Which do you know better? Your god OR your God?
I like to think, analyze and mull things over and over in my mind. You can say that I am an introspective
person. The dictionary defines
introspection as, “a reflective looking inward : an examination of one's own
thoughts and feelings.”
True, there are some benefits to examining my thoughts and feelings, but
most often it only gets me into trouble.
How does thinking too much get me into trouble? When I spend my energy and make it my
end goal to be fully familiar with my “god” rather than focusing on knowing my
God. It usually starts with a sin
or struggle that keeps reappearing in my life. Then as I begin to notice its frequent reappearance, I grow
frustrated at my inability to change and turn. So I make it my goal to change. Using all of my spare moments throughout the day, I make it
my passion to get to know this new sin of mine. It’s a hunger to know why and a grasp to gain control, to discover
what wrong thinking led to my wrong beliefs about God and thus resulted in the
action of my sin. But it is a
hunger that is never satisfied.
Even after I identify my wrong thinking, my heart idol, and
the pattern and location of temptation…I wait. I wait for brokenness, I wait for tears and sorrow over my
sin. And I wait in fear, afraid
that if tears do not fall I assume I must still have a hardened heart….so I
start the process all over again, because I think I must have missed something. You can probably imagine this process
is very wearisome. Which naturally
leads to depression and a state of hopelessness.
The failure in the process of introspection is that knowledge
of God is blinded by sin. Sin by
its very nature is deceitful. The
ability to fully know myself and my sin and my “god” depends upon my knowledge
of God. When I go through this
depressing introspective cycle of getting aquatinted with my “god” -- with my
Bible closed -- it is like I am groping in the darkness. It is futile and leads only to
weariness.[1]
The man declares, I am weary, O God; I am weary, O
God, and worn out. Surely I am too stupid to
be a man. I have not the understanding of a
man. I have not learned wisdom, nor have I knowledge of the Holy One. (Proverbs 30:1b-3)
In all of my introspective efforts
I have failed to realize that the only way people come to God is because God
draws them, no one comes to God out of human reason. Analyzing, admiring and scrutinizing my “god” will not bring
me to knowing God. No, I need to turn
from my “god” and come, look and believe in my God. But it is not enough to replace gazing upon my “god” with
gazing upon my God. I need the
Bread of Life. Eating is
necessary, I cannot just come and admire the Bread. But to eat there must be hunger, which is an aching of the
heart because it is empty. It is
food, the Bread of Life, that transforms, you must eat.[2]
So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you,
unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no
life in you. Whoever
feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up
on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood
is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my
blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father
sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will
live because of me. 58 This is the bread
that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died.
Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” (John 6:53-58)
I am thankful for my husband’s faithfulness to love me like
Christ loves the church. He faithfully
observes and learns the way my mind works, and as a result he understands me
better than I understand myself.
He sees the overwhelming burden I carry when I try to dissect my
sin. He sees the shock and
surprise I have each time I fail. And
he consistently listens when I tell him time and time again the ugliness of my
sin and repetitive sin patterns.
Then he patiently ministers the Word to me and reminds me of the
gospel. One of the ways he
reminded me of the gospel recently was by directing me to read an article
titled “Strength=Good,
Weakness=Bad”, by Tim Challies.
Here are a few paragraphs:
I like to be strong. At least I like to appear strong. You do too, I think. Most of us value
strength and look down on weakness. We honor those who have their lives
together and regard with suspicion those who do not.
Strength =
good, weakness = bad. That is
our functional formula. But it is not the Lord’s. 2 Corinthians 12 says it very
differently: “ ‘My grace is sufficient for you,” said the Lord, “ ‘for my
power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly
of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of
Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions,
and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Paul saw that weakness, not strength, was key to his ministry. He
had to own his weakness so the Lord could fill him with strength. The stronger
he was, the weaker the power of God would be; the weaker he was, the greater
the power of God would be.
I told my husband, Allan, that the truth from 2 Corinthians
12 was so refreshing! I said it
was such a relief because it removes my burden and lifts my gaze from my “god”
to my God. Allan told me that he
sees the burden I put myself under each time I sin and he reminded me that as
soon as I try to fight my sin I have already lost. Why? Because
sin has already been fought by my Savior on the cross and I have victory
through His death and resurrection.
This reminder simplifies the whole process of
repentance. As I got lost in the
path of introspection I made the repentance process, and the entire Christian
walk, burdensome and complicated.
So this year one of my resolutions is going to be to turn and gaze upon
my God and Savior. Instead of
getting lost in the introspective maze of analyzing my thoughts and feelings, I
am going to open my Bible more and let the Word renew my mind. Why? Because next time I sin I am not going to be surprised at the
ugliness of my flesh, instead I am going to see the weakness of my flesh as a
blessing in disguise, because it is the vehicle, the hunger and the fuel that
leads me to my Savior and the gospel.
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