March 08, 2010
Ah-Ha
It’s not unusual to have discussion in Sunday School where someone will interject a little tidbit they learned while doing their own devotions or Bible Study. While those ah-ha moments are exciting for us, others don’t always share our enthusiasm. They may understand what we’re saying, but the Spirit is just not giving them the same ah-ha. Jesus taught in parables and it reminds me when Peter asked, “Lord, are you telling this parable to us, or to everyone?” (Luke 12:41NIV) A similar thought comes to mind, ‘Lord, is this ah-ha just for me, or is it for others too?’
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Gail;
-----Ah-Ha! You have indicated a need for analysis! I try not to resist analysis. So for full analysis, let me add three categories to the two you have identified. We then have five categories, “for everyone”, “for others”, “for me”, “don’t know”, and “for no one”. It seems complicated and pointless, but both the unity of the body and outdoing one another in showing honor depend upon properly handling each other’s tidbits of thought and feeling. Certainly God has only four categories for His analysis of insights. He knows about the usefulness of every thought and expression and about the needs of every soul. Therefore He can dispense with the “don’t know” category. Since we do not have God’s ability to do this, we must humbly accept it and use it.
-----What might be the criteria for sorting? The usefulness or destructiveness of the mental tidbit is one. The more closely it aligns with the truth, the more it is useful. Of course, its proximity to falsehood creates destruction. I believe few of our insights are purely true or purely false; the overwhelming majority lay as a mix of the two. Most of us are sincere about our desire to know truly, so we groom from our insights what we ourselves are able to perceive as false. Then we believe our well groomed insights sort into the category of “for everyone”. Certainly, if God were doing the grooming, they might. But as much as we believe the Holy Spirit helps us to groom, and as right as we really are about that, an insight does not yet by this alone fall into the “for everyone” bin.
-----For no one is not without bias. Bias occurs from our inability to know everything. That means each of us only knows a portion, and I assure you, it is a small portion indeed! So our own insight testing is restricted and not totally accurate. Since the Holy Spirit works very intimately to grow each individual soul, He pays much respect to our personal limitations. The insights He grooms in me usually are for the service of my perspectives, mostly. They are probably of less service to others and of no service to some. Not because they are bad insights, but because others have different perspectives which may not accommodate them. In fact, some of their perspectives may even be damaged by them. Yet they and the Lord love each other as sincerely as I and the Lord do.
-----Therefore the other criteria for sorting is the perspectives of those around you. This is a certain call to know your brothers and sisters if you desire to share insights with them. The time it takes to get well acquainted and the impossibility of ever getting completely acquainted should make heavy use of the “don’t know” bin. Since the usefulness or destructiveness of an insight might extend from the accuracy or inaccuracy of either itself or the hearer’s perceptions (and usually extends from the mixture of both), one should sort carefully. For overusing the “for everyone“ bin for our own insights and the “for no one“ bin for those of others is too common and too damaging.
-----I think what the Spirit was trying to say through Paul at Rom 14 is that ideas are ideas and brothers are brothers. Brothers must have ideas, even if they are contradictory or hard to understand. And if they are, set the ideas aside while you hold your brother.
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