Insanity is Contagious ...

If you saw somebody do something crazy, and it worked, would you do it too?  The first time you try something new, some experience you have never had before; you are generally a little skeptical that what others may have shared with you, will also be what you personally think about it.  Take for instance the first time you try a new food.  Others may love it, but you cannot be sure you will, until you taste it.  Now the crazier the “idea” of the food, the more skeptical you may be.  Trying some exotic fruit for example, perhaps like a persimmon, or a pomegranate might not be so unusual.  But sampling some kind of cooked bug, just sounds nuts.  Depending on how adventurous, or perhaps how much you trust the person who recommends the new food, you may decide to taste it, or not.  But food is much easier a risk to take, than something more substantial.  Risking your reputation for example, is not something you can recover from if things go wrong, unlike food whose negative effects are at worst temporary.  Risking your health on some new form of treatment might likewise take even more courage to attempt.  But how about risking your reputation, your health, and your salvation … all at once … against the council of the professionals.

Imagine yourself with a lifelong disability, or perhaps an acute illness that has very limited treatment options.  Because of your condition, “normal” people are going to think less of you to begin with.  After all, the “healthy” cannot sympathize with something they do not suffer from.  And in times past, the first thought as to the cause of your condition, is that “you” must have done something to cause it.  Oh sure, it is easy to connect the dots between skateboarding and a broken arm, or smoking and lung cancer.  But it is much harder to connect the dots between breast cancer and its victim.  A great many conditions that impact our health can well be beyond our control.  Attempting to assign blame for something like breast cancer spans the gamut from genetics, to environment, to diet.  But the farther back in history we go, the higher the inclination to assign responsibility for the illness to its victim.  In the time of Christ, this practice had reached an all-time high.  When confronted with a sick person, the first thought or question in the mind, was usually … “who sinned” and what did they commit, that would lead to this condition.  So in His day, the sick already had one strike against their reputation to start with.

Then comes the importance of community, of belonging.  In addition to the normal societal need to be accepted in the groups in which we live, the Jewish community had interwoven its faith into the core of its societal structure.  Samaritans for example, were not admired, because they did not conform to the traditional thinking that valued only the temple in Jerusalem as the pinnacle of the place of worship.  Gentiles were even lower on the reputation scale than that.  Pagans even more despised.  And Romans scraped the bottom of the barrel.  For a Jew in the time of Christ to achieve the best social standing, they would have to maintain good relations with the temple system based in Jerusalem.  This included general acknowledgement and adherence to the rules laid out by the priests, rabbis, and of course the Sanhedrin.  To stray away from their collective direction, was to risk being ostracized by the faith itself.  Salvation itself would be denied because of this choice to disobey the voice of God as taught by his authorized servants.  So beyond being sick and having one strike against you, to seek healing from Jesus Christ, was sure to be enough to get you tossed out of polite society, and lumped in with the lost.

Now, when you are truly sick, and there is no other option you have ever heard of to get well, you might go ahead and take the risk of seeking Jesus.  How interesting that nothing seems to have changed in our day.  But even if you make this risky choice, you are likely to pursue doing it the traditional way that everyone is talking about how it works.  For example, Jesus is said to have made some mud, and recreated a missing eye.  When He interacts with the possessed He commands the demons to leave them, and they do.  He takes the lame by the hand and they are able to rise.  The short story, is that a personal encounter with Jesus appears to be enough to heal whatever problem you have (and nothing has changed today).  But then comes the crazy.

You will remember from our earlier study (titled “Bleeding and Dying no more [part two]”) there was once a woman who decided on her own, that she only needed to touch the hem of His garment to be made whole.  This level of insanity was a product of her own imagination.  It had never been done before.  And there was no proof it would even work.  But it did.  The story of her decision to live beyond the limitations we impose upon ourselves, had remained in open discussion across the region.  Everyone was talking about how this crazy lady tried the impossible with Christ, and it worked.  What is more, Jesus even called her “His daughter” during His discovery and revelation of her faith.  No matter what the doctors said, no matter what the priests, and rabbis were saying … for those that saw how deep their own need was, there was really only one choice, to seek Jesus.  And this insanity was highly contagious.

Peter recalls the impact of this one crazy lady to John Mark in his gospel in chapter six and picks up the story in verse 53 saying … “And when they had passed over, they came into the land of Gennesaret, and drew to the shore. [verse 54] And when they were come out of the ship, straightway they knew him,”  The fame of Jesus had spread far and wide in this region on the far side of the Sea of Galilee.  A demoniac had been freed from nearly 2000 demons in a single command, and while he had wished to follow Jesus right then and become the next disciple, Jesus had bid him to stay in this region and witness to these people about what Christ had freed him from.  And the man had been a faithful witness, for the entire region now knew who Jesus was, though none of us even know the name of the man who spread this witness.  In addition, the story of the crazy lady who sought only the touch of His garment to be made well, was still a topic fresh in the minds of the people.  It did not take long to connect the dots.

