Another takeaway was that this faith cannot be just limited to the theory only nor practical only nor deeds only nor belief nor feelings nor anything in particular. It is whole. And more than the sum of its parts.
While my pre-conditioned and biased mind tends to look at things from a largely rational standpoint, (OK, I am not fully rational but I tend to value it more) other parts are important too. This really is a reminder that I cannot think Christianity. It is not a subject to understand alone. To claim one understands this faith through the mind alone is to miss out on a huge chunk of this faith. It is more than just logically sound, it is also emotionally, spiritually, morally, sociologically, psychologically sound. To reduce God into an argument is to not know God actually, perhaps it is something I ought to safeguard against. To limit God into just feeling would be to have mindless masses like those after pop culture or whatnot (did I just insult pop culture? Perhaps.) To limit God to a genie… … So on and so forth.
Rev. Tan Tiong Ann mentioned that John Calvin was able to synthesise the bible, the living word of God, into functional theology. He claimed that was one of the most important things Calvin did. I agree. Knowing without doing anything is something us second-generation Christians tend towards. So into the culture that one does not understand it from the outside. An example from week 1: I never knew that Chinese in Singapore these days still hold onto Christianity as a white man’s religion. And that was true even to friends that I have spoken to about Christianity and I never even knew about this underlying assumption.
Some of us generalize the Bible into an instruction manual, something Rev. Tan repeatedly cautions against. Like what is right what is wrong. Like lawyers. We take God’s word to be a law, like the Pharisees. We try to define terms, set limits, boundaries, discuss the extent that things crosses into wrong. All these are well and good in the interests of better understanding God’s word but God’s word is more than law. Rev. Tan (I think) also said that God’s word is relevant today. It is alive! I think one should look past technicalities and focus on the intent and bigger picture of God.
A Christian life is unique and different in all forms. From the state of perpetual worship to the whole being.
Lastly, I would also interject that the point of us telling the world about God and not to convert the world to be Christians. Basically we are telling them a truth! And the truth prompts us to do such and such. It cannot be the other way around of showing them the way of life or the benefits or the whatnot then leading them to the truth. We are not trying to get a bigger lobby group, trying to save souls .etc ALONE. There is no end in that. All has to stem from a living God that has revealed himself to us. I would do well to put it in perspective.
Looking inwards this week I see again lots of flaws in myself, again, especially in such an environment where everyone has done so much. I wouldn’t take it as comparison for the sake of comparison but more as comparison to see what can be learned and improved. Still, we are all works in progress.
I know these two posts are in really broad, modern-art esque strokes and apologise for that. Time constraints. (A really bad reason, I know.)
Nicholas Khaw
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