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| Knowing God |
Suppose a boy of fourteen is lying in bed overcome by a desperate family situation, devoid of confidence, and dismayed at his disintegrating world. Suppose he prays with a desperate, trusting surrender to God that is unique to that existential moment in his life. Brought up in the church and knowing the scriptures, he wonders if the teachings are true. The stories and teachings drown in the existential moment. He centers on God, surrenders in trust, and asks God to meet his fourteen-year-old needs. A sense of Presence and peace comes, bringing a non-verbal certainty that everything will be all right. Where is God? God is everywhere, present in every moment. Panentheism (to be distinguished from pantheism) insists that God is in creation and at the same time separate from creation, combining the notions of immanence and transcendence. Notice how many religious experiences occur in a moment of crisis. In a crisis, preconditioned cognitive patterns shatter, resulting in a cognitive vacuum that allows the experience of Presence. Cognitive patterns, as we have seen, condition perceptions. Our ordinary focus on the world around us triggers cognitive patterns, shutting out the Presence. In addition to a moment of crisis, a moment of awe in nature neutralizes usual cognitive patterns. Before a grand view, an overwhelming sunset, or a bubbling stream, many sense Presence as the usual cognitive patterns are neutralized for a moment. Indeed, "be still, and know that I am God" as Psalms 46:10 proclaims. Let us return to the boy's religious experience. After the experience of that night, the boy's cognitive patterns include God, changing his perception of everything. Simple needs are met in the course of the day, but now he perceives God in his life meeting his needs. While the situation in his family remains in crisis, his focus on God frees him from the old cognitive patterns of despair. The new cognitive pattern includes hope. His perception of everything is changed. A short time later he attends his usual weekend movie. The film is the story of a World War II fighter pilot who became a minister after the war. As he watches the story unfold, he becomes aware of a vague impression. He returns to see the film on another night, and the vague impression takes conscious shape: "I should enter the ministry." In the days ahead, he encounters a family situation that forces him to put the impression into words. Surprisingly, rather than the usual attacks, he is encouraged to talk with the family's pastor. He consults his pastor who tells him to enter the ministry only if no other course gives him peace. Burdened with the growing impression, the boy finally surrenders to his understanding of God's will for his life. Several weeks later, he formally shares with his religious community his sense of call to enter the Christian ministry. The response from the community is positive and encouraging. Friends outside his religious community respond positively, further confirming his subjective idea. Let us now consider his decision in the light of the epistemological question. The impression took shape in his mind: within his cognitive patterns and in a cultural-historical context. However, notice that feedback occurred: within his family, from his religious leaders, from the larger religious community, and from others outside his religious community. The feedback enlarged and tested his personal perception, giving the subjective idea objective confirmation: others could see him as a minister. The problem with religious experience (or encounter with God) is that it is by definition subjective, personal, and self-evident.[12] The expression “encounter with God” is more limiting and useful for my discussion. Many religious experiences in the Bible (Abraham, the prophets, Moses, Paul) can be aptly described as encounters with God. I am avoiding the use of the word "mystical" because the word has many (often-unfavorable) connotations. Some individuals in history designated as mystics show signs of mental illness, confusing the issue. However, the idea of mystical experience is a valid concept. I am discussing Pauline mysticism in which the self does not cease to exist.[13] Because the encounter is subjective, personal, and self-evident, a valid encounter with God can lead to error. However, the errors occur because of a lack of feedback rather than from the nature of the experience. The previous discussions on solipsism and escaping isolation also apply to religious experience, as well as the earlier discussion concerning testing perceptions. Thus, the problem of religious knowing is not different from the problem of knowing in general. Religious perceptions are not the only perceptions that can be mistaken, wrong, psychotic, irrational, destructive, controlling, etc. In all areas of life, one must distinguish perceptions of reality from reality, and one must test perceptions through community, logic, reason, and working hypotheses. Feedback remains the escape from the dark closet of the mind. The essence of the experience for the boy was a sense of Presence. No thoughts are involved in an awareness of Presence. Most of us have had an experience in which we entered a room and sensed a presence. When we discovered the person already in the room (unseen for some reason), we were nervously amused. Even in such an explainable human encounter, however, the sense of presence preceded thoughts about the presence. Presence and thoughts about the Presence are two different events. Whatever emotions accompany an awareness of Presence (warmth, peace, love, and fear), the emotions (like thoughts) are a secondary