John Mark continues in verse 55 saying … “And ran through that whole region round about, and began to carry about in beds those that were sick, where they heard he was. [verse 56] And whithersoever he entered, into villages, or cities, or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought him that they might touch if it were but the border of his garment: and as many as touched him were made whole.”  Entire populations of sick, disabled, crippled, and needy were brought to wherever Jesus was.  They were laid in the street, and Jesus was asked if He would just pass over His garment to make them well.  So great was the contagion of insanity in this area, that now everyone was convinced they only needed His clothing to make them well.  They did not want to trouble the Lord for a personal interaction, they had enough belief to “know” they would be cured if he just got close enough to them in passing, to drag his garment over them.  Forget what the professionals had to say, forget what ridicule other normal people may still harbor; those in need, need a savior.  Those in need will do what seems crazy in the eyes of others.  Those in need find their needs met ONLY in Jesus Christ.

And nothing has changed.  It is crazy to think, that a life of bad decisions, and addictive self-love can be changed by a power outside of our control.  It is crazy to think that the way to see a change in what we want, and what we love, can be performed in us, but not by us.  To be saved by Jesus, in spite of who we know we are today, is just a crazy premise … but it works.  It is not the Shroud of Turin we need to pass over us to make us whole now, it is only our choice to surrender to the “insanity” of being saved from ourselves by Jesus Christ.  The same professionals in our day echo the ridicule of the past, but what do they know?  The salvation of the crazy lady that pioneered this idea was not put at risk in doing so, it was instead cemented with her Lord.  The salvation of the wounded laid on city streets and country roads, was not put at risk in seeking Christ, it was affirmed by Him.  Our Creator is also capable of re-Creation as He proved over and over again.

This story could easily have been omitted in the gospel.  It is only a few verses at the end of an otherwise climactic chapter of miracles and greatness.  Compared with the other events in this chapter alone, the results of one crazy lady and the impact she had on an entire region seem inconsequential.  What difference does it make “how” people were healed by Jesus right?  The important point is that they were.  But I believe this story remains in the gospel, because it does matter “how” we can seek Jesus beyond the norms and conventions of what we have otherwise been taught.  A relationship with Christ is not confined to how others do it, what the professionals say, or how others have one; it is uniquely personal to you.  The faith of this woman who imagined her own healing in an unconventional way of seeking Jesus was rewarded.  In these verses her impact of doing so is recorded to have impacted an entire region.  Many found healing the same way she did, because they found the same faith she did. 

How you interact with Christ may be beyond the normal conventions that others do, and that is OK.  The lesson of this story is that there is no limitations God imposes on how He can interact with you, the only “limitations” that exist are the ones in your own mind that you have placed upon yourself and God.  To think differently is to find and believe that there are no limits on God, and therefore no limits to how He can truly impact your life.  The beauty of the gospel, is that once connected to Jesus, there is no limit to how much God can impact the lives of others, through you.  This is His favorite method of loving others, to love them through you.  It has the added blessing of bringing you joy and bliss in the process.  For to love others has always been the ultimate expression of who our God is.

True insanity, is not to seek Jesus.  True insanity, is to listen to those professionals that will never understand what it is like for you, to be made whole by Jesus Christ, even if that is only ever on a spiritual level.  The kind of “insanity” that seeks Christ beyond the limits of convention, of history, of tradition is the kind of insanity we need to embrace.  It may seem crazy to seek Jesus, but that is only ever the perspective of those who have not personally experienced what Jesus can do in a life.  Once you have tasted of the freedom Jesus can bring, the tables turn on the definition of what insanity is.  Once you know it works, the concept of who is truly the professional where it comes to salvation and how it works, begins to be understood entirely differently.  I would wish to be fully infected with the contagion of Jesus Christ, and if that looks crazy to you right now, just wait …

 

ProCreation ...

