Opening Our Souls to God, Part I

Inner transformation is God's work; it is not something that we can produce by our own effort. That does not mean, however, that we do not have a role to play. We cannot simply sit back and wait for God to transform. In previous posts, we have seen that we have a role to play by surrendering our thoughts, emotions, and desires to God so that he can transform them in positive ways. The power of God enables us to put away those desires and actions that hurt us and replace them with desires and actions that promote health and growth.

How can we tap into the power? How do we prepare ourselves for God's work of renewal? I want to discuss our role in renewal in a series of posts, but in this post I want to lay the foundation by discussing how we can open our souls to God and let him do his work within us.

I. The Goal of Spiritual Growth: The Image of Christ (Rom 8:29)

First, let's remind ourselves of the goal of spiritual growth: "For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters" (Rom 8:29 TNIV). Spiritual growth is the process of being transformed into thte image of Christ.

In the late 15^th century, the Florentine sculptor Agostino d'Antonio began work on a huge block of marble with a view to producing a spectacular sculpture, but after a few futile attempts, he gave it up as worthless. The badly disfigured block of marble lay idle for forty years until Michelangelo came along and saw its potential. Out of that block, he created one of the most outstanding artistic achievements of all time, the statue of David. As he was working on the sculpture, a passerby asked him what he was doing, and he replied that he was releasing an angel from the rock.

God sees within us the image of Christ, and he can release that image into view if we allow him. Although it is God's work to make us like Christ, we must decide that we want to change and grow. We must make an effort to allow God to change us from the inside out.

John 15:5 says that a branch produces grapes by being connected to the vine, which is the source of life. We bear fruit when we are intimately connected with Christ. He provides us with spiritual nourishment and strength. But we must make the effort to attach ourselves to the source of life and to remain attached to him. If we try to grow on our own as a solitary branch detached from the vine, we will wither and die.

We create the environment in which God can bear fruit in our lives by meeting three conditions: belief, discipline, and time.

II. 1^st Condition for Spiritual Growth: Belief

Hebrews 11:6 says that we cannot get close to God without faith. If we want to get close to God, we must believe that he exists. Many people follow false forms of spirituality because they do not accept the reality of God. They do not believe there is a spiritual Being who is the Creator of the universe, the Redeemer of all people, and yet personal enough to desire to know each of us individually. To grow spiritually, we must believe in the reality of the spiritual dimension, and we must believe that at the center of that spiritual dimension and pervading all of reality is a personal God whose primary characteristic is love.

Hebrews 11:6 says that we must also believe that God rewards those who earnestly seek him. There are many who profess belief in God, but it is merely an intellectual assent to certain facts about God. They do not believe that they can truly encounter God, experience him, relate to him, or get to know him on a personal basis. They do not believe that God really hears when they speak to him, and they believe even less that God is able to speak back to them.

The first step of spiritual growth after becoming a Christian is to believe that God cares about us and is intimately involved in every aspect of our lives. One of the greatest advances that I have made in my spiritual progress resulted from reading an author (perhaps Morton Kelsey?) who reminded me that God is not way off somewhere. God is not out there and up there, far beyond my reach, so that I have to grope blindly and struggle to find him in some desperate effort doomed to failure.

Actually, God is as close as my heart. When I was baptized into Christ, God's own Spirit entered my heart and my spirit and now dwells within me. So if I want to be close to God, I do not have to shout upward to him in prayer, hoping that my fervency will catch his attention. Instead, I simply become silent and turn my attention within to experience his presence with me. James 4:8 expresses this idea succinctly: "Come near to God and he will come near to you." Believing that it is possible to be close to God and to know him personally is the first requirement for spiritual growth.

In the next post, I will finish discussing the second and third conditions for spiritual growth.

Reflection Questions

1. What have you been doing to keep yourself attached to Christ? What can you do in the future to stay connected to him?

2. Examine your beliefs about God. Do you doubt that he exists? Do you believe he cares for you? Do you believe he wants you to know him?

3. How would it affect your relationship with God if you understood that he is as close as your heart?

Next Topic: Opening Our Souls to God, Part II

Is Change Really Possible?, Part III

In the last couple of posts, I have been considering various types of determinism. These are reasons that people offer for why it is impossible to change. I will finish by considering two more types of determinism.

