This video is a great followup to last week’s Theology Thursday post.
The text is from Joshua Harris’ Dug Down Deep.
I’ve come to learn that theology matters. And it matters not because we want a good grade on a test but because what we know about God shapes the way we think and live. What you believe about God’s nature—what he is like, what he wants from you, and whether or not you will answer to him—affects every part of your life.
Theology matters, because if we get it wrong, then our whole life will be wrong.
I know the idea of “studying” God often rubs people the wrong way. It sounds cold and theoretical, as if God were a frog carcass to dissect in a lab or a set of ideas that we memorize like math proofs.
But studying God doesn’t have to be like that. You can study him the way you study a sunset that leaves you speechless. You can study him the way a man studies the wife he passionately loves. Does anyone fault him for noting her every like and dislike? Is it clinical for him to desire to know the thoughts and longings of her heart? Or to want to hear her speak?
Knowledge doesn’t have to be dry and lifeless. And when you think about it, exactly what is our alternative? Ignorance? Falsehood?
We’re either building our lives on the reality of what God is truly like and what he’s about, or we’re basing our lives on our own imagination and misconceptions.
We’re all theologians. The question is whether what we know about God is true.
Recommended Resources:
Title: Dug Down Deep
Author: Joshua Harris
Young evangelicals today are torn between the undefined theology of their generation and the hard-edged attitudes of some older conservatives. In Dug Down Deep, Harris charts a path of humble orthodoxy with enormous appeal. Harris understands that his readers are at a crucial juncture―they are deciding that they will and won’t keep of the faith that has been passed down to them. They want to know what to believe and why it matters.
Dug Down Deep tells Harris’ own story of discovering that seemingly worn-out words like theology doctrine and orthodoxy are the way to the mysterious awe-filled experience of truly knowing the original Jesus Christ.