mid-tues post

A friend just told me last night, in response to my previous post, that God is in the midst of my busyness. Very true. Thanks N. :)

In the midst of my busyness, I felt compelled to write about what I feel God spoke. So yep. Abandon work for a bit for now.

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the diving nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. “

(2 Pet 1:3-4)

These are 2 verses. 5 sentences, 4 linking words, and plenty of vocabulary. But that's not the thing I want to write about what I think God has spoken to me. If you read on to the remaining 4 verses:

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

(2 Pet 1: 5-8)

These 6 verses are part of the 120 verses I got to remember ( word perfect ) for Friday's mid-term check up. A chill went through my body thinking about it. But that can wait till later.

I used to read self-help books quite a bit, not so much for myself, but to understand people, particularly the people I was interested in then. I also enjoy studying how the human psych works, and I have always been quite impressed how certain theories are developed.

After I became a Christian, and I started to read the bible, I realized that many psychology theories come forth from the bible in its rawest form. Christians believe that the bible is God-breathed and inspired by God. That means God speaks through the words in the bible. I know some have lots to say about certain parts of the bible being inconsistent and not applicable. That can be discussed in another entry. For now, it suffices to say that my personal belief is that everything is in its truest form written at that point in time, and it's because of how humans interpret it with our finite minds that cause all the hoo-ha about whether the bible is relevant or not.

We know that God's next greatest commandment after loving Him with all of our hearts and minds and souls, is to love our neighbour as ourselves, and in part of the gospel, He emphasizes that importance by even asking us to lay our lives down for our friends. So why, in this instance, did Paul not start with supplementing our faith with love first? Why did he say, “make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love”, as if it is wise to do it in this order.

My personal rhema from this is that, well, for me, I am pretty affectionate most times, even with people I have just met, and I have learnt that my affection can go haywire without self control, (it has happened before). The thing about loving women, is that because we are such relational creatures, we get close too quickly and if we have experienced being intimate with another, there is basically nothing much except excellent self-control and a very determined spirit to keep things from happening between the two especially if both are mutually attracted to each other. So therein lies this verse, that before I even think about loving everyone, which happens quite speedily for me, that I should seriously consider the wise counsel God is giving me.

Faith – Virtue – knowledge – self-control – steadfastness – godliness – brotherly affection – love.

I really think the guideline is in this order. Maybe that's how agape love is. In its purest form. Maybe that's the friendship between Jonathon and David. People think they might be gay, being so close as they were. Maybe they got the order right. And they had loved each other with that pure love that came out of brotherly affection, which came from godliness.

I would wish to dwell more on this but because I got to work, That is all for now.
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