V. Situational Determinism

Many people feel that they are victims of circumstances beyond their control. They are locked into a situation they cannot change. They are imprisoned in a dead-end, meaningless job, and they have no opportunities to better themselves. Their marriage is unfulfilling, and there seems to be no way to improve it. They suffer from an oppressive economic situation, such as high unemployment or high inflation, and they suffer the consequences of it.

Of course, it is true that there are times that we cannot control or change our circumstances. Some people will have physical disabilities their entire life. Some people will have personality defects or mental disorders that may never change. Many things in life happen to us as a matter of chance, and sometimes these accidents or mishaps leave lifelong scars, both physical and emotional.

On the other hand, sometimes circumstances do change. One of the facts of life seems to be that, if you wait long enough, it will eventually change. Doors do open up; new opportunities do come along; the economy does improve; our spouse may respond to our attempts at reconciliation.

But even when our circumstances do not change, we can control how we react to them. We are all dealt a certain hand, some worse than others, and we do the best we can with what we have received. You know the old saying: "If life hands you a bunch of lemons, make lemonade."

Within any situation, no matter how restrictive it may appear, there are always some choices that can be made. The key to responding healthily to our circumstances is to avoid self-pity. Self-pity robs us of motivation to change. It paralyzes us because we think we are stuck and there is nothing we can do about it.

When we decide not to play the victim but to take control of our lives, we often find that we can make some changes that help us feel better. We can begin with changes in our attitudes and thinking patterns. If we can change our unhealthy intepretations of difficult circumstances, we can change how we feel about them.

History is full of examples of people who rose above their difficult circumstances to accomplish great things. In fact, it seems that most great figures of history suffered difficulties and tragedies early in life. George Washington's father died when he was eleven years old, and his surrogate father, his brother Lawrence, died when he was twenty. Abraham Lincoln's mother died when he was nine years old. He had a difficult relationship with his father throughout his life, and he did not even attend his father's funeral. Franklin Roosevelt was stricken with polio at the age of 39 but went on to serve four times as president. Many more such examples could be given.

We might be tempted to say that such people accomplished great things in spite of their circumstances, but it may be more accurate to say that they accomplished great things because of their circumstances. Their difficulties, and the way they responded to them, created qualities in them that bore fruit later in life.

Of course, this does not happen for everyone. Many people in such situations give themselves over to despair and believe that they can never rise above their circumstances. They feel trapped and victimized, and so their circumstances become a crushing burden they carry their whole lives.

The Apostle Paul encouraged his readers to reject the idea that they had to change their circumstances in order to serve the Lord more fully: "Let each of you lead the life that the Lord has assigned, to which God has called you. This is my rule in all the churches" (1 Cor 7:17). He goes on to say that if you were not circumcised when you came to Christ, don't feel that you have to be circumcised to serve him more fully. If you were a slave when you came to Christ, don't feel that you have to become free in order to serve him. If you were unmarried when you came to Christ, do not feel that you must become married.

This is consistent with Paul's teaching elsewhere that we should be content in all circumstances. Paul himself had experienced difficult circumstances, but he had learned to be content and to serve the Lord in every situation: "Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong" (2 Cor 12:10).

Sometimes circumstances do improve if we are patient and wait long enough. Sometimes our circumstances will never change. But we can choose our attitudes, our thoughts, and our character in responses to them.

VI. Emotional Determinism

Many people feel that they are slaves to their emotions. Emotions are viewed as external forces that seize possession and cause them to act in ways that they cannot control. If they are angry, then they must lash out at others. If they are depressed, they cannot change how they feel.

In most cases, this is simply not true. Schools of psychotherapy, such as rational-emotive therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy, have been developed for the purpose of teaching people to control their emotions. These approaches teach that emotions are caused by our thought patterns. Our self-talk affects how we feel. If we can change how we interpret events, we can change how we feel about them. If we replace faulty thought patterns with healthy ones, our emotions will change.

Of course, there are some emotions that result from chemical imbalances in the brain. Fortunately, we have medications today that can help with that. An open question is whether those chemical imbalances are caused by faulty thought patterns or whether the chemical imbalances cause faulty thought patterns.

In an earlier post, I addressed the issue of changing our emotions, so I will not say more about that here.

Reflection Questions

1. How have you felt like the victim of circumstances? What current circumstances do you find difficult to deal with?

2. In what ways you have responded in positive and healthy ways to your circumstances?

3. How can you learn to be content in all circumstances, as Paul was?

Next Topic: Preparing Ourselves for Renewal