response. Conclusions and inferences one draws from the experience are also secondary. Any sense of renewed energy, any newly discovered hope, any change in cognitive patterns, any improvement in an ability to function are secondary. One may relate such perceived results to the experience, but all such perceived results are secondary to the experience. In the case of the boy, the Presence (less conscious in the second experience) and an impression led to a thought: I should enter the ministry. The boy encountered God in the movie as the thought took shape, accompanied by a growing awareness of Presence. The thought (I should enter the ministry) needed testing, and notice that the boy (however unwittingly) did test the thought. I am aware (and have experienced personally) that a sense of command in a religious experience may conflict with generally accepted opinion. Therefore, prophetic moments are not to be entered flippantly. Consider Amos, uttering his prophetic word against the warnings of the religious leaders of his day.[14] True prophets can do nothing else but proclaim the word given, and all feedback will not be positive in any real life situation. The point is that I have trouble reading the prophets of the Old Testament and feeling that they were proud, flippant, or shallow people. They knew they cut against the accepted, expected to be resisted, and did not particularly want the job. What I am arguing against here is the flippant and shallow belief that every thought that accompanies a religious experience is a word from God and is to be blindly acted upon. Our mind is involved even in religious experience; thus, we should distinguish the sense of Presence from thoughts (perceptions, cognitions, and emotions) that accompany the sense of Presence. Already we have introduced the idea that a person's religious community is a source of feedback (and thus a laboratory for testing). If, as the boy shared his insight, others had responded negatively, he would have needed to take the feedback seriously. Others, of course, can be wrong; but to discount the perception of others without serious prayer and reflection is to court disaster. God often speaks to us through others. Surely somewhere (in almost every case) there are some sincere, spiritual people who also have experienced the Presence and are obedient to the light God gives them. To believe that one is the only true believer is to court disaster.[15] How else might one test a thought arising from a religious experience? One might compare the impression with biblical experiences (assuming a passing knowledge of the Bible). In addition to the person having the experience, others might use the Bible as an objective point of reference in considering a shared religious experience. Even allowing that perceptions and cognitive patterns are involved in the reading of the text, the Bible is an external point of reference. Our perception of the biblical text is subject to the same process of verification as any other perception. In other words, a person reading the Bible alone has a right to his/her perceptions. However, as in any other field, enlarging one’s experience by including the perceptions of others will better answer the epistemological question. For example, throughout church history the Bible has been interpreted. Greek scholars, for example, have various perceptions of word meanings and grammar constructions. A consensus among qualified Greek scholars adds certainty (i.e., a greater probability given current knowledge) as to the reading of a text. Also, the Bible is read and taught within a religious community with a history of interpretation. In addition, reason (broadly defined as human intelligence) can further test the impressions derived from a religious experience.[16] Doubt is not the enemy of faith, for doubt warns of incongruity. Further prayer, reflection, study, and feedback clarify doubt. Thus, faith is not the complete absence of doubt; faith is the prayerful decision to move forward after considering the doubts (which Kierkegaard so wisely called a "leap of faith"). To test a religious experience by reason is to apply human intelligence to any impression that arises out of an encounter with God. However, reason is to be applied to any impression of any event, not just religious experiences. Reason is the only tool God has given us to order and consider jumbled impressions; and, although the perceptions derived from reason must be tested, all tests involve reason (i.e., the application of human intelligence).[17] When testing a religious experience within a community, the concept of community should be broadly conceived (i.e., the community of scholars, the local religious community, the larger religious community). To test a religious experience in the broader arena of general knowledge, the communities of scholars in various fields should be considered. We should never forget that experience matters in choosing which community to consult. We should not repeat old errors, predetermining that "truth" should be clear (as mathematical truth is clear), or that truth equals logical conclusions. We should acknowledge that the quest for absolute certainty is unrealistic. We should sketch the map of our journey toward the ideal of truth with the pencil of consensus, frequently erasing. In other words, the greater the consensus among those with experience in a matter, the greater the probability that the perceptions contain some measure of truth. To put it simply, the blind man who keeps on saying the elephant is like a wall (feeling of the elephant's side) is correct. But the ten maintaining that the elephant is like a snake (feeling of the elephant's trunk) are also