I Don't Fully Know
I ended my last post that spoke about the current state of the United Methodist Church with what I say is my answer to the questions that we are dealing with as a denomination. If you would like to read it for the background you can click here.
I have spent most of my life trying to know everything I can know about the things that are important to me. I was the child that took things apart and put them back together so that I could know how they work. I am someone who is always trying to learn. I believe in lifelong learning. I want answers. I struggle to live in the mystery sometimes. I don't like not knowing. I want to know all the answers. One thing I have learned in my relationship with God is that the more I know the more I realize I don't know. The more I learn about God the more I discover I know very little about God. God is bigger than I can wrap my mind around. Isaiah 55:8-9 says, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."
It was not easy for this guy who wants to know all the answers to come to this understanding of God. I wanted to be able to have all the answers about God. I want to know God completely. I want to be able as a pastor to help people to know God. But the truth is I do not fully know everything there is to know about God and the things of God. Scripture reveals this to me all the time. Just when I think that I know what a particular passage is saying It speaks to me in a new way. Just when I think that I understand all the nuances and all the details something new is stirred in me as I meditate on the word of God. More is revealed as I continue to seek to know more. Scripture also speaks to this in a direct way. Paul writes about knowing God and the things of God in a chapter that we tend to focus on what it tells us about love. 1 Corinthians 13:9-12 says, "For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."
Paul tells us that what we know now is only in part. We don't fully know. This side of heaven we can only know part of the truth about God and the things of God. I can't tell you I fully know what God is thinking or doing. I only know in part. I don't have all the answers. I can't figure it all out because right now I can only see a reflection in the mirror. It looks a lot like it, but it is not it. I don't fully know. This means for me that I can discern and I can know God and the things of God. I can find answers. But, It is not all that there is to know. What I know is only part. I told you before that this was hard for me to come to this understanding but I want you to know that it has also been very freeing.
You see we cannot coop the mind of God for ourselves. We should be cautioned about saying "I know that this is where God stands on this." We should be cautioned, by Pauls words, against saying that we fully know the answers. I think when we study God's word we find that saying and believing that we fully know the mind of God is incompatible with Christian teaching. The Bible certainly does not support that thinking. No matter how much we know about God and no matter how much we know God there is always more his way is higher than mine and his thoughts I can only get part of. I do not fully know. Here in lies some tension. It is a tension Paul lives in. The now and the not yet. The ever-unfolding Kingdom of God. Now I only know in part then I shall know fully. Yes, I can know God and I can discern his ways but I can always know more. What I know now is not everything there is to know. Saying that I don't fully know is not a cop-out answer. I think it is a faithful and biblical response. It is also not saying I don't know anything. It is about discerning faithfully and biblically what I know but understanding that it is not all there is to know. It is about being open to the part I may not yet know. I am aware that for people who really want to know where I stand on the issues they don't want to hear I don't fully know. That want me to say this is what the answer is. I struggle at times with that myself. It would be easier to just say that this is all I want to know I don't want to think about it anymore. But what if God has more in store? What if the God that makes all things new does a new thing? What if I only know in part? So, I do know some things that I have discerned and learned but I don't fully know. I can interpret scripture as it has been revealed to me but I don't fully know. I will try to share in some upcoming post about what I have discerned from my personal wrestling with the issues and I am sure they will reveal the tension that is there as we think about the issues of human sexuality, marriage, ordination, truth, and Christian love.
But, I have to begin here. With this understanding that as I talk about truth and love as revealed to me I only know in part. What I can share, what I believe, is only part of the fullness of God's truth. I do not know fully and I am living in that tension. I don't apologize, and I pray that I did not offend anyone, for the use of the words "incompatible with Christian teaching" from the United Methodist Book of Discipline. I will continue to use that phrase as I share what I can discern from the scriptures as behaviors that could be understood that way as well. I use these words only to help me and maybe you think about how we all at times might participate in behaviors that are incompatible with Christian teaching as we seek to live in relationship with Christ.