The most difficult question for an evolutionist to answer is simply “why”.  The process of cell division can be clearly articulated, but the reason for it is completely absent.  We understand what takes place when cells divide and multiply.  We can even understand how life can evolve.  But why do cells divide in the first place?  “Why” does life find a way?  To answer “it just does”, seems a bit superficial to me.  But where there is a God who creates, who innovates, and who loves – growth and change – would be a logical conclusion witnessed in infinite expansion.  God, it would appear, is constantly looking for new ways to express His love for everything He creates.  It is why bringing something new into existence makes sense.  He designs creation to be the next physical expression of His love.  Our senses, our ability to think on our own, to choose, to love by choice, to experience existence – all hallmarks of a God keenly interested in sharing His own experience with what He has made in us.  We share His image by intent, by design, through the execution of deliberate planning on His part.  The evil we embraced was not His wish or His intent for us; but our ability to choose evil had to exist, in order that our ability to reject it and accept love could also exist.  We choose to love God, not because He forces us, but because He loves us.  We grow, we learn, we love – not because we invented these concepts – but because we were created to experience them.  Growth, change, and innovation are characteristics of our God reflected in our existence.  God succinctly answers the question “why” in perhaps the only way that could make sense.

Our growth then, our ability to think and learn and expand our experience as a result, is placed within us by His creative design.  We are meant to increase our knowledge, our love, and our joy.  Life grows and with it love grows.  As we introduce children into our lives for example, when our first child is born and is only minutes old, there is already a connection, a bond, a feeling.  It is the infancy of a love for our child that is destined to ever expand.  Our love for our first child does not diminish over time (normally), it grows, it expands, it deepens.  As our children develop individual personalities, likes, dislikes, habits – they become distinct, and we love them all the more for their distinctions.  As they grow still and age for many years, the nature of our relationship alters from provider to consultant and friend.  Still our love deepens as does our appreciation for the person or adult our child has become.  At each stage of life love exists, but because life grows and expands, it gives with it the opportunity for love to grow and expand as well.  This is by design.  The author of love looks to constantly expand His love to us, and in so doing He creates the processes of growth, so that we might share in what it means to see love grow.  Every healthy cell that divides and expands carries with it an incremental opportunity to see love grow as well.  This is perhaps “why” life is ever expanding.

It is only the antithesis of God that introduces decay and demise.  Where love is constantly expanding, self is constantly contracting.  Where a focus outward on the needs of others brings joy to the object of love, a focus inward on the needs of self, diminishes the joy we and those around us can experience.  This is why love is life, and self is death.  But perfection was not designed to have evil corrupt it, and one day, evil will make a full exit from our existence, purged by choice, by grace, and by fire.  After that, evil will be no more, all that will remain is love.  Therefore the process of expansion, the concept of innovation, the ability to reason, these things will ever be present, a part of who and what we are.  It would seem then, that love is the reason why we exist and why our experience and our existence are destined to forever be better every day.  There is no plateau of joy or experience we will reach and maintain; rather we are destined to forever be in a pattern of expansion and growth.  In this sense, our creation in the image of God is reflected in our creative impulses.

While we do not share our God’s ability to call things into existence by sheer will or thought, we were created with the ability to find new combinations of thoughts or elements and in the combination produce something “new”.  The concept of music for example would likely have been created by God.  However the infinite variations of musical sound are left to us to perform, compose, alter, innovate, and expand for all of eternity.  The shear variance in instrumentation can produce wide varieties of music, let alone the unique vocal tones each of us possess.  While God likely invented the idea of music, He seems perfectly happy to bless us with abilities to share in it.  There are those who write, who play, who perform, or simply who appreciate it; a wide range of experience where it comes to the concept of music.  The topic of pro-creation then is not merely about the offspring of a couple paired in sexual intimacy, it is about the pro-creation of ideas, of concepts, or constructions.  When we build a building, when we form new thoughts, when we imagine – we are in effect expressing a reflection of the creative nature of our God.  In this we are procreating.

To be called the sons and daughters of God is not only an honor we will never deserve; it may also reflect a desire on God’s part to see us join with Him in the process of creation, of innovation, of expansion.  Every minuet shred of life in our world was created to grow, to expand, and to procreate.  The methods of procreation, rates of growth and change vary widely; but every tiny particle of life shares in the process in its own way.  The process is the constant.  The expression is the variable.  Life did not have to have this characteristic.  God could have brought in to existence only a fixed number of animated creations, and not given them the ability to expand or grow.  He could have created only a fixed number of trees, or fish, or lions – exactly enough to populate our perfect world, or His perfect heaven.  Had He done so, He would have not needed the command to go and be fruitful and multiply.  Perfection after all, did not require expansion.  Expansion, or procreation, was a choice God made in His designs of all life.  Because the love of God grows, life grows with it.  Because love is not content to be stagnant, life is not designed to be stagnant.  The concepts that we have a hard time understanding are how the love of God is infinite, yet expanding.  Perhaps it is only our perceptions that are expanding as we grow.