correct. The problem is that one is not experiencing the elephant's trunk, and the ten are not experiencing the elephant's side. Experience matters. More to the point, if a question of biology is concerned, the perception of a community whose profession is the study of biology should be chosen over a community that has no experience in the study of biology. The search for truth is the province of all humanity, but we must allow that experience better qualifies some perceptions and some communities. Religious communities composed of people who have encountered God are better judges of religious experience than communities composed of people who have not experienced such an encounter. Of course, one cannot test the perception of a religious experience in the same way one can test the perception of the apple sitting on a table. Deprived of feedback, one could weigh, measure, and devise tests to confirm the existence of the apple. Nonetheless, we depend on others seeing the apple to confirm our sense experience. If only one person out of ten sees the apple, something is wrong. Without a community to confirm perceptions, one may only be asleep and dreaming that an apple is sitting on the table. In objective experience, if the apple falls from the tree and hits a man on the head, he may postulate the law of gravity. The wonderful thing about scientific knowledge is that the hypothesis can be tested. If apples do not fall in Tibet, he realizes that his hypothesis needs more work. However, we are assuming that the “laws of nature” are everywhere uniform in the universe. So far, that assumption has continued to be a worthwhile working hypothesis. Nonetheless, testing a religious experience means testing a subjective experience. One cannot bring nine other people into an encounter with God (which is by definition personal, private, and self-evident). One can, however, share the perception of the encounter with God and test the perception. Testing a perception, of course, is not limited to religious experience. One scientist in Tibet may have the perception that the experiment with the falling apple meets the criteria necessary to verify the hypothesis, but if nine other scientists do not share his perception, more work is needed. Yet, how does a person test knowledge about God? Although a case can be made for religious experience as occurring throughout human history (and continuing to occur), knowledge of God is not the same as religious experience. However, information is often transmitted in an encounter with God.[18] Moses encountered God at the burning bush and perceived that he should return to Egypt and liberate his people.[19] Moses experienced doubts, but he acted in faith (trusted his perception) and fulfilled his mission (while experiencing confirmations, doubts, frustrations). Still, one can say to Moses, “How do you know it was God?” While the human mind is always involved in any perception, it does not follow that reality is limited to the human mind. While I maintain there is no knowledge without a knower, I do not maintain that there is no reality without a knower. The apple may exist on the table without any human ever seeing the apple, but if the apple is to be known, some person must know. For the sake of discussion, let us assume that there may be God (as a reality) apart from knowledge about God (which assumes a human mind and thus perception and cognitive patterns). In order to make the problem clear, let us begin with the human mind, which is all we know existentially. Given the previous discussion, God will speak to me in my time, space, history, and language. Thus in one sense all knowledge about God is secondary and indirect. However, that problem occurs in human relationships as well. I must speak to my wife in time and space, and in my cultural/historical existence. She must hear and speak from within her existence. Thus words are secondary to existence and communication is secondary to being. Let us say, for example, that a stranger knocks on my door. I observe the person and invite him/her in for a conversation. I observe height, weight, and other aspects of the person's appearance. However, before we can move past superficial conversation, the person leaves. Later in the day you mention the person by name and ask if I know him/her. I reply that the person visited me briefly, and the implication is that I know the person. Actually, I only know about him/her based on my observations and our superficial conversation. Now, let us suppose that the person returns and we continue our conversation. As the conversation progresses, the person reveals to me his/her thoughts and feelings. In other words, rather than the conversation remaining superficial (i.e., comments about the weather, etc.), the person dares to speak from the heart about life, death, and issues of the day. Later, if you ask me if I know the person, I can say that I know him/her existentially rather than merely by observation, i.e., the person has revealed his/her existence to me. Potential friends dare to reveal to one another thoughts and feelings about existence. The only way a relationship moves from the superficial to the intimate is through self-revelation. At whatever point we feel rejected, we stop revealing ourselves. At that point, we retreat into superficial, safe banalities. We know about many people, but we know only a few. Say I work on projects with Susie over a number of years. Thus, through observation, I gain a greater knowledge of Susie because of the experience over time. Yet, I can work with a person for years and never really know the person (only knowing about her) unless she reveals to me her inner thoughts and feelings. Susie may be