"The law, any type of law, offers this. It offers us our own confidence and a sense of self that is of our own making because spiritual law (as the sin nature sees it) depends upon our own ability to obey it. However subtle a form it may come in, however disguised it may be, our sin nature wants to perform and will use any percieved system (moral or otherwise) to attempt to do so, but unfortunately it will always leaves us in bondage."I think hat it is helpful to understand that the roots of our desire to live by formulas and principles goes back Adam. For many years I lived my life by a complex set of biblical principles ... it gave me the appearance of godliness - but it had no power when I faced intense pain in my life ... there is no principle that covers death and grief. My journey from legalism is a picture of a man fully embracing the knowledge of good and evil ... a journey of arrogant judging. I only changed when I had no other options ... the end of legalism is a pit ... our dogma has no answers for pain ... when pain comes (hallelujah) we are forced to change ... forced to abandon our knowledge of good and evil.
"The knowledge of good and evil is in its most fundamental form a system of law that varies greatly or slightly from person to person. It is our own code of right and wrong, good and evil, shoulds and should'nts, musts and must'nts, righteousness and unrighteousness, do this and don't do that."
"After the fall man began deciding what was good for himself. The first and most obvious example of this is when Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves because they knew (through the knowing of good and evil) that they were naked. Later on in Genesis we read that “every man was doing what was right in his own eyes.” A system of good and evil existed in every man and still does today."
The Knowledge of Good and Evil
In his most recent post Simon, of Adullams Cave, connects the dots between the "Knowledge of Good and Evil", the "Old Testament Law" and our desire to live by rules. He does a great job ... I encourage you to read the post. Here are a few gems that I gleaned from it:
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Thanks, KB. Simon always has something interesting to share and so do you!!!
ReplyDeleteGood post, man!
ReplyDeleteWhat breaks my heart the most is the sacrifice Jesus made so that we could once again eat from the tree of life, and most christians pass right by on their way to continue eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. When will we learn?
When will we learn?
ReplyDeleteWhen we are called home.
First, thank you for the blog. Always thought provoking.
ReplyDeleteNot meaning to sound harsh but the other blog, Simon's, seems way off the mark to me. . . consider this scripture:
Jer 31:33 "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time," declares the LORD. "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
I don't think it is a "system"; that it "varies from person to person", or that its "our own code". . . rather, Knowledge of Good and Evil is something God himself placed in our heart.
I am doing some catch up on blogs this morning.
ReplyDeleteI am very glad I made my way here.
Your post on Unprocessed Pain is very good. I think that my main target is God Himself. He is THE Authority Figure over all others. I am not anywhere near as bad as I used to be at doing this though.
I will have to think more about the Eyeglass Question. Right off the top of my head I would say it simply does not occure to people to ask for healing of that nature. We tend to think of healing as something for sickness not for something that we are born with and it would seem very rarely as healing for the spirit and soul despite physical problems.
"How often I forget that everything in life ... pain and suffering in specific ... is filtered and sifted through our Father’s loving fingers." Enough said on that post!
The post I am commenting in is great! Pain and how you write about it is the main reason I orginally came to this blog and asked that you would bless mine with your insight.
It seems to me that alot of churches bury pain rather than address it. Soon I will be addressing pain in Solomons life in the continuing study of Ecclesiastes.
Oh Ya!
ReplyDeleteI wanted to thank you for your continuing comments at Deeper Truth! They are valued!
I think there's probably a great allegorical story somewhere in this. The knowledge of good looks so ... so ... good. And if we work really hard, and are constantly vigilant, we can keep the evil away, right?
ReplyDeleteWe can do it this time! Those other guys just let their guard down, and so did we the last few times. This time, we'll make everything so simple, and so clear that nobody could possibly mess it up!
Yep, let's go for it!
Good stuff. I emailed you about it, but if you want to read some excellent material on the whole "living out of the knowledge of good and evil" scenario, look at Greg Boyd's book, Repenting of Religion. Fantastic. It set me free in a very unusual way. Blessings!
ReplyDelete