Orientation

Virtually every person finds an orientation in currency for functioning in the world.  It begins with preoccupation of self which we interpret as innocent in a baby/child.  The baby is oriented to heat and cold, to hunger and food, to cuddling and cooing/crying, and sleeping.  For the child, life emerges and registers in the family context.  Wise parenting accents life affirmatives and gently works on managing negatives – a vital factor in forming life.  As the child forms self-consciousness the person becomes responsible for self.  A bit soon in time he or she begins to think less as a child, especially in puberty years, and more as grown up, sensing that maturity is important, but not yet wise enough to claim independence.  When the right nurture is provided the journey is easier to manage.  Some advance with better resources for additions in quality life to keep balance, so they do rather well.  Advancement to maturity is incremental with only a few leaps along the way.  Idols are advanced in general society appeal to us about what we are expected to wear, how to fix hair, how much skin to show, what music to listen to, who to model after, how to interpret values, what education to gain, what passions to release, and the story grows long – formation. 

The elements add up to positive or negative persons living in a demanding world – and that in degrees of evaluation.  We are often attracted to non-sequiturs, to unreal expectations, to selfishness, to distortions of reality, to passions of youth, and the like.  In all this we are told by the church that we acknowledge our need for God’s help to get through life to constructive and comforting conclusions.   It all amounts to a life stew mixed on a secular and/or spiritual recipe.  The taste of life is determined on the spice of the secular and/or the spiritual. The ingredients are selected with some items left out of the secular, and some from the spiritual.  They gain different outcomes.  God urges wisdom development that causes the individual to choose that which provides the outcome desired by the person – not decided by Christians on any other base than faith and God as represented in Jesus Christ.  Life becomes a story of overcoming.

Among the unique factors of Christianity is the communion (Eucharist) analogy.  Jesus taught that there is a water of life, a beverage that will last beyond any return to thirst.  The doctrine is partly explained in reference to the human experience (always making the best analogies for human understanding of spiritual verities) – where thirst slacked by water, will only serve until thirst arises again.  Spiritual thirst met with the water of life from God will never appear again – except thirst for growth.  Scripture suggests that no person should take of the communion who is ignorant of its meaning and not yet noting drafts of the life of Jesus Christ.  If the experience of communion is embraced in its biblical meaning it relates vitally to the personal experience of redemption found in the meaning of the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. 

Spiritual life is played out in nature’s human experience in the stew and beverage of spiritual food that assures the Christ-life, even for the most ordinary (perhaps immature) Christian.  This is not really understood in much of the discussion about Christianity, and the status of Christians with God. The world generally finds Christianity to be a decent way to live, in life and service to others, with some sternness about human conduct and conservative values.  It is not seen in the light of biblical teachings which include such statements as: Christ in you the hope of glory.  That seems odd and exotic for the secular masses.  We may be indwelt by fetuses, or even mechanical devices, but to be indwelt by God is taken as a bit of religiosity.  We extend it beyond nature.  Perhaps the marriage supper of the lamb referred to in Scripture will have something of this stew (manna) and beverage of Christian formation.  As the hymn has it: . . . . drawn from Emanuel’s veins.  At each setting there will appear a new name (Revelation 2:17) – to each one alone and very personal, attaching that guest of God to the list of citizens in the kingdom of God.  On my left is my mother, and on the right is my wife, my children and friends yonder – all equally the children of God’s fatherhood.  Christ’s speech at that great spiritual banquet (there is no night there) will be entitled: Enter into the joy of the Lord, thou good and faithful servant. (Matthew 25:21)