professional, efficient, and positive at work while hating the job. However, her husband probably knows she hates the job because Susie reveals herself to him. We know no person except through self-revelation. Those lonely people who dare not reveal themselves move through life wearing a mask and playing a part; such people are devoid of intimacy. Thus, the concept of self-revelation is essential to knowing (rather than knowing about) a person. On the slightest possibility that God is a Person, the only way we could know God is through self-revelation. I am aware, of course, that we can start from the other pole and say that the human mind only projects Mind on the cosmic screen, but it is not clear to me why we must inescapably start with that assumption. Perhaps Mind (the Ground of Being, the Cosmic Screen experienced as Energy) instead projects mind. Remember that panentheism (as opposed to pantheism) combines immanence and transcendence, the two theological concepts maintained in tension in classical theology. Given the range of human cultures throughout history, we should expect different perceptions of God. We have already spoken of the difference in an encounter and in thoughts about an encounter. Let us take a fresh look at the Christian claim that God’s self-disclosure occurred in Jesus of Nazareth. Rather than talking of something uniquely "religious," I am speaking of what must occur in any relationship involving persons. Once my small son was drumming his fingers on the table while waiting for lunch. I felt irritated and angry at the playful noise, and I knew my irritation was irrational. Then, the thought occurred to me: “How will he know I am angry if I do not tell him?” I was good at masking my emotions in those days, especially when I felt my anger was unjustified. Therefore, I simply said, “I feel very irritated that you are drumming your fingers on the table.” “Oh,” he said with obvious surprise. He was glad to stop, but he had no way of knowing apart from my self-revelation. To say that God revealed himself in Jesus of Nazareth does not solve any of the secondary problems of knowing, including the problems involved in reading a text. However, on the slightest possibility that God exists as Person, we should expect such a self-revelation. That God only self-revealed fully, finally, and uniquely in Jesus of Nazareth is another question. Nevertheless, no knowledge of God as Person would be possible without self-revelation. Thus, the Christian claim that God revealed himself in the person/Person of Jesus of Nazareth becomes momentous. Before the written text, the spoken word resounded with inherent symbolism almost impossible for us to appreciate in our day.[20] The spoken word possessed power and meaning that resided in the speaker (the more powerful the speaker, the more powerful the word). For example, if the king spoke, the word carried more power than if a slave spoke. There is a difference in power and authority, but authority (of the king, for example) often correlates with power. If, on the other hand, the slave held a sword to the king’s throat, the spoken word of the slave in that context possessed considerable power (although not necessarily authority). The difference in power and authority is not merely hypothetical. I am constantly forced to remind the parents of teenagers that, although they have the authority (from the state and from God), they often do not have the power to control the behavior of the teenager. While not giving up their authority, they are not dealing with a five-year-old, and discipline must take the form of teaching and enlisting the cooperation of the teenager. However, let us return to the unique spoken word. Another component is that the spoken word lasted only as long as the sound vibrated. Therefore, the word of power and authority was momentary, and the response of the hearer was accentuated (hearing, obeying or disobeying, acting or refusing to act). In addition, the spoken word could not be called back once uttered. Thus, in Genesis God created by the spoken word: the resounding energy created the material universe.[21] I am especially interested in the research linking language with thinking. Can we think without words (symbols)? Can anyone create anything without words (or mathematical symbols) existing in the mind? I once listened to an artist who thought aloud as he painted in order to help students understand the process. I listened in amazement to the magical process (to me) being broken down into words. In fact, we seem to think in either words or pictures, and my experience with children who suddenly begin having trouble in school when they reach junior high is that they tend to think in pictures. Public school education in America is about thinking in words. Leading a student who thinks in pictures to start verbalizing thoughts (internally) seems to make an astounding difference. When the prophets spoke, the energy of the spoken word resounded, challenged the hearers to respond, and ceased to exist except in memory. The written text changed the powerful spoken word into a static form. Moses heard the word from God before the burning bush and responded in faith. If we read the Bible and encounter God, we too respond in faith or reject our perception of the existential moment. However, with a written word (a static form), we can subdivide the text and analyze the Greek and Hebrew (worthwhile pursuits) without ever hearing (being open to God or encountering God in our existential moment). We can fall into the trap of legalism and logically work out the smallest application of the text, creating salvation (or sanctification) by works. I follow the Pauline reinterpretation of Abraham