Random thoughts and theories

First thing first...




Finally a full cg photo.

I have been thinking a fair bit on certain aspects of a Christian life. The stuff that I will be discussing might offend people but I hope that it will provoke and shake our thoughts and allow these strains of consciousness to challenge our comfort zone.

1. The theory of sensitivity

Imagine this scenario. A friend is undergoing some tough time in his studies, and probably in some of his relationships with people as well. You come along, and start talking about the recent assignment you have gotten back which scored an A and the fun time you had last night in a class outing. Your friend listened, was a bit affected, but chose not to say anything and just listen. Another bugger, who knows what is going on, come along and rebuked you for the lack of sensitivity to your friend.

I tell you, I will get pissed off. I asked myself, why would I get pissed off? Is it because of the age old claim that if you get angry, you are confronting yourself or some sort of the nonsense? After all, didn't the bible teach us to be discerning and sensitive? This I need to acknowledge, that we need to be sensitive to other people and be discerning to their need. My problem is with the bugger (note the bugger is just a way of identifying the person, not a direct attack). The premise is this, I would deserve the rebuttal if I know the friend's situation and yet go on doing the insensitive act. But I hate it when people come along and rebuke me on the assumption that I know what is going on and I know what to do. Doesn't everybody does that? The key point is that when we always tell people to be sensitive, we sometime fall into the trap of Luke 6:41. We tell people to be sensitive but we are not sensitive enough to stop assuming that the person knows as much as we do. This is what I call the theory of sensitivity. Often, the sensitive person is not exactly a sensitive person either. It happens to me for quite a lot of time, either in church or outside of church. Not only in terms of the scenario mentioned above. Perhaps we can try a bit of examining before we start telling people to be sensitive.

2. The theory of respectivity

I like this, but let me give another scenario. Assume I'm going to hold a wedding (assume, dun read in between the lines!!!) and I tell all my guests to come in informal and probably causal. And viola, I got accused of having no self-respect, and having no respect for my spouse or whatsoever.

Another scenario, I come to service wearing singlet and shorts and slippers. Whoa... no respect....

I always love to challenge this with the brothers and sisters and my friends and never fail to see people either shying away or trying hard to justify. But let's tackle this one by one. I want to respect myself and others, and want reciprocals as well. But let's say I did something which I dun think is wrong (and there is nothing wrong practically and biblically) and I got accused of having no self respect, is that going to work for me? The question here will then be, who on earth do you think you are to define my area of respectivity? How come you are defining the boundary for me? I mean if I decide that my wedding guests should all come in informal or stuff, and coming in formal would be a disrespect, who are the people to accuse me of the same thing?

Another thing is perhaps the issue of clothing as a form of respect in the second scenario. I suspect that I am told this only because I'm a believer. I wonder if I'm a non-believer, would people say the same thing (I did exactly just that when I was a non-believer)? Of course, dun get me wrong as I seriously think that you should be dressed a bit properly when you go and meet people (at least bermudas and sandals lah). But I seriously suspect that churches today inherited a long man-made tradition of needing to dress 'properly' when you go for service. Reasons got created to justify this: you need to respect the pastor, you need to respect God, blah blah blah. I got quite amused when I hear the reason, 'how to gain points with sisters like that'. Well... firstly, I seriously doubt that the first preacher after Jesus was dressed in the tuxedo of the day. Peter was a fisherman... I seriously doubt that the bible even mention anything that talks about clothing and respect for God. The need for the priests to change their clothing in the OT has a much more symbolic meaning than just respect.

But then, where do we draw the line? I am seriously quite reluctant to be balanced in this issue but I need to draw the line somewhere. The thing is that we need to realise that our clothing is not a pre-requisite for salvation but people do identify people through clothing. If I go to service on saturday wearing a wayang costume with the wayang mask, most likely I won't be able to identify with the people. The example is a bit exaggerated but I want to make the point. But yet, I really dun expect myself to be dressed in singlets and shorts for the practical reasons that I have no pockets and it will be very cold for me. But where to draw the line?

Eventually, my purpose for this part is to theorise that we dun impose our notion of respect on others on the assumption that they understand it in the same terms as us. We need to understand this term 'respect' more and not abuse it when you see people doing things against the norms.

3. Criticising some old ghosts

This bugger, by the name of R (I shall withhold his full name but I want the people who know him to know that I'm writing about him), who happens to tell me that he is a Christian (I seriously doubt so after all these years), once lectured me on certain issues regarding Christianity (which happens to be dubious at best) shortly after I received Christ. I choose to criticize him cos I decided that I need to clarify in this blog my stand as a Christ follower to the people who have trusted in R and revered him as some sort of divine human being or whatsoever (sense the bitterness? I have learned to overcome most of it). Of course, I will need to face the consequences of posting this, but I need to bite the bullet.

There was once R called me on a Friday evening and called for a YZA meeting (figure it out yourself). I told him I got service on saturday and was told that God will understand... Oh,now looking at hindsight, I begin to see the stupidity of the wisdom... I will explain why later. Then after the meeting, he talked to me and told me a load of stuff, telling me to go and discover the 'codes' in the bible myself and that he has fully 'decoded' the bible, to go and consider the 'codes' of other scriptures... that he no longer goes to church now as he is very close to God already... that he would have been a successful pastor if he had wanted to... Being a young Christian, I seriously believed him.

Now, I would have also listened to him, but point him back to Jesus. Now looking back on the talk, I realise how deeply misguided has he been. Leaving the other BS asides, the fact that he no longer goes to service and the reason he gives for that already indicated a straying off, not to mention the confidence involved that he has deciphered the bible... Now looking back, he looks more like a syncretic than a Christ follower to me. That's why I begin to see my own stupidity for listening to him at that time. Furthermore, he married a non-believer. In my hearts, I wouldn't be able to criticize him on this as this is his own personal decision, but for someone to disobey God at such an outright manner and yet claiming that he is so close to God that he no longer needs to worship Him in church, he sounds deluded.

So my verdict, R is someone whom I will still respect, but his wisdom now have no bearing on me anymore. I would want to point him back to God but that's till the next time we meet.

So this concludes the post on my random thoughts and theories.