my theology of gifts and more...

The cogs of my mind started spinning fast last night after a good chat to my insightful sister about general insights about life and people and how they work. The question of gifts sprung off inside my head as a shoot from a conversation about church. How do we function, as a community of God's people, when people have some gifts but lack other important ones? How best should we view living in community with other Christians who act unlovingly, without being aware of it?

So I propose a theory- or maybe more a model- of how we, as Christians, function; a model representing what it means to give of oneself in love for another (of which I think is the basis of what a 'gift' is), and how this may look diagrammatically.

First, we all are born as a multi-sided shape, I'll use a decagon. So the decagon represents us at birth. Now, let me explain: the decagon's outline is the barrier between us and the outside world (other people, etc). This barriers stops us from giving ourselves in love for another person. God created us good and He created Adam and Eve to be in a relationship with each other characterised by Mutual Love (I should reference Michael Hill for his Mutual Love ethic that he draws from the Bible). So I represent us, as God created us in the beginning, as being a decagon with no sides, so maybe more accurately, no shape at all. It is a relationship in which each person gives of him-/herself fully in love for the other person: a most harmonious relationship.

Adam sinned as our representative father. His wickedness of rebelling against a God of all goodness, love and peace reveals thorough perverseness in all of us. We all choose to rebel against this loving God. The human heart is perverse, in that it seeks its own glory, rather that the consummate glory of God. If I can use an analogy, it's like exalting the mechanics of a pendulum over and and against the near-unfathomable workings of the human body, with all its different systems working in perfect synchronisation.

Sin, flowing from the hearts of men and women, begins its devastating effects on all of God's creation, disconnecting all things from their life-source, God. As a result, all thing degenerate into a shadow of their former glory- including the giving, harmonious relationships spoken of above. Because we turn our backs on the loving rule of God, and disobey His good and loving rule as Creator, how much more will we turn our back on our fellow human? The relationship is broken, now characterised by distrust and fear, instead of mutual love.

In the face of this distrust and wariness, we feel the need to build walls between each other. This is where the 'boundaries' come in (the sides of the decagon). In order to protect ourselves from others, we build boundaries between us and them, sort of like a city wall from ancient history, or possibly similar to the high walls built for many houses today. More than this though, the boundaries are our own sins, committed against God and man. This causes breaks in relationships with others, and so in their own way, act like barriers between people.

Another element worth mentioning is the post-modern concept of individualism. I must say, I don't know much about the concept of post-modern individuality, but I think it may stem from an age-old issue we have previously called pride; pride, expressed more overtly, as a desire to be like God. And this is THE desire that has tripped up humanity for all of history, that flows from a lie that this (becoming like God) can actually happen, which of course it can't.

In today's society, the most basic unit of society is the individual. So there is much focus on the development and confidence of the individual, outside their place in relationships. However, the Bible sets bipolar relationships (ie. 2 people in relationship) as the most basic unit in society. This means a society should have as their first priority the betterment of the bipolar relationship, not the individual. However, most non-Christians- being convinced that it is most important to build a self-identity outside and apart from relationships- want to establish themselves over and against others (and God), and want others to see how 'established' (or great) they are. I've represented this with the arrows pointing in to the centre of the decagon.

While non-christians build for themselves boundaries for protection, security and safeguard, and have arrows pointing in towards themselves to their own 'greatness', Christians- only through the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit- are 'born again' with an entirely transformed inner nature, or 'heart', as the Bible usually expresses it. No longer do we want the arrows pointing in to us, but we want them pointing out to God, expressed through our love for others. In this life, even with changed dispositions, we constantly wage war against our own sin and yearnings to be made much of. Still we together as Christians, moved by the Holy Spirit, sing together 'All glory to God!', while the non-Christian competes with all unregenerate people to shout loudest, harking to his own pint-sized glory.

I would argue that the arrows pointing in act as something similar to a vacuum, keeping the decagon's side sturdy and unmoving. But the regenerate heart, with its outward pointing arrows, forces the decagon's sides to slowly be moved over time (Christians may know this to be the process of 'sanctification'). So as a Christian grows more like Christ, they begin to loose their sides, and become more a like a decagon with no sides (which would be no shape at all!). Adam represents sinful man and the decagon with all sides intact. Jesus represents the regenerate man with no sides intact. Jesus was the perfect God-man, who loved- and continues to love- all people of all time perfectly and wants to be in a mutual love relationship with all people, if only they would choose (rightly) to glorify Him (as God), and not themselves. He established himself by giving of himself to others, quite literally. As Paul's letter to the Philippians puts it:

"Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." ch.2 v5-8

Summary: we were created with no decagon sides with arrows naturally pointing out. Sin enters the world and we respond by adding the sides of the decagon (sin), and have arrows now pointing in. Jesus dies and gives His Holy Spirit to all who choose to give glory to him, as a result we are 'reborn' with arrows again pointing outwards to God as the sides of our decagon continue to break away, allowing us to restore the mutual love relationships that God had originally intended in the beginning.

Now, back to my thinking on gifts. Most basically, I think a gift is the giving of yourself in love for other people. A gift has the potential to make one look good and better than another, and this could be typified by anyone using their gift with arrows pointing in. For instance, one my have the gift of piano playing. He or she may use this gift in the loving service of others and God (arrows out), or to show how good he or she is (arrows in).

Adding to this, Christians have a regenerate heart that, wants more than anything, to point outwards. But sometimes they have a decagon 'side' preventing the arrow from moving outside the shape (hope you're following the model of the decagon, it's getting more complicated!). We must remember that sanctification (the removing of decagon sides) is a process that occurs over time. It does not occur instantaneously, leaving the Christian exactly like Jesus as the one who is a decagon with no sides. So there may come along a more mature Christian or one with more insight who can see particular barriers, or decagon sides, in others that others can't see, or who themselves can't see. This, I suppose, might be a good time for the 'humbly informed' person to humbly inform/rebuke the 'uninformed' person who has the 'barrier' preventing the outward journeying arrow. Theoretically, the uninformed person should welcome the insight.

Again, in summary, gifts are the application of the arrows pointing outward, applied to bipolar relationship in love. This should be a unique characteristic of Christian community. Be that as it may, 'barriers' may prevent gifts from being used as they should be. A Christian, desiring to be like Jesus, should desire all barriers to be taken away, and if a brother or sister in Jesus can help achieve this, he or she should warmly welcome such help.

Now, I would like to think this model is based on sound and biblical principles, but all my theorising could have gone down wrong paths, so please, if you get this far, leave a comment if you disagree or have any other thoughts. One day I might back up what I've said with some Bible references.