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December 3, 2003
Hello everyone,
Given my aspirations to teach at the university level, I have recently been doing some reading on the integration of faith and learning, a subject that concerns itself with developing a total Christian worldview. Retired Vanguard University professor Dr. Robert Harris has compiled a useful catalog of links to articles and other web resources pertaining to this very subject. The first link on the list offers an exceptional article written by William Hasker for the Christian Scholar’s Review defining this so-called faith-learning integration. While each of us have different vocational callings—and while faith-learning integration is an overtly scholarly enterprise—there are elements of Hasker’s article that are applicable to us all, even if we should never step foot inside the university’s doors.
Hasker says that faith-learning integration is “concerned with integral relationships between faith and knowledge, the relationships which inherently exist between the content of the faith and the subject-matter of this or that discipline; such connections do not have to be invented or manufactured. But they do need to be ascertained and developed; unless this is done faith and knowledge may appear to be, and for practical purposes may be in fact, alien and unrelated to each other.” No one can possibly know all, hence the need to “chunk up” integration into the smaller units of the various academic disciplines. Yet I think we would be safe in applying this concept to the broader level of all knowable things while conversely tailoring this idea to our own respective vocation. We do not live in a vacuum; we all come into contact with other people with different interests and beliefs. The more we understand how Christianity speaks to every aspect of our lives and the world around us, the more effective we will be as agents of salt and light and the more meaningful and personally enriching our own faith will become to us. In sum, faith-learning integration’s effort is to develop a total Christian worldview that permeates every area of our lives and of our thinking, making our compartmentalized views of reality more consistent and our fragmented selves increasingly whole. Hasker goes on to write:
Integration or unitary truth? David Wolfe points out that some Christians object to the very word “integration,” because it seems to “presuppose a denial that truth is already one.” In a certain sense, this objection is justified. It is not as though there are two completely distinct and unrelated aspects of reality—say, Christianity and biochemistry—and it is up to us to create or invent a relationship between them. There is rather a single reality, all of which is created by God and under his dominion, and all of which we as his children and image-bearers must seek to understand. And for the mature Christian scholar it is, ideally, not a question of having on the one hand one’s Christian faith, and on the other one’s scholarly discipline, and needing to set up some kind of connection between them. Rather, one’s scholarly thinking should already be permeated by Christian attitudes and beliefs, by Christian ways of seeing God’s world—and, conversely, one’s Christian vision of God’s world should be already informed with the best insights gleaned from scholarly activity. In such a situation, one is not confronted with the task of “integrating” two more or less separate and disjoint bodies of knowledge and belief; rather, there is a unitary vision of truth.
And yet there is ample justification for speaking of “integration.” First of all, though there is a unity of truth there is nevertheless a diversity in our ways of knowing that makes the unity of truth a difficult and demanding achievement for us humans. The way of knowing in biochemistry is through experiment and theorizing, while in theology we know truth by grasping and responding to God’s revelation. Corresponding to these diverse ways of knowing there is a diversity in the ways of speaking, of asking and answering questions; this diversity is sometimes expressed by saying that we have here different “language-games.” This diversity in ways of knowing and speaking provides a perennial challenge for the Christian scholar, and sets many traps for the student who would ignore it; those who would know God by the methods of the natural sciences and those who would understand scientific matters through scriptural revelation share a common record of ill-success. So as a matter of fact we as human knowers are confronted by diverse and apparently unconnected bodies of knowledge achieved through different means; it is precisely and only by “integrating” such diverse bodies of knowledge that the vision of a unity of truth is gained. (Faith-Learning Integration: An Overview)
Did you notice that forms of the word “diversity” appear seven times in Hasker’s last paragraph? This should not surprise us, for we have already examined in some detail how the transformation from modernity to our current era of postmodernity progressed. While we will likely pick it up again in even further detail at a future date, suffice it to say here that beginning around the 1950s there was an explosion of information and technology. Not only this, but the manpower needed for the manufacture of resources gave way to service oriented occupations, most requiring specialized knowledge. The blue collar worker was increasingly replaced by machinery, while the white collar worker rose in status and demand. For the first time, artificial satellites were installed in space and the mammoth mainframes used to crack enemy codes during World War II were becoming smaller and more sophisticated. The information and technology revolution far outstripped any one person’s ability to keep up with it all. Men like Jean-François Lyotard (1924–1998) not only diagnosed the symptoms but celebrated the fragmentation of knowledge, denouncing “total systems” such as Marxism and Christianity. Looking back, we see a bread trail of such events leading up to the very society in which we live. There is indeed a diversity of knowledge and information—and ways of processing knowledge and information—unlike any other time in history.
