Dealing with Personal Contradictions

 Jeremiah 2:1-13                                       John 12:9-19

Dealing with Personal Contradictions

In his book, The God Who is There, Dr Francis Schaefer told a story about the late contemporary American Composer by the name of John Cage.  Mr Cage evidently believed that the universe is impersonal by nature and that it originated only through pure chance. In an attempt to live consistently with his personal philosophy, Cage pioneered a form of composition called “indeterminacy” in which some parts of the work are left open to chance or to the interpreter's individual imagination.  He used, among other things, the tossing of coins and the rolling of dice to ensure that no personal element entered into the final product. The result is music that has little to no form or structure and, for the most part, no appeal. (https://youtu.be/XlBo7_3EXqk?si=0cf-_iQ0RAqiAkG2  https://youtu.be/Rlyf9_gkP1A?si=urfKzbRj5mqErXDb).

Now what is interesting about this gentleman is that although his professional life accurately reflected his philosophy, his personal life did not. One of his favourite pastime activities was mycology, the study of fungi and mushrooms. But because of the potentially lethal results of ingesting the wrong sort of mushroom, he could not approach this activity on a purely by-chance basis. Concerning this personal contradiction, he apparently said that he became aware that if he approached mushrooms in the spirit of chance operations, he would die.

John Cage believed one thing but practised another. Faced with the certainty of creation, he chose to ignore the obvious signs of ordered design in the universe and stubbornly clung to his own novel theory. You may well ask, how was he able to live with such a glaring personal contradiction? Surely, if he had seriously reflected on this incongruity, he would have had to admit his inconsistency and change his theory. But well-entrenched presuppositions tend to override any attempt at serious reflection because the alternative has already been rejected outright without any form of proper investigation. 

True, most people live with contradictions in their personal lives, some major, some minor. So, it is not a question of whether or not we have them in our lives, but rather what we do with them when they are discovered. In our Gospel passage for today, we have three main responses to having our contradictions exposed by the truth: the removal or the avoidance of truth, the recognition and re-evaluation of truth, and the rejection of truth.

As we have already seen, the Chief Priests and Pharisees had decided Jesus was dangerous and that he was leading the people in a direction that was potentially harmful to them. Consequently, they began to plot against him, to eliminate him. But while they entertained thoughts of murder in their heart, Jesus did something that brought them face to face with a question that demanded an answer. If Jesus was a liar or a deluded lunatic or yet another megalomanic revolutionary, then how could they explain the raising of Lazarus? Anyone in their right mind would think that this incomprehensible miracle would have brought them to their senses…that they would have been forced to reconsider their position and admit that they were wrong concerning their conclusions about Jesus. 

But they didn’t do that, did they? Instead, when confronted with the truth, they simply ignored it by seeking to remove it…and so, even though it boggles the mind, they considered murdering Lazarus because his mere existence testified against them. Now we marvel at such a ludicrous decision, but how often haven’t we done something similar? We dogmatically defend our position in an argument, only to find that we are wrong…and then we either admit our mistake and change our opinion, or we attempt to avoid the person and/or the subject, which can be problematic depending on the level of the relationship. That’s how church hopping, and church splits happen. 

 Yet the strangest thing is that if we were able to question the Chief Priests about this conflict in their thinking, they would more than likely have denied that there was an inconsistency. No one likes to admit the discrepancies in their philosophy of life…no one enjoys admitting they are wrong, especially if they have really made an issue about it or hold a position of authority. Pride is one of the most difficult things for humans to deal with. But if we are ever to benefit from the truth, we will have to learn to eat humble pie often, because none of us are exempt from flaws and errors. 

Think of how the lives of the Chief Priests would have changed had they confessed that their conclusions about Jesus were incorrect. If they had faced the truth with humility, they would have changed their opinions concerning him and would have come to a saving knowledge of his person. But sadly, they determined to remove whatever challenged them and to eliminate whoever exposed their ignorance and hardness of heart. 

You can stop your ears all you like…you can run and hide…you can attempt to ignore or eradicate the truth…but truth will not be obliterated. Truth will come to light, as the Bard said.  It will confront you again and again throughout your life and in the end, as you stand before the Throne of Judgement, truth will have to be acknowledged even if only through clenched teeth. And as John wrote in the Revelation,  those who rejected the Way, the Truth, and the Life…"those who pierced him", to use his words, witnessed with their eyes his universal sovereignty when that which they endeavoured to protect and preserve was destroyed by the Roman forces in AD 70.

A better way to deal with truth is to recognise it for what it is and to re-evaluate your own present position in the light of that truth. When Jesus entered Jerusalem on the back of a young donkey, the crowds recalled the many great things he had said and done and concluded that he was the long-awaited Messiah, the King of Israel. But truth not put into practice soon becomes a stumbling block. It’s easy to believe something when it's simple and obvious and when you are in the majority. But the test of whether truth has been understood and integrated into your belief system is whether it will continue to govern your way of life when the going gets tough and you find that you are in the minority. 

