Minni Me-s
I have been studying people for decades. It’s part of my job as a pastor… to understand, sympathetically and compassionately, the human condition. It continues to amaze me how skilled we are at masking our fallenness, our pain, our suffering, our weakness, our sin. Our minds are adept at developing layer upon layer of protection against change because its number one concern is self-preservation. This is the primary preoccupation of the organism. It shouldn’t come as a shock to me because even when I read back in my journals that go all the way back to 1986, I am overwhelmed with how much the same I am. In spite of all my efforts to change over the years, I still recognize the same sinful self that was there at the beginning. I, like all others, have learned the art of avoiding real change in exchange for accommodation.
You see, at some point I had to ask myself the most difficult yet obvious question: Who was the “I” that wanted to change “me”? For it is this “I” that needs to be transformed, not the “me” the “I” insisted was the culprit. This is the problem. Because the “I” certainly does not want to die and will do anything to avoid it. So the “I” selects phantom “I-s”… mini- “me-s”… to be disposed of. But it never allows itself to put itself to death. Like I said, the number one concern of the organism is self-protection. But this is precisely that which needs to die! The “I” that decides to take up spiritual practice, most often to strengthen itself, must itself die. The ultimate spiritual practice is the cross. Instead, we adopt spiritual practices and attitudes and beliefs, all as an avoidance of the real work… taking up the cross!
Understanding this must give me compassion for myself and all people. I will not get mesmerized by any impressive spiritual knowledge, belief or practice in myself or others. These are all games to distract us. It is like flack to draw the fire away from the “I” that is afraid of death and therefore avoids it at all costs. I keep hammering away at the core issue: the sin and suffering in this world and in our hearts and minds, the humble acknowledgment of it, and the crucifixion of ourselves, all of ourselves, not part. This is the root! The fruit? I am convinced this is where resurrection power, with all its joy, finds fullest expression.
When Jesus died, it was all of him that died. There wasn’t a golden nugget, the “true Jesus”, the “true Self”, preserved from death on the cross. No, it wasn’t just dross that died there. There wasn’t a special spark of Self that escaped death. To think this way is pure and simple gnosticism. All of Jesus died. Even the best of Jesus died. And this is what we are called to do, invited to do: completely die. Is this possible? Can we walk into our death? Can we die daily? Can we take up the cross? For only then can we know what the joy of the resurrection life means.
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And this is what we are called to do, invited to do: completely die. Is this possible? Can we walk into our death? Can we die daily? Can we take up the cross? For only then can we know what the joy of the resurrection life means.
——-I dare say if someone was to tell you they have, you would thing them….
fishon
David
“The ultimate spiritual practice is the cross. Instead, we adopt spiritual practices and attitudes and beliefs, all as an avoidance of the real work… taking up the cross!”
Wow………now if thats not a biased spiritual belief…………I see you havnt lost Your “I” yet
David you said…
“There wasn’t a special spark of Self that escaped death. To think this way is pure and simple gnosticism. All of Jesus died. Even the best of Jesus died.”
If Jesus was really God and really man at the same time, how is it that no part of Him escaped death? If your statement is correct, wouldn’t the God part of Him have had to die as well? And isn’t that impossible if He truly was God? If not then it seems to me He would no longer be God, he’d just be man and isn’t that exactly the opposite of the point?
Hope that makes sense.
Isn’t the “I” that has to die the self-same “I” that chooses to believe in the first place? So it can’t be all bad, can it?
If it then chooses to die, it is given back to us a hundredfold, and God never gives a bad thing to his children. So it can’t be bad at all.
Perhaps the thing that has to die is the belief that something has to die. (Though, for those within a church that can be the hardest thing of all.)
Woah! Paradox!!
“I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” – Jesus
John 12:24-25
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Hebrews 12:2-3
If we truly understand that love is waiting for us on the other side of dying daily… then yes, it can be done. The death that’s required is a death to building our own kingdoms in exchange for building his. This is not some depressive, dark alternative to enjoying life as we know it… but an invitation to more life than we know right now. Greater love, greater joy, greater purpose and greater hope are waiting on the other side of surrender (I’m talking about this life in this age – not the next). This is foolishness to those who don’t know Him and an amazing truth experienced by those who do.
Stout stuff! And a profound reminder that:
1. Flesh DEMANDS to live, and will compromise, negotiate, “go to sleep,” or do anything but die.
2. Crucifixion of the flesh is a God-work for that very reason.
3. It’s already happened – the old man was crucified (Rom. 6).
Decarte said: “I think therefore I am”. As the tagic history of World wars shown,h e made a mistake wich Jean Paul Satre corrected by stating that the “I” who thinks is not the real “I”, not the essence of a human being. The “I” who is aware that it thinks-that is what makes us human. To be conscious of the fact that your thoughts and emotions is not the essence of who you are, is to die to yourself and awaken to your real self.
This is how Eckardt Tolle interpreted Jesus’s teaching in “A New Earth”. I no know why Oprah fans are so hokked on this guy. It seems to me he understands the essence of Jesus’s teachings better than most of us. In my opinion there is an “I” that is good, that could not and should not die, but be awaken.
Many of us think we are to simply dress-up in the clothes of Jesus. Paul says, “putting off the former things…” to new believers. The former us does reform, the mind does renew, the flesh of us does go down, but not without a fight. If we are speaking from the innermost part of us… “for out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” Jesus. Then we are doomed, but for the ongoing mercy of our beautiful Father, who knew, we are not born from above as he was, but were born of sin, to become like him, by his Spiritual process, and at the same time remain uniquely ourselves with a preserved DNA, now fashioned in heaven. Now here is a mystery; but the choice, by faith to want to die, to desire to die, to long for that completeness to incinerate and obliterate the flesh as we know it… now there is a feat worth persuing. God honors our efforts and rewards us… yes to die a thousand deaths daily is not enough… we are left to behold the mercy and longsuffering of a wonderful friend who welcomes us to his table… because the blood has made us whole.
Amen! Amen! Amen!