God's common grace

I was reading a blog earlier today from a man who gives advice on love. One of his readers wrote "In this moment, if I truly loved myself, I would let go of this marriage and realize that I can’t fix him – and that The Uni-verse will take care of me if I do what’s best for myself and my children."

Now I would expect an expert on love to advise this person to go to counseling and attempt to save this marriage, or perhaps give some insight about what love looks like in this scenario. His response instead was "...When we choose to be in a relationship with someone who we do not accept, or who is unhealthy for us and we do not leave, it is not the other person’s fault, it is our own. On top of that, if we are constantly trying to fix someone else, we are looking at them with eyes of fear, not eyes of Love. The eyes of Love still see the imperfections of others, but they accept and embrace them. Love does not ask us to change, but meets us exactly where we are..."

Sadly, this blogger has no concept of what love is. Didn't we accept this person when we said "I do"? He was partially correct that the eyes of love will see the imperfections in others and still accept them, however, love does ask us to change. Love is never content with who we are but strives to become a better person. Love does not accept an abusive situation as a norm. Love does tell the abuser they must change. Here is the rub though, love tells the abuser to change for their sake, not our own. Love seeks the best for our mate. It is not loving to accept the drug abuser as they are. It is loving to tell them they must change. Love does meet them where they are but love does not let them stay there.

As I was reading this man's post I had to wonder about his readership. Who acted on his counsel and left their family? How many people could relate to some aspect of what he wrote? It is not hard to find a nugget of truth anywhere. The best lies are based on truth. His foundation for his worldview seems to be a form of Pantheism. The idea that the Uni-verse is the source of love and somehow has a will of it's own to take care of us. This sounds so much like the unknown god of ancient Greece. We recognize supernatural blessings and attribute them to anything that we can invent. Romans 1:25 "They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen."

The universe is a created thing. It has no will of its own. Love does not emanate from the rocks and trees, and yet blessings still seem to flow in the lives of those who do not believe in God. In my thinking, if God wanted to draw all men to Himself He would simply withhold His blessings from all of those who do not come to Him. This would establish Him as the great provider for all the world to see. All other false religions would fall. This is not what we see happening though. For some reason the rain falls on the good and the bad. Does this mean that there must be many ways to interpret a deity since blessings are associated with them all or even without a deity at all? No. Truth is still truth.

Suppose my children denied the existence of their parents (namely me and their mother) and instead believed that their cereal bowl was the source of their daily provision. Everyday I go and fill my child's bowl because I love them and want to sustain their life in hopes that they will one day recognize me. Even though my filling their bowl only reinforces their perception that the cereal bowl has yet again supplied their need. This is what we do when we attribute God's blessings to any other source.

I can only pray that the woman in the letter finds a better way to deal with her unhappiness. She will find the universe is a big, cold, empty place. The universe can not teach you how to love. Love comes from God because God is Love. This woman's problem is that she tried to find her source of love in her spouse. People will always fail you. When we are filled with God's love then we are able to let that love overflow into our marriage and it will never grow cold because it is no longer dependant on the actions of our spouse, but on the One who will never fail us. The universe cannot supply this love, only God can. What we attribute to the "Uni-verse" is just our own concept of love which pales by comparison to the real thing. Just like the moon cannot supply heat, only the sun can. The light of the moon is only a pale reflection of the real source of light.

I truly sympathize for this woman. An unhappy marriage can be a miserable experience. It can weigh you down, shorten your life, cause real damage to you and those around you. I have seen it this bad. I depended on my wife to make me happy. We seemed hopelessly incompatable, having drifted too far apart. Our only common vision was that we both wanted to please God, well that became my vision eventually. I had to first get over myself. That seems to be an ongoing theme in my life. Every piece I lose of "me" I seem to gain back in "us". I recognize that my wife is imperfect. She will fail me in surprising ways in our lifetime, and I have no doubt that I will surprise myself in the creative ways I find to fail her. The difference now is that I love my wife as an overflowing of my love for God. She loves me the same way. Our marriage doesn't seek happiness anymore, we now seek fulfillment. Happiness is a passing phase that is nice when it's around (which is a lot) but fulfillment lasts through the hard times. We still fail each other often but we are both more likely to react by seeking forgiveness rather than blame. May this woman find even greater fulfillment in her marriage through God.
These are my observations anyways.

How am I doing?

I get asked this question a lot since my parents have died. I have different answers depending on who is asking.

To most acquaintances I answer "fine" because they are usually just asking to be polite but they either don't have the time to hear everything or they don't really want to hear. So I respect the social obligation of acknowledging their concern and extend the courtesy of letting them off the hook of having to hear the long sad story.