as saved by faith (not works). Abraham responded to his encounter with God with faith/trust/belief. He responded to the light he possessed (far less than the fuller revelation in Christ and contained in the New Testament-- according to classical theology). In addition, I am interested in the insights of Carl Rogers in which he developed the importance of acceptance in personality change. The more I read Rogers in On Becoming a Person (in my college years), the more I thought his insights sounded like grace. The church in which I had grown up faithfully preached a gospel of salvation by faith: no matter your social status or past actions, God will accept you in Christ. However, as I read Rogers, I became acutely aware that in my church something changed after baptism. The general atmosphere of my church then became legalism: now that you are a Christian, here is a list of do's and don'ts. I gradually became convinced that sanctification (spiritual growth, becoming the person God created one to be) occurs through grace. As one continues to confess sins, God is faithful and just to forgive sins, and to cleanse from all unrighteousness. [22] Rogers validated at the psychological level that indeed personality changed for the better in an atmosphere of acceptance.[23] Perhaps God is there and we shut God out of our consciousness. The Energy that sustains the universe, the Ground of Being that is everywhere present, the God of Creation in the still, small voice is always there. Only in a moment of crisis or in a moment of awe are we open to the Presence. I find it easy to understand why so many people experience something akin to worship when communing with nature, for in nature we are back to the primal moments of openness to the universe. Nature, however, is not always beautiful and inspiring. Anyone who thinks so has never been lost in the desert without water. Nevertheless, unless we become as little children we will never enter the kingdom of heaven.[24] The little child is open to wonder and curiosity. The cognitive patterns are still being formed, and thus the child is open to the moment. Everything is new to the child, allowing for more experiences of wonder. That, however, brings up another question: Must one encounter God to be a Christian? Not everyone is Moses, Paul, or Isaiah. William James made us aware of the varieties of religious experience. Many Christians bear witness to a moment of crisis in which they became open to God and experienced a sense of Presence. However, for others, the moment may come quietly as a decision to trust (following the light one possesses). The concepts of faith, trust, and belief describe the same phenomena, but trust is the best modern usage in ordinary speech. Faith is associated with religious beliefs or believing the impossible. Belief is associated with mental assent to propositions. Therefore, trust is the best word. The issue is not our knowledge of God (i.e., a Gnostic view of salvation by knowledge) but our relationship with God as a trusting response to the light we possess. Let us turn our attention to the Institutional Church. One must always be aware that the Institutional Church must (of necessity) justify its own existence by claiming exclusive authority and power. If a person has a religious experience and shares it, well and good. However, if one hundred people find themselves in sympathy and share their religious experiences, if they meet to worship, discuss, and teach, then a place is needed, money is needed. The moment we build a building and write a budget, the moment a religious institution comes to exist in time and space, other considerations come into play. Now power struggles develop between personalities. Now the institution must be preserved. Now we worry about attendance and finances. The struggle to focus on God rather than all these secondary matters is a great challenge. Many institutional churches fail to maintain the proper focus on God and become social clubs. God becomes secondary and worship becomes entertainment. We need to remember that the Church as the Body of Christ (all people of faith) is a spiritual reality rather than an institutional reality. Nonetheless, the Body of Christ inevitability takes form in time and space as people meet to worship. In the Body of Christ, worship focuses on God with scripture proclaiming the gospel, the Eucharist dramatizing the gospel, prayer opening the mind to the gospel, offerings sustaining the gospel, and music responding to the gospel. In the Body of Christ, all ritual and form aid the worshiper in focusing on God with the mindset of "speak to me." Anything that interferes with focusing on God has no place in worship. Ideas that come to the mind of the worshiper must be tested, but God does speak to the open heart. In addition to collective worship, individuals who compose the spiritual Body of Christ will find that private prayer and scripture reading help maintain a daily focus on God. Writing impressions from God may release deep insights and be psychologically healthy as well as adding perspective to life. However, writing impressions from God should be accompanied by awareness that such impressions are passing through one's mind, subject to all the problems of knowing associated with perceptions and cognitive patterns. All such impressions must be prayerfully tested as discussed earlier. Being a part of a community lifts individual perceptions of God out of the dark closet of the mind. However, community must not be too narrowly construed. For example, being a part of a community is more than being a part of a local fellowship or a part of an Institutional Church. Being a part of the community of faith largely