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<H1>The Supremacy of God in the Life of the Mind </H1>
<H4 class=black>Northwestern College Centennial Series</H4>
<P class=small>February 25, 2003
Let's start with a simple definition of the phrase "life of the mind." As I use it, the phrase has a narrow and a broad meaning. The <I>narrow</I> meaning is the life of the vocational scholar, that is, a life devoted to research, thinking, teaching, and writing. The <I>broad</I> meaning is the use of the mind in everyone's life to observe, analyze, systematize, imagine, memorize, and express itself. In the first sense a small band of scholar-teachers is involved in the life of the mind. In the second sense everyone is involved in the life of the mind. I assume that the task of education is for people in the first group to help people in the second group use their minds better.
What about the phrase "The supremacy of God"? What do I mean by that? First, in this day of Islamic resurgence, I should make explicit that by "God" I mean the Sovereign Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, who was sent from him to die for sinners and was raised by him and reigns today over the universe as very God and very man.
What I mean by the "supremacy of God" is this: <I>the conscious and worshipful experience of God's supremacy in the use of one's mind, together with an intentional display of this supremacy in our mental work.</I> I say it like this because even atheists experience the supremacy of God. He holds them in being. He grants them to discover many natural truths. But they have no "conscious and worshipful experience" of God's supremacy. And they do not make any intentional displays of his supremacy in their mental work. That is not what I mean by the supremacy of God in the life of the mind. I mean conscious worshipful experience of God's supremacy and unashamed displays of his supreme truth and beauty in our work.
When I put these two sets of definitions together, they become for me a prayer - a prayer for Northwestern College - indeed for all colleges and universities. <SPAN class=excerpt>I pray that vocational scholars will so consciously and worshipfully experience God's supremacy in the use of their minds, and so intentionally display God's supremacy in their research and thinking and teaching and writing, that the rest of us will be inspired and instructed to depend on the supremacy of God and display the supremacy of God in all our mental work - indeed all our work absolutely.</SPAN>
Why should a Bible-believing Christian care about the life of the mind? The question is urgent because the Bible warns, "Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up" (1 Corinthians 8:1). "Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh" (Ecclesiastes 12:12). "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise [says the Lord]" (1 Corinthians 1:19). "But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise" (1 Corinthians 1:27).
Yes that is true. And every college should fly it like a banner over its work. But it should not fly at the top of the mast. The reason knowledge puffs up, and the reason study is a weariness to the flesh, and the reason God destroys the wisdom of the wise and puts them to shame is that the life of the mind has been severed from the supremacy of God in Christ.
Flying in bright colors above the Biblical warnings should be the flags of scripture calling us to embrace the life of the mind under the supremacy of God and for the glory of God.
If you believe the scriptures, you cannot be indifferent or merely suspicious of the life of the mind. God commands us to think, and to think with maturity, and to think with energy, and to think for the sake of holiness and for Christ. The first and great commandment is this: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Matthew 22:37).
There is no running from this great mandate: God cares about the life of the mind. It is no fluke of history that everywhere Christian missionaries have gone three institutions spring up: churches, hospitals, and schools. Why these three? Because if you can't live, you can't worship, and if you can't think, you can't worship. The right use of the mind is essential to faith and worship. There would simply be no church without right thinking.
And the supremacy of God is essential to the right use of the mind. But we haven't established that yet. We haven't shown it from scripture. How shall we do that? I'm going to do it in the way that has been most powerful in my own experience. My experience and my conviction is that when a person is overwhelmed by the pervasive Biblical truth of God's supremacy in his own mind, then God's supremacy in ours is almost irresistible.
<H4>The Supremacy of God in the Mind of God</H4>There is something about the jolting, shocking, all-encompassing Biblical truth of God's supremacy in the mind of God that either makes you radically God-centered or forces you to put your head in the sand. In other words, the approach that I am taking is not to collect those passages of Scripture that say we should make God supreme, but those passages that say God makes God supreme. This is the truth that changes scholars, and makes God manifestly supreme in their work.
There are many Christian scholars who say that they believe in the supremacy of God in the life of the mind. But you look in vain for any robust public evidence of it. But when a scholar is enthralled with the Biblical reality of the supremacy of God in his own mind, then things change. There is something about this Biblical truth that frees us from the fear of making God manifestly supreme in our work. Perhaps its this: that, when we see the truth of God's supremacy in his own mind, we see that making him manifestly supreme in our mind is to link our purposes with the highest, holiest, happiest purpose in the universe: God's own exultation in God.
Whatever the reason, I have found that in my own experience - and in the experience of many others - to see and savor God's supremacy in the mind of God is to be so intellectually and emotionally transformed that to make much of God in our mental labor is irresistibly joyful.</H1>
To be continued......
<H1>The Supremacy of God in the Life of the Mind </H1>
<H4 class=black>Northwestern College Centennial Series</H4>
<P class=small>February 25, 2003
Let's start with a simple definition of the phrase "life of the mind." As I use it, the phrase has a narrow and a broad meaning. The <I>narrow</I> meaning is the life of the vocational scholar, that is, a life devoted to research, thinking, teaching, and writing. The <I>broad</I> meaning is the use of the mind in everyone's life to observe, analyze, systematize, imagine, memorize, and express itself. In the first sense a small band of scholar-teachers is involved in the life of the mind. In the second sense everyone is involved in the life of the mind. I assume that the task of education is for people in the first group to help people in the second group use their minds better.