The exponential increase in technology and information has left many frightened, fearful of what the future might bring. However, the Apostle Paul offers wisdom that speaks to such fears in his apologetic at the Areopagus in Athens. Among his audience, of course, were pagans and philosophers who loved new ideas and prided themselves in their refined sensibilities when selecting from the smorgasbord of spirituality. Paul selects passages from the Athenians’ own culture, clearly showing his familiarity with the customs of his day and implicitly revealing the extensive education he enjoyed. (I tip my hat to any man who can speak seven languages fluently, keep up with all the latest in philosophy, speak, teach, preach, and write with eloquence, and be known for years to come as a first rate theologian):
Now those who escorted Paul brought him as far as Athens; and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left. Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was observing the city full of idols. So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the market place every day with those who happened to be present. And also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Some were saying, “What would this idle babbler wish to say?” Others, “He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,”—because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming? For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; so we want to know what these things mean.” (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new.) So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward Him and find Him. Yet He is actually not far from each one of us, for ‘In Him we live and move and have our being’;[1] as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are indeed His offspring.’[2]” (Acts 17:15–28)
[1]Probably from Epimenides of Crete
[2]From Aratus’s poem “Phainomena”
Did you notice that Paul says, concerning the nations of the world, that God “determined their allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place”? Paul further states why God did this: “in the hope that they might feel their way toward Him and find Him.” There are several things we can conclude from Paul’s description here. Perhaps the first and most obvious is that nothing escapes the notice of God, and, not only this, He is in complete control of the world and all that happens in it. Paul further suggests that not only is He in control, but that He has a plan that is being executed. He is not surprised or caught off guard that we live in this period in time: no, rather, it has been “allotted” us from His own hand. Nor is He surprised that we live in the country we do, for He has determined the boundaries of our dwelling place. Further, no matter how bleak some alarmists may paint the picture, it is not hopeless, for God places people in the stream of time and space for the very purpose that some might reach out often uncertain fingers and firmly grasp hold of Him. What this means on a very practical level, man or woman of God, is that you have been raised up to be a part of this postmodern generation, in the privileged country in which you live where Internet access and other amenities are within your means. You may not be wealthy by the standard of your country, but you are surely pampered and privileged in terms of the global economy. What is more, these privileges bear their own responsibilities as well, all part of the reason that the thinking Christian, now more than ever, needs to make inroads into integrating the increasing knowledge of our day with the unchanging truth of Jesus Christ, just as Paul did in his day.
If God created the world and everything in it, there is nothing that is not ultimately answerable by this fact. The most seemingly contradictory evidence we encounter still finds its basis in Him. There is no reason we should shrink from the task of integrating what we can learn of the natural world with what we know of special revelation: the Holy Spirit is there to help guide us when we veer into areas that require extra prudence. Because we have been given the ultimate answer, it is simply a matter of demonstrating how the pieces fit. We know the beginning and we know the final outcome already. As Hasker points out in his approach to faith-learning integration, it is not a case of inventing connections that don’t exist. There is no reason to do so. Further, we don’t have to manufacture pious little analogies either: as long as we are rooted in the knowledge that Christ is Lord over all—that He was slain even before the foundation of the world—and that all that exists not only comes from the hand of God but was placed there according to His will and good pleasure, we can confidently tell the truth about anything we investigate or encounter. And when we report accurate findings, we have nothing to fear, for God does not contradict Himself. We may, of course, be wrong (a realization that should spur us on to giving it our very best), but to the degree that we can accurately reflect the world around us we will have accurately reflected something of God and His plan and purpose of redemption.
