Barth on Believing

Next post I will give my perspective on one "answer" to skipping Christmas day services offered by those who are closing the doors on December 25, what I am calling "Christmas Take Out".  But to prime the pump of our thinking, here is Karl Barth on believing.

“Believing is not something as special and difficult of even unnatural as we often suppose.  Believing means that what we listen to, we listen to as God’s speech.  What moves us is not just our concern, but precisely God’s concern.  What causes me worry, that is God’s worry, what gives me joy is God’s joy, what I hope for is God’s hope.  In other words, in all that I am, I am only a party to that which God thinks and does.  In all that I do it is not I, but rather God who is important.  Imagine if everything were brought into this great and proper connection, if we were willing to suffer, be angry, love and rejoice with God, instead of always wanting to make everything our own private affair, as if we were alone.
Just imagine, if we were to adapt everything that gratifies and moves us into the life and movement of God’s kingdom, so that we personally are, so to speak, taken out of play.  Simple love! Simply hope!  Simply rejoice! Simply strive! But in everything, do it no longer from yourself, but rather from God! Everything great that is hidden can indeed be great only in God.” (emphasis mine)

Karl Barth, (from, Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, p. 137)

Comments

[David Wayne]

Hey Tod - shhh - please don't tell any of my peeps that I have something nice to say about Karl Barth, but that quote is outstanding, especially the last paragraph.
Thanks for this,
David