This is a comment I just left on the blog of a Christian seminarian that I've known for a number of years. His post was an explanation of why he finds Christian girls boring. The topic interests me because other young men I have known have also expressed the same complaint. In my comment I dissect to some level a few of the ideas he expressed.Brother, if I may comment, I would like to say that in general you find women who are stereotyping themselves as “Christians” to be boring and, of course, so do I. Authentic life in either sex is what attracts, life lived “as you are” and, if Christ is your life, well, what can I say? You will not probably fit the cookie cutter pattern of the modern Christian. Instead, you will be like someone out of a science fiction or fantasy novel, or from the pages of the Bible itself. Why? Because the inauthentic has become the majority environment of the world in these final days, and only fiction (written to give some relief, though it is not permanent or lasting) or the Word of God (the eternal, the always fresh, revelation of the mind of God our maker and deliverer), challenges this environment, and presents us with an alternative.
I find that most of your criticisms are not coming from a scriptural mindset, but from one which is really quite secular. This surprises me, as you have put forth yourself as one who is a follower of Jesus, who is the Word of God in human form, and who said, “If you make My Word your home, you will be My disciples.” That home comes fully furnished with everything we need, and He has arranged everything so wisely for us. People say they are moving in to live there, but usually they only visit and try to rearrange His furniture to suit themselves. Brother, do not be that kind of habitant!
You say that you don’t like this in Christian women, that they think their biological clock is ticking very quickly, that they must get married and make babies as soon as possible, no matter what. You challenge this, saying, “It costs A LOT of money to support oneself, but to bring in another life and be dependent on it is another ordeal altogether, how many can say they're financially secure right after school? I mean, unless you married someone who's an oil baron who doesn't need a spouse to work, you and the guy you're married to will BOTH need to work to support each other, bringing kids into the world while not being somewhat financially secure is bad idea in my opinion. You will have plenty of time to make some kids, don't worry, until then get on some form of birth control.” I challenge you to take up the biblical faith, starting with not seating yourself on the throne of your life and tailoring the commandments to suit what you think is reasonable.
The truth is that no one is ever ready to have children once they are married, no one, not even the rich. It is a scary proposition, not however for the reasons you state, financial inadequacy and such, but rather, because God has given us a commandment, “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth”, in which He partners with us in the most intimate way imaginable, making us in our act of procreation co-creators with Him of other human lives and fashioners of the history of the world. As followers of Jesus—I am not saying, as “Christians”, because anyone can say they are that—as followers of the Living One, the Holy One of Israel, the only God, who risked all to enter the womb of an unwedded bride and become Man, as followers of That Man, we run the way of the commandments, because we have been set free.
Set free from what? Set free from fear, ultimately the fear of death, but intimately the fear of submitting our day to day lives to Him, to letting Him, the Faithful and the True, hold us in the palm of His hand. The first commandment is the easiest, but only if we obey it without hedging it in with restrictions. Yes, your young body and the young body of your wife, are prepared for the begetting, bearing and raising of children. We let ourselves be guided by biblically informed reason, according to the conditions at hand. If you are caught in the midst of a raging battle, your land is being pillaged and raped and denuded of its inhabitants, this is not the time to procreate, but to pray for deliverance. We aren’t there yet, brother. But if you make ease the measuring stick of how and when to fulfill the commandments, you will lose all.
Everything that our good and loving God commands in holy and divine scripture is true. It doesn’t need adjustment from us. The Holy Spirit in fact interprets for us in every situation how to apply it, if we will listen to Him and not take refuge in our own calculated reason. He can enlighten reason in us, but only when we have yielded all to Him.
You seem to have a problem with God’s order of Man and Woman that is provided for us in His Word. Out of context, you say, people have stressed the “wives submit to your husbands” and suppressed the “husbands submit to your wives.” There is no such verse, other than to “submit yourselves to one another, in love.” The word submission can mean many things, and you have a lot to learn, not from modern philosophy or your own thoughts fashioned by the world system, but from living the commandments that have been revealed in the Word, instead of just talking about them. At one time you identified yourself as Greek Orthodox, and I don’t know if you still do. Orthodoxy does not bend to the world system or its philosophy, and those who are Orthodox live already in another world, in another house, and that house is the one that Jesus speaks of when He says, “If you make My Word your home…”
People are afraid—there’s that word “fear” again!—to submit themselves body, mind and soul to what the Word of God decrees for mankind, that is, the divine economy, the plan of salvation. They always want to tailor it to what they think is their current condition or status. That’s why we see hundreds of different editions of the bible for every kind of person. But this, brother, is blatant blasphemy, yet the world-conditioned Christians see it as God’s gentle and accepting way with them. C. S. Lewis was right when he described this kind of man-made “God” as a Grandfather in heaven, who is happy when he knows that everyone has had a great day and enjoyed themselves.
You say that you are not one of those who box reality up into secular and spiritual categories. You say that “everything is spiritual, all truth is God’s truth.” Easy to say this, brother, but difficult to live it, don’t you think? You say, “No need to complicate things and make laws that aren't of God.” Again, easy to say, but then whose laws are of God, and whose aren’t, and who is to judge?
There is a divinely established order of Man and Woman, and it is what the Word of God declares. Only those who intend to live according to that order can speak about it, can describe what it is like, but most importantly, even without speaking of it, we can see the effect that following the order that God has established has on their lives. Their marriages and their families become ikons of life in the Holy Triad, ikons even of Paradise, as the Orthodox wedding service proclaims.
