-
Posts
-
Dialectic, dialogue, discussion, exchange of ideas. Does faith happen or can it be described by exchanging ideas, discussion, dialogue, dialectic.
Faith is a relationship. The details of a relationship are only truly known by the persons in the relationship. For instance, your relationship with your wife is a private and intimate experience between the two of you. You could try to describe it to me but unless I’ve had a similar relationship, chances are it won’t mean much to me personally. It’s between the two of you. Likewise, my faith in God is a relationship with him. I can describe my faith to you, but unless you’ve had the same faith experience, I can talk all day and you won’t understand.
(1107.6) 101:2.16 Religion must ever be its own critic and judge; it can never be observed, much less understood, from the outside. Your only assurance of a personal God consists in your own insight as to your belief in, and experience with, things spiritual. To all of your fellows who have had a similar experience, no argument about the personality or reality of God is necessary, while to all other men who are not thus sure of God no possible argument could ever be truly convincing.
Or perhaps you’re wondering if it’s possible to instill faith in another person by talking about your own faith. I think it’s possible to inspire folks to look for faith, but it can’t be given to them by any of us. It’s a gift from God, and it’s given once a person begins to desire a relationship with him. Faith is a gift, but I can’t give it, nor can you. If you have faith, then have it to yourself. My faith is God’s trust in me when I express a willingness to trust him in return. God always makes the first move. Our job is to discover, recognize, interpret and choose it.
99:5.7 Let the term “faith” stand for the individual’s relation to God rather than for the creedal formulation of what some group of mortals have been able to agree upon as a common religious attitude. “Have you faith? Then have it to yourself.”
What happens next are the fruits of the spirit which are offspring of the relationship, soul powers. Dialectic, dialogue, discussion, exchange of ideas are not fruits, but fruits of the spirit will give these things a spiritual fragrance because they become soul inspired. Remember, God is more than an idea. God is more than mind and thoughts. God is a person, a very lovely person who wants a relationship with you, just you, one-on-one. That’s the only way to have faith, and growing faith means growing trust: a greater willingness to engage in the one-on-one; a more open attitude toward being taught and lead; a greater desire to be like the one who is loved; greater courage to actually carry it out because life becomes a partnership; greater joy in living because life becomes more balanced; greater happiness because you’re never alone. Faith is a truly good and beautiful gift.
(1610.2) 143:2.7 “Your sonship is grounded in faith, and you are to remain unmoved by fear. Your joy is born of trust in the divine word, and you shall not therefore be led to doubt the reality of the Father’s love and mercy. It is the very goodness of God that leads men into true and genuine repentance. Your secret of the mastery of self is bound up with your faith in the indwelling spirit, which ever works by love. Even this saving faith you have not of yourselves; it also is the gift of God. And if you are the children of this living faith, you are no longer the bondslaves of self but rather the triumphant masters of yourselves, the liberated sons of God.
Dang, you are so articulate.
Yes, Faith really cannot happen by talking about it, faith is a reality, not an idea.
It’s relationship, not dialogue.
Hegel on the idea side with his belief in ideas as ultimate reality and TUB on the other with detail explanations and examples (Jesus life) of faith creates two sides of a coin that helps me understand faith better.Yes, Faith really cannot happen by talking about it, faith is a reality, not an idea. It’s relationship, not dialogue.
Faith is more than an idea, but it does include ideas. Ideas are important; they should not be disparaged even though there are so many false and misleading ones. Ideas are the middle ground where material reality and spiritual reality begin to work together. Ideas are formed from contemplating the outer world, but they are supposed to become elevated to the level of ideals as they become more infused with spiritual reality from the inner world. The goal is to coordinate and unify (by personality) all three levels of reality, energy (body), ideas (mind) and spirit (soul). Recall these quotes:
101:6.7 Revelation teaches mortal man that, to start such a magnificent and intriguing adventure through space by means of the progression of time, he should begin by the organization of knowledge into idea-decisions; next, mandate wisdom to labor unremittingly at its noble task of transforming self-possessed ideas into increasingly practical but nonetheless supernal ideals, even those concepts which are so reasonable as ideas and so logical as ideals that the Adjuster dares so to combine and spiritize them as to render them available for such association in the finite mind as will constitute them the actual human complement thus made ready for the action of the Truth Spirit of the Sons, the time-space manifestations of Paradise truth—universal truth. The co-ordination of idea-decisions, logical ideals, and divine truth constitutes the possession of a righteous character, the prerequisite for mortal admission to the ever-expanding and increasingly spiritual realities of the morontia worlds.
160:1.2 Human life consists in three great drives — urges, desires, and lures. Strong character, commanding personality, is only acquired by converting the natural urge of life into the social art of living, by transforming present desires into those higher longings which are capable of lasting attainment, while the commonplace lure of existence must be transferred from one’s conventional and established ideas to the higher realms of unexplored ideas and undiscovered ideals.
2:7.11 Health, sanity, and happiness are integrations of truth, beauty, and goodness as they are blended in human experience. Such levels of efficient living come about through the unification of energy systems, idea systems, and spirit systems.
