"Give
me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring
them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become
any type of specialist I might select -- doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief
and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants,
tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors" (John B.
Watson).
As the acknowledged father of Behavioral Psychology, Watson argued that we need nothing to explain human behavior but the ordinary laws of
physics and chemistry. Had his thesis proved correct, humanity would have
healed itself of such destructive phenomenon as war, genocide, and ethnic
cleansing. Mankind would have created a more peaceful society than currently exists.
As our world currently exists, humanity remains in the
grip of religious philosophies and secular ideologies that find themselves
unable to cure our selfishness, greed, and hatred. Evil behavior revisits humanity
regularly, filling our fragile relationships with terrorism, threat of wars, all
as contagious as an epidemic of Ebola.
The Christian Church, on the other hand, repeatedly
achieves many things otherwise impossible except for faith in God. The Bible is
filled with humanity’s encounters with its own limitations, but Biblical
writers seldom stop there. Paul preached in Antioch of Pisidia where he traced
Israel’s history from the Exodus out of Egypt all the way down to the Roman Courts
where Jesus was observed standing before Pilate and facing death.
Luke further reported that when they had fulfilled all
that was written concerning Jesus, “they took Him down from the tree and laid
Him in a tomb.” Normally that would have concluded the story. Under normal
circumstances Jesus would have been left to rot—dead by crucifixion. Luke adds
two controversial words, however: “But God ...” (Acts 13:29-30 NKJV).
God made the difference then, by raising Jesus from the
dead. God made the difference throughout human history by offering divine
solutions as alternatives to human failures. Whatever one may believe about
Jesus Christ, he lived a life in which humanity has yet to find moral flaw. We
cannot imitate Him. We cannot reproduce His quality of life by our human means
... but God.
It is generally recognized in Christian circles that people
can and do experience transformed lives by inviting Jesus to live within their
hearts and reconfigure their lives. This is a change that multiplied multitudes
have experience, and continue to
experience, through the power of those two controversial words - “But God…”
We all know the Church has many faults, as well as many critics!
I also know the Church’s mission of human transformation remains historically
uncontested and without viable competition. Giovanni Papini was a typical non-believer
when he began researching his monumental Life of Christ. Research revealed a
sequence of events and experiences that led Papina away from the Jesus of
history, and enabled him to discover the living Christ and experience his own
personal transformation. (Elson/And Still He Speaks/ 118).
It was while viewing a sunrise in the Swiss Alps that a
teenaged British girl encountered the transforming love of God. She had no idea
he actually existed until an unplanned moment found her vacationing family
without overnight lodging. As sometimes happens, Jill’s family chose to make
the best of their lack of adequate planning; they would sleep in their compact
car ... but God.
But God … It just so happened that Jill, cramped and
resting poorly, rose early the following morning cramped from lack of rest. She
rose early the following morning and meandered aimlessly about the small ridge
overlooking that popular tourist area. “And there,” she announces, “I watched
the sunrise.”
Later, Jill read the Book of Romans in her bible. Her
reading revealed to her that God had revealed Himself to humanity in nature.
Admitting she had not read much of the Bible, she readily confessed, “I did
‘read’ that sunrise and a huge sense of God’s glory overwhelmed me.”
Jill’s unexpected “conversion” came when the realization
of God’s transforming presence confronted her personal sense of unworthiness. Writing
as Jill Briscoe, whom many of us have read and some of us have met, she penned
the following lines that described her “Conversion”:
The day
breaks softly, filling me with awe.
It
seems the other side of heaven’s door.
That God
forgives my sin, to me is plain. . .
Today,
‘spite of my sin - the sun doth rise again!’ 1
I am walkingwithwarner.blogspot.com
and now you know the rest of the story.
_______________
1 Jill
Briscoe, By Hook or By Crook. (Waco: Word Publishing Co., 1987) p. 37.
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