To extended family and others close to me I may offer a tidbit of an emotional response because I know they can relate but at the same time I am careful not to burden anyone with the heaviness of the pain.

To my wife and kids I share my pain with a healthy attitude while reassuring them that I am strong enough to feel this pain while maintaining our household.

To my pillow at night I feel sorrow that lays very heavy on my chest and takes my breath away.

I am unresolved about my parents dying. I am lost in life without a rudder. I am angry that I have been robbed of them. I am angry at God for circumstances beyond my control. I am angry at myself for circumstances within my control. I am angry at them for taking circumstances out of my control. I cant be strong all the time anymore. I didn't realize how much I was bottling this up. It has to come out in other ways than headaches and feeling run down all the time.

I trust Romans 8:28. It is life to me. My response to my circumstances may be all too human at times but I do know that God is in control, and that all things work together for my good. I am learning how to walk in the role of patriarch for my family. It is new territory for me. I am suddenly the go-to guy for my lineage. I have many siblings of course, but within the context of my downward lineage, I am the man. That is a role that I feel ill-equipped to walk in, but God thrives on working outside of our comfort zones.

I regret that I did not know my parents better. I was always waiting for my life to be better so I could feel like I had something worth showing them. It seems that my only relationship with them was either having them bail me out of a difficulty, or trying to reassure them that I am doing ok when I really wasn't. I know that was probably just in my own mind. My embarrassment around them probably fed resentment in them for only seeing me when I needed something. Truthfully, I just got tired of every conversation with them having to be about my finances. I wanted my relationship with them to be about more than money concerns.

Honestly, I don't mind being poor. I find humble surroundings kind of comforting actually. God has used these times to strengthen my faith in Him as Jevovah Jireh. I am grateful for how intimately I know this aspect of God.

My parents had different values. It's understandable that they wanted to be reassured of my financial success, not only for their peace of mind, but for the peace of their wallet. That fault lies with me. I ran to them far too often when I should have been waiting on God. No doubt God used my parents to accomplish His faithfulness but I can't help but wonder what my life spoke to them about who God is.

I wish I could know that they were able to respect me. I was able to build a better relationship with my Dad in the last 3 years before he died. We talked politics, computers, religion, and certain traits that we shared in common. He still bailed me out too often but he had a tenderness in the process that I had not seen in 38 years prior. It was wonderful building on this relationship with him. I was starting to see the "swell Mel" who was often talked about but never seen. But now that is gone. What I had with him will not be built upon. I was just starting to get to know this man for the first time in my life and now I am left with only the memory of what little I had with him.

My Mom and I had a hard time finding things to talk about. Phone conversations were always awkward. There was so much silence as we struggled for things to say. I am not sure why that was. Maybe we just had two very different personalities. Maybe we both wanted to talk about ourselves ad nausium but found no audience in each other. Whatever the case there is no going back to fix that relationship. It's not like I didn't want to be around her. I loved her. I just always felt like I was hard for her to tolerate.

I have a hope that I will see them again and that the reunion will be joyful. I don't harbor bad feelings about either of them. It was what it was. I am grateful for having known them.

SO, how am I doing?

I'm fine

ADAM..and the big bang theory

I love media that talks about Aspergers. It is hopeful to me that the more we investigate and highlight aspects of it, the more informed we will come. That is the goal behind this blog actually. While it is cathartic to me to be able to write down what is going on in my head, it is also my hope that what I experience will contribute to a bigger picture of shared experiences among Aspies. Which brings me to ADAM, the movie. This is an independent movie about a man with Aspergers who is suddenly thrust into the world on his own by the death of his father. It discusses jobs, love, relationships, and basically highlights the additional difficulty that Aspies face when dealing with these already difficult scenarios. I enjoyed the movie. I thought it was fairly similar to my own experiences in life. I was able to relate to much of it. Except that Adam in the movie was not a christian. I don't really have a big problem with that because I don't expect Hollywood to use Christianity as part of the protagonist's struggle.

I also reluctantly enjoy watching The Big Bang Theory. I have to tell you out right though that there is a big part of it that I find very offensive and it is not a tv show that I can recommend with a clear conscience. It is assumed that one of the leading characters is an Aspie, though it has never been pointed out within the show.

These two examples of Aspergers in film got me thinking about a curiosity. I do visit many Asperger forums and interact with a number of other Aspies. Many of them are atheists. Not even agnostic, but outright atheist. There are a few of us Christian Aspies out here as well, praise God, and I am sure the ratio is probably on par with Christians in the NT world.

