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Decision making in God
by Erin Dijkema There has been something on my heart for a time, in the middle of the process of banging my head against the wall, on the issue of how to go about making a difference in so many damaged lives with only my BA and a collection of personal experiences to use in my future career. But then it came to me. I am going to refute the argument of Kant and other philosophers, Liberal thinkers and the general ego booster of all mankind; we as human beings are not rational. Yes, I'll point out the needed counter argument insisting on all our powers of knowledge and intelligence. Think of all the times we've said, "I know, I know.... but blah blah, blah", usually concerning the rational thing we should have done to achieve some important concept such as success, morality, redemption or retribution but opted out because of our irrational last resort of emotions, whims and fears. Global rationality, where the well being and benefit of all people are considered, cannot be achieved that way. Rationality in full is being able to reason in accordance with reason and logic sensibly and clearly, with no emotion or prejudice. Our actions and our reasoning for such are far from being fully sensible, aware, unbiased and lacking emotion and conflict. Now sure we have all this power with our knowledge and know how, but are the uses of the resources we have access to globally rational? Our problems of injustice could be eliminated if the irrational decisions of corporate companies and institutions were not based on whim, greed, and hunger for power and fame. This rationality would not ignore the obvious and actually well known fact, but largely disregarded one in favour of placing blame and displaying anger, that colour does not make a difference. This fact would not deny the world the peace and give it benefits it deserves by not basing critical choices on such a senile fact. Globally rational beings would not allow the art industry to be founded on schemes to gain few people wealth while hundreds of thousands of people suffer the very real harmful consequences of the resulting messages while the true purpose of art dies. There are countless other examples I could give to support my argument of lack of global or even communal rationality, but I'm pretty sure you can think of some on your own, even personal irrational decisions, done today. Even when trying to be unselfish and attempt to view another's perspective, we often fail in accomplishing God's kingdom. Consider the age old example of colonialism for a moment. Or to be more modern, consider clothes drives for the homeless and working poor. These clothes will be appreciated even though they are stinky, dirty and so dated; since they're poor, they don't care right? Notice how self-esteem is a tool to bettering one's life but is also too often in the hands of those of high esteem and we don't care. My point is that we can never be completely rational, to obtain that you must be able to view each perspective and fact in your head at once and only the one true God has that power of omniscience. In decision making, we must accept His gentle nudging guidance of His love. We cannot answer all of our 'why's' or 'how's' correctly or quick enough, future decisions need to be guided on the sole concentration on the love of God. Too often we get caught up in what we know and what we want, we forget about who we are to serve. Somehow the notion of Christ's love is lost; usually among the clutter collected by our sinful attitudes. When these are the foundation of our rationale several things happen. Sometimes there is this wall of distinction between those unfortunate and those helping them, and it tends to be pride and pity. Or the possibilities God had for us are consumed by fear or lack of faith. I am to no extent saying all Christians are similar, there are of course many exceptions to this trend, they produce the saltiness we are supposed to aim for, the saltiness that makes people notice and yearn for more. Unfortunately, sometimes the sour smell of luke-warm milk from good intentioned but ill-guided lives makes it harder for the faint pull of thirst from salt to come through. Christ's love is the key, we must rest in that. He is the One who makes connections between good intentions and wholly true results by guiding people with His Love and True global rationality. God is the only thing we need, He's been preparing us for the longest time, no amount of rationalization is going to have the same reassuring consequences. Written by Erin Dijkema. A recent graduate from Redeemer University College, I have lived most of my life in a small town called Athens,ON. A church participant all my life, I have just recently was blessed to be baptized in His Church. Email: [email protected] Article Source: http://www.faithwriters.com |