A friend recently shared a story of an accomplished, successful seminary grad now CEO who treats his family and colleagues like the dirt he walks on. Not again, I thought.
There are too many of these stories: Young men and women get excited about God, have a desire to learn about him and his story, so they apply to seminary.
With wide eyes and open minds, they immerse themselves in both the challenge and gratification of higher education. I remember hearing a seminary professor talk about the passion and energy of first year students. He spoke about them as dry sponges the size of an ocean, ready to soak up every bit of knowledge they could.
Sadly, though, the professor warned his students of the seemingly inevitable: A cynicism snuck in between year 2 and graduation. It never failed that students in their final year would lose their vigor and enter into a stagnant state, even to the point of judging and writing off the energetic first-year students.
The same can happen to all of us as we journey longer into faith and life.
If what you learn about God does not translate to repentance, redemption, restoration, and deeper capacities to love, what is it worth?
The danger of any serious Bible study comes in the attempt to stockpile data without it reshaping our character. Sometimes the more knowledge we have, the further we distance ourselves from the heart of things.
We cannot master God or our heart as educational entities. I’ve tried to make them so. At one point, I attempted to outline and memorize books I read. If I can just memorize and master knowing about God, I will attain the life I want. I came up empty, no more connected to God and with an awareness that I somehow knew less than I did before.
God simply does not work this way. We bring our fear, loneliness, and shame to the desire to know God, and in an attempt to distance ourselves from our pain, we create a formula to master him.
If it is easier to talk about theology than your own heart and relationships, you may want to take an internal look.
There is a theology of the heart. The head has its theology, learned from books and the best of teachers. Exams and degrees and masterful sermons reveal an air-tight, well-versed head theology, respected often by peers and those who feel like they know less.
The theology of the heart, though, shows itself in the most overlooked places: the way we relate to others.
The truest theology fills our mind and runs freely through the reservoir of our head and drips patiently and steadily into our heart, filling it fully to the brim. The result is a person who can be themselves and be loving. With themselves. With others. With God.
But pain and suffering too often expose the theology of our heart. It is quite possible to know right and become the evil we say we despise.
To learn your own theology, you must do more than look at doctrine. My wife knows my theology more than anyone else. So do the people I have loved and the people I have hurt. While my daughters know I go to church, hear me pray, and listen to me read Bible stories at bedtime, we have never discussed my views on predestination, soteriology, hermeneutics, or Dispensationalism. They, too, though, know my theology better than most in the tone I talk to them when they disobey and the patience (or lack thereof) I show when they reject me.
When we care more about knowledge of God than letting truth change us, we harm others and leave them lonely and wounded. We miss out on God in the process, too, all the while thinking we have him because we know about him.
Jesus tells the Pharisees, “You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.” These men who know the most about God miss his presence before them and harm those around them by how they relate.
Every bit of who we are is relational, and unless we connect what we learn about God to how we interact with him and treat each other, we will remain as blind and offer no more life than these Pharisees.
I hope to never hear another story of an MDiv who shames his children and employees and hides behind his title. And yet, I know there are places in all of us which need reformation and renovation.
God, help us all.
May we pursue a theology in our head that transforms the theology of our heart.
