Sunday, June 10, 2012

God's Ways Are Not Our Ways


I am, and have always been, peculiar. I see things dimensionally. For as long as I can remember I can look at a physical object and see it in schematic form, exploded out, each part that makes up the whole but exists on its own separate plane. Thus, I have always been good at designing and building things. It’s a long story, suffice it to say this is a part of my personal operating system that has always seemed to set me apart from the world’s norm. I have willfully marched to a different drummer, forever odd man (woman) out. But, because of this somewhat unique ability, I also look at concepts using a similar perception. One thing that I have always seen differently is creation. I am acutely devoted to the concept of a Sovereign Creator.

I won’t even begin to argue this with staunch evolutionists because it is a futile effort that cannot come to good conclusion. As I mentioned I am not inclined to debate anything (part of my personality type). However, on this issue, where I diverge from the gotta choose A or B stance is that I see there are many more parts, which have not been identified because people cannot see beyond the simple black and white choices that have been set forth. Please note: I’m not tossing the evolutionist/creationist battle out for discussion, I am using this to lead to something else.


I recently discovered a truth about myself that answered so many questions. It was like a door that opened up. But then, as is usually the case, after pondering this, I stopped looking inward and looked outward and found something else that was profound. I was reading a political blog by a fellow who always has a unique perspective that I “get”. He mentioned, off-handedly, that he was identified as an INTJ personality type, as defined by criteria set up in the Meyers-Briggs personality test that delineates 16 separate main categories that humans fall into. I think this test was created using Carl Jung’s research on human behaviors. Anyway, I was curious (there’s a shock) and did a search on the INTJ type. I found it in Wikipedia. Turns out this is the rarest of the types, accounting for 1%-4% of the population. As I read the description it was like reading about me personally. There was not one thing, either in the primary four or the sub-group and auxiliary four categories that did not identify my outlook, my perspectives, my tendencies and my personality, both visual and hidden. It was an epiphanic moment for me, I have to tell you. It was something akin to vindication, but not exactly. Maybe more like justification. At the very least I saw myself not so much as a mutant, but as a true, albeit small, part of a whole.

Then, when I took this revelation outside of my own small realm and began applying it to other issues, I was able to connect some missing dots. First, reiterating my comment about believing a Sovereign God created the universe, I also accept without question that He also set in place a unique natural order (all sciences) that we, for all our advanced knowledge, have only seen a tiny glimpse of. So, what if He created us in His image (body, soul, spirit) but divided us into unique categories because the Divine Natural Order was established to be synergistic? Adam was forbidden to eat of the tree of knowledge because, being omnipotent, God knew mankind would screw it up and then begin worshipping the knowledge instead of Him. Clearly He was spot on, too.

If we take into consideration how it was supposed to be, with different types all working individually to make the whole greater than its sum, we can see the archetype for the Body of Christ in the original Plan. Unfortunately, this is a word of knowledge that is hidden now and instead of us recognizing and utilizing the advantages of our differences, we choose to be dogmatic, judgmental separationists, all of which is governed by the immature, petty, fleshly stronghold of “SELF” which is the weakness that Satan is allowed to use to sift us. 

But where we really stumble is in our total lack of comprehension of the multi-dimensional power of faith. We either commandeer and attempt to micro-manage a self-righteous facsimile of the Holy Spirit to our own agendas or we simply ignore Him, trusting and leaning on our own understandings more. Faith is, at the same time, so complex and yet so simple. It’s like looking at a basic tool without being able to see all the parts that it is constructed of. We use the word “faith” as though we understand the concept, but until we are able to say with conviction, “I will trust Him, though He slay me,” we have not fully grasped the meaning of true faith. 

All this is to say, for these and many other reasons, mankind could not and will never be able to save itself and that is why we needed a Savior. And though He is denied, rejected and falsely represented, He remains true to those who seek Him. He knows we are flawed, He knows we are easily lead astray. He takes the 999 steps to our 1 and yet we often refuse to take the one. If it were not for Grace, who then could be saved? The fruit of a truly surrendered life is not good works, as are defined by man, it is the undeniable result of obedience to the prompts of the Holy Spirit. Obeying the laws of synergy, good fruit lifts up, creates and multiplies, conversely bad fruit always pulls down and destroys. More importantly good fruit always points to Him. 

This is how we know how to discern the difference.

For Him,
Meema




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