Faith is not synonymous with anti-intellectualism. In fact, there are several things that can be said in defense of this statement. For one, we have the historical example that people of faith kept the torches of knowledge burning when the rest of the world slumbered peacefully. Our earliest examples lead us into the Byzantine Empire. After the Byzantine flame had been all but snuffed out, it was the Muslims who preserved the tradition of education throughout the so-called Dark Ages. Many of the Renaissance scholars’ copies of the Greek classics had first been translated from Greek into Arabic, then from Arabic into Latin. Not only this, but the Islamic world set themselves apart from their peers in the practice and study of medicine, also making great advances in mathematics and the sciences. It is from them that we have our algebra and it is from them that much of the higher learning of Persia was preserved. And why did Islam contribute to the intellectual achievements of its day? Because they believed all truth was Allah’s truth and that by learning what they could about the world, they would learn more about Allah.
The scholars of the Renaissance caught the spark and brought scholarship to new levels, founding many monasteries in the process. It was to the monasteries that the common man went when he wished to pursue higher education. Why? Because the Renaissance thinkers believed that the world was the Lord’s and everything in it. Following this rich heritage, most of the great bastions of learning in our day and time—Harvard, Oxford, Yale, Princeton, etc.—were founded by Godly scholars as seminaries and Christian liberal arts colleges. Apparently, only in recent decades has faith become synonymous with unfounded or superstitious belief, a supposition that is often even insinuated in the denotation of the word. For example, the first definition given in Encarta is: “belief in, devotion to, or trust in somebody or something, especially without logical proof.” There could, of course, be more than one way to interpret that last delimiter, but I am afraid that far too many are inclined to conclude that “without logical proof” tranlates into the phrase “in a blind leap of irrationality.” One can be logical without having absolute proof: it is called plausibility and probability.
In the short devotional entry Childlike Faith, David Fincher of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries fame writes: “[W]hen I looked up the meaning of ‘faith’ in the original language, I found that it involved having confidence in something that was trustworthy (or faithful). It did not imply anything associated with acting blindly.” (He is apparently referring to the Hebrew root word aman and its derivations.) Perhaps the shallowness of faith is but a further reflection of the shallowness of a culture entrenched in media overkill and entertainment excess? Whatever the case, it is clear that many of the brightest thinkers in Western history have come from the ranks of Christendom. What is not so obvious is that many of the brightest thinkers who followed have nevertheless been impacted by the Judeo-Christian worldview. Writes Dr. Gordon L. Ziniewicz concerning the theories of the Austrian founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud:
The Medieval understanding of the individual human soul gives human beings a new and special status. Each soul is individually created by God (not generated from our parents, as for Aristotle) and exists forever after that. [For our current theological understanding, I personally do not think that these two views have to be held in tension: could God not have created and predestined individual human souls through the agency of human reproductivity? What is this gift of life? Is the soul tied in with the “life-force” or is it “other”? If it is involved in the “life-force,” can we say that both our parents and God have given us life without contradiction? We also say God created the human body, yet we see no contradiction in saying that we are indebted both to God and our parents for this gift. Is the soul a separate entity that God must supply from without? —Eric] Human souls are eternal in one direction, like a line drawn to infinity from a point. According to Thomas Aquinas, the status of the human soul is higher than that of the heavenly bodies, but lower than that of the angels. Human bodies are inferior to heavenly bodies (which are incorruptible), but human souls are superior to them. Thus, compared with Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas elevates human beings above all of physical creation (except for the angels, although certain of the saints, such as the Blessed Virgin, are higher than the angels). At the same time as human nature is given a higher status, by virtue of the individual dignity of the immortal human soul, it is also seen as deficient and fallen and dependent upon redemption. The highest human nature (apart from the Son of God) is that of Mary, who sits next to God above the angels in heaven. The lowest human nature, that of the damned and the spiritually dead (mortal sin) is lower and more wretched than the lowest earthly beast. Thus, we see in human nature both elevated status and radical deficiency (by original sin). This confidence and self-effacement of human nature persisted long into the modern ages and long after philosophers ceased to accept the theological faith that underlay it. In many ways, the Freudian view of human nature is an atheistic account of the effects of original sin. In any case, in the modern ages, both to believers and unbelievers, human nature was considered to be, however splendid in its scientific capability, hardly innocent in its moral and political foundations. (The Medieval View of the World: Sin and Salvation)
