True Spirituality

by Francis A. Schaeffer

  We wait for the resurrection of the body. We wait for the perfect application of the finished work of Christ for the whole of man. We wait for this, but on this side of the fall, and before Christ comes, we must not insist on "perfection or nothing," or we will end with the "nothing." And this is as true in the area of psychological problems as it is in all other areas of life.

  Having said that, let us add that we are not to go to the other extreme, and expect less than to act in the circle of the being God made man to be—that is, in his own image, rational and normal. What does this mean? Well, let us think of Pavlov's bell. Pavlov's bell was the beginning of the experi­mentation of a mechanically conditioned reflex. He rang a bell in front of the dog before he fed him, and after proper condi­tioning, the saliva came to the dog's mouth any time the bell was rung. This is perfectly correct concerning dogs, for that is what dogs are and what God made them to be. But woe to man when he begins to act as though this is all there is to man, because we have not been made in this circle of creation. We have been made in the circle of creation in the image of God—not only moral but rational.

  The understanding of a conditioned reflex in regard to man has its limited place. If I study my physical structure, mechanics has its place in regard to the tension of the muscles and so on. But this is not all there is to man. If you deal with a man merely as a structural machine you miss the point, and if you deal with a man merely as a set of psychological condi­tionings, you miss the central point. Consequently, as Chris­tians begin to deal with psychological problems we must do so in the realization of who man is. I am made in the image of God; this being so, I am rational and I am moral, thus there will be a conscious and responsible behavior. We must not think we can simply trigger ourselves or others into mechanical reflexes and all will be well. If we begin acting this way we will deny the doctrines which we say we believe. In action that comes anywhere near the heart of psychological problems, there will be a conscious aspect, because God has made man this way.

  The basic psychological problem is trying to be what we are not, and trying to carry what we cannot carry. Most of all, the basic problem is not being willing to be the creatures we are before the Creator. Let us imagine that you meet Atlas and he is carrying the world on his shoulder. In classical mythology he has no problem in carrying the world on his shoulder, be-cause he is Atlas! You meet him walking somewhere on the shores of North Africa, where the Atlas mountains are. He sees you coming and says, "Here, you carry the world for awhile." And you are squashed. You are squashed because you cannot carry what you have been handed. The psychological parallel is that man is trying to be the center of the universe and refuses to be the creature he is. He is trying to carry the world on his shoulder and is crushed by the simple factor that it is too much for him to bear. There is nothing complicated about it; he is squashed in trying to bear what no one except God himself can bear because only God is infinite.

  The squashing can come in various ways. When you pump too much air into a weak tire, it will blow out. The reason for this blowout is the excessive pressure, but the actual break comes at the point of the weakness in the tire. Since the fall, we all have points of weakness. With some of us it tends to be physical, with some it tends to be psychological. If we carry what we cannot, the blowout will come and it will come at the place of our inherent weakness. The central, overwhelming pressure is that of needing to be the integration point of all things because we are not willing to be the creatures we are. We refuse to acknowledge the existence of God, or—even though acknowledging his existence intellectually—in practice we refuse to bow before him in the midst of our moment-by­-moment lives.

  Christian doctrine speaks first in rational answers, and then in practice, to the psychological results of man's revolt since the fall. In other words, it is not necessary to search for psychological healing outside the total structure of Christian doctrine. The Christian gospel is the answer not only theoreti­cally but also in practice within the unity of the biblical teaching, and specifically within the unity of the creature-Creator relationship, and the redeemed-Redeemer relationship. Within the structure of the unity of biblical teaching there is the possibility not only of theoretical psychology, but also of a practical psychology.

  One of these psychological results of man's rebellion is fear. Fear can come in many guises, but generally it comes in three areas: the fear of the impersonal, the fear of non-being, and the fear of death. We can think of other types of fear, but many fears will fit under these headings. Fear can be small, or it can be the horror of great despair. Or it can be anywhere in between these extremes. Many modern men who have come to a philosophy of despair have gone through such a horror of great darkness. Many psychologists, for example Carl Gustav Jung, will meet this fear simply by telling the patient to act as if God were there. In his last interview, about eight days before his death, Jung defined God as "whatever cuts across my will outside of myself, or whatever wells up from the collective un­conscious within myself." And his advice was, just call it "God," and give in to "him." In other words it is acting as if.

  But in the unity of the biblical teaching, God really is there. He is not just the father-image projected, but the Christian system begins with the comprehension and declaration of his objective existence. Consequently, there need never be a fear of the impersonal. But if men do not have this God, they are even­tually faced with only a stream of energy particles. Or, if they shut themselves up and put on blinders to this conclusion, they are shut up to a faceless humanity. And the more they become aware of humanity the more they realize its facelessness. Out of this springs a real fear of the impersonal, and they are right to be afraid.

