Thursday Thoughts Newsletter is your weekly dose of 3 brief ideas from me, 2 quotes I’ve recently enjoyed from others, and 1 question for you as you go about your week.
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3 Brief Ideas
- Empathy means recognizing another’s pain as real to them; however, empathy does not mean equating what is real to them as a valid measure of what is always true of reality. Regardless of how we may feel at any given point, it does not change what is true outside of our feelings and opinions.
- If God seems so ‘coy’ and ‘hidden,’ perhaps it’s not because He’s trying to be, but because we’re seeking Him incorrectly. If we come to God first with terms and conditions and expectations and preferences, of course we cannot know Him as He truly is—as that would be true in any relationship. To know anyone truly is to come to them on their own terms and conditions, their own self-revelation. We won’t ever know someone if we first put them up for judgment according to our own criteria. Similarly, we cannot know God if we come to Him with our own unbreakable, inflexible categories. That is pride. We will know God only first by coming to Him on His own terms, not our own preferences. That is humility.
- Jesus says that the path to following Him—and therefore, knowing Him, experiencing closeness with Him, and partaking in His abundant life and wisdom—is one where we first take up our cross and follow. While a ‘taking up our cross’ may refer to the totality of giving up our life to Christ, perhaps we can still struggle with bearing a ‘cross’ in a particular area of our lives more than others. For example, maybe I am failing to experience the truth of God right now because I haven’t yet died to my own wisdom, and therefore need to bear the cross of thinking I know better than God. Maybe I am failing to experience closeness with God currently because I haven’t yet died to my own sense of “ideal” financial security, and therefore need to bear the cross of greediness and stinginess. Maybe I am failing to sense the love of Christ as of recent because I haven’t yet died to my own sense of retributive justice for how I’ve been wronged, and therefore need to bear the cross of giving my grudges to God. Maybe I am failing to experience the peace of Christ because I haven’t yet died to my own sense of control, and instead need to bear the cross of knowing I am not in control.
2 Quotes From Others
“When I expect myself to be what only Jesus can be—perfectly loving, infinitely wise, supremely strong—I’m going to hate myself for falling so short every day.”
– Gary Thomas, When To Walk Away, p. 217
“It is our work to cast care, and it is God’s work to take care.”
– Thomas Watson
1 Question For You
What “cross” are you not carrying in a certain area of your life, and therefore, failing to experience God’s closeness—especially in that particular area?
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Thanks again for following along, see you again next week!
AG