Ziniewicz is correct in his assessment of Medieval thought, though we should again note that these Medieval scholars force a false dichotomy on the sacred versus the secular, the body versus the soul. This Gnostic-like concept had much to do with a selective reading of Plato, who at times did seem to neglect the body in favor of the soul, a fault we noticed this semester in our reading of the Republic. Yet the Incarnation of Christ clearly shows the redemptive nature of all of reality: the physical as well as the spiritual. In one body, both humanity and Divinity were fully realized; by a very real physical body nailed to a tree spiritual atonement was made manifest. One is not more profane than the other, though we could correctly say that the body suffers from limitations not imposed on the spirit, though both together (if such divisive terminology is even warranted) make a single entity: man. (See Ziniewicz’s article on Kierkegaard for more on the two realms of time and eternity finding their paradoxical home within every man and woman.) With this objection addressed, the point remains, however, that many of the most famous skeptics and atheists (such as Freud) were reacting to a Judeo-Christian worldview. Such is still largely the case, though the effect is diminishing, yet another reason to concern ourselves with the integration of faith and learning. Why? It is because the plausibility structure of the general populace is shifting once again. Writes Christian philosopher J.P. Moreland’s in Academic Integration and the Christian Scholar:
Integration can also help an unbeliever to accept certain beliefs crucial to the Christian journey and aid a believer in maintaining and developing convictions about those beliefs. This aspect of integration becomes clear when we reflect on the notion of a plausibility structure. A person will never be able to change his/her life if he/she cannot even entertain the beliefs needed to bring about that change. By “entertain a belief” I mean to consider the possibility that the belief might be true. If someone is hateful and mean to a fellow employee, that person will have to change what he believes about that co-worker before he will treat him differently. But if a person cannot even entertain the thought that the co-worker is a good person worthy of kindness, the hateful person will not change.
A person’s plausibility structure is the set of ideas the person either is or is not willing to entertain as possibly true. For example, no one would come to a lecture defending a flat earth because this idea is just not part of our plausibility structure. We cannot even [seriously] entertain the idea. Moreover, a person’s plausibility structure is largely (though not exclusively) a function of the beliefs he or she already has.
We said that the effect of Christianity was diminishing: that the plausibility structure is beginning to shift. Again, we do not need to fear the total extinction of the Christian faith, for God always has His faithful witnesses: in fact, Scripture tells us that the rocks themselves would cry out if mortal tongues were stilled. Yet while we do not need to fear, this is surely no time for complacency either. We do owe fealty to a real Person and it is an honor to be stewards of His Kingdom. So then, what is this paradigm shift in the plausibility structure of which we speak?
We should first acknowledge, along with Ziniewicz, that our Western identity was forged not only of Judeo-Christian beliefs: Greek rationality also enters this equation. We noted just a moment ago that the false dichotomy between body and soul resulted from selective readings of Platonic thought. Let’s plot a line through history so we can examine this influence a little more closely. Without going into extensive detail here of Plato’s conception of the forms/ideas, when Egyptian-born Roman philosopher Plotinus (205–270) read Plato’s Parmenides (the latter discusses the form of the good, the highest of all the forms: it can be read online at The Internet Classics Archive), he correlated the form of the good with God, introducing neo-Platonism to Christianity. Alongside this duality came not only the Medieval concept of the body/soul dichotomy but also the concept of the great chain of being. In effect, this great chain of being saw an unchanging and necessary order to the universe from God Himself down to the lowest of life-forms, traveling through angels, man, animals, and plants in the process (which I suspect helped contribute to Darwin’s theory). As enjoyable as it would be to delve more deeply into these fascinating ideas, let us just say that some of the strengths and weaknesses of Medieval Christianity were indebted to the pagan philosophers of Athens. Such a meshing of Jewish and Gentile thought was not without its critics, even in its day. For instance, Roman theologian Tertullion (circa 160–225)—referring to the trend Plotinus represents—is famed for asking “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?”
