A Scientist in Church

It is part of the ethos of scientists to be skeptical in many areas of life. I think this is particularly true because as a scientist, we also have a particular incentive to make claims of discovery. Our propensity to discover new and important knowledge that may impact society is likely the fuel that keeps the flame of science from being snuffed out. At the same time, making claims that cannot be replicated is a sure-fire way to ensure that one’s career and reputation will be snuffed out. 

In addition, I have had personal experiences in which a rational and well thought-out experiment can have unexplained and counterintuitive results. Therefore, I can say unequivocally that there was at least one thing wrong with my thinking about that particular experiment. Unfortunately, I think many people outside of science rarely get to this process of their own flawed logic in such a tangible way. People largely prefer to support their thinking process despite the evidence.

In First Thessalonians 5:19-22, Paul tells the people that they should test what they hear people say about the scriptures. What he said implies that some of the information being spread was not in accordance with spirit and truth of God’s word. 

The first lesson Paul appears to be giving is that Christians should not automatically dismiss new ideas. Far too often, the culture of Christianity involves exactly the opposite of what Paul is suggesting. We retreat to our churches to find other people who agree with us, not those who might challenge us to think differently.

Instead of automatically accepting or rejecting ideas, I think Christians could use a little more science-styled thinking. The science-oriented thinker does not outwardly reject or accept newer ideas, but they tests them to assess their validity or utility. What if Churches started testing new ideas? How might that change how we treat people who think differently than us? 

Flaming

I tend to be an early morning person. I have a hard time sleeping in even if I try. My mother says that she would have to fight tooth and nail to wake up my brothers for school, but I would often already be awake when she came in to wake me. I think I just do not sleep very deeply.

A scientific explanation is that it seems are bodies are largely created to be more active in the day and rest at night. We do not regularly use awesome raccoon night vision or dolphin echolocation to navigate our environment. We rely on the light to keep us from running into things or other things from running into us. Our bodies also intake necessary vitamin D from the sun’s rays.

In first Thessalonians, Paul wrote about being children of a different kind of light. He says that being in this light implies awareness and alertness. This light helps us to not be afraid of others knowing us and knowing others. It also involves being vigilant of our role in the world. 

Living in a pre-electricity world, I can imagine that Paul’s concept of night and day was probably much more potent to him and his readers in Thessalonica. Night may not have been considered a time when people necessarily I have read that people who lived in cities before electricity rarely ventured out of their homes after dark because doing so was not very safe.

As much as I find myself attracted to physical and metaphorical light, I know that I am not always living in this reality. My life rhythms get out of step and I find myself running and hiding in the dark. Usually it takes another person to notice it, someone says “Where have you been?” Then I know, then I see a flickering flame in a dark room. I hope you people in your life that may speak such truth to you, and I hope you feel the need to speak it to others.

Controlled.

I read about a study this morning about Religion and self-control. The participants were asked to do crossword puzzles in which the words were either religiously oriented or random. After doing the crossword puzzles, the participants went on to complete other tasks that required them to exercise willpower or self-control. The article suggested that the participants who saw the religious words performed better on the self-control tasks than the participants who saw the random words.

This finding is not too surprising to me, because people often associate religion with trying to control yourself and not sinning. Some people suggest that this may be the whole purpose of religion, helping us control our hedonistic urges. 

In his first letter to the Thessalonians, the apostle Paul seems to be endorsing self-control. He says that Christians should live a holy life, abstaining from merely following our basic desires. However, Paul did not say that this is the primary ends to which the life of a Christian is aimed. He said in verse 5 that this ability to be self-controlled is a trait which may overflow from knowing God.

I think the overall idea is that knowing God may help one to have a different purpose in life, rather than doing what makes you happy at the moment. If we are going about the aims of God in the world (loving our neighbors, seeking justice, showing mercy), controlling ones’ self becomes merely a means to a much bigger end of seeking his kingdom on earth.

Admirer

I once received an awkward love letter from a secret admirer. I found it in my college mailbox, covered in red hearts, written in red ink. Although I must admit that my inner 12 year-old received an ego boost, while my 19 year-old logical cortices were introducing some skepticism. I had received a prank love letter some years before and I was wondering which current friend of mine was riddled enough with cruelty to take the time to orchestrate such a prank.

The content of the letter seemed pretty standard for an anonymous love letter. It suggested that the author was really impressed with me. She gushed about my personality and how she found me attractive. She said she thought we would be a good match for each other, but she was afraid to divulge her identity. Even though I was in disbelief regarding the author’s authenticity, I still blushed. 

In reading the second and third chapters of the apostle Paul’s letter to the church in Thessalonica, I could not help but notice how it also sounds like a gushy love letter. Paul said that the Thessalonians were his “glory and joy,” he also described an “intense longing” to see them again. He also mentions overflowing love for them.

It seems to me that this type of outpouring is a largely unrecognized benefit of spiritual mentorship. Because Paul had taken the time to teach the Thessalonians and modeled a Christ-focused life, he had invested effort in their success. He had watched them slowly progress and cheered them on. This sounds like a lot of work, but as the letter suggests, the result was overflowing love for them.

What would happen to the Church if we looked beyond our own navels and opened ourselves to this kind of love? What if you gave your heart to spiritually mentoring someone else? To whom would you write a Thessalonians-type love letter? Could you be an admirer like Paul?

P.S. The love letter I received was not a prank, the author did reveal herself to me. It was so awkward that I just kind of laughed and we never spoke about it again.

King-dom.

Martin Luther King Jr. dreamed that his people would no longer be treated as second-class when compared to others. His inspirational life was focused on speaking for those who could not speak for themselves, calling all people to recognize our kinship as brothers and sisters.

Many years before, a similar message was written and spoken by the Paul, who seems to have been fighting a similar battle in different circumstances. He wrote in his first letter to the church in Thessalonica concerning the injustice the new Christians were facing from the Jewish people. In the book of Acts, we see Paul had many disputes with Jewish Christians concerning their belief that only Jews could be saved, making non-Jewish believers second-class in their eyes. Despite Jesus’ assertion that the kingdom was for all (Matthew 28), it still took a literal vision from God to convince Peter that the kingdom of God was for Jews AND everyone else. 

It seems like these types of struggles have been present for all of recorded history, when different groups of people do not accept each other and attempt to subvert the humanity of one another. Humans are by our nature relational beings who tend to form groups with many different purposes. Not surprisingly, we tend to prefer individuals who are in our groups over those who are not. It seems that conflict often arises when groups perceive some type of scarcity of resources between groups. For example, sports teams may have conflict because only one team may win.

In my opinion, many of the struggles with prejudice throughout the years are rooted in our misperception of scarcity and similarity. We somehow think that another group’s success may result in our failure, or another group’s power will require our submission. We also see certain groups as fundamentally different from ours, when it is likely that we are actually very similar.

On this day when the United States stops briefly to recognize the message of a great man, I think we need to search our hearts. We can ask ourselves; are we really in a power struggle between each other? Are we really so different? Jesus, Paul, and Martin Luther King Jr. spoke of a love that transcends our group boundaries, making us into one group, all brothers and sisters. Let your kingdom come...on earth as it is in heaven.