Re[2]: Cute Fable - good point!

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Kyle wrote:

>Michael,

>What was the good point that I was supposed to get?  That angels are
>better than us?  I thought that we were the *sons* of God, not them.
>Remember, they want what *we* got: 

You missed the true point.  I was not implying that angels are better
than us, but the note was directed towards  people who are
unregenerate and thus LOWER than angels.  THEY think that higher
progress is in technology and "higher" education.  THEY are wrong.

And christian religions that do not believe in new birth and
regeneration of the Spirit have the tendency to likewise uphold
intellectualism above spirituality, although they say the two are one
and the same (check out the RCC for example).  How can they know what
is truly spiritual if they do not even comprehend new birth of the
Spirit?

What the world values as progressive has even crept into the so-called
church of the world.  They, too, feel that education is spirituality.
They believe that the key to spirituality is education.  Education is
not wrong (I say this so no one runs with my words and twists them).
It is only LOWER than praise and worship and revelatory experience.

The wise of this world seek for wisdom and won't find God in it.
Check out the Greeks in context with Paul's words in 1 Cor. 1:18-28.
Check it out!  Education is natural.  That does not make it bad.  It
just makes it outside the whole realm of the Spirit of God.

The Corinthians could have been professors, but would still have
scratched their heads when they heard Paul teach, for they were
NATURALLY MINDED ALONE (1 Cor. 2:14; 3:1).  Whatever heights of
intellect I can attain to this moment and in this day, will never be
higher than those heights I can attain to without God in my life and
the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  In other words, intellectualism is
fully mine to ascend into without God in my life.
That doesn't make it bad, it only makes it useless in pursuing God.
It's of the old creation.  And nothing from the old can assist the new
creature in Christ as far as progressing in God's Kingdom is
concerned.

If you're notcareful you'll have all requiring grade twelve before
they can be saved.

It's like saying there are GOOD sinners and bad
sinners.  But they're still sinners, and sentence of death is still
upon their lives simply because they are not born again into the new
creation.  God's kingdom is not a matter of what is good or bad,
despite the popular opinion.  It is whether a thing is flesh or
spirit.  Things born of flesh (like education) will ALWAYS BE
FLESH.  Only that born of Spirit is spirit (John 3:5-6).  There are
GOOD fleshly things, like education.  We need them.  Paul called
giving money a "CARNAL" gift.  It's necessary, though, isn't it.  But
our RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD and that relationship's growth and progress
does not involve anything carnal.

Whatever I can have without God will not help me know Him.  That which
is spiritual cannot be experienced by unregenerate people.  Education
is not spiritual.


In their proper places, the carnal things are not evil.  Many are, in
fact, necessary.  But they are not to be elevated to spirituality.

Hagar was useful and needful in her proper place.  She represents
flesh.  She was LOWER THAN SARAH, her mistress.  But when she was
elevated to the status Sarah had, that is, useful to God's purposes,
she became a danger and produced a carnal, rebellious product in
Ishmael.  Hagar represents anmything of the flesh.  Keep it in its
proper place UNDER spirituality and it is fine.  But start elevating
it with or above spirituality and you are in grave danger.

What people think to be advancement in our humanity is NOT
advancement in God's mind.  That was the fable's point.

>Also, I'm really upset by the anti-education/civilization overtones in
>this "fable."  I can't say that God really ever discouraged
>education.

Would Adam and Eve have attended university had they not fallen?  See
what I mean?

I know a mathematician, Joe Gaut, who has deep revelatory experiences.
But he recognizes that he must always ensure that his brain does not
get in the way of his spirit.  the mind is to be put in its place of
value UNDER the things of the Spirit.

I'm sorry if you are offended.  I think it may be that you missed the
actual point.  But education and civilization are NOT God's priorities
for our lives.  The spiritual relationship with God is far higher than
these.  A man may be uneducated and born again, ready to meet God.
But an educated man who is not born again will be eternally lost.
That is the point.

>In fact, I seem to remember something about "My people
>are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected
>knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to
>me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget
>thy children" (Hosea 4:6).

Wow, brother!  Did you ever take that out of context!  Knowledge of
God's Law is certainly not the knowledge of education.

Are you saying that Hosea implied that unless we all get educated in
carnal schooling then we are doomed to be destroyed?   If carnal
education is what Hosea implied, then this must be so!

Jesus said we shall KNOW THE TRUTH and the TRUTH shall set us free.
That is what Hosea referred to.  Not carnal knowledge, but knowledge
of the things of God!  You won't get that in a university.

God's law is
so simple that a *fool* (educationally witless) will not err therein,
thus discriminating carnal intellectual knowledge from
spiritual knowledge.  Did Paul imply his need of carnal education when
he said, "That I might *know* Him in the power of his resurrection and
the fellowship of his suffering" (Phil. 3)?  Adam *KNEW* Eve.  This
biblical "knowledge" implies intimate union with something, and when
it comes to spiritual laws of God and God, Himself, it is not talking
about education that can be rated in doctorate degrees.

>Also, let us not forget the importance of
>education to Daniel and the three Hebrew children.  And let us not
>forget the education of Paul.

What did Paul say about his carnal abilities?  He said that all the
carnal intellectualism he had and all his Hebrew heritage, being a
Hebrew of Hebrews and his learning under Gamaliel, was but dung
*compared* to the knowledge of Jesus Christ - that spiritual union. He
did not imply it was USELESS, nor do I.  But when *COMPARED* TO THE
INTIMATE KNOWING OF CHRIST, it was but dung.

That is the point.  WHEN COMPARED to spiritual values, the
intellectual pursuits of this world are but dung.  Plain and simple.

Do not mistaken the Hebrew children's knowledge for carnal
intellectualism.

> I realize that the fable was made to
>point out how much wonderful God's realm was than our own.

Not exactly.  You missed the point.  More to the point... it was to
show that we must put our priorites upon the spiritual and not the
lesser, but not unnecessary, carnal intellectualisms.

>But we
>need to be careful about the message we're encouraging.  We're saying
>that it's O. K. to not be educated.

Well, it isn't WRONG to be uneducated.  But that is not my point,
anyway.  I value education, BUT NOT ABOVE spirituality.  That's my
point.  Compared to spirituality, education is dung.  Stand
education on its own, and it is great!  We should see it as a good
thing.  But WHEN COMPARED TO SPIRITUALITY...

Did you catch the
references to "VALUES" in the early part of the fable?

>And I'm just apt to think that
>our attempts at knowledge, feeble though they may be in the sight of
>God, that God still takes pride in the fact that we care enough about
>the world that *He* created to learn a little more about it.

That may or may not be so.  There's no indication in scripture about
that.  What scripture does stress and value is our hunger for
righteousness, not intellectualism.  To be honest with you, I think
God does not regard our intellectual pursuits at all.  Without FAITH
it is impossible to please Him.  I don't need education to have faith.

> I doubt very seriously that any angel in gonna be bored by
>something in which God takes pleasure.

God takes pleasure in our highly developed intellects?  Poor old John
the Baptist.  Living in the desert and all.  He missed out on so much,
but was still called a prophet of higher status than any other before
him!  Hmmmmm.

>Kyle

Please reread the fable and realise that it is merely comparing
priorities in what we value as compared to what God values.  It is NOT
saying that anti-education is the way to go.  But, maybe some need to
hear a bit about their abundance of concern over the carnal that may
be over and above the spiritual.

In Christ!
                                                                      
MBlume