First a tiny bit of back story: My mom and I talked about church a couple of nights ago. We disagree on the necessity, or at least the importance, of going to a physical building on Sunday for church. I typically turn on an Alistair Begg podcast and have “church” at 8am or 5pm in my car and consider that sufficient. Mom would like for me to join her at a local church on Sunday morning.
Ok more back story: I’m in my car the next day thinking about the conversation I had with my mom and decide to turn on some Alistair. I’m already thinking about “religion” so why not listen to a sermon. I turn on the podcast and the brief introduction to the sermon says the next 8 sermons will be on “the Church”. I was surprised at my response…
So many times, I realize that an opportunity to learn lies before me and I’m pumped about it. I’m ready and anxious to learn. Sometimes I look back on something major that’s just happened and feel that there must be something to be learned from the experience and I try to piece the meaning together in my mind. Surely there has to be some meaning in all that I just experienced. But that morning in my car with Alistair was different. I didn’t want to learn. Or better yet, I was afraid to learn. I’m so firm in my convictions about the role of the church and I didn’t want those convictions challenged. I didn’t want to spend 8 sessions (4 hours!) being told how I was wrong about my ideas on the church. I’m fully aware of how much of an authority Alistair is to me so I knew that even if I didn’t like one word of what he said, I’d have to take it seriously. I’d have to consider what it was that he had to say because it was likely very biblically based and I know he is an intelligent and educated man who is very committed to teaching. Frankly, in the event that his teaching was different from my views, I didn’t feel up for the challenge.
I was pretty ashamed at myself for not wanting to listen and be challenged so I braced myself and have finally made my way through all four hours of Alistair’s teaching on the church. In the end, his views aren't drastically different from mine and I wasn’t quite as challenged as I expected to be. Probably 20 percent of what I heard was new and a learning experience but it really wasn’t a paradigm-shifting series.
Anyways, I was surprised at myself for discovering that I was so reluctant to listen and potentially be challenged and learn and grow. We shouldn’t think ourselves beyond such things. We all have areas where we’re comfortable and would just as well leave good enough alone.
We should encourage ourselves and each other in those areas where we are intellectually curious, brave and quest for knowledge or truth. But we should also try to figure out where we’re stubborn and areas where we don’t want to hear something that might challenge us. We need to know a) why we are so reluctant to change our views in those select areas of stubbornness and b) how we got so firm in those views to begin with so we can re-evaluate whether such conviction is really justified.
