The greatest block to learning...

... is thinking that we already know the answer!

This is an issue in every area of life, but it is a particular problem for people of faith. As Christians we have a precious truth that we know and must not be compromised. And yet, if we think we already know everything about our faith, we are greatly mistaken! So, how do we continue to be open to learning more of God, while holding firmly to what we already know?

Moreover, we have another related problem: we have inevitably already added onto the core Biblical truth all manner of 'knowledge' that we have unconsciously accumulated around it. This is an encrusted layer of culture and a multitude of assumptions that we have collected while growing up and through our life's experience - but which are not actually there in the Bible! We have ended up with a 'boat encrusted with barnacles', which slows us down, make us unresponsive and difficult to steer. But we are so used to all this stuff we 'know', that we don't even realise that underneath this encrusted, misshapen faith of ours, there is smooth pure truth.

We no longer seek to learn, for we already 'know'. So we shut our minds to new understanding, and we also resist having the barnacles of our unredeemed ‘knowledge’ scraped away! We continue to wear our blinkers, oblivious to the far greater truth that God wants to reveal to us!

So, how do we keep our hearts and minds open to God’s further revelation? (Note: I do not mean to imply that He has ‘new truth’ to reveal to us, merely that we have much more of God still to know.) How do we keep growing and learning whilst not changing the Gospel already fully revealed through Christ and recorded in the Bible?

Of course, this is not a new issue. The early church leaders wrestled with the same question, and this was part of what led them to lay down the early creeds - those fundamental truths of the Christian faith that were not to be compromised. The creeds are surprisingly short!

When we think we know, we are at the greatest risk of pride. Where we are certain we know, we are most vulnerable to deception! In fact the very things we hold most dear are likely to be the same areas where we are blind and deaf to Jesus' challenging love, where He desires to show us more of His grace - and yet we will not listen!

Can we daily come in an attitude of humility, with two prayers: "Lord, what more do You want to show me?" and "I ask You show me what I think I ‘know’ that is not really of You".

The greatest block to being open to Christ is thinking that we already know the answer!

Upholding the truth?

There is an ongoing frustration, even sometimes an exasperation, between those Christians who are careful to "uphold the truth", and those who seem more inclined to say "well, it's rather more complicated than that". This usually occurs in some argument over a matter of Biblical interpretation.

Paul in the New Testament (1 Cor 3) exhorts Christians to move from being spiritual babes taking milk to mature adults eating solid food, to put aside childish interests and become mature believers. Becoming more mature would seem to imply that we have ironed out many of our uncertainties and become clearer about the truth. And yet the opposite often appears to be true - it is the 'young hot-heads' are the ones who seem most certain of the rights and wrongs, and the 'older and wiser ones' who often seem less sure about the details and distinctions. Have these older people let go of their former zeal and clarity, and let worldly arguments and complexities cloud their judgement? Have they lost sight of the simple truth?

Perhaps that is the problem: the truth is not often simple.

False certainty

Certainty may arise out of ignorance or arrogance, not only from sure knowledge - and distinguishing between these can be very hard indeed. Moreover, passion about a subject more often arises out of some personal vested interest, rather than out of any objective understanding. So it is much more likely that when we are adamant that we are 'upholding the truth' about some issue, that we are merely holding tightly to our own preferred view of how things should be, and most at risk of using the Bible to back our personal cause.

Women in church leadership is a topical example, but there are many. It is possible to find some Biblical support for both positions.

Where is the place for saying 'we don't really know for sure', when not knowing is sometimes, perhaps often, an honest and mature answer? It may also be that the more mature believers take a stance that is best summed up by 'it doesn't matter that much' - while recognising that it matters greatly to those who feel strongly about it, it's not a matter that defines one's faith or warrants any splits.

Even those issues which do define a faith - for example, that God exists and came in human form as Jesus, whose death on the cross made possible the cleansing of sin - are still matters of faith and not 'right' or 'wrong'. The Christian faith is, after all, faith.

Where we are indeed upholding the truth, need that look the same as having a closed mind? And does being willing to seriously consider an opposing view on an issue of Christian teaching necessarily mean that you are compromising the truth?

