Comprehension part 3
Sometimes it takes that "Aha!" moment before you can truly comprehend (or understand) what you know. When the truth becomes true to you. When it becomes real. Not just an idea, or something you've read, or something someone has told you, but something you've experienced. This happened to Saul of Tarsus when he was knocked off his donkey and blinded by the light. All of a sudden everything changed. Even his name. Saul became Paul. His very identity changed when the truth was revealed to him. He had been running around persecuting the followers of Christ... thinking he was doing God's work. He "knew" he was on the right side of things. Until he KNEW the truth. The truth set him free, and made him free. Let me say it another way, "And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life" (1 John 5:20). Did you catch that? We KNOW that He is come... and we KNOW that He has given us an understanding. Just as He has given us THE measure of faith--by proving Himself faithful--HE has given us an understanding. We don't have to try really hard to figure things out. Spiritual things don't make sense to the carnal mind. The more we try to figure it out on our own, the more mixed up we get. We get on a path and we think it's right... but the end of it is death. But until we receive with meekness that engrafted Word, we'll keep stumbling around in the dark. The blind will keep leading the blind and everyone will end up in a ditch. That's about all we can accomplish on our own. We can bang our heads against the wall, but all we'll earn is a headache. Because it's not about earning. And it's not about what we can do on our own. It's about Jesus. It's about love. Jesus, revealing Himself to us, and in us, and through us, and as us. Receiving and releasing the love of God. Loving Him by loving one another. Loving one another as He loves us. Comprehending the height, and length, and depth, and breadth of His love... by sharing it with others. Loving big because we are loved big. That's what a disciple of Jesus is; a never-ending life-long studen of love. Learning to love as we learn HOW we are loved. Letting God love us and filling ourselves to overflowing with that love so that it comes out of us naturally. The understanding--the revelation--He gives us is what makes the truth true for us. It's is what equips and empowers us to live in Him. Because we KNOW that He lives in us. And step by step, day by day, we learn what it means to have love living in us. We learn and grow. We mature. We don't become more complete or perfect--because we are already complete and perfect in Him, because He is complete and perfect in us--but we learn what it means to BE complete and perfect. As HE reveals HIMSELF to us, and in us, and through us, and as us. So we start with the foundation. And build. Little by little. Line upon line. Precept upon precept. And then--usually when we least expect it--the light turns on. We see things clearly. We KNOW, with a knowledge that passes knowledge, what it means to be loved. What it means to love. Aha!