The question a Christian should perhaps give a bit more thought to, is “how much is enough?”.  Could you ever envision yourself as having had “enough” of the company of God?  Could you ever envision being loved “enough”?  Being close to author of all Love, is not something any sentient life can imagine tiring of, particularly when our own growth reveals deeper and deeper revelations of what love is, and what it means to us, and to those we treasure.  I do not believe there is a “just right” number of close friends.  Whether you have one, two, three, or any number beyond that, you tend to treasure each one because they are unique, and bring a unique perspective to the friendship you share.  In eternity, through the eons of time, we will come to know every single person who was saved in this world.  We will think of them as our family, as our friends.  We will love them all intensely.  And will we have finally hit just the right number of objects upon which to share our love?  God didn’t.

The reason we were created with the ability to pro-create is precisely because there is no limit, no perfect number of recipients of the love of God.  Our species, and every other could have been created with only a limited ability to expand – procreate until we reach a certain population, or saturation of the earth, and then by miraculous design, lose the ability to procreate further.  Perhaps only achieving procreation to cover losses from whatever the perfect number was.  But this is not how God created us.  The ability to infinitely expand eventually puts the limits of this world to the test.  Our destiny however was not be constrained by the limits of only this world.  There is no cap on the edict of being fruitful and multiplying, as there is no cap on the number of other potential worlds which we might inhabit and enjoy.  Our galaxy alone could keep us “multiplying” for quite a while.  The point is not about population explosion, it is about the lack of population controls – love does not seek to control or limit itself and its expression to others.  As we find love for the newborn baby who enters our lives, so God finds infinite love for it as well.  It is not merely the parents, grandparents, and siblings who may be elated at the birth of someone new – it is ALL of heaven.  God too, finds His own joy, in the introduction of a new life into the universe.  This is what He intended.  This is what He designed.  This is another way in which He finds His joy – to express His infinite love to yet another life.  It is also why each life is precious, and in His view, absolutely of infinite value.

Given our current condition, it is hard for us to appreciate why any particular life is so important to God.  After all some folks are not exactly go-getters, there are many who appear so steeped in selfishness that they are offensive, obnoxious, and some even psychotic (and that may be just the one in the mirror).  Our embrace of evil does not make our existence one to envy or admire, it is more pathetic and sad.  But our God sees beyond our current disease to the existence we were destined for from creation.  He sees us after His work of re-creation is completed.  He sees our potential to forsake the evil of self, and embrace what it means to surrender and then truly love.  And there has not been a single addition to our population whose life God would not treasure and desire to redeem.  Upon entering heaven, it will not matter how many of us there are, because no matter how great a number that will be, each particular person will be of infinite value to God.  If God could have persuaded even one more person to accept His gift of redemption from self, He would be elated to accept that additional life.  There is room in heaven for more than will choose to be there.  There is room in the heart of God to love every single person who has ever lived, or who will ever live.  Every despot in history, from the wicked pharaoh, to the current folks like Joseph Kony, are not beyond the ability of God to love, or His desire to redeem.  There is no waste of a life or a waste of existence where God is concerned.  If every single person from Adam to the end of time had accepted the gift of God of freedom from self and evil, heaven would be overjoyed, and considered complete.  It mourns greatly however that many have rejected this gift, and elected to hold on to their chains of bondage to evil.

It seems only logical that if the population of our re-created perfect world expands, it would be in character with the designs of God.  If God creates our world anew as He did the first time He set it up, the trees and plants will still germinate and expand, the birds, fishes, and animals will still carry the ability to have families, and perhaps we too will still carry the designs of a family unit.  It may be that marriage and family still constitute the designs God intended before evil was embraced.  Our notions of love will certainly expand, but perhaps the designs of God of a special relationship may survive what damage evil and self have done to it in this world of sin.  Perhaps the restoration of family will be the last redemption God extends the species of man.  To me, it does not really matter.  I trust the wishes of God in this regard, and believe whatever He has in mind with respect to family and human procreation, I will be elated with His choice.  However, what I have learned of God, is that He truly never seems to have a limit to His love.  He loves each of us so thoroughly and completely.  He does not get tired.  He does not change His mind about who He loves, or how He loves.  No matter how many others He loves, He does not get tired of loving someone new, a new child in His Kingdom.  It seems only reasonable to me, that heaven will not be the starting point for putting a cap on any new additions to the family.  In fact, it seems only more reasonable and consistent with what He designed so far, that heaven may be the starting point for an explosion of love, and perhaps with it, an explosion of new life, new families, and even greater love.