construed opens the individual to feedback across Institutional Church boundaries as well as across the centuries. The Body of Christ is the spiritual reality of the Church, but we live in time and space, in community, in fellowship, and inescapably in institutions. However, unless the Institutional Church remains focused on and obedient to God, the Institutional Church may prosper as an institution but cease to be a disclosure of the Body of Christ. God may be the projection of the human mind, or the human mind may be the ultimate extension of God into creation. The body/soul dichotomy may have freed science from the dictates of religion, but viewing God as the Ground of Being is a better concept. If there is any immortality, the individual continues because the individual exists in the Mind of God (as does all creation), not because the soul has some independent existence (even apart from God). If the person exists in the Mind of God and then as an extension into material creation, then the person can continue to exist in the Mind of God separate from matter. Romans 1:20 speaks of natural revelation as eternal power and deity. We encounter the eternal power as the matter/energy experience of the universe, and we encounter deity in a sense of awe before the wonders of the universe. I am interested in the idea expressed in Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity where matter (as mass) and energy are equivalent, allowing that matter can be converted into energy and energy into matter. I am not, of course, a professional scientist, but I am intrigued by the idea of energy becoming matter and the ramifications for theology. My current working hypothesis (discussed above) removes the dichotomy of God/matter and suggests that Energy/energy becomes matter (thus my interest in panentheism). How does one know there is a God? Moreover, if there is a God, what kind of God? My understanding of the gospel is that God is Love as revealed in the life of Christ.[25] However, religious experience is the moment in which the existence of God becomes self-evident to the individual. One must allow for varieties of religious experience and for different methods of encounter. The proclamation of the Christian gospel creates one possibility of encounter and self-evident insight. As I have pointed out before, because of the nature of perception, no one can pretend that the dictated text interprets itself. In the Christian context, individuals encounter God through the Christian gospel, proclaimed or read. We always interpret, inevitably, as cognitive patterns shape our perception. Nevertheless, we know God as the existence of God becomes self-evident in our own existence. I once taught a college student who was Islamic in his faith. He signed up for an Old Testament class because he felt that he knew about Abraham and "all those guys." As we started reading the Old Testament together (taught as literature, not a sectarian course), he responded favorably until we reached the invasion of Canaan. Obviously, given the Palestinian problem, he reacted negatively. As he read the text, his cognitive patterns (determined by his personal and cultural history) dictated the perception of Jews seizing someone's land, all in God's name. In fact, most of my Islamic students (1970s) said they came to the United States to study so they could return home and be freedom fighters, dismayed that Americans cared so little about their plight. One young man said to me sadly, “My family has owned property in Jerusalem for 200 years, and I cannot go home.” This student and I had many discussions about faith, and we obviously had many differences in our understanding of God. One day I asked him about the daily prayers in Islam, people faithfully stopping to pray at prescribed times. I asked him if he thought such acts were sincere acts of devotion or a cultural expression that most people hurriedly obliged. He responded quickly that most often it was cultural rather than sincerely focused worship. I told him that many Christian acts of worship also failed to focus on God. People went through the motions without being open to God. Then I suggested to him that he pray to God as he understood God, and I would pray to God as I understood God for God to show us the truth. The thought was a new idea to him (moving beyond a superficial religion of culture), and our conversations subsequently occurred in the context of the God who is there, who is greater than any human understanding, and who exists beyond any symbol. To limit God to the symbol is idolatry. The word apple is not the same as the object apple, nor is the word "God" the same as the reality of God to whom the symbol refers. I still believe that God exists beyond any symbol (or any human understanding). Many of our religious problems will be solved if we pray sincerely for God’s self-revelation to us. In conservative Christian theology the word illumination would be preferred, limiting the word revelation to God's special revelation contained in the Bible and fully and finally expressed in Jesus Christ. However, I am convinced that if God will not self-reveal to a sincere inquirer, then the whole question of God makes no difference. If God cannot self-reveal to a sincere inquirer, then the whole question of God is irrelevant. Our decision is to desire God’s self-revelation and to be open to such a disclosure. The Christian message (that God’s self-revelation occurred in Jesus of Nazareth) means nothing without God's self-disclosure to the individual. A Roman Catholic priest friend who worshipped and worked in a far different tradition than my born-again, adult-conversion Baptist background, said to me, “Of course one