What about the phrase "The supremacy of God"? What do I mean by that? First, in this day of Islamic resurgence, I should make explicit that by "God" I mean the Sovereign Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, who was sent from him to die for sinners and was raised by him and reigns today over the universe as very God and very man.
What I mean by the "supremacy of God" is this: <I>the conscious and worshipful experience of God's supremacy in the use of one's mind, together with an intentional display of this supremacy in our mental work.</I> I say it like this because even atheists experience the supremacy of God. He holds them in being. He grants them to discover many natural truths. But they have no "conscious and worshipful experience" of God's supremacy. And they do not make any intentional displays of his supremacy in their mental work. That is not what I mean by the supremacy of God in the life of the mind. I mean conscious worshipful experience of God's supremacy and unashamed displays of his supreme truth and beauty in our work.
When I put these two sets of definitions together, they become for me a prayer - a prayer for Northwestern College - indeed for all colleges and universities. <SPAN class=excerpt>I pray that vocational scholars will so consciously and worshipfully experience God's supremacy in the use of their minds, and so intentionally display God's supremacy in their research and thinking and teaching and writing, that the rest of us will be inspired and instructed to depend on the supremacy of God and display the supremacy of God in all our mental work - indeed all our work absolutely.</SPAN>
Why should a Bible-believing Christian care about the life of the mind? The question is urgent because the Bible warns, "Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up" (1 Corinthians 8:1). "Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh" (Ecclesiastes 12:12). "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise [says the Lord]" (1 Corinthians 1:19). "But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise" (1 Corinthians 1:27).
Yes that is true. And every college should fly it like a banner over its work. But it should not fly at the top of the mast. The reason knowledge puffs up, and the reason study is a weariness to the flesh, and the reason God destroys the wisdom of the wise and puts them to shame is that the life of the mind has been severed from the supremacy of God in Christ.
Flying in bright colors above the Biblical warnings should be the flags of scripture calling us to embrace the life of the mind under the supremacy of God and for the glory of God.
- "Brethren, do not be children in your thinking; yet in evil be infants, but in your thinking be mature" (1 Corinthians 14:20).
- "Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything." (2 Timothy 2:7).
- "Gird up the loins of your minds" (1 Peter 1:13).
- Fourteen times the apostle Paul rebukes his churches saying, "Do you not know?" "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit?" (1 Corinthians 6:19). "Do you not know . . . that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives?" (Romans 7:1; see also Rom. 6:3,16; 11:2; 1Cor. 3:16; 5:6; 6:2, 3, 9, 15, 16; 9:13, 24).
- Repeatedly in the book of Acts we find Paul "reasoning" in the synagogues with the Jews proving that Jesus is the Christ (Acts 17:2; see also 18:4,19; 19:9; 24:25).
If you believe the scriptures, you cannot be indifferent or merely suspicious of the life of the mind. God commands us to think, and to think with maturity, and to think with energy, and to think for the sake of holiness and for Christ. The first and great commandment is this: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Matthew 22:37).
There is no running from this great mandate: God cares about the life of the mind. It is no fluke of history that everywhere Christian missionaries have gone three institutions spring up: churches, hospitals, and schools. Why these three? Because if you can't live, you can't worship, and if you can't think, you can't worship. The right use of the mind is essential to faith and worship. There would simply be no church without right thinking.
And the supremacy of God is essential to the right use of the mind. But we haven't established that yet. We haven't shown it from scripture. How shall we do that? I'm going to do it in the way that has been most powerful in my own experience. My experience and my conviction is that when a person is overwhelmed by the pervasive Biblical truth of God's supremacy in his own mind, then God's supremacy in ours is almost irresistible.
<H4>The Supremacy of God in the Mind of God</H4>There is something about the jolting, shocking, all-encompassing Biblical truth of God's supremacy in the mind of God that either makes you radically God-centered or forces you to put your head in the sand. In other words, the approach that I am taking is not to collect those passages of Scripture that say we should make God supreme, but those passages that say God makes God supreme. This is the truth that changes scholars, and makes God manifestly supreme in their work.
There are many Christian scholars who say that they believe in the supremacy of God in the life of the mind. But you look in vain for any robust public evidence of it. But when a scholar is enthralled with the Biblical reality of the supremacy of God in his own mind, then things change. There is something about this Biblical truth that frees us from the fear of making God manifestly supreme in our work. Perhaps its this: that, when we see the truth of God's supremacy in his own mind, we see that making him manifestly supreme in our mind is to link our purposes with the highest, holiest, happiest purpose in the universe: God's own exultation in God.
Whatever the reason, I have found that in my own experience - and in the experience of many others - to see and savor God's supremacy in the mind of God is to be so intellectually and emotionally transformed that to make much of God in our mental labor is irresistibly joyful.</H1>
To be continued......