Anyone reading these Pages is bombarded with the word context. I have tried to live for nearly eighty years in a Christian context. I did fairly well, but sometimes unsatisfactorily. Improvement (growth) was nourished. From wide experience, I firmly recommend that, under God, each person take charge of his or her life – to cultivate and nourish it. Do not be deterred by others who overstate, understate, or simply misstate our places in the world, either in personal (private) or relationship (social) life. Such confidence is generated in the assurance that one is pursuing, and is responsible for, a constructive course for a Christian holistic life (context). This quest is a worthy one for here and will further clarify hereafter.
The text book for life is Scripture. The best teachers, counselors and friends are partly formed from that primary source. This is not to say that other opinions, contributions, and involvements, including humanistic education, are not highly meaningful in lasting influence, but the ground for the discovery of life that is most gratifying (not only to God, but to oneself) is found in personal faith in God and building life’s context in the light of divine (creator’s) instructions. Dedication to personal growth in physical, social, spiritual and personal life as well as for family, citizenship, devotion and health is significant for solving problems. The point is to live devotionally, positively, practically, contributing to others’ benefit so to fulfill one of the meaningful purposes of our existence – to model life as God would have it. A side benefit of all this is that one avoids at least some of the common problems reported by persons working in the areas affecting the life of troubled mankind on earth. It doesn’t require high intellectual acumen to discover that preoccupation with self, anger, distractions, hatred, fear, jealousy, misdirected passion and two score other aggravations will drag us down. When one gains awe and respect for life, that person will find a somewhat mysterious satisfaction with whatever must be faced, perhaps encountered, including our mortal departure. The sting of departure is largely relieved by the belief that it is transitional to some larger, ecstatic, life. Life itself is the most convincing evidence of God in an otherwise temporary creation.
The enemies of this redeemed life context are several, first understood in the condition of human depravity, but signified more specifically as doubt, arrogance, limited intellect (unable to deal with spiritual mystery), humanism (belief that nature is all there is), appeals in conduct (violations of righteousness), and the like. The life that reaches for Christian idealism incurs some cost, sometimes great cost. That cost is often personal (unseen by others) in discovering areas of self-denial in belief and conduct, limitations that we may not prefer, perhaps would like to reject. There is also the price of ridicule and misrepresentation that arise from those who prefer not to involve deity in the natural world. They say: Believe, if one must, but insignificantly. From the Scripture, this is spoken against. The Christian partly occupied with presenting faith as important and best for life, but as diplomatically and graciously as possible, must accept some cultural rejection by humanists interpreting the world as animal habitat, with human animals at the top. Many factors of life experience are best understood in the context of rejection. Some of the commandments are best understood in negative wording – (Thou shalt not . . . .). So the Christian accepts the large benefits of his or her faith, but needs to know that there are negative costs that relate to personal consequences of mortal life. As the wise person learns how to adapt life to what is given, as say a blind person adjusts to life darkness and becomes noble (as did Helen Keller), so the person of spiritual life turns to benefit what is possible in the holistic life of the Christian in both benefits and disappointments. If disappointments seem too great to bear, then the benefits were not adequately understood, or the person has lost spiritual balance. It is clear that persons may aspire toward Christ-likeness so to find a life that is filled with a fullness that ultimately becomes forevermore. Law and rules are never sufficient; there must be a development of morality within that will triumph for righteousness (rightness) in all things. This is related to the new life in Christ for those who follow the biblical context. There may appear difficulty in this approach, in that persons may interpret Scripture in private interpretation. We remember that interpretation is usually found in the larger context of passages. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020