5:5.11 God-consciousness, as it is experienced by an evolving mortal of the realms, must consist of three varying factors, three differential levels of reality realization. There is first the mind consciousness — the comprehension of the idea of God. Then follows the soul consciousness — the realization of the ideal of God. Last, dawns the spirit consciousness — the realization of the spirit reality of God. By the unification of these factors of the divine realization, no matter how incomplete, the mortal personality at all times overspreads all conscious levels with a realization of the personality of God.
Don’t forget that, “Faith is the inspiration of the spiritized imagination.” (132:3.5). Faith is that process by which ideas are transformed into ideals. By having a relationship with the source of ideals (Deity), we slowly learn to adopt them and live them, thus allowing our character to change from human to divine (divinity attainment). But it does begin with ideas, it begins in the mind, the gateway to the soul. However, those ideas have to get to the soul for this to happen. That’s where I think many people stall out. They keep ideas swirling around in their adjutant mind. Without prayer (spirit of worship) and the desire for improvement (spirit of wisdom), the gateway to the soul, where ideals live, never opens. It’s sad. I think that’s why the authors lament that there are so few real thinkers and that so many become trapped in cultural bondage, satisfied with so little.
155:6.13 When you once begin to find God in your soul, presently you will begin to discover him in other men’s souls and eventually in all the creatures and creations of a mighty universe. But what chance does the Father have to appear as a God of supreme loyalties and divine ideals in the souls of men who give little or no time to the thoughtful contemplation of such eternal realities? While the mind is not the seat of the spiritual nature, it is indeed the gateway thereto.
101:7.4 A third group progress to the level of logical intellectuality but there stagnate in consequence of cultural slavery. It is indeed pitiful to behold giant intellects held so securely within the cruel grasp of cultural bondage. It is equally pathetic to observe those who trade their cultural bondage for the materialistic fetters of a science, falsely so called.
110:7.6 So few mortals are real thinkers; you do not spiritually develop and discipline your minds to the point of favorable liaison with the divine Adjusters.
“Don’t forget that, “Faith is the inspiration of the spiritized imagination.” (132:3.5). Faith is that process by which ideas are transformed into ideals. By having a relationship with the source of ideals (Deity), we slowly learn to adopt them and live them, thus allowing our character to change from human to divine (divinity attainment). But it does begin with ideas, it begins in the mind, the gateway to the soul. However, those ideas have to get to the soul for this to happen. That’s where I think many people stall out. They keep ideas swirling around in their adjutant mind. Without prayer (spirit of worship) and the desire for improvement (spirit of wisdom), the gateway to the soul, where ideals live, never opens. It’s sad. I think that’s why the authors lament that there are so few real thinkers and that so many become trapped in cultural bondage, satisfied with so little.”
Nicely put
The desire for improvement, so important.
I watch lots of science shows and there is considerable desire to improve telescopes and devices that help reveal the material universe but little desire to find out what it all means or what value it has.Sincerity must also be there
And the spirit of truth is part of the process.I watch lots of science shows and there is considerable desire to improve telescopes and devices that help reveal the material universe but little desire to find out what it all means or what value it has.
Well said. Most of the world thinks backwards, which leads to distortion. Revelation is supposed to help turn it all around, but the mind must be open and the heart willing. So few real thinkers, so many in cultural bondage.
Sincerity must also be there And the spirit of truth is part of the process.
Yeah, I don’t think trust is possible without sincerity, and if trust is not there, there’s little or no faith. Faith and trust are intertwined into one package deal, as I see it, and I think assurance goes along too.
I really love quote 101:6.7 which I posted above. It says that if we dare to open that gateway to the soul with worship and wisdom the Adjuster will spiritize our ideas and adjust them so the material mind can actually use them within our lives with the help of the Spirit of Truth. That quote pretty much spells it out for us. We have help every step of the way. I mean, if you sincerely desire a righteous character, nothing can really prevent it from happening. All the parts are present, all the gifts open and available and real people are assisting us. It’s not just forces, energies, gravities and divine substances, but real, actual personalities intimately involved with you, with me, one-on-one. Where on this world can you get that kind of free-will attention? Nowhere. And it’s all happening right inside your head. It’s truly a good and beautiful thing.
Yes, 101:6.7 does say it all.
And How about the first part of it where we are told about the nature of this development or transformation of idea to ideal to soul, or morontia reality, stating it is: “ a magnificent and intriguing adventure through space by means of the progression of time“???
Now that is plenty of food for thought eh??
The author has a knack of waking up the minds curiousity in prep for a revelation I’d say.The author has a knack of waking up the minds curiousity in prep for a revelation I’d say.
Yup, that’s the gateway!
152:6.4 Jesus taught the appeal to the emotions as the technique of arresting and focusing the intellectual attention. He designated the mind thus aroused and quickened as the gateway to the soul, where there resides that spiritual nature of man which must recognize truth and respond to the spiritual appeal of the gospel in order to afford the permanent results of true character transformations.
Login to reply to this topic.
Not registered? Sign up here.