Yeah, I do think there was a bit of that. Certainly, as a teenager the folk who recommended Narnia truly loved it and you could tell they had a treasured memories of reading it growing. On one level I don’t doubt that they wanted to invite me to participate in their joy. One the other hand, I do think there was a lot of sacred vs secular cultural warfare going on too. Eg. Harry Potter = bad; Narnia = good. I think the hope was that I would discover these ‘good’ Christian books, and then loose the taste for all those ‘bad’ non-Christian books.
It was the same with music to a degree. “Oh you like Led Zepplin and Metallica, huh? Well I am sure you’re just love this amazing Christian band called Delirious. They’re the best ever!”
Don’t you think that has to be qualified? There are many who do not have the IQ to understand a sentence, let alone the concept of God. Others have suffered enough not to be able to see a constant Lawgiver who is just throughout (I don’t for one; there are a lot of nuances there, and I have not suffered anything like many who have cried to God for help, and heard nothing. ). The Biblical references are injunctions to those who fit.
Rather, it seems to me clearer to say that God will not hold us guilty of what we can not conceive. Thanks for your gracious discourse…
Isn’t there is an implicit qualification? Since we are finite, we will never know all about him. More than once you’ve seen me mention that he is inscrutable, as well.
One more repeated post, about finding and being found:
During a dark time in her life, a woman in my congregation complained that she had prayed over and over, “God, help me find you,” but had gotten nowhere. A Christian friend suggested to her that she might change her prayer to, “God, come and find me. After all, you are the Good Shepherd who goes looking for the lost sheep.” She concluded when she was recounting this to me, “The only reason I can tell you this story is – he did.”
I’m sorry, but I’m not getting this. An argument for mysticism leaves little room for discussion, it seems to me.
Islam uses the mysticism claim, too. It says we’re all Muslims at birth, but our Christian, Jewish or pagan parents warp that as we grow. How can we argue with them that we’re not apostates?
What if it’s my elephant leading the rider? Anyone can use the mysticism charge. Once we do, we have no reason to argue we are right over the other.
Randal Rauser reviews this well in “What’s So Confusing About Grace?”.
I think we all need something that satisfies our need to understand how whatever this something more may be fits with the empirical world as we know it. As long as we never lose sight of our footnote that all such theories are provisional and ultimately unconfirmable in spite of everyone’s best intentions. Of course those assuming there just isn’t anything more will need something to explain everyone else’s obsession with this - or just assume we’re all crazy. Maybe that will give them peace.
Do you mean the Keller quote? I don’t necessarily associate it with anything mystic – in fact, my wont is to presume that it was something empirical. The empirical can be denied, of course, or dismissed, but that is a choice, and not childlike. Rich Stearns is a great example whose account I would not consider ‘mystical’, with its multiple objective events. The one thing where the adjective might apply would be Bill Bryce’s ‘prophecy’, but we don’t know the details. There is certainly a wonderful mystery in how God works in providence (you’ve seen that before, too ), but objective empirical events that can be documented (and denied) I would not label as mystical.
yes, there are times I am certain of God, and times I’m not. Thanking Him for gifts prior to asking for them seems to help with that–but is that psychological? Thankfulness is good practice, anyhow.
Good question on the evidence. It seems that for every providential appearing change, there’s an equal evil. Rachel Held Evans worked in India, where a child prayed that his mother with HIV would not die; saw her die; and on return, found it odd that her pastor proclaimed the accumulation of several thousand dollars for a parking lot was God’s will (when, presumably, that money would have saved several HIV afflicted mothers).
God can work evil to good, but we don’t know how to make sense of this. How do we know it’s not our own determination to work out for good?
I’ll PM you to discuss this more, for fear of diverting the subject. Good thoughts, all. Again, none of this is making it impossible to believe in God. I do think we need God as a reference point, for sure; all else seems to be fleeting…
I’d say, communication, empathy, and imagination. If I consider Puddleglum’s speech as an apologetics argument, it leaves me completely cold. But if instead I consider it (as I do) an imaginative portrayal of how we can dwell in Underland – without certainty that there are sunlit lands – but still live faithfully and hopefully, I find it inspiring.
This is still relevant to the thread, I think, because it is about what underlies our hope, even Puddleglum’s…
I think that is why we are given the testimony of scripture and others like Maggie and Rich – my faith probably started with the testimony of my parents. So our faith can be justifiable and justified by belief without necessarily – and maybe necessarily not – having first had firsthand experience. Thus, I’m not saying firsthand objective empirical evidence is required for true faith. Maybe the repentant thief on the cross exemplifies that – we don’t know how much of Jesus’ life and work he was familiar with beforehand, but he was able to proclaim a faithful testimony.
An adaptation from William James goes right along with that, “We make a continuous moral choice as to what we are paying attention to.”
Psalm 37 in its entirety gives us perspective, along with multiple other injunctions and exhortations elsewhere not to be anxious. Remembering of course that it is poetry, it still tells us who is sovereign:
(That’s all easy enough for me to point to, but I am not where you are with respect to being directly involved in the pandemic!)
The older I get, the less I think I know—at least with certainty—and the more I hope. In my earlier days, I might have put Newsome’s percentages for religious faith to be closer to 75% cognitive assent, 20% intuition, and only 5% sheer unadulterated hope. Now I’m more comfortable with those things in thirds.
Yes, we should be hopeful, but not as others hope. Others look for hope in the situation, while Christians look for hope in God. Today the situation looks bleak because Christians cannot work together and justify their lack of faith with conspiracy theories. Our hope in not in ourselves or in our politics or in our theology, but in God, the Logos, Jesus the Messiah.
Faith is not cognitive assent. It is trust in God and our willingness to put Jesus first in our lives, which we have not been doing. Our hope is in God, because we know that God is good. This does not mean that science is evil, because science is only a tool, not an end in itself.
Right now, we are a house divided against itself because Christians do not have love, the primary ingredient of faith according to Paul. Love is not intuition. Love is a profound concern for God and others
We hope because we know that God is Good, and God is in charge. We love because God first loved us
Great article for food for thought. We have 3 ways of knowing, our heart, head and gut. I don’t think hope comes in thirds from each of these sources. Some of us are more heart-oriented, some more head-oriented and certainly some of us mostly operate from our guts’ reactions.
So I love how Jim ended the article “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” ([Romans 15:13]
HOPE COMES FROM THE HOLY SPIRIT and the Holy Spirit operates in us through our hearts, heads and guts. Sometimes my hope mostly sits in my heart and I’m overwhelmed by the wonderful loving assurance. Other times it shoots from my gut as I look up/ponder the night skies in awe and wonder. And sometimes it’s lacking from my head/thinking with lots of doubt. When that happens, I reassure myself that like faith --I only need a mustard seed amount to move mountains-- and I’ll be OK.
Come Holy Spirit. Come now to your people. We are hurting. Pray for us. Lift us up with your hope!
And the older I get (threescore and ten and then some), the more sure my hope is, as in knowledge. “Cross my heart and hope to die.” I know I’m going to die (I also hope to ). There is quite a bit in the NT about growing in knowledge.
), but objective empirical events that can be documented (and denied) I would not label as mystical.
the “neo-calvinist theo-bro” if you will.