The Wonderful Plan (1)
See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. Colossians 2:8 NASB
Tradition – About half a century ago this verse was one of the standards I used to evangelize those poor souls who had fallen from the true path to God. Of course, it was also ammunition to fight against returning to the “Law,” that is, the Jewish traditions of men. Fifty years later the verse has an entirely different exegesis but recapping the change might be useful.
It all started with the Four Spiritual Laws. As a college student, evangelism on California beaches at Spring break was a standard part of my religious training. I attended the sessions at Arrowhead Springs and dutifully hit the beach with copies of The Four Spiritual Laws in my pockets. At the time it seemed like this was fulfilling the Great Commission. Perhaps some good came from the effort. I’ll probably never know. But what I realize today is that it was basically driven by fear and self-satisfaction. What I mean is perfectly summarized in a comment by Abraham Heschel:
“To define religion primarily as a quest for personal satisfaction or salvation is to make it a refined kind of magic. As long as man sees in religion the satisfaction of his own needs, a guarantee for immortality or a device to protect society, it is not God whom he serves but himself.”[1]
Yes, that’s right. The strategy of Campus Crusade in those days was all about discovering God’s wonderful plan for you! It was pure personal need fulfillment. That need might have been motivated by the fear of going to Hell (also a useful strategy) or it might have been motivated by wanting the best out of life, but either way it was egocentric. That doesn’t mean God didn’t use it. He’s capable of using just about any human misdirected effort, but looking back on it now, I see that it was really, as Heschel says, a kind of magical promise to get what you wanted.
“Religions may be classified as those of self-satisfaction, of self-annihilation or of fellowship. In the first worship is a quest for satisfaction of personal needs like salvation or desire for immortality. In the second all personal needs are discarded, and man seeks to dedicate his life to God at the price of annihilating all desire, believing that human sacrifice or at least complete self-denial is the only true form of worship. The third form of religion, while shunning the idea of considering God a means for attaining personal ends, insists that there is a partnership of God and man, that human needs are God’s concern and that divine needs ought to become human needs. It rejects the idea that the good should be done in self-detachment, that the satisfaction felt in doing the good would taint the purity of the act. Judaism demands the full participation of the person in the service of the Lord; the heart rather than boycotting the acts of the will ought to respond in joy and undivided delight.”[2]
Since Judaism is a religion of deeds,[3] it doesn’t have much appeal to those who just want wish fulfillment faith. A religion of deeds is difficult. It’s a daily grind, a lifelong battle. Not the kind of thing that rings with the headline: God has a wonderful plan for your life.
“To the pious man God is as real as life, and as nobody would be satisfied with mere knowing or reading about life, so he is not content to suppose or to prove logically that there is a God; he wants to feel and to give himself to Him; not only to obey but to approach Him. His desire is to taste the whole wheat of spirit before it is ground by the millstone of reason.”[4] But what this means is that my faith is a long, long road of often difficult steps. Not a joyless pilgrimage, but still a walk in the valley of the shadow of death. The plan might be wonderful, for all I know, but that isn’t why we choose it. We choose it because we can’t be satisfied with anything less, even if it hurts.
Topical Index: plan, religion, magic, Four Spiritual Laws, Colossians 2:8
[1] Abraham Heschel, Man Is Not Alone, p. 233.
[2] Ibid., p. 250.
[3] “Judaism is a theology of the common deed, of the trivialities of life, dealing not so much with the training for the exceptional as with the management of the trivial.” Abraham Heschel, Man Is Not Alone, p. 271.
[4] Abraham Heschel, Man Is Not Alone, p. 254.
