“Through a Glass Darkly”

“Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.” 1 Corinthians 13:12

There are two mindsets that dominate the thinking of the modern man.

These are the Greek mindset, which is best expressed in the phrase, “know thyself” and the Hebraic mindset (Hebrew way of thinking), which focuses on “knowing God”.

Now here’s where the root of the problem lays of why we seem to have totally lost touch with the original understanding of the way of God…

The Bible was written using the Hebraic mindset.

However, these days we have been trained from childhood to understand it using the Greek/Western mindset taught to us.

It’s like a white man trying to interpret and teach Africans about their own culture.

You can be sure that in the process, many things will be lost, priorities missed and distorted.

The only way that Western man can fully understand the rudiments of African culture and life style is for him to first, learn to think and see things the same way Africans do before he will be able tentatively grasp and understand.

What this means is that Western culture has continued to see the Bible predominantly “through a glass darkly” so when the Bible is used as the source of their thoughts and actions, Western culture has in their process neglected God Himself, who is the author of the Bible.

There’s no better way of getting to know the one who is the author of all things, first of all Western man needs to understand Him through the stories of His dealings with His chosen people.

This is the only blueprint we needed to know of Gods divine plan.

Yet to think with a Western mindset or with a Greek pattern of thought this is found deep down, right in our very core, our DNA.

We all have been taught to think in a particular way.

This Greek/Western way might have given us scientific progress which has in turn made life easier, yet it has never provided an accurate interface with the maker of all things.

The Greek/Western mindset can never provide us with the correct tools for understanding God’s word, the Bible in its true, full and proper context.

Do we even ask why in our arrogance, it’s become more and more difficult for those who claim to be believers in God’s word to think, act, and live biblically in these modern times?

Do we even wonder why the church, and here I’m referring the universal body of the church, seem to be the way it is despite all its intellectual claims of understanding?

The only way out is for us to go back to basics, to the early church.

This goes beyond learning of their practices and trying to imitate them.

Imitation is not the way to make this work because we will probably end up replicating the same errors created by the Greek/Western mindsets that have been used to interpret God and His way.

Can we truly say in all sincerity that what we mean through our interpretations of the Word, the Holy Scriptures, the Bible is the same as what the early church fathers meant?

Can we say in all honesty that the perspective we have today about God and his way is with the same perspective the early church fathers had?

In our limited objective mindset, be the judge for yourself.

So, let’s for once try to understand God and His way the way He would have wanted things understood by putting on the eyes of Hebraic church fathers.

And sit at their feet and learn.

This can only happen if we are courageous enough to set aside our indoctrinated Greek/Western patterns of thinking and begin to view Scripture and the early church with a Hebraic mindset.

The Western church stands at a new pivotal point coming out of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Church has been shaken up, its identity has been challenged.

Now is not the time to just go back to doing the same old things in the same old way.

Now is the time to sing a new song.

In Ezekiel 11:19-20 we see how this new song will work out in our lives, our church and our community, “I will give them singleness of heart and put a new spirit within them. I will take away their stony, stubborn heart and give them a tender, responsive heart, so they will obey my decrees and regulations.”