What we know gets in the way of what we need to know

Our willingness to learn is diminished by the success of what we know because we think success is proof we have attained. Intellectual security is based in pride, it guarantees calamity because God loves us.

Blameless?

What does that mean?

When I first became a "christian" it was one of the first words that God spoke into my life that I was aware of.

"Be blameless"! It was in context to the current situation then. At the time, my first wife had left with my two kids and was pursuing another relationship. I was convicted of my own complicity in the situation and God said stop giving her reasons to justify her actions. Regret was the overwhelming emotion at the time. It was one of the reasons I "called on the Lord" in the first place.

This "regret" was the result of living a life as I saw fit and God was telling me that to be free of regret I needed to be blameless in all my relationships. It seemed simple enough. At least in concept. Just trust God to guide me in what I say and do and no one will be able to blame me for how things turn out. Yeah, right.

The issues...

• You have to really seek out and pay attention to the Holy Spirit's guidance. There are a lot of reasons we don't do that.
• People tend to blame others for their predicament. Mostly because we give them a reason.
• The enemy is constantly running around making accusations in our minds and in the minds of those around us.

I have come to realize "I am to Blame". But in that realization God's love covers my complicity and by the Blood of Christ I am forgiven. In the same realization I am called to "Trust in Him with all my heart and not trust in my own understanding. To recognize His presence in everything I do, and he will guide me on the path that leads to no regrets" Proverbs 3:5-6.

https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionaries/bakers-evangelical-dictionary/blameless.html

Experience and knowledge compared to Wisdom and understanding.

One does not mean you have the other. Experience and knowledge is a function of our ability to remember. Wisdom and understanding is a function of our ability to anticipate and reason. The problem is that knowledge puffs up, and pride is a stumbling block to wisdom.

Humility is the first step a wise man will make. A teachable heart is the path to understanding.

You are Becoming?

There's no getting around it. Change happens. Mostly deterministic. Everything is becoming something other than what it was. What it is, is not what it will be.

You are swept along by the interaction of mass and energy. But choice affords an alternative to determinism.  The truth for you and me, Christ died for us.

Now will you choose the Lover of your Soul? Because of what He did, you have a choice.

Hope for the Future?

If we embrace (take responsibility for) our past we can learn in the "Now"(a teachable heart can be renewed). A change in heart results in hope for the future. All the promises find their YES in Christ. Take responsibility for your choices and allow the Holy Spirit to take control of your future. Then heed His guidance. Seek, Listen, Trust and Obey.

Tradition? Resting in yesterday's blessing.

Tradition has a certain re-assurance. It provides a continuity with the past where God had guided and blessed with steps to take to maintain a close relationship with Him.

It takes a lot of attention and humility to follow Christ. The easier route is to trust in what worked before. So we fall back on the familiar, and do that again.

But God has moved on.

"What we learned yesterday can get in the way of what we need to learn today" Bill Johnson

Cause and Effect (As in "Swept along in the Now")

Cause and effect creates a flow within an inertial frame. Have you ever felt like you were in a rut? This flow tends to take the same path if free will does not exert a choice. The choice is hidden by a lie that presents unworthiness and concludes condemnation. And rightly so if we accept the flow.

Hope presents a promise and says, “you choose” 1 Corinthians 10:13 The choice is simple but most difficult. We can stay in the flow and trust in our own understanding or we can choose to trust the Lover of our soul and begin to see who He created us to be. The truth sets us free as we trust in the Lord with all our hearts.

Cause and effect appeals to self-interest. There the tension is manifest. The enemy clouds the truth that self-interest is ultimately fulfilled in giving.

Cause and effect if left alone ultimately will result in degradation, the second law. Life can overcome that degradation by accepting the truth that Hope offers. Choose the author of life and be an overcomer.

Have you ever thought, I just wish someone would tell me what to do? Have you ever wished someone would show you the way you should go?

“I am the way, the truth, and the light”
Jesus Christ

Most likely you’ve believed, as I did, that you have it within you to succeed. The problem is what you define as success.

Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. 

~ George Santayana ~ 

Remember the past? Each of us has a history. We reminisce with those we shared the past with. Remember when we say. Progress is not found there.

Our history viewed with clarity reveals the struggle. A struggle that gives us insight. The insight brings us to the realization that it is not within us to progress.

Come to an end of yourself. Humility is the fertile ground of a teachable heart. Allow the Lover of your soul to blast the light of truth into the darkness of your history to reveal the plan He has had for you from the beginning. He has one goal, to share himself with you.