Two lectures into the discipleship training course here at YWAM has already been insightful, for they have constructed a wonderfully logical way of approaching the faith. I am hearing profundities I have vaguely deduced articulated with refreshing clarity and precision.
The first series of lectures is by YWAM veteran Paul Hawkins, concerning the character and nature of God. It is a vivifying distillation of theology derived from biblical and practical experience. Which, after reading Sophie's world, I would call a twin approach of knowledge by perception and language, for written records fall under the avenue of linguistics for me.
He has thus far spoken on how God is a person, or as a trinitarian perspective might suggest, three persons relating in perfect unity. Paul suggests that a person must have intelligence, emotion and volition, three delightfully latinate words. Intelligence is further delineated as the qualities of self-consciousness, reasonability, imagination and memory. He went on to prove that since God has all these qualities, evidenced by the biblical record, we can be confident of His full personhood.
These are several of the points which I found as confirmation of what answers I arrived at as I had meditated on the nature of God and creation. After going to the series of lectures on the nature of the Trinity in 2013, I learnt about the Father, the Son and the Spirit, and the perfect communion that unites them. I felt that while I was never explicitly stated, the reason why God created us to was to extend that perfect source of love and joy to other persons. I had heard previously that we were created in order to worship God. To some extent this is true, but more importantly, we were created to have intimate, personal relationships with Him. To be sure, worship is an essential and beautiful aspect of our relationship with God, but I almost feel that the full realisation of our relationship with God will be more than the word 'worship' can do justice to. I daresay we are called to be more than worshippers, we are called to be children of God, fellow partakers in that inheritance which Christ has already received.
Second, he spoke about the intensity of God's emotions, which I am very glad to have assurance on now. I had sensed that as one comes to know God and to understand Christ, one does not approach a sort of tranquil enlightenment, at utter acceptance of the world. Conversely, we move into greater and stronger emotional and motivational states, for God is a God of crazy love, of impartial compassion and righteous anger. As we know Him more, our hearts likewise imitate His perspectives and emotions. Just as the opposite of love is not hatred, but apathy, the opposite of God's emotional intensity could be viewed as an emotional insensitivity, which is wont to develop if one is detached from God for an extended period of time, living a purposeless life, where emotions are not a boon but a bane. The tranquility of monastery life and buddhist apotheosis seems appealing, but it resolves the suffering of the world in a philosophical sense, not in the practical sense which will compel positive action which God desires. It is an answer that appeals to the world, that we must come to accept the suffering and distress as part of a grander whole, that there is no good and evil, but only oneness where duality is a refracted dispersal of unity. There is a mysticism to it, but it is not what a believer in the Christian God is drawn to. The Christian God calls us to fix what is unjust, to work against exploitation and disease and poverty, to do what we can to heal the brokenness of this world, instead of denying our sense of morality in a series of noble, but misguided, mental gymnastic manoeuvres.
Third, his central point was 'What you believe about God will affect what you believe about everything else.' This reminds me very much of a much loved quote from C. S. Lewis 'I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.' It ties in with a principle that I have experienced in my own life, that once I learned about the nature of God, through bible studies and prayer, personal experience and the testimonies of others, I become increasingly able to make sense of an otherwise inconsistent and irrational world. When one learns about one aspect of God, it augments one's faith in all the other characteristics one has already observed. And the more one learns about Him, the more one can say 'There is none like You.' without a sliver of doubt.
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