The Other & Respect for Persons
December 3rd, 2005
We may exist in time and space on a small spinning planet far away from other discernable or any life, a mystery in itself, but we also exist in a sea of other people. Human relations are both the height of daily experience ( except of course for the LORD), and can also be the nadir of existence: they bring joy and happiness and plunge people into despair and despondency.
Life among others on this planet however it manifests itself, though is inevitable: and in the forming of the Mind of Christ, one of the most critical tenets is how we view the 'Other'. Scripture is adamantly clear about how we are to view other people both in the Old and New Testament. Sometimes a complex picture is presented, as we are called to the tenderloving kindness of God, and yet we see Israel commanded to go into bloody battles to take Canaan. While some have argued that approaches or commands are different in the Old Testament, the truth is, the same commands and doctrines hold, and some of the same complexities, although in the New Testament there is a more direct examination of how we should live in the face of other people. Even Jesus at one point, having taught the love and peace of God admonishes a time of picking up the sword, albeit only once, although the clear command in Old and New Testaments is the love and high regard for the people in our lives, even our enemies. These are the issues addressed in this passage.
THE ORDER OF GOD
Before beginning a look at the teachings in the Word about 'Others', we need to delineate that part of the reason, outside of the Divine Love and Nature of God for obeying and honoring, learning, and 'putting on the thinking of God' in regard to other people is that it maintains the ORDER OF GOD
When I was an unbeliever, I held views many unbelievers hold: since God was far from my mind, so was His Order: I did not think about such things, in fact I rather saw the world as unordered, put together by a random chaos. Even after coming to the LORD I did not concern myself with such things, but after years, and changing my mind and thinking about many things, I came to understand the critical nature of God's ORDER, both in nature and among people, and between Man and God. When God's order is maintained and established, the world and relationships work in equilibrium: everything functions smoothly. I am tempted to say "like a well-oiled machine" but this is no mechanical creation, but a living, breathing one: not a pantheistic 'all is one' or 'all is god' view, but a viable excellent creation in perfect order, in which vegetation draws nutrition from the ground and replenishes it when it decays, where trees and plants grow leaves producing photosynthesis which feed the tree: a million and yet each different, where processes of distillation , winds, weather and the composition of the layers of air, our 'firmament' protect a planet supporting life in perfect balance, where even the death of plant and animal life reinforces the ground to support future life: it is a complex and intricate order and an excellent one.
But just as God's creation manifests itself in an excellent web and network of order, so do human relationships both of people to people and people to God. The Holy Bible directs us in many principles of obedience which keep us in order. When God's Order is disrupted: there is chaos and entropy, and at whatever point the order is destroyed, so are the people events and things around it. While we always claim Romans 8:28, that all works for the good, we can avoid a great deal of suffering when we maintain God's Order in human relationships and in our relationship with Him. Sin, is often referred to as 'missing the mark' from a translation of the word, and the Bible also uses the word 'inequity to denote sin. An 'iniquity' means an 'un-equalness': a point where God's equilibrium and order come apart, and the result is never good, unless God knits it back together in His inimitable way.
To understand even Sin in this way, we can then understand that the commands of God both in the Old and New Testament are for our good: He doesn't tell us not to 'marry foreign spouses' or for the wife to be subject to the husband, or for us to avoid bearing false witness or loving the world and the things in it, it is not because He wishes to put retrictions and burdens on us so that we can be 'religious' and stoic: it is so we can avoid chaotic destructiveness which He knows will take place in our lives when we walk outside His Order and excellence. Many people see Sin as doing something 'bad' and we are 'bad' because of it, but when we 'miss the mark' we fall into disruption and destructiveness: God doesn't want that for us: He wants us at rest and content. This is not 'name it and claim it' voodoo where we get any carnal desire by conjuring God, but a learning to walk in balance and order, the 'plain path' of scripture which He promises He will give. The Keeping of His Order is a good and holy thing: it does not promise that the discomforts and hardships of the world will not come into our lives. only that we will have a firm foundation when they do and the winds will not prevail in the end.
The Other
Now , this may not seem related to a discussion of how the 'Other' is regarded in the Mind of Christ but it is an essential understanding: when our view of others, regard for others and willingness to submit to the order God has given us with regard to others, we are blessed with rest and contentment, and God promises His presence. The following are areas regarding the 'Other' which we are called to change our thinking and heart about when coming to Christ. As with most points, though in our transformations into a New Life, it is Christ in us and through us that accomplishes the change in mind and heart: we are powerless to do it ourselves. To be continued.
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