July 28, 2009
Shut Out
I recently attended a session where participants were asked to give their views on various interests within the community. A couple of people in the group dominated the conversation and seemed oblivious when other participants tried to squeeze in their comments. Believers too can be guilty of hijacking a Sunday school class, Bible study or fellowship. I think most of us know when someone is redirecting a lesson. Normally we feel it is up to the leader to get us back on track, however we also have an obligation to not let ourselves get squeezed out of the conversation.
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Gail;
-----The favorite saying amongst the educated elite is that the thumb, the opposing digit, makes man what he is and sets him apart from the rest of the animal kingdom. I disagree. As important as the thumb is, the ability to think, reflect, and communicate innumerable thoughts and feelings sets him apart far more. The thumb makes tools; communication makes society. But mixed in with that ability is narcissism.
-----Although we interact in a highly socialized world, each one of us reflects upon his own individual experiences far more than the experiences of others. This individualization colors the views and ideologies of each person differently, yet most of us give little thought to the extent of its effect. We become guilty of taking the world we see through the effects of our own personal ideologies for granted as being the world that is. We then bring that world forward into our social interactions as if it should be as simply accepted by others as it by ourselves. After all, we have experienced it, so surely it is real! Narcissism makes every effort to project that self-reality into the social system.
-----Humility understands that perceptions of the world are as numerous as people in the world, and both, that one’s own perception is as susceptible to flaw as any one else’s, and that everyone else‘s is as personally important to themselves as one‘s own is to one‘s self. But even more importantly, it understands that what is ultimately true and real exists as it is regardless of how anyone, including one’s self, perceives it to exist. Therefore humility craves interjections from others as much as it desires to interject its own perceptions to others. For it knows that the only way to discover reality for certain is to reflect upon as much experience as it can, no matter who experienced it.
-----That is what is so beautiful about the Bible, and so ugly about today’s secular society. The Word of God is the collection of many experiences of men with God. It does not matter that these experiences happened in the distant past. They happened. Therefore they are valid interjections into any social system, and the humble receive them as such. But our secular society is not humble. It is arrogant to the max through the narcissism of the pop figures who bogart its stages. These people are sure that the perceptions they have formed of life are indeed real! They have no mind to sort their own thoughts for error, since they do not believe they could possibly be in error. So anyone who does not believe as they do must be denied the stage, and everyone else is not important enough to have the stage.
-----Although it is Hollywood, the mainstream news media, the legislated curricula of our public schools, and innumerable organizations such as Greenpeace, The American Bar Association, the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, ACCORN, etc., etc., etc., where the attitude of boggarting the stage is most visible, the attitude itself is brought from the careless side of man’s heart into the social group, therefore it is prevalent in our churches as well. If good and careful people stood up and bogartted the stage, the problem would only be less severe. For no one is good enough to be perfect, therefore, no one’s perception is good enough to be held by all. Hence, we must continue to bring the Bible forward as the measure of man’s thoughts and give the more time to thoughts which measure up to it the best.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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