must appropriate one’s faith. The fact that we baptize a baby into the church is to be followed by a personal approbation of faith at confirmation. Of course the individual must have a personal faith.” We may call it the work of the Spirit, or we may call it encounter with God, or we may call it illumination, but the truth must become self- evident (by whatever means) to the individual. A man once told me about sitting in a room late one night and experiencing a sense of Presence that forever changed his outlook on life (i.e., cognitive patterns). After the experience, he attended worship more faithfully, and his whole perspective on life changed. Once I took a poll of people who attended church regularly. I found that each of them had experienced the Presence of God, although many were reluctant to talk about it. They seemed to suffer from the general fear that people would think them crazy. Plato’s illustration of the man trying to describe light to the blind men in the cave who had never experienced light captures the problem: he will either be thought a liar or insane. I have found that metal coat hangers make good stakes for flowers. Once straightened, the hangers blend in nicely, especially when the flowers are tied up with green string. Once I took three coat hangers with me to stake up some drooping lilies. After entering the flowerbed, I propped two of the straightened metal coat hangers against a tall, sturdy plant and proceeded to tie several lilies to the coat hanger I had pushed into the earth. When I turned to take a second coat hanger, the two propped up hangers had disappeared. I knew that they had fallen, and I knew they lay at my feet. However, taking a precaution against a wayward copperhead, I hesitated to grope around with my hands in the flowerbed. I stood for several minutes straining to see the fallen, straightened metal coat hangers. I knew they were there. I knew what they looked like. I tried to alter my perception by changing focus in order to see the blended in coat hangers. Finally, I gave up, found a stick, and hit around until I heard the stick strike metal. Once I saw one coat hanger, I could clearly see them both at my feet in a slightly different position than I had visualized. Such is the nature of perception. We see what we expect to see, or we cannot see because perception trumps reason. In addition, when we see, we can question our senses (or our reason). Yet, we are stuck with our perceptions, with our cognitive patterns, and with our existence. God, it seems to me, is a Person who is involved in self-revelation, for we know a person differently than we know a thing.[26] God is not a book any more than I am letters to my wife. To cage God in the Bible is nonsense and is worshipping the Bible rather than worshipping God, which is idolatry. Knowledge about God (reason) is different from knowledge of God (self-revelation), just as knowledge about a person (reason) is different from knowledge of a person (self-revelation). I, of course, understand God’s self-revelation to me through the lens of Christian symbols. I continue to try to understand my faith, but I am aware of Presence when I am still. Like Job, I discover God in the depths of existence. Like Elijah, I hear God in the still, small voice. Like Moses, I encounter God on the back side of my spiritual desert. Like Saul of Tarsus, my self-righteousness evaporates into shame in the light of the cross. Faith in God, (as I understand it) is not mental assent to a proposition, but a radical trust in the God who is there beyond human understanding. We must indeed become as little children to enter the kingdom of heaven, or at least that is the way I moved from the hell of my existential anxiety and my egocentric predicament: someday I will die, and (inconceivably) the world will continue to exist. ____________________ [12] See William James, The Varieties of Religions Experience. James points out a range of experiences that are perceived as religious. Also, see David Elton Trueblood, The Philosophy of Religion. [13] See Galatians 2:20. [14] Amos 7:12-17 [15] See I Kings 19:9-18, the experience of Elijah. [16] See Matthew 4:5-7 where the devil quotes scripture and Jesus responds by quoting another scripture, using his mind (reason) to discriminate between the quoted texts. [17] The false struggle between reason and sense experience is aptly illustrated by the (probably apocryphal) medieval story of the dullard scholar at the University of Paris who suggested counting the teeth in the mouth of a horse. Tired of the rationalistic debate on the subject, he brought a horse onto the stage and told the scholars to count the teeth. As the story goes, he was nearly killed for his common sense approach; any fool knew that one could not trust sense experience, according the scholars of the day. Reason is a valuable and indispensable tool; sense experience must be assumed to in some measure relate to reality. However, the problem of perception compounds the pre-scientific debates involving the epistemological question. [18] I am here confining myself to the Christian faith and biblical examples. [19] Exodus 3. [20] I am indebted to Dr. Clyde Fant, (who taught homiletics at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Ft. Worth, Texas) for making me aware of the implications of the spoken word. However, he should not be held accountable for all the inferences I draw from the basic idea. [21] Genesis 1. [22] I John 1:9. [23] See Luke 15:11-32. [24] Matthew 18:1-11 [25] More about the meaning of love/Love later. [26] See Martin Buber, I and Thou. Buber distinguishes I/Thou (relationship with a person) from I/It (relationship with a thing). (C) 2004, Don Mize |