Many in this same crowd of enthusiastic participants turned quite nasty a few days later, didn’t they? Yes, some may still have clung to what they believed to be true, but if the reaction of the disciples at the arrest, trial, and crucifixion is any indication of the general response of the people, then that number was not very large.

However, it is possible to recognise and accept the truth, to lose that truth in a moment of strife or intense pressure, and yet to regain that truth after some recollection and reflection. This was true of the disciples, at least. Triumphantly, they marched by the side of the Master as he rode into Jerusalem. Confidently they openly acknowledged him and fearlessly supported him. Little did they know that they would be cowering behind locked doors only a few days later, having abandoned him or even denied him either by word or deed.

Yet, after the resurrection, when Jesus took them through the Scriptures, showing them the many things written about him from Genesis through to Malachi, they returned to the truth. For the first time after those awful three days, the confusing events surrounding what was surely the most stressful time of their lives, all made sense and they could once more embrace the truth and overcome their momentary unbelief. 

Often, throughout the New Testament, we read that the authors remembered what had been written about Jesus and then they would quote the relevant passages to substantiate or validate the truth of what they were writing. By recalling the things written about Jesus as well as the things said by Jesus, and by reflecting on what he had done, they concluded that this man they had followed for three years was, in fact, God incarnate. 

And this called for radical change in their thinking and their way of living…a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn in their philosophy of life. They had to discard all that they had learned and believed before to accept what they now knew to be true. To many Jews, a suffering and dying messiah was ludicrous…even though it is all over the Scriptures…so they invented their own ideas about who this messiah would be. 

Most believed that he would be a warrior-king who would free them from the tyranny of Rome and re-establish the Davidic kingdom once more. Right up until the ascension, we see that even the disciples thought this was what he was going to do. Remember their question in Acts 1:6? “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” 

I don’t think we realise how difficult it must have been for them to recognise the truth, let alone accept it! But that is why they needed the Holy Spirit to help them comprehend the truth and also have the wisdom and ability to articulate that truth in such a way as to make it understandable to those to whom they spoke and wrote. 

That is why we too need the Holy Spirit. He substantiates and validates our testimony to the truth. His internal work turns even the most stubborn and wicked persons into humble believers…we see this in the Scriptures, but also in our lives and in the lives of other followers of Jesus. He convicts us of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He takes out the heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh. He upholds us with a new and willing spirit. He gives us the power to be obedient. 

Only God can change the hearts of people. If the Gospels teach us anything it is that no sign, no wonder, no miracle, no argument, or logic will ever turn a corrupt and wicked heart…only God can do that. So, when confronted with truth, it is only those who have been prepared or regenerated by the Holy Spirit who will believe. According to Paul, “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 2:14) And so even when faced with the impossible, these Chief Priests could not see the truth because the truth had no part in them. 

And this leads to the final way folks deal with truth and that is rejection. One of the most tragic kinds of people in the Church are the lone crusaders. That’s where many splinter groups have come from. These folks somehow convince themselves that they alone are right in spite of the overwhelming historical and biblical evidence against them. Think of people like Joseph Smith, Jim Jones, or David Koresh. 

But sadder still is the fact that these people always succeed in attracting followers because most of them tend to be rather persuasive and dynamic or they tend to be forceful, violent, unpredictable, and irrational and their followers fear them. The latter was certainly true of the Pharisees as those who disagreed with them were threatened with excommunication. As we saw in the case of the man born blind, there was no reasoning with them…you were either in or out. 

And we have the same thing here…even though they saw that many of the people were persuaded by the raising of Lazarus, they dug in their heels and rejected the obvious. Same with the resurrection of Jesus. They chose to bribe the soldiers to lie about what they had witnessed rather than confess and change.

Throughout the book of Acts, these same men were confronted with the truth as taught by a growing body of believers. They were confronted with bold and determined witnessing. They were confronted with signs and wonders done by those who believed in the name of the one they had crucified. But what did they do? While some did believe, most of them rejected the truth. 

Could they explain the healing of the man born blind? No. Could they explain the resurrection of Lazarus?  No. Could they explain the resurrection of Jesus? No. Could they explain the changed lives of the disciples? No.  On multiple occasions, they were faced with a contradiction in their philosophy of life, and they only had three options…removal or avoidance of the truth…removing the messenger of truth or moving themselves out of the way, which we would call ignoring the elephant in the room…re-evaluation of what they thought was the truth…or the outright deliberate rejection of the truth…facing it, acknowledging it, but consciously denying it anyway.

We also have the same three choices. The first and the last, removal and rejection, are relatively easy because they conform to our sinful and proud fallen nature, but they exact a very high price tag. The second is the more difficult path to follow as it demands great humility and self-discipline, but its rewards are peace and love and true joy. God’s ways are never easy for fallen humanity because they are contrary to what we want in life, but they are always the best.   

You can live with contradiction if you suppress the truth as John Cage and many others have done. But who really wants to risk living a lie?

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2024