How do you know what you know?

 

Our knowledge is imperfect, and our prophesying is imperfect.  When the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. 

 

Yesterday, my inner defense attorney objected to the idea that “love never fails.”  Today, my inner know-it-all feels exposed.  I don’t know what I don’t know.  On Sunday, I spoke about the question, “How do we know what we know?”  Stop, what is the foundation of your explanations and exhortations?  We live in a Google-dominated world where we are convinced that we have it all figured out.  Brian McLaren says we are attracted to leaders who are confident even when they are not competent.  We like strong people, because we don’t believe Jesus saying that the peacemakers will inherit and usher in the realm of God.  We have tried for centuries to bomb our way to peace.  Even though it has never worked, we still go back to that as our first, last, and only resource.  Einstein was right: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.  Faulkner was right, the past isn’t dead and isn’t even the past.  Today carries the brokenness of yesterday because we keep clinging to our way, rather than God’s way. 

 

As a recovering perfectionist, who is still in process, I shudder at the idea of the phrase, “when the perfect comes”.  Another word that could be faithfully substituted into the above translation is “whole”.  “When the whole comes, the incompleteness will pass away.”  This echoes the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy kin-dom/realm come, here on earth, fully, completely, wholly and holy”.  N.T. Wright says that the goal of religion is not to get your soul to heaven, but to get heaven into your soul here on earth to spread out from you to others.  The pathway to heaven isn’t only through your intellect.  You don’t need to write volumes of Church Theology arguing every point.  You need to let love be written in your life every day.  Karl Barth, who wrote 12 volumes of a book called “Church Dogmatics” (talk about thinking your way through faith!), was once asked to summarize those million words he had written.  He said, “Jesus loves me (and everyone), this I know for the Bible tells me so.”  May that truth challenge you, be lived in you.  May God continue to sketch, draw, and color in your life today.  Amen.