so many more. And before reading this I was concerned that my questions in turn questioned my faith. I got so tired of people saying, you should not ask such questions, or you don’t have enough faith. No, not true, I do have faith and it is by my faith that I seek to understand. I love it. I am a scholastic. I have learned to seek out other scholastics to have my debates with. The scholastics of the middle ages combined faith with understanding.
Beyond understanding I crave an intimacy with God that cannot be explained.
Thus, I also related to the Mystics and their search for the devotional life. Eckhart stated, “meditation about God is to be a lifestyle, not an activity.” He instructed that if we emphasize a time and place to control our thoughts on God, sacred locations and moments in one hand and the secular in the other, we have not found true union with God.
“One ought to keep hold of God in everything and accustom his mind to retain God always among his feeling, thoughts, and loves. Take care how you think of God. As you think of him in church or closet, think of him everywhere. Take him with you among the crowds and turmoil of an alien world. You should however, maintain the same mind, the same trust, and the same earnestness toward God in all your doings… One the other hand, the person who is not conscious of God’s presence, but who must always be going out to get him from this or that, who has to seek him by special methods, as be means of some activity, person, or place – such people have not attained God.” Yes, God did not call us to go to church, to sit in the pew on Sunday, often sleeping for so many Christians today. God called us to be the Church. To live 24/7 Christ-like… “Revolutionaries” as George Barna has termed this radical generation. How can we lead this movement, play our parts, and not make the mistakes of the past, not be seen as a heretic, not get lead astray?
Where did the Mystics get derailed? They craved transcendence. Ah, I hear the serpent again. Isn’t this why eve ate the apple, to be like God. One day we will be with God in eternity, until then, there is a balance that’s must be respected. With God in heaven watching over us, protecting us, and we here in earth, submissive, loving, trusting, and worshiping Him.
We must not take our focus of Christ. Our mission here on the this mission field called planet earth, is not to be like God, but to be like Christ. Through our salvation in Christ we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and that we are saved. Christ left us instructions, they were not, “hey, your job is to transcend to be God”, but he commanded us to “Go and make disciples of all nations.”
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