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aaron klinefelter
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We have a problem these days it seems. I'm not sure it's only a product of "these days" but I do know I see it constantly now. The concept of pragmatism that we see in terms of a philosophy of life in connection to Christianity and our theology can cause lots of problems. For one thing, the essence of our faith isn't a very pragmatic thing. It's outlandish. It's crazy. It really makes no sense. If you get it to a place where it makes too much normal sense, you've gotten it, I think, too far out of it's center. You have made it something too palatable. You have taken it's face off and made it unrecognizable. How does this work? I can only say how I've seen it work. The typical rhetoric you hear is usually something about how to make the Christian life "livable." First I'll say I understand this because there are many ways to look at living a life as a Christian which are too heavy, too much. I cast that off myself. Specifically calling for quick "perfection" is problematic. It's extreme in a bad way. I think there are good extremes but this is not one of them. Boom! You're saved! Now behave yourself, you have no excuse now, you know the Truth! Well, we don't have to be a pragmatist to know it doesn't work that way. I didn't say I don't want to work it that way. I said it does not work. There's a difference. This notion of livability is a difficult one. I'll admit that. We're talking about people who are interiorly torn asunder, severely broken. Even when we are connected to the Life of God in and through Jesus and are indwelt by the Holy Spirit - even then, parts of us are still cracked and broken, in need of repair, actually of remaking. What happens though, is that we get things confused. Natural, I suppose. I mean, it makes sense that we wouldn't immediately know how things work. We try sometimes to figure things out from where we are and merely from the place in which we stand in our present development as a person. If we do this alone and do not consider what is beyond where we are, what can and should be, then we cripple our own deductions. We cannot though, especially because of this brokenness and need of transformation - we cannot be the measure of whether or not something will "work." If our experience of being transformed is not perfect, if we aren't experiencing God or His Life in the way we've been told we're supposed to - or even in the real way we should - we can't allow that to be the ruler with which we measure truth and God's will. That would be a blind man interpreting the light. The whole thing is bigger than us, than any of us and all of us. How it all works is often beyond us. That doesn't mean it doesn't work though. Simply because we don't see empirical evidence cannot be interpreted to mean there is nothing there or that our experience then trumps all. That one step goes off a nasty cliff. Faith is more mysterious than that. The kind of seeing that is done by faith doesn't always make sense. It isn't always readily apparent with the senses. It gets clearer though. The more we "see" by faith, the more we see in reality and that reality, God's reality, trumps all. There are things we must accept whether we like them or not. We are broken. Our minds don't understand or think properly. Our hearts are deceptive and want things they should not want. We are drawn to the fire. A pragmatic theological philosophy can cause us to find ways to live in the fire. We say something like, "Well, we're here in the fire and the heat all around us. It doesn't seem to be going away, so we must find a way to live in it, with it. We must embrace the heat." Maybe we do research and make fire-suits. Perhaps we develop a skin conditioner which helps ease the pain. Maybe it even numbs us so we feel nothing. Still the heat cooks our skin - the radiation poisons us. I know all this is somewhat vague. There are so many things that will fit inside this scenario I won't even try to bring them up. I simply think it needs to be said that being lead by pragmatism in doing theology or shepherding people, spiritual direction, etc. is not healthy. When we do this, we forget the greatness of God. We put aside His power and His willingness to really help us, His ability to transform our lives at the very deepest level. Instead, we focus merely on what's happening in front of us. Hell, if that's all it's about, we have no hope at all. I could understand giving way to a pragmatic approach. But the Holy Spirit is alive in this realm of reality! Let's not think and act as if we have no other recourse but our own minds and schemes. That's disaster. I don't know what else to say about it. I've rambled enough. Hopefully it was somewhatcoherentt. Grace and Peace be with you. technorati tags > pragmatism, pragmatic, church, theology, spirituality :::
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three quotes |:: "Then, if we cannot as yet think alike in all things, at least we may love alike. Herein we cannot possibly do amiss." "Keep your eyes on the crucifix, for Jesus without the cross
is a man without a mission, and the cross without Jesus
is a burden without a reliever." "...I am deeply convinced that the Christian leader of the future is called to be
completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self."
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