We’re all inclined to believe that people like Tiger Woods and the man who flew his plane into the IRS building in Texas are in a completely different moral category from us. But the Bible reveals that these men are in fact just like us. They’re merely farther along our common trajectory. Some people just can’t see things this way. The suggestion is so absurd as to not even be offensive. (You have to believe something a little to find it offensive.) They probably think I’m exaggerating for effect rather than making a serious point. “Oh, Christians just say that, but they don’t really mean it.” The possibility of what the Bible teaches here is so literally too threatening to their psychological structure to even consider. But it is precisely the self-deception of believing that I am incapable of behaving atrociously (even under the wrong circumstances) which prepares me to behave atrociously when those (or other) wrong circumstances come about. You see, all men suffer from delusions of their own moral grandeur, delusions only reinforced by believing that bright line category distinctions exist between us and them. “I never thought I would have done anything like that,” is the universal lament of the man who used to be completely sure that, “There but for the strength of my own character and willpower go I. Andrew Tallman ☀
Socrates rather infamously claimed to know nothing. Thinking this was a quantum improvement over error, he went about proving to others that they didn’t know anything either, a habit which eventually got him lynched. Although one might question the value of self-exploration which only leads to ignorance, I think there is a lesson here for Christians. Our first command is to love God fully. Of course, love presupposes knowledge, and the Christian shorthand term for the knowledge of God is the Gospel. But at some point, those of us who seek God realize that we don’t really love Him and we don’t really know Him, truths which our actions clearly show and which prove that we don’t really believe the Gospel. Admitting this failure is painful, but it is the pain of self-revelation. As such, it is a major checkpoint on the path to real intimacy with God and the holy life which grows from that. Whereas Socrates’s sense of ignorance was an endpoint, the Christian’s sense of unworthiness is a whole new beginning. Andrew Tallman ☀
Peace. It’s quite some word. Even just saying it solemnly seems to bring a hint of the its substance to a moment of our lives. And at this particular time of the year, it’s something far too many of us feel we lack. We rush to buy gifts. We scurry to prepare a feast. And then it’s all over. January comes and it seems as though another season devoted to the birth of the Prince of Peace came and went with very little indication that He was Lord of it at all. Andrew Tallman ☀
Know thyself,” was a maxim given several hundred years before Jesus by the philosopher Plato. And one of the aspect of self-knowledge is understanding why we believe what we believe. And one of the keys to this is becoming aware of what you want to be true in any given area. The reason is simple. We tend to believe things are true that we want to be true, and we tend to reject ideas as false if they challenge something we cherish. This tendency to be misled into comforting or comfortable falsehoods is what philosophers call “wishful thinking.” And it means that, when we believe things to be true which we also strongly want to be true, we should at least be aware of our vulnerability toward coloring and distorting the facts to fit our desires. We must never underestimate the role of desire and pride in holding beliefs. Hence, “Why do I want to believe this?” is at least as important a question to ask ourselves as, “Why do I believe this?
Andrew Tallman
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