The truth stands

In fact, the truth is never compromised - it does, and always will stand firm. Rather, it is we who are compromised - by our pride, our insecurity, our desire for certainty, our personal need to be 'right'. (See an earlier post: 'Craving-certainty')

God either exists or he doesn't. He was, or was not, shown through his Son Jesus. My careful or outspoken arguments one way or the other make no difference to the fact! At some future point the truth will be plainly known.

Remember, for now we see and understand the truth 'through a glass darkly' and so may too readily mistake our reflection for the truth. Perhaps the older and wiser Christians just have a clearer view of that grubby glass and are more prepared to put aside peripheral issues and focus on the heart of the matter? Maybe that is why St Paul, writing the letters in our New Testament, moved from asserting his right to being an apostle in his early writings (e.g. 1 Cor 9 v1) to saying in one of the last letters he wrote, "Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst" (1 Tim 1 v15). At the end of his life, Paul was sure of these things: that Christ came to save sinners, and that he was himself the vilest of sinners. In this context all other trivia falls away.

So the truth remains, totally untarnished, despite our total sinfulness.

Doing more than half the work

Here are three suggested guidelines related to helping.

They can be applied in just about any setting – practical help, offering guidance, third-world development work, Christian mission…

1. When we do for someone what they can do for themselves, we diminish them and rob them of their dignity.

• How often we demonstrate our ‘helpfulness’ by doing for others what they can do for themselves! But usually we are just demonstrating our pride and our lack of respect.
• And all we are really showing is our own neediness – our need to be ‘top dog’, our need to be needed, our need to be seen as helpful…
• We also show our lack of listening or discernment, our lack of understanding of the other person’s knowledge, skills and capabilities. And so we miss the opportunity to learn from the other and so grow ourselves.

2. Where a task is heavy and some assistance might be appreciated, we may offer to help but we shouldn’t take control; our role is to serve under their leadership; it is their task.

• Where we think we can help, there usually comes an assumption that actually we could do it better than they can. And so we say we are offering to help, but actually are offering to take over!
• But when it comes to knowing what needs to be done, who knows better – the outside ‘expert’ or the person who lives within the situation and brings a lifetime of experience to their situation?
• Just occasionally – though much less frequently that assumed – the outsider may know something that is genuinely useful. But this should be offered very tentatively and humbly, with the decision over whether to take it forward left firmly with the person whose task it is. If it is imposed it will not be adopted or owned, merely tolerated for a while.

3. Even where a person really cannot do something for themselves, don't do more than half the work, as this creates dependence and robs them of learning.

• How much easier it is to do the task for the other, rather than go through the lengthy process of working alongside someone who does not understand!
• But this merely feeds our ego, until we become bored and tire of helping and depart, leaving the other worse off than when we began.
• Rather, work together, offering your skills or understanding, but also listening and learning from the other, so that together you create something which is better than either of you could do alone.

Helping is a difficult task, and not often encountered.

On saying "no"

Do you remember all those times you said "yes" to some request for help, without really stopping and thinking about it much? And then later got annoyed that you were committed to doing this thing, or found yourself ending up being much too busy?

It is said that 'If you want something done, ask a busy person'. You know how there are some people who seem to be involved in lots of things, and others who don't seem to get involved at all? Well, if you are the former, this post is for you. Let's take a closer look at the thinking and motives that may be going on here.

As a Christian I should say 'yes'

Maybe you feel that as a Christian you should be helping out, even when you don't really feel like it? After all, this is about putting others' needs before our own, isn't it?

Well, God certainly calls us to work for him, and this may well include ways that aren't high on our personal list of preferences, or that involve real sacrificial service.  But this also means that there are things he does not call us to do.  This isn't simply to say that God calls us to do good and not evil (though that is true), but that there are good things he is not calling me to do - for he has different, individually tailored, work for each person who will follow him.

There are only 24 hours in a day, and they need to be used fully in the ways God has commanded - which includes his command to rest and to take time with him... We certainly can't do everything, and God doesn't call us to do so! So what is he calling us to do, and what is he calling others to do?