What has me wondering is why an Asperger would come to an atheistic conclusion about the world around them. Setting aside the issue of election, I am approaching this pondering from the human perspective. I know that I benefit from the gift of seeing the world around me through faith that has been given to me by God. I can easily say that if God said it, it must be so. But I do not have to rely on that alone, not by a long shot.

I ask myself why the Asperger would use his analytical mind and lack of emotional dependency to embrace scientific method and still come to the conclusion that there is no God.

Scientific method is the best way to understand the physical world around us. It utilizes all of our five senses. It does also limit us to our understanding of the world by only using our 5 senses. I am amazed by the arrogance of man to think that our body encompasses all we need in order to know everything. We have no way to verify that 5 senses are all that we need in order to know the world around us. What if there is more information in the world than what can be understood through our senses? I know this sounds like the beginning monologue of some cheesy 50's sci-fi show.

I believe that the Christian does sense a world beyond the physical, in fact many people, regardless of their faith, have had anecdotal experiences with the non-physical world. There is a strange sensation that I am aware of at times when I am meditating and praying with God. It is something that is difficult to describe. Early Christians referred to it as a quickening of the spirit, some call it the moving of the Holy Spirit, It is a sensation that I experience that wells up inside of me to the point of overflowing into worship and praise. Those who know me know that I am not a man of emotion. I do not purposefully seek emotional experiences even in my christian walk, but I can not deny that there is something tangible, yet elusive to my senses when I am in communion with God. I am trying hard not to use Christianise when describing this but it is hard to put it in common lingo. It is an uncommon experience.

I do not base my faith on the fact that I have some anecdotal, metaphysical experiences. I only mention it to say that I believe there is more to this world than can be understood by mere mortal human senses.

My difficulty with atheist Aspies is that it does not seem logical to me to look at the scientific data around us and conclude there is no God. Even assuming that our 5 senses are all we need to go by, we are still left with plenty of evidence that points to a creator. Every time I hear of some new discovery that seems to reinforce secular thinking I look at the same evidence and realize it actually reinforces my understanding of God.

Even using scientific method it seems easy for me to be able to point back to God as the designer of this world and everything within it. Early scientists looked to God as the source of all of creation. Newton, who is often cited as the greatest scientist, wrote more about Christian doctrine than he did about science. We don't have to resort to "God said it and that's all I need to know" as an answer to understanding the world around us. All of creation points back to God. Origins have been heavily studied by scientists over the past 150 years or so. I should say, the effects of origins have been studied. Christians and secularists both have the same scientific data to study and yet we come to very different conclusions. No one alive today witnessed the origin of the universe so one big requirement of scientific method is removed from the equation already. We are supposed to rely strongly on observation in order to establish proper scientific method. All we have available today are the results of what happened at the birth of the universe. This leaves verifiability unavailable as well. We are left at an educated guess, at best, in understanding how we all got here.

This again brings me back to the question of why logic and reasoning itself are not enough for aspies to embrace the knowledge of God. It takes a great leap of faith to believe that the universe is the result of random chance. Statisticians show the likelihood of the big bang resulting in me being able to blog on this laptop right now as being astronomical. We have the historicity of the Bible, archaeological evidence, the conscience, very real dilemmas with alternative theories, etc. When employing the limitations of scientific method, early scientists were consistently brought back to the reality of God. It might be argued that it was their worldview that skewed their interpretation of the facts, but the same is just as easily said about atheistic interpretations of data.

My belief in God is first of all a gift from God. He opened my eyes to let me see. Beyond that I also see very clearly how everything, and I mean everything, in this world points me back to God. My faith is strengthened by scientific method, not distracted by it. Logic and reason enhance my understanding of God, it doesn't  invalidate it. I am sure that other Aspies look at me and wonder how I can believe in a God that they have concluded does not exist. I can only pity them that they are enslaved by their own blindness.

Matt 13:15 "For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them"
Romans 1:21 "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened."

When one assumes that they can look within for the answer they deceive themselves. If I were lost and needed directions, I would be the last person to look to for the answer.
Mark 7:21 "For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery,"

Admittedly, my writing is a bit disjointed on this post. I'm not always the best at communicating my thoughts. I guess ultimately I am trying to understand, from a secular perspective, how aspies can deny God after having actually invested real thought into the question. I might have an over-inflated appreciation for the aspie mind in thinking they, of all people, should be able to see God despite the darkness of man's heart but alas, unless God raises us up we are all desperately dead in our sins.