Throughout my university years, I was heavily involved with Campus Crusade for Christ (in Canada, now known as Power to Change). I believed in the vision so heavily that I even wrote a paper on the founder, Bill Bright.
Now i’m not saying anything against the ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ (CCC); after all, if it weren’t for CCC, I wouldn’t be able to articulate my faith as well as I do now, and I wouldn’t understand missions as well as I do now.
However, there is one aspect within the regular CCC teaching materials that I want to propose is off-the-mark.
There is a CCC booklet entitled, “Satisfied?” or the other name for it is “Have you made the wonderful discovery of the Spirit-filled life?” I love this booklet! In fact, I have taught it to countless individuals! It has helped me and others tremendously in our faith. However, in the booklet, there is an overriding analogy regarding “The Christ-centered life.” To summarize, the book basically talks about everyone having a “throne” in their life, or a “control centre.” Whenever we sit on the throne of our life and push Jesus Christ off to the side, we cease to experience satisfaction, joy, love, etc. However, if we place Christ on the throne of our life, then we will begin to live a life filled with the Holy Spirit. It is then, and only then, that we will experience satisfaction and direction from Christ.
Another way of putting that analogy is by considering a car. Christ being on the throne of our life is like Christ being in the driver’s seat and us being in the passenger seat.
But there seems to be something fundamentally wrong with that analogy. If Christ is in the driver’s seat of our car/life, then how do we make choices? Does God just control everything that we do and everywhere we go?
Reason and daily living suggests no.
Whether you believe in God or not, we can all admit that we make thousands of choices daily without even asking God whether or not we should do it – as if we needed the permission of God to go to the bathroom. 😉
Then what kind of message are we portraying if Christ is supposed to be in the driver’s seat? If Christ is really in the driver’s seat of our life, then whenever we screw up, is it Christ who is leading us to a disaster scenario? Maybe not, perhaps whenever we screw up, is it that we suddenly switch places with Christ, and we are the ones driving our car towards a dead-end or a disaster? However, in that case, isn’t God merciful and loving enough to prevent us from experiencing pain and disaster? Why doesn’t Christ just keep on driving the car and strap us into the passenger seat? In other words, why doesn’t he just take away our free-will?
My understanding? It’s because he is merciful and loving enough that we aren’t strapped into a passenger seat. In other words, a loving God would grant us free-will, not take it away from us! For example, imagine a child who had been sheltered from all harm and was kept inside of a house, under the strict supervision of others. The first time that the child was ever left-alone was when he was 20 years old. Are the parents of that child loving and merciful for doing that? ……… I hope your answer is no.
As a result, when we examine passages in the Bible like The Parable of the Talents and even examine our uniqueness in comparison to others, we can all admit two things: 1) God has blessed every human being differently, and 2) We are not all equal – there are things that we do better than others (and vice versa). Thus, we are all unique – we all have different types of cars.
But what would it look like if we sat in the driver’s seat of our car, and allowed Christ to be the Chief Navigator? What would it look like if we did the maneuvering, breaking, stopping, and accelerating, and allowed Christ to tell us which direction we should go? What if we lived a life of “GO” until Christ told us to slow down and turn left or right? What if we stopped asking Christ whether or not we should turn left or right every 30 seconds, when he has already told us to go straight?
In the end, I understand what the CCC booklet is trying to say – it’s talking about Christ being in the centre of our life. I agree with that – “He must increase, and I must decrease.” Christ is the literal centre of our life – that’s what I mean by Christ being the Chief Navigator – Christ is the one who tells us when to go straight, turn left, and turn right…
…but what would it look like if we sat in the driver’s seat of our car, and allowed Christ to be the Chief Navigator?
*Analogy adapted from John R. Cionca’s Before You Move
Thinking of the last comment I made about D Bonhoeffer. In his book he talks about Christ being the mediator of everything for us. I think that is a great insight. We still make the choices, but we make them under the direction, guidance and purposes of Christ.
A cool guy called Martin Buber said we look at the world in two ways, two types of relationships: the I and thou, and the I and it. We look at the world in the relationship to us, whether it is a person (a “Thou”) or a thing (an “It”).