Somebody's got to do it

But if God has not called you to such work, why are you doing it?  It might be because you've got hooked by the notion that someone's got to do this thing, and if no-one else is, then it better be you.

But actually, it might be that God actually doesn't need that particular thing done, and so no-one doing it really is the best outcome. Alternatively, it may be that someone else should be getting off their backside to do what God has called them to.

So, it may also be that while you are doing these things that God hasn't called you to do, you are robbing someone else of that role which is theirs!  Perhaps they remain one of the people in the background because you are always there in front, getting in the way?

Moreover, if you are busy doing something you are not called to, then you are not getting on with what he has called you to ...

It would look bad if I said no / it would look good if I said yes

Umm. I thought that pride would turn up somewhere in this topic.

There's a real need

Does a need constitute a call? I think not. There are so many needs and we cannot possibly respond to them all. Some are easy to say 'no' to, as we clearly don't have the required skills or resources; but when we could do something, does that mean we are called?

So when we helpfully, or out of a sense of Christian duty, always say 'yes', then we are spending time not doing what God has called us to do. The devil is very keen to keep us busy doing all sorts of good things, just so long as they are not what God has called us to do.

Our thinking and motives for saying 'yes' or 'no' are always complex and mixed; pride and fear are bound to be in there somewhere. So perhaps, rather than simply saying "yes", or by starting from the point of considering whether the task needs to be done, we would do better to start by asking God, "Are you calling me to do this?"

Of course, the question arises: "How do I know what God is calling me to do?". The answer lies in a close and personal walk with Jesus - which will almost certainly be squeezed out if you are always saying 'yes' to everything else...

Craving certainty

How alluring it is to be totally and really sure of something; how difficult it is to admit it when we don't know or even that we're not quite sure!

The commonly used solution to this discomfort is to make up some certainty!  A trivial example  would be the (probably male) driver who doesn't know the route but won't stop and look at a map.  A much more significant historical example: when faced with not knowing our place in the universe, the religious answer was to state with certainty "right in the centre, of course, because God made it that way.  The Sun and everything goes round the Earth".   Over time various constructed arguments by eminent experts bolstered the 'fact' and when it was challenged this led to ever more extreme and hideous measures to defend their certainty from total collapse, because the whole credibility of Christendom was felt to be at stake.

With such a degree of distance, we can all laugh at the absurdity in this example - and it was actually only the credibility of those defending their pride which was at stake!

However, spotting our current and personal equivalents is much more difficult.  Is it our certainty over the correctness of our particular theological position as opposed to whichever our preferred outcasts may be?  Is it our certainty in our position regarding gay Christians? or women in church leadership? or ... (insert the things you feel most strongly about - it is almost certainly something we feel strongly about!)?  Note that we are not looking for areas where we are uncertain, but areas where we are convinced we are right!

Pursue certainty at all costs and we will certainly end up in one of two outcomes.  Either we'll spend a lifetime on a treadmill, attempting to nail down those doubts that just won't go away - with ever more detailed arguments and picky distinctions.  Or we find ourselves building a fake and brittle certainty, which is founded on pride and will one day be shattered and with it all our counterfeit confidence.

Am I advocating blissful ignorance, or that we don't engage with the difficult issues of the day?  No, just humility and honesty, a willingness to accept that we don't know all the answers, that the other side may have a point, and that ultimately we may never know this side of heaven.

Why do you think the Old Testament starts off with the 10 Commandments and becomes chapters and chapters of increasingly detailed rules for everything (Wondering which kinds of flying insects you can eat?  The answer is only the four-legged ones which have jointed legs for hopping; Leviticus 11v20-23), while Jesus, who fulfilled the law, summarised it in two sentences: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all you mind"; and "Love your neighbour as yourself" (Luke 10 v27).  In the light of this, our petty arguments and divisions pale into insignificance.

Let's stay with his clear commands, and not try to tie everything down to our liking, and in so doing find ourselves choosing to be 'right' rather than choosing life.

Though if any of you can tell me whether my 'neighbour' includes those who live 2 doors away from my house, I'd like to know.  And what about those 3 doors away?  But what if they are Catholics?  And what if ...