Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Wednesday September 8, 2010

The old philosopher's favorite line was, "Know thyself" and they meandered all over the creation trying to find the key to this knowledge of the self. Christians should have no trouble with this tenet of personal growth. I call the recognition of this truth, "The Golden Key to Self Knowledge." Blaise Pascal expressed it like this:

"Not only do we not know God except through Jesus Christ; we do not even know ourselves except through Jesus Christ." The problem with coming to grips with "Know thyself" is as old as time and perhaps eternity. As far as I can tell from the scriptures, Lucifer, a "lightbearer" became Satan due to a rebellion against God because he failed to truly know God and thus was short on knowing himself.

The scripture is clear that Jesus Christ is the template for true humanity, and this template is flawless, thus the progress in our individual life is measured by Christ.

As I "study" Christ I find a true evaluation of myself and thus must face the truth expressed by Paul in Romans 3:23:

For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;

The context bears out the exposition; we do not measure up, thus more surrender to Christ. It is God's grace that teaches us to deny our own idea of perfection and to seek the perfection, the full manhood, or in our vernacular, "personhood" and this is the work of God’s grace in our heart, our mind and thus our life.

Over the course of life we are constantly facing new to us challenges as to just what we should do, how should we act, should we do this or that. Because Christ lives we are not left to our own resources; but we have a bellwether, an exemplar, Jesus Christ the righteous, to guide us through. We can study our self throughout life and die as ignorant as the day we were born. True personal growth comes through a walk with Christ and a growing into becoming more like Him. The biblical phrase, "being born again of incorruptible seed" is essential in growth for we know a child cannot grow if it is not born, hence the necessity of being as Jesus told Nicodemus, "born again."

Knowing, experiencing Christ personally is essential for knowing thyself.

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2010 Use with credit

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