Not only in the married life, but in everything—for He has ordered even our society—we live according to the mind of Christ, which is One mind, and which He gives to us, when we come to Him without defense or excuse, and allow Him to reveal to us what and who He made us to be, and gives us that white stone on which our new names are written, which only the one who receives it can read.
It’s time to grow up for real, and leave behind the world’s false assurances and decrees.
The decree of Yahweh Sabaoth awaits us all, who have ears to hear.
I find that most of your criticisms are not coming from a scriptural mindset, but from one which is really quite secular. This surprises me, as you have put forth yourself as one who is a follower of Jesus, who is the Word of God in human form, and who said, “If you make My Word your home, you will be My disciples.” That home comes fully furnished with everything we need, and He has arranged everything so wisely for us. People say they are moving in to live there, but usually they only visit and try to rearrange His furniture to suit themselves. Brother, do not be that kind of habitant!
You say that you don’t like this in Christian women, that they think their biological clock is ticking very quickly, that they must get married and make babies as soon as possible, no matter what. You challenge this, saying, “It costs A LOT of money to support oneself, but to bring in another life and be dependent on it is another ordeal altogether, how many can say they're financially secure right after school? I mean, unless you married someone who's an oil baron who doesn't need a spouse to work, you and the guy you're married to will BOTH need to work to support each other, bringing kids into the world while not being somewhat financially secure is bad idea in my opinion. You will have plenty of time to make some kids, don't worry, until then get on some form of birth control.” I challenge you to take up the biblical faith, starting with not seating yourself on the throne of your life and tailoring the commandments to suit what you think is reasonable.
The truth is that no one is ever ready to have children once they are married, no one, not even the rich. It is a scary proposition, not however for the reasons you state, financial inadequacy and such, but rather, because God has given us a commandment, “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth”, in which He partners with us in the most intimate way imaginable, making us in our act of procreation co-creators with Him of other human lives and fashioners of the history of the world. As followers of Jesus—I am not saying, as “Christians”, because anyone can say they are that—as followers of the Living One, the Holy One of Israel, the only God, who risked all to enter the womb of an unwedded bride and become Man, as followers of That Man, we run the way of the commandments, because we have been set free.
Set free from what? Set free from fear, ultimately the fear of death, but intimately the fear of submitting our day to day lives to Him, to letting Him, the Faithful and the True, hold us in the palm of His hand. The first commandment is the easiest, but only if we obey it without hedging it in with restrictions. Yes, your young body and the young body of your wife, are prepared for the begetting, bearing and raising of children. We let ourselves be guided by biblically informed reason, according to the conditions at hand. If you are caught in the midst of a raging battle, your land is being pillaged and raped and denuded of its inhabitants, this is not the time to procreate, but to pray for deliverance. We aren’t there yet, brother. But if you make ease the measuring stick of how and when to fulfill the commandments, you will lose all.
Everything that our good and loving God commands in holy and divine scripture is true. It doesn’t need adjustment from us. The Holy Spirit in fact interprets for us in every situation how to apply it, if we will listen to Him and not take refuge in our own calculated reason. He can enlighten reason in us, but only when we have yielded all to Him.
You seem to have a problem with God’s order of Man and Woman that is provided for us in His Word. Out of context, you say, people have stressed the “wives submit to your husbands” and suppressed the “husbands submit to your wives.” There is no such verse, other than to “submit yourselves to one another, in love.” The word submission can mean many things, and you have a lot to learn, not from modern philosophy or your own thoughts fashioned by the world system, but from living the commandments that have been revealed in the Word, instead of just talking about them. At one time you identified yourself as Greek Orthodox, and I don’t know if you still do. Orthodoxy does not bend to the world system or its philosophy, and those who are Orthodox live already in another world, in another house, and that house is the one that Jesus speaks of when He says, “If you make My Word your home…”
People are afraid—there’s that word “fear” again!—to submit themselves body, mind and soul to what the Word of God decrees for mankind, that is, the divine economy, the plan of salvation. They always want to tailor it to what they think is their current condition or status. That’s why we see hundreds of different editions of the bible for every kind of person. But this, brother, is blatant blasphemy, yet the world-conditioned Christians see it as God’s gentle and accepting way with them. C. S. Lewis was right when he described this kind of man-made “God” as a Grandfather in heaven, who is happy when he knows that everyone has had a great day and enjoyed themselves.
You say that you are not one of those who box reality up into secular and spiritual categories. You say that “everything is spiritual, all truth is God’s truth.” Easy to say this, brother, but difficult to live it, don’t you think? You say, “No need to complicate things and make laws that aren't of God.” Again, easy to say, but then whose laws are of God, and whose aren’t, and who is to judge?
There is a divinely established order of Man and Woman, and it is what the Word of God declares. Only those who intend to live according to that order can speak about it, can describe what it is like, but most importantly, even without speaking of it, we can see the effect that following the order that God has established has on their lives. Their marriages and their families become ikons of life in the Holy Triad, ikons even of Paradise, as the Orthodox wedding service proclaims.
Not only in the married life, but in everything—for He has ordered even our society—we live according to the mind of Christ, which is One mind, and which He gives to us, when we come to Him without defense or excuse, and allow Him to reveal to us what and who He made us to be, and gives us that white stone on which our new names are written, which only the one who receives it can read.
It’s time to grow up for real, and leave behind the world’s false assurances and decrees.
The decree of Yahweh Sabaoth awaits us all, who have ears to hear.
1 comment:
This is great stuff here. As you wrote, we're never quite ready for marriage or children. The Biblical mandate is clear though.
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