The greatness of God and the words of pitiful man.

How we view the world is a critical factor in our decisions and our emotional and spiritual condition. Too often our view of humanity is too high. We overestimate the image of God and underestimate the sin nature. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about how poor (unbiblical) theology ruins our personal spiritual development (personal discipleship). There are a ton of reasons for this but one reason I’ve observed is the love of reading people talking about the Bible, or worse, their experience in the Christian endeavor (with little Bible input and lots of experiential anecdotes) more than reading the Bible itself. This is compounded when these authors place too high a value on the abilities of humans.

Our source is God.

When we lose sight of this, we’re on a wrong track.

Consider the psalmist:

“Who is like the Lord our God, who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth? He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap, to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people.”‭‭ Psalms‬ ‭113:5-8‬ ‭ESV‬‬ http://bible.com/59/psa.113.5-8.esv

Look to God, not man. He lifts us from the ash heap, not we ourselves.

Realize that our sin is a regular part of the battle and that the words of man can only help us as they point to the words of God and to our Father in Heaven. As much as the words of man point us to God, read and heed them in thankfulness for pointing us upwards, beyond the earth and heavens to Him.

All glory and praise to He who died and rose for us.

Now, this is not to say that we mustn’t read non biblical authors at all. There is much to learn from them. There is much to learn from history, biography, politics and even Christian literature.

What I am urging is that we look through God shaped lenses as we train our hearts and minds to know and follow Jesus as His disciple.

Know Him first. He will lift us up.