A THOUGHT ABOUT CONTEMPLATING CHRIST
Where does your confidence lie? That is the question.
At some point, I found that I didn't have a firm understanding of the phrase "believe in Christ". What does it mean, actually? Does it mean believing that He's God? Or that He's my Savior? Or that He's holy? Or that He's loving? Or that He died and rose again?
Obviously, true belief includes all of those things. But it doesn't seem to suffice to think of an abstract quality, or even a conglomerate of qualities, when it comes to thinking about God. God is, after all, a person. And the more I think about it, the more I realize that it is a difficult task to set my mind to think about the most important person in the universe without reducing Him to a list of weighty and immense attributes.
Let me explain myself further. Let's say that there's a boy called John. Now, everybody in town agrees that John is smart. So, it's safe to say that John is smart. However, It would be wrong to say that "smart" is John. "Smart" is not John. John is smart, but he is more. John is a person, and "smart" is an attribute, a quality that he possesses.
Now, if I've never met John, how am I supposed to have an understanding of him that is beyond the abstract quality "smart"? I've never seen him or talked to him; all I know is that he's smart. Obviously, he has to be revealed to me in some way, in order for me to know him personally. I might have to talk to him, or have someone else tell me about the things he did, in order to have a real sense of his person.
If I'm ever asked what kind of person I think John is, I would say much about him if I was very impressed by our conversations or by stories about him. But if he failed to impress me in any way, my answer would merely be, "I'm not sure, I don't really know him." The problem is not with the amount of information about John I've been exposed to, it's with my response. If I'm impressed by John, I would remember him, and probably even try to imitate him. But if I'm unimpressed, the idea wouldn't even cross my mind that John is a person worth remembering.
I've learned a ton of information about Jesus Christ. And of course I'm impressed by Him. But Him being the most glorious person in the universe, my admiration for Him underrates Him far too much. The problem is not that I know too little, or even that I've reached my creaturely limits. The true problem is that I'm too distracted by other things to truly contemplate His person. As a result, He slips my mind. And when I'm asked what I think of Christ, a part of my mind reflexively goes, "I'm not sure, I don't really know Him."
What is distracting me? Admittedly, I am my own distraction. At one point, I realized that while the word "believe" seems a little fuzzy when applied to God, I seem to understand exactly what it means when I apply it to myself. I know what it means to believe in myself, to believe that I'm able to achieve certain goals, to believe that I'm a special person, a person worth remembering.
It's easy for me to believe in myself, because I think about myself all the time! Whenever I do something good, or complete a difficult task, I become so impressed with myself that I add the achievement to a subconscious trophy collection, to remind myself of the great truth: "Yes I can!" I look in the mirror to remind myself that I look good, and if I don't look good, I fix it then and there, so that my confidence in my appearance is firmly established. I read my past writings to affirm my writing skills, and I think about what people have said about me to boost my self-esteem. In this way, day by day and with each passing moment, I build my self-confidence.
This is pathetic. This is idiocy, and I hate it. I hate what I do everyday. Compared to the glory of Christ, what insignificant, haughty speck of dust am I? Why would I choose to build my confidence in myself, when I can build it upon someone infinitely better than me? That, indeed, is the mystery of the folly of sin, and I have no answer for it. I'm just born proud.
Oh, that I would build my confidence upon Christ! Oh, that I would believe in Him! Instead of looking in the mirror, I would look in the Bible for Christ. Instead of remembering my achievements, I would contemplate His works. Instead thinking about what great things I might set out to do, I would place my hope in the impossibilities that He will defy! Where is the wonder of being a Christian? Is it not in believing in a God whose works exceed expectations?
I need to constantly revise what I know about Him, and stop thinking about myself. I need to meditate on Him. In this way, I will start to have a sense of the person of Christ. I will start being confident in Him. And when people ask me about Him (or don't ask me about Him), I will have tons to say about this person.
