“It’s motive alone which gives character to the actions of men,” ika nga nung 17th century na French philosopher na si Jean de la Bruyere. Although I do not fully agree, but I think mayroon siyang malinaw na idea kung ano ang nagagawa ng motive sa ating mga actions. Motive is something that causes a person to act in a certain way, do a certain thing. When a basketball player does not have the motive to win, you can see it sa kaniyang performance -- most notably yung recent na losing skid nila Lebron James bago sila nagtrade ng maraming players. After nung trade they suddenly had a motive to win and it really showed not only in their actions but in the games they won against top caliber teams. Motive does that. Sa apologetics kailangan natin ng motive. For the next three episodes, we will talk about three important motives for ministry: faith, hope and love. Ngayong episode we will talk about faith.
When you engage in Christian apologetics you are making a step of faith. It means you are going out of your comfort zone at pupunta ka sa isang mundo ng adventure kung saan haharapin mo ang mga mga pagsubok ng doubts, objections even insults from people. There is uncertainty, oftentimes you would doubt pa whether you are doing the right thing or not. Sabi ni Mark Jones,
Living by faith means moving into a realm whereby we are uncertain of ourselves but more certain of God and his faithfulness. Faith relinquishes self-dependence for dependence on one whom we can never fully grasp or understand.*Yet this is our situational condition being finite beings -- we act in faith. We might not know the rules of the apologetics game completely. We might not be as eloquent as Ravi Zacharias or as philosophically savvy as William Lane Craig, yet our motive is to do things with trust in God, despite our inadequacies.
Ayaw naman natin mabuhay na hindi akma sa pagkatawag sa ministry ng ebanghelyo. Kasama kasi sa pagkatawag ng ministry of the gospel is to defend the gospel (Phillippians 1:7, 16). Ayaw nating magkasala by committing the sin of omission. Sabi sa James 4:17, "Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins." To embrace the task of defending the gospel or contending for the faith (Jude 3) must be done as an act of faith because, “Everything that is not from faith is sin,” says Romans 14:23.
If apologetics is to be good, it has to emerge not only from a divine mandate but also of a proper biblical motive or situation for it to be blessed by God.
This truth I take to heart -- etong motive of faith. As I type this section I am having hard time breathing because of the accumulation of fluid on my lungs dahil nga kidney transplant ako at medyo hindi na optimum level yung transplanted kidney ko. I pause every five or ten minutes just to breathe well, and I question myself from time to time whether tama pa ba itong ginagawa ko -- in short, I doubt the reason for my actions. Yet I am reminded by living by faith. Feeling ko minsan tulad ako ni Ananias sa Acts 9 na sa una ay reluctant but because He believed Jesus, he stepped in faith to go to Saul of Tarsus who Ananias said just meant “harm to [God’s] holy people in Jerusalem” (v13). May big fear or anxiety but the relationship with Jesus is what made him take that step of faith and heal Saul of blindess. I may not know whether God will use what I am doing or not but I embrace this task with the belief of His love for His people. Sabi ni Mark Jones ulit,
Faith, then, is not simply (or merely) assent to the truth God has revealed (cf. James 2:19). Rather, it denotes the radical principle by which man thinks and acts in relation to God and man. God looks for this kind of faith: a firm and unwavering confidence based on an ingrained attitude of trust in him (cf. Num. 14:11, “How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs that I have done among them?”). Faith and trust go hand in hand (Ps. 78:22).†This faith is the “Spirit-enabled embrace of and resting on our faithful God in Christ for the redemption offered by him through the promise of the gospel.” The faith we are talking about here is one that was instrumental in the Christian’s salvation. Sa dahilan ng pananampalatayang ito nabuksan ang ating kamalayan patungkol sa habag at awa ng Panginoon. This is the faith that comes from a person that was once filled with guilt for violating God’s will and then this person came to trust Jesus for His rescue. From this grace emerges a life full of gratitude to the Gospel that is the person and work of Christ.