Athens influenced Medieval minds: for the better and for the worse. According to Dr. Dale Streeter, professor of history at Southwest Missouri State University, the result has been passed on to us today as a sort of tension between the emphases of (1) God versus man, (2) faith versus reason, and (3) religion versus culture. He claims that virtually every person in Western culture struggles with these tensions, a statement I am inclined to accept. The fact that these are points of tension suggests to me all the more need to strive for faith-learning integration. I think there is ample room in God’s universe for both recognizing the role of God as well as the place of man, for using our reason to inform our faith and our faith to inform our reason, and to allow for the study of proper theology in a culture that has predictable (if not immediately obvious) antecedents. What is more, if we are ever to satisfactorily resolve these tensions for ourselves, an awareness of both is a necessary prerequisite.
So what of those who veer to the opposite extreme, rejecting God, shunning faith, and decrying religion? How are they, as in our example of Freud, products of this same curious duality of Greek rationality and Judeo-Christian faith? Before we answer this question, let us note that this sort of tension is not a new phenomenon for God’s people. In the time of Moses, the influence of Egypt and Mesopotamia exerted a strong force on the nomadic people who would come to be known as the Israelites. Some scholars suggest that the first two chapters of Genesis, which provide complementary accounts of creation, were not only written to describe a factual event but were written in a style that served as an apologetic against the polytheistic and mythologically based accounts of their neighbors. The Israelites typically followed a cycle in which they kept the faith and prospered only to let it slip away in several generations. This invariably resulted in captivity, the Israelites absorbing lessons in culture and technology along the way. They were not a particularly progressive people, often far behind the times of their neighbors. In the time of King Saul, for instance, the knowledge of smelting iron was not known to the Israelites. Some believe that King David brought back the knowledge from his time spent in the Philistine lands while being pursued by King Saul. The postexilic years spent in Babylon saw a great deal of sophistication and refinement in Jewish thought, beginning with King Nebuchadnezzar’s selection of choice specimens from among the Hebrew youth to receive the finest in Babylonian education. Among these young men was Daniel, who far excelled his peers in the study of knowledge and wisdom. This was the same Daniel who King Belshazzar honored by placing third ruler in the kingdom. Scholars trace further maturity in and clarification of Jewish theology to this period. The bible, then, reflects the desirable aspects of all the cultures the Jews touched without giving into a syncretism that would have destroyed or diluted its foundational points. The result is a faith that is tempered by the fires of affliction: tried, true, and emerging triumphant, stronger than ever.
Now then, we said we would look at persons like Freud, and so we shall. Ziniewicz frames his thought like this:
In the philosophy of the modern ages, we will see what happens when certain presuppositions of the Middle Ages are remembered, while others are forgotten. The modern ages remember the medieval view that nature is unreliable and that the cosmos is not our true home. They also remember that human beings can do nothing by themselves—or very little. They remember that human minds tend to be clouded by ignorance, that the senses tend to deceive, that human motives tend to be conniving and anti-social. But what happens if such presuppositions are retained, while the presupposition of faith in redemption is lost? (The Medieval View of the World: Sin and Salvation)
Indeed, what does happen when we take away faith in redemption, yet leave the ideas behind it engendered? Such was a question that fascinated Nietzsche, as it has many modern thinkers. Let’s once again call on Ziniewicz’s excellent synopsis as he answers his own question:
If human nature is deficient and non-human nature is unsupportive, on what can we rely? We cannot even rely wholly on ourselves, for we tend to make all kinds of mistakes. If we cannot count on God and we cannot return to the naïve trust of the ancient naturalistic views, we can perhaps turn to certain artificial creations or products of the mind and the body. To make up for the shortcomings of our mind, we can devise and use methods. To make up for the shortcomings of our body, we can invent artificial aids and conveniences. If our legs are deficient, we can rely on crutches; if we walk too slowly, we can invent carriages, etc. The artificial is then seen as better than the natural. After loss of faith in the natural and after loss of faith in God, we can at least have faith in our products, our inventions, our sciences. Mathematical method will help us to think clearly. Physical contrivances will afford us health and convenience. We have then the reversal of the Aristotelian view that the natural is better than the artificial. [. . .] [W]e must quickly as possible convert nature into artifice. Even human nature must be consciously formed and reworked (against its tendencies) in order to be “redeemed.” See Hobbes, for whom the artificial institution of the state is superior to the natural condition of man (state of nature where every man is a wolf to every other man—homo homini lupus). (Ibid.)