Love today.
In Christ's Love and mine,
Doug
I have spent most of my life trying to know everything I can know about the things that are important to me. I was the child that took things apart and put them back together so that I could know how they work. I am someone who is always trying to learn. I believe in lifelong learning. I want answers. I struggle to live in the mystery sometimes. I don't like not knowing. I want to know all the answers. One thing I have learned in my relationship with God is that the more I know the more I realize I don't know. The more I learn about God the more I discover I know very little about God. God is bigger than I can wrap my mind around. Isaiah 55:8-9 says, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."
It was not easy for this guy who wants to know all the answers to come to this understanding of God. I wanted to be able to have all the answers about God. I want to know God completely. I want to be able as a pastor to help people to know God. But the truth is I do not fully know everything there is to know about God and the things of God. Scripture reveals this to me all the time. Just when I think that I know what a particular passage is saying It speaks to me in a new way. Just when I think that I understand all the nuances and all the details something new is stirred in me as I meditate on the word of God. More is revealed as I continue to seek to know more. Scripture also speaks to this in a direct way. Paul writes about knowing God and the things of God in a chapter that we tend to focus on what it tells us about love. 1 Corinthians 13:9-12 says, "For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."
Paul tells us that what we know now is only in part. We don't fully know. This side of heaven we can only know part of the truth about God and the things of God. I can't tell you I fully know what God is thinking or doing. I only know in part. I don't have all the answers. I can't figure it all out because right now I can only see a reflection in the mirror. It looks a lot like it, but it is not it. I don't fully know. This means for me that I can discern and I can know God and the things of God. I can find answers. But, It is not all that there is to know. What I know is only part. I told you before that this was hard for me to come to this understanding but I want you to know that it has also been very freeing.
You see we cannot coop the mind of God for ourselves. We should be cautioned about saying "I know that this is where God stands on this." We should be cautioned, by Pauls words, against saying that we fully know the answers. I think when we study God's word we find that saying and believing that we fully know the mind of God is incompatible with Christian teaching. The Bible certainly does not support that thinking. No matter how much we know about God and no matter how much we know God there is always more his way is higher than mine and his thoughts I can only get part of. I do not fully know. Here in lies some tension. It is a tension Paul lives in. The now and the not yet. The ever-unfolding Kingdom of God. Now I only know in part then I shall know fully. Yes, I can know God and I can discern his ways but I can always know more. What I know now is not everything there is to know. Saying that I don't fully know is not a cop-out answer. I think it is a faithful and biblical response. It is also not saying I don't know anything. It is about discerning faithfully and biblically what I know but understanding that it is not all there is to know. It is about being open to the part I may not yet know. I am aware that for people who really want to know where I stand on the issues they don't want to hear I don't fully know. That want me to say this is what the answer is. I struggle at times with that myself. It would be easier to just say that this is all I want to know I don't want to think about it anymore. But what if God has more in store? What if the God that makes all things new does a new thing? What if I only know in part? So, I do know some things that I have discerned and learned but I don't fully know. I can interpret scripture as it has been revealed to me but I don't fully know. I will try to share in some upcoming post about what I have discerned from my personal wrestling with the issues and I am sure they will reveal the tension that is there as we think about the issues of human sexuality, marriage, ordination, truth, and Christian love.
But, I have to begin here. With this understanding that as I talk about truth and love as revealed to me I only know in part. What I can share, what I believe, is only part of the fullness of God's truth. I do not know fully and I am living in that tension. I don't apologize, and I pray that I did not offend anyone, for the use of the words "incompatible with Christian teaching" from the United Methodist Book of Discipline. I will continue to use that phrase as I share what I can discern from the scriptures as behaviors that could be understood that way as well. I use these words only to help me and maybe you think about how we all at times might participate in behaviors that are incompatible with Christian teaching as we seek to live in relationship with Christ.
Love today.
In Christ's Love and mine,
Doug
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