Hello All,
(Just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. And these weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on this or any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in God. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from the “Adult Sabbath School Bible Study Guide”, is titled “The Central Issue: Love or Selfishness”. Oooooo. A good title. This may encapsulate the real issue. As stated in my “thought” last week, Satan’s casting doubt on God’s character as he tempted Eve, was the means to have her and Adam decide to be their own “god”. If God is not God of our lives, then we must be our own god. A very attractive allurement. We are created individuals, made in God’s image. But without an intimate relationship with our Father-God, we pervert our Godly image. “Every human being, created in the image of God, is endowed with a power akin to that of the Creator-- individuality, power to think and to do” (Education pg. 17). We take our “individuality, power to think and to do” and use it with our own self-actualized best thinking, WITHOUT CONSIDERING OUR FATHER!!! WITHOUT AN ACTIVE, TIGHT, LOVING, TRUSTING REALTIONSHIP WITH OUR FATHER!!! Therefore, we are making decisions from a platform of self, self-centeredness, self-promotion, self-assuredness. Hence, the “Central Issue” hinges on our trust of God (faith). This is the issue that determines whether we are loving or selfish. Faith in our Father is the bedrock issue.
This is the issue that determines whether it be “love or selfishness”. Without an intimate loving relationship with our Father-of-Love, selfishness rules in our hearts and in our lives. True love for others can only exist in our hearts if our self-less Father rules in our lives. If not, we will always be motivated by self-loving, self-preserving, self-motivating actions… because… we do not have a Father who loves us, preserves us and is motivated toward our highest good. We do not have a Father we can love and trust. Therefore, we will love and trust ourselves and our own judgement.
God knows that we will not give-up this self-love, self-promotion, self-motivation until we see His love-promotion, and love-motivation. Until we see the superiority of that love in contrast with our base and bestial self-love and self-promotion. Only when our need to be loved is fully and grandly met by our God, will we then consent to have our old way of thinking (our “old-man”) die with God on the cross. And as we reject our old-man with Christ, then we are free to embrace the new-man, with Christ. This cannot be done at all outside of an intimate, abiding relationship with our Father-of-love. Because our true identity is only in one-ness with our Father. This is the true image in which we were created. To be in an intimate mutual love-relationship with our Father. This is the only way our “individuality, power to think and to do” can be properly aligned. Only when we see through the eyes of loving-truth… truthful-love, can we be motivated aright. Only then.
I hope you enjoy the lesson this week. It is important for us to be clear about the real issues in the Great Controversy. Else we will be misleading ourselves and others, even as we try to follow our Lord. If we have an intimate, ongoing trust-relationship with our Father, then all will be well. If not, all will be lost.
With brotherly love,
Jim