This is not man-centered self-confidence on one’s own abilities motivated by self-aggrandizement, but Christ-centered on one’s own sense of gratitude.
The Puritan Robert Leighton in his most excellent commentary to 1 Peter said of faith, “Faith is the root of all graces, and of all obedience and holiness.” Apologetics situates itself almost always in conflicts. There is always the stress of going on or bailing out especially if our minds are severely beset by doubts of our own or by others. To continue to believe in the mandate of God requires faith. To obey requires that we trust and have confidence in the will of God for us. To be able to see the manifold blessing of God even in the presence of paralyzing suffering because of we took a step of faith requires the continuance of that faith – “from faith to faith” (Romans 1:17).
Kumbaga nakabuhos ang sarili mo sa pagsunod sa kaniya. Leighton explains,
It is an excellent life, and the proper life of a Christian, to be daily outstripping himself, to be spiritually wiser, holier, more heavenly-minded . . . Every day loving the world less, and Christ more . . . Notwithstanding all your imperfections, and the strength of sin, [Christ] can and will subdue it . . . Though you are weak, he is strong . . . and renews your strength (Isaiah 40:28-31).“We walk by faith, not by sight,” says Paul in 2 Corinthian 5:7. Although we engage in something that is overwhelming as responding to objections of people or deep doubts in our lives, ang ating pananampalataya na naging instrumento sa ating kaligtasan ang siyang nagbibigay sa atin ng mapanghahawakan na hindi tayo iniiwan ng Diyos sa ating pagpapagal. Kaya naman sa gitna ng mga pagsubok sa ministry, hindi basta-basta tumitiklop ang mga David sa harapan ni Goliath. Sabi sa Isaiah 7:9, “If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.”
In much the same reason as others have, the fear at anxiety sa apologetics is not being able to know what to do or what to say. And this is oftentimes the reason why we sin as servants of the gospel. We are overcome by fear and lack of faith. “I have come to understand and listen to the fear. I walk towards it and I lean into it to find new information — and the things it has to teach me.” sabi ni Tracee Ellis Ross. God is pretty much involved sa buhay natin bilang mga mananampalataya. If we dip into the work of God, He will enable us. Kaya naman kung ika’y may pag aagam agam sa pagsusuri at pag aaral sa pagtatanggol ng iyong pananampalataya, marapat lamang na tumalima ka sa buhay na may pananampalataya. Wag kang takot.
Pero wag ka ring mapagmataas sa natutunan mong mga bagong paraan ng pagsagot. Tandaan natin na hindi sa sarili ang ating pananampalataya. Nasa Diyos. Sabi sa Habakkuk 2:4 “Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith.” Pareho ang kawalan ng pagtitiwala sa Diyos at ang sobrang pagtitiwala sa sarili o mga methods ay salungat sa living by faith.
Sana po napagpala kayo sa lesson ngayon araw na ito at sa next episode naman po pag uusapan natin ang pangalawa sa tatlong motives at yan ang hope. Kung nais ninyong mabasa ang manuscript ng episode natin ngayon pumunta lamang po kayo sa fb page na Kaliwanagan Kay Kristo.
__________
* Mark Jones, Faith, Hope and Love, 35
† Jones, 37.
PS
Because apologists are more than rational beings, and because no one knows with absolute certainty where ideas will lead, apologetic discourse involves more than a systematic argument. Apology also entails risk. All who defend faith open themselves to opponents’ fire. But risk extends beyond enduring retaliatory attacks. “Worse still,” he tellingly admits, “we expose ourselves to the recoil from our own shots: for if I may trust my personal experience, no doctrine is, for the moment, dimmer to the eye of faith than that which a man has just successfully defended.
Andrew Hoffecker https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/doubt-and-the-apologist/
See also "Christian Apologetics" by CS Lewis http://www.virtueonline.org/christian-apologetics-cs-lewis-1945
No comments:
Post a Comment