First, a disclaimer: I am not a theologian. When it comes to theological matters, I am a “buccaneer-scholar“. I love to have theological discussions and glean knowledge from those who are versed in that field.
For the past several weeks, I have been occasionally attending gatherings in Second Life (if you’re in Second Life, I am known as Miguelski Simsider). These gatherings are hosted by Neill Loxingly (in real-life: Neal Locke) and the 1st Presbyterian Church of Second Life. These gatherings take on two primary forms. The first is a prayer gathering on Sundays, and the second is an informal discussion gathering on Wednesdays. I have found these gatherings to be everything that you would expect them to be in real-life with the only real difference being that in Second Life, I have hair — for now.
At any rate, the discussion last night centered around the question of Who/What is God. We discussed God in terms of time and space, omnipotence, omniscience, Trinity, and other constructs. It was profoundly interesting. I learned a lot. Discussions like this serve to help me further understand God in terms of more than the abstract. They help me to understand the relational God.
But that’s not the point of this post.
At one point in the discussion of all these various ideas about God (i.e. “Can God make a rock so heavy that God can’t lift it?” or “How do you reconcile omnipotence with free-will?”), one of the group threw out this gem: “For now we see through a glass, darkly” (1 Corinthians 13:12, KJV). That got me to thinking.
First, consider this translation (Contemporary English): “Now all we can see of God is like a cloudy picture in a mirror.” Interesting imagery. The view that we have of God is, well, fuzzy and backwards. But that’s another post.
But what really struck me — for the first time — was the overall context of the passage. Paul is writing about love. He’s telling the church at Corinth how to love and that love is the most important thing. Yet, in the conclusion of this discussion, he throws out this idea that even though we try — feebly — to understand God and the ways of God, we will not be able to until we’re standing there face to face. Let me point it out again, though, the context of that comment is in the middle of a lesson on LOVE.
It occurs to me that perhaps what Paul is saying is that it’s OK to wonder and seek to understand the higher concepts of God and who God is, but it is not OK to do so at the risk of losing site of love. This goes deeper than how to conduct healthy debate on the matter. Rather it seems to be saying that love is myriad of feelings and actions, and should serve to center our lives as Christ-Followers.
Anytime I think of what it means to be a Christ-Follower, I think of love. Christ’s mission on earth was singular — love. Christ’s mission given to us (His followers) is also singular — love. I think we often miss that mark. We take the mission of Christ and turn it into something akin to proselytization. That’s so much easier than love. Just force everyone to believe. But that’s not what Christ has called us to do.
For me, the best definition of life as a Christ-Follower has always been Rich Mullins’ comment. Consider this:
“Jesus said whatever you do to the least of these my brothers you’ve done it to me. And this is what I’ve come to think. That if I want to identify fully with Jesus Christ, who I claim to be my Savior and Lord, the best way that I can do that is to identify with the poor. This I know will go against the teachings of all the popular evangelical preachers. But they’re just wrong. They’re not bad, they’re just wrong. Christianity is not about building an absolutely secure little niche in the world where you can live with your perfect little wife and your perfect little children in a beautiful little house where you have no gays or minority groups anywhere near you. Christianity is about learning to love like Jesus loved and Jesus loved the poor and Jesus loved the broken.”
For now, we see but a backwards reflection of God. Yet, still, we are called to love. We are called to help. We are called to be the hands of God in the world. To affect radical, foundational change through the living out of our Faith. Not to force people into our belief structure, but to show them, through love, that God exists, God cares, and God loves.
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