Challenging My Own Strong Misguided Opinions
True growth doesn’t occur simply by repeating what I think I know.
The things you and I have in common are what connect us — nothing wrong with this — but too much commonality can stunt our mental and spiritual growth.
This means improvements of character require periodic challenges to our own assumptions. We need to create time and space in our lives, hopefully on a daily basis, to sit and ponder the deeper principles for living an abundant life — one that moves us toward becoming better people.
Hopefully the process of seeking common ground, through conversations and reading good books, will create in us enough trust to listen and consider thoughts and ideas we have not considered, or may even have rejected a time or two already.
Truth is truth. It exists beyond simply my opinions on subjects beyond my current knowledge.
I remember when I had no interest in reading or studying the Bible. I didn’t know Old Testament from New and I had no idea what was behind the list of chapter titles that turned out to be book titles.
What added to my problem was the fact that I grew up in a home filled with the biblically illiterate people who, none-the-less, had strong opinions about the Bible, God and church people they had gleaned from general public opinion.
For this reason, when I finally was invited to study the Bible with someone, I had no interest.
It would take a series of odd circumstances to help prepare me with enough curiosity as well as doubt in my own beliefs before I was ready to sit and listen with enough of an open mind to be able to absorb new information to me. It turned out over time to be compelling, even life changing.
“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.
If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
Isaiah 1:18-20 (ESV)
Same here. God used my circumstances to drive me to His Word. For the first time, really, after many decades of being a believer.