But isn’t that philosophy made all the better if we realize that for every relationship there needs to be something mediating (going-in-between) for that relationship?
For example between a mother and child there is the mediating sense of duty and loyalty. Between friends there is a mediating power of proximity, or maybe culture.
Yet for the Christian it is different. The thing that mediates for us is not a thing. It is Jesus Christ. No abstracts, no myths, no things, but the person Jesus Christ.
He is the one who defines our relationship to the whole world.
So if you were to use the race car analogy I would say it’s more like there are a bunch of Christians in the car (this adds a communal aspect which we must admit, is there) and they’re squabiling over where to go, but then they realize that they do not have a destination, rather they are all looking to go to and for Christ. Not a place, but a person.
Hey Daniel, Good to see you in the blogging world and good to know you are alive and well! Have you decided what to do about your future seminary pursuit?
Isaiah,
Ah! I like the way you put it – that “for every relationship there needs to be something mediating (going-in-between) for that relationship.”
However, when we look at our lives as followers of Christ, and if we are a bunch of Christians in the car, then who gets to ride shotgun? Who’s driving? Who’s way in the back?
Dan,
Great to hear from you!! I’ll email you about it.
I like the thought, but i want to share one of my own with you.
In the book of Job, what did God do did God spare Job? Or did he tell Satan, ‘Go ahead and test Job, he is a noble man,’? The reason i ask you this, is well Job has EVERYthing taken from him, his family, his image, his farm, and his money. Everything he worked for was gone at a blink of an eye.
Then Satan gave him a disease, and God didn’t stop him, he didn’t protect him. When Job was sitting at the fire scratching at his boils, his only living family memeber which happened to be his wife, told him ‘to curse God and die’ But he didn’t.
He sat there at the foot of God, and asked him what he did to deserve such pain. How in God’s eyes he had sinned against him to deserve such punishement. He not once had blamed God, but himself.
Now i ask you, do you think Dail IM, that we need any form of trials, or stuggles removed from our lives even if it means trying to give up control of them when we think we can fix them? Job did, why can’t we?
i heard both tim keller & john piper explain the “free will” dilemma by saying that it’s not either we’re in charge or God’s in charge — it’s both we’re in charge and God’s in charge.
it’s hard to wrap my mind around in practical life, but it makes sense; i’m 100% responsible for my choices. i’m rightfully considered a sinner because of the actions i choose to take. at the same time, God is 100% guiding my footsteps such that i can’t take a “wrong” step under His sovereign will. there’s no such thing as an “accident” in this world.
so — is it possible to be both strapped in the passenger seat & driving the car at the same time?
I guess I kind of realized that I probably should link my comment more to the post. But it’s true that it’s never just one person in the ‘car’…. especially in Christianity.
J., Isaiah you are both right, but saying it into two different ways.
J.- In my opinion, i’d say ‘Yes’ it is possible for you to be strapped in the passenger seat and driving the car at the same time. Bc through you, God helps you find your desinty and drive the ‘car’ to the right destination. But when you and only you are driving that car, and its not with God behind you 100% then you aren’t finding that right destination.
Do you understand?
And Isaiah- Yes, you can definatly say that it’s never just one person in the ‘car’ when it does come to Chrisianity. That’s the difficult part of teh relationship we lead with God, we as people get so wrapped up in ourselves and our lives we forget about Him.
J.,
If we’re both strapped in the passenger seat and driving the car at the same time, then it’s kind of like we’re driving one of those one seater sport cars.
However, if we stick with this analogy and we’re both in the passenger seat and driving the car, then where is the Holy Spirit?
gstoneawong,
A life without trials and struggles is an immature life.
A faith without trials and struggles is a shallow faith.
I believe that every trial is unique. If it’s a trial that has been self-induced as a result of our foolishness, then shouldn’t we try to fix it? Isn’t that our responsibility?
However, there are some trials that aren’t self-induced, but completely out of our control (like in Job’s case). In those times, even though we may want to do something to fix the situation, and even though we may try to, we will soon find out that our efforts are fruitless or ineffective.