I love watching babies interact with their parents.
There is something exposing about watching a baby learn. It shows in me where I am still an infant in my faith, having ceased to grow. Hebrews 5 warns against this type of stagnancy. We are to continue to grow, at first longing for Truth like baby's milk (1 Pet 2:2), but eventually moving on to adult food.
One aspect of child-development that I have always found fascinating is that of Object Permanency. This is the concept that babies learn usually within the first two years of life in which they realize that things continue to exist, even if they cannot see them!
One aspect of child-development that I have always found fascinating is that of Object Permanency. This is the concept that babies learn usually within the first two years of life in which they realize that things continue to exist, even if they cannot see them!
I think that people who fail to believe in God (or Christians who act like God doesn't exist!!) are merely failing to have Spiritual Object Permanency. Jesus says in the Gospel of John, "blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed" (John 20:29).
How can we do such a task? To some, it seems impossible. Yet, we are told in Hebrews that we can have confidence or assurance in what we cannot see (Heb 11:1).
How can we do such a task? To some, it seems impossible. Yet, we are told in Hebrews that we can have confidence or assurance in what we cannot see (Heb 11:1).
Look at the Greek word translated by the NIV to mean "assurance."
ὑπόστασις (Transliterated: hupostasis). The word seems to be a cognate for "understanding" (hupo for 'under', stasis for 'standing, cf. Strong's #5087). [Go easy on me! I'm not a Greek scholar; this is just an observation of mine.]
Because of the cognate, I think what the writer is saying is that "faith is the [understanding] of things hoped for." It is not that we have a blind faith! We just understand something contrary to what is obvious to the naked eye.
Don't we do the same thing with science concepts like atoms? Or even abstract truths like math or language. Why do we know an atom is real? We just infer it from what we understand! God is much the same way.
Could it be that atheists and agnostics reject our Father simply because He cannot be seen? They cannot understand what they cannot see, because they lack Object Permanency.
Don't we do the same thing with science concepts like atoms? Or even abstract truths like math or language. Why do we know an atom is real? We just infer it from what we understand! God is much the same way.
Could it be that atheists and agnostics reject our Father simply because He cannot be seen? They cannot understand what they cannot see, because they lack Object Permanency.
I hope you'll join with me to pray for our lost brothers. God is trying to give them a Newborn Spirit!! (John 3:5-8). Only then will their spirit be able to truly know the compassion and love of the Father.
And when their spirit gets its object permanency, I hope they do see God, like I do. I am in this Divine game of peek-a-boo, where God has to be away from me in the body until we are joined to Him in the end times. But, until then, God, on certain occasions, shows me His face.
Sunsets are my peek-a-boo. When I see the sunlight bleeding into the clouds, it's like God's smiling face on me. "Peek-a-boo! I love you!"
I desperately hope that more and more people come to know that Fatherly affection, through the intervention of the Holy Spirit.
God bless.
