Quote:
Originally Posted by kisstheson
To be honest, I have yet to come across an example of allegorizing by any Christian author/teacher that has inspired me to "love and good works". And yet a plain reading of the Scriptures in a spirit of humility will inspire me to repentance and "love and good works" almost every time. My experience inside and outside the LRC has been that allegorizing typically leads to puffed-up heads, not to a Christ-like spirit.
|
You have put words to something that was rummaging around inside of me. If you have been reading my posts over the past year or so, it should be pretty obvious that I believe that simple obedience is one of the most missing items in so much of Christianity, but more so in the more "spiritual" groups like inner-life groups of which the LRC is a part. I do not say that the spiritual stuff is pointless. But if you have to despise the book of James to keep from getting hit between the eyes, then you probably are missing the mark.
While the book of John has more "spiritual" things than the other gospels, it still contains many references to obedience and to doing. It even says that belief and obedience come before abiding. And all put together, Jesus said much more about how we live life than what we think about or even what specifics we believe. At least if the combined gospels are to be accepted as the touchstone. And even eliminating the duplications from the three synoptics, although the fact that we get much of it three times says something to me about the importance of what is duplicated (triplicated?).