Dear Trekker,
As we begin our 13th year together, I hope over time you have concluded “Jim says what he means and means what he says!” If not, you have not taken me seriously.
Some personalities are hard to take seriously. They are bigger than life, or so they seem. Like all of us sinners, they are boastful, proud, combative, judgmental, and always right!! Now you are thinking of others… but likely not yourself. Me too!
Our current President is a prime example. By any stretch, he is a human being of extremes, and loquacious. He says what he thinks! As one pundit commented a few weeks ago: “Trump supporters took him seriously, but not literally. The establishment and the media took him literally, but not seriously.” And I would add, the latter got ambushed and have no consensus why.
Now we are all seeking to be good, serious communicators. For various reasons, we usually have mixed success. Implicit in all communication is the better we communicate and find out what a person is saying, the better will be life. Not necessarily. Better communication usually enhances relationship, but it may also sharpen differences which can divide.
Now here is the rub… intelligible words communicate deep feelings, thoughts and attitudes of the heart and mind. Since we are social creatures created in the image of God, words are intended for communion. Good communication should lead to great communion, or the purpose of words is thwarted. When we speak, we primarily are saying who we are. The mystery of being is being revealed by our words and actions. Eugene Peterson says in Subversive Spirituality: “You can look at me, measure me, weigh me, test me, but until I started to talk you do not know what is going on inside, who I really am. If you listen and I am telling the truth, something marvelous starts to take place.” An understanding, a touch, a relationship, a moment of oneness! Now all this is because God is good, as we wrote last month. A good God has sought to communicate His goodness. That is His eternal agenda… to communicate goodness! He intended to bequeath to us His goodness, but gives us the chance and choice to participate… if we take Him and His Word seriously.
God’s words are ours to believe, follow and practice. We learn to speak and do because God has shown us the way. Words when activated by us achieve results, define and yet deepen the mystery of the human existence we know as life. We must take Jesus Christ’s words… “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life and no man cometh to the Father except through me” (John 14:6), seriously if we are to enter into the mystery of Life and realize a communal existence with others.
Some take Christ’s words seriously. Some do not. Some take His words literally, some do not. We can take communion, but we have not communion! When Christ said “This is my body given for you, do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19) and “in the same way… this cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (v. 20), he was speaking literally, His life to be given bodily for us all. What a mystery… but the essence of life. We can’t agree on what it means to “do this in remembrance of me,” and we lose communion in the process. Yet, these words of Christ were perhaps the most profound of all time.
God, being good, uses words to communicate, to create, to restore, to redeem, to bridge the gap between a righteous God and a wayward, “turned to his own way” man (Isaiah 53:6). If we will listen to God, believe He is telling us the truth in the Scriptures as “holy men spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit (2nd Peter 1:21), we will effect communication and receive communion.
How do we take God and the Scriptures seriously? Here are some thoughts:
First, accept as simple fact that God is seeking to communicate with us, to tell us who He is and what He has done, is doing, and will do throughout eternity.
Second, the initiative is all His. “He wrote the Book,” so to speak. We are characters in history, but history is His Story, not ours! His context shapes and molds our experience and lives. This is the thought in some good old hymns, i.e. “Living for Jesus, a life that is true; striving to please Him in all that we do! “
Third, Search and study seriously the Scriptures! I like the words of Paul to Timothy, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth” (2nd Timothy 2:15). In other words, let the truth absorb you as you absorb it! Let it change you from the inside out. Get the mind and heart and hands in gear. Carry the Scriptures in your heart as well as your head!
Fourth, be convinced the Scriptures are the plumb line and propellant for all of life. Paul has some serious words for his mentor Timothy, “…continue in what you have learned and become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it…” (2nd Timothy 3:14ff.)
Trekker, I don’t know if you take Donald Trump seriously, literally or reject him totally! For the sake of eternity, it likely may not matter. Kings and kingdoms, presidents and parties will all pass away… but there is just something about the name of Jesus Christ and the words of Him and about Him known as the Scriptures. One can ignore the truth, but one cannot deny the fact of His Way, Truth and Life. Let us continue to take Him and His Word seriously!
Your fellow trekker, Jim Meredith