This thought is one that we are covering this very semester in our reading of Alduous Huxley’s classic Brave New World written in 1932. The chilling aspect of the novel is that while its surface masquerades as science fiction, it could have been an autobiography of our age. In one section Huxley uses one of the handful of elite “controllers” speaking to the highest caste—a group of artificially bred young persons who will be working as technicians in the fertility factory—as a literary device to communicate the type of society in which the book takes place: if one does the math, it would be somewhere around the year 2030, though again, we could almost reverse the last two numbers of this date and have an accurate scenario. He states simply: “The machine turns, turns and must keep on turning—for ever. It is death if it stands still” (p. 42). We see the same thing in The Matrix Reloaded, for the refuge of Zion exists solely because of the machines, even though the colony itself is juxtaposed sharply against this backdrop with its almost orgiastic barbarism.
Hobbes and Enlightenment thinkers aside, can we not say the same thing of our society: that the wheels must keep turning? What would happen if the machines stopped running? Our cars? Our refrigerators? Our central heating and cooling? Our electric lights? Our microwaves? Our electric ovens? Our electric water pumps that fuel our showers, our sinks? Our hot water heaters? Are we not enslaved to our machines in many ways? What of this computer upon which I type; the computer upon whose screen you read these words or the printer that converted these electronic bits and bytes to black ink on recycled paper? How long could the average person survive who lives in a culture such as ours if the machines stopped turning? Where would our food come from? Where would we get our water? How about keeping warm in winter? Frightening, and precisely the reason Huxley’s words grow more prophetic each year.
The total breakdown occurs when humanity has not only lost its faith in God but in technology as well. What is left?
Of course, if humans lose faith in nature, other humans, and God, and then lose faith in themselves and in technology, we have nihilism, the belief that nothing matters, that nothing has importance. Nihilism is the black hole that absorbs all interest. Every human being has a fundamental attitude that esteems some things of more importance than others (priorities). This esteem is perhaps an unwarranted attachment, an unreasonable love, a prejudice. But such prejudice is the basis of life. To exist without belief, without presupposition, without preference for this or that aspect of context, is inhuman and quite impossible. The ancient Greeks felt awe and wonder before the universe, the basic and unquestioned context for their lives. Medieval religious persons bowed before their God in prayer; faith was their unquestioned foundation. Moderns turned to scientific enquiry, empiricism, reason, mathematics, and technological progress. Some moderns turned to the self as absolute. In every case, new faith (however problematic) followed every loss of faith. (Ibid.)
Nihilism, then, is the total breakdown of all faith, an impossible philosophy and one by which even its proponents cannot consistently abide. There has been placed within every human heart a homing device to seek its Maker and thereby find its purpose. When man worships himself, atrocity occurs. All the technology that shows the remarkable progress of man is at once his salvation and his dependence. Make no mistake on this point either: man is never free. The question, then, is which master will he serve? The true answer is found in one who claims that His burden is light and His yoke is easy.
We are indeed in the dawning of a brave new world, but we are here for a reason. God has appointed the time and the boundaries of our habitation for just such a generation as ours. He is looking for men and women of faith to rise up and meet the challenge, to bring the good news to all peoples. Our missionaries may look a bit different and employ methods our ancestors would never have envisioned, but one fact remains certain: even as this world keeps on changing, there is one thing that never will. Indeed, this world is transient. Yet God has placed eternity in the hearts of men. The choice comes down to this one: which master will you serve? Will you serve yourself, enslaved to your passions and all that goes along with them writ large in society with its machines and the paper and plastic that drive its cogs? Or will you incline your neck toward that which begot you and for whom you were created to serve: the Lamb that was slain before the foundation of the earth? On one side, you have unrest, turmoil, fear, and transience. On the other you have peace, joy, love, and life everlasting: the very fulfillment for which you were created.
God bless,
Eric
“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
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