  But the solution for the Christian is that there need never be a fear of the impersonal, because the personal-infinite God is really there.

  This is not just a piece of theater. If we live in the light of the doctrine that we say we believe, this very basic form of fear dissolves away. This is what the Christian parent says to the little child who is afraid to be left alone when the mother goes out of the room. There is nothing complex about it. It is as simple and profound as God's existence. The little child is afraid to be left alone in the dark with the impersonal situa­tion, and we may stay there and comfort him, but eventually the Christian parent has to say, "But you do not have to be afraid, because God is here." This is a profound truth, not just for children. Indeed, it is the glory of the Christian faith that the little things are profound and the profound things are over­whelmingly simple.

  So when the mother teaches the little child that God is there with him, and as the child grows and comes to know for himself that there are good and sufficient reasons to know that God is there, this has meaning in a profound sense that will prove sufficient all his life, through all his philosophic wan­derings, as well as in the darkness of the night. On the basis of the existence of the biblical God, and who he is in the total structure of the Christian faith, it is not meaningless for the little child in the dark and it is not meaningless for the most diligent student in philosophy who has ever walked through the darkness of philosophical speculation. There need be no fear of the impersonal.

  The second basic fear is the fear of non-being. Why are so many people today caught in the fear of non-being? Because modern man does not have any idea where he came from, and not having any answer to Being, is eventually locked up in the sequence of pure chance. Therefore he has a fear of non-being, and well he might. But the Christian, in the total system of Christianity, has the answer to Being, as we have already seen. Knowing the answer to Being, there is no fear of non-being. I have been created by an infinite-personal God, created truly outside of himself. So I know who I am in my being. I have a valid existence. That being so, there is no reason or need for a fear of non-being. There is a reason to fear hell if I am in revolt against God, but there is no fear of non-being.

  The third basic fear is the fear of death. And I deal with this last because it is th
e most obvious fear, and because in the Christian perspective it is obvious that we should not and need not be afraid of death. To Christians there is a continuity of life on a straight horizontal line from this life on into the world to come. The chasm is past at the new birth. Death is not the chasm; we already have passed from death to life. In earlier chapters we have stood at the Mount of Transfiguration and there we have seen the continuity in space and time. There is the ascension; there is Stephen seeing Jesus; there is Paul seeing Jesus on the Damascus road; there is John having seen and heard Jesus on Patmos. Consequently, it should be very obvious to the Christian, inside the total unity of Christian doctrine, that there does not need to be a fear of death.

  But now we are dealing with the practical problem, because this is not just a theoretical thing. And we must say that some-times in the midst of psychological upheaval these truths are difficult to apply. But there is a rational framework within which we can work, think, and talk, and that is altogether dif­ferent from the situation of a man who is in rebellion against God. What is needed in a time of psychological disturbance, whether it is temporary or more prolonged, is that we should help each other to act upon the total unified Christian teaching. This is entirely different from trying to work by jumping into the dark without a rational framework. We must talk to each other, we must help each other to think in the light of the truth of the total unified Christian system. In this we now have a point of conversation and contact in the total framework that will not give way under our feet. This is a very different thing from a psychologist sitting there smoking his pipe and urging his patient to roll his fears upon him personally on the basis of his own authority and personality, especially when you know he has his problems too.

  I should like now to touch on another area of conflict and tension: the area of feelings of superiority and inferiority in relationship to other people. Many of us move backwards and forwards between superiority and inferiority, almost like the swing of a pendulum. This is a question of comparisons be­tween myself and other men, arising from the fact that we are social creatures. No man lives to himself; no man lives on a desert island by himself. We shall be considering this in regard to communication with other men later, when we deal with the Christian's relationship to others. But at this point we are con-fining ourselves to the internal results of feelings of inferiority and superiority. Superiority feelings are a pushing of my status in relationship to other men, as though I were not one creature among other equal creatures. For the Christian, status and va­lidity do not rest upon relative relationships to other men. As a Christian I do not have to find my validity in my status, or by thinking myself above other men. My validity and my status are found in being before the God who is there. My basic valid­ity and my basic status do not depend upon what men think of me. So the problems of superiority are set in a completely dif­ferent framework and I can deal with them without fearing that if I limit my superiority, my value, validity, and status will be totally lost.

  It is much the same with inferiority. Inferiority is the reverse, the return of the pendulum of the clock after I have hung my superiority on the wall, as it were. If I realize the real­ity of my being a creature, I shall not begin with the expecta­tion of being either unlimited and infinite, or better than others. I know who I am: I am a creature. I see myself in the light of having been created by God and in the light of the true, historic fall. So I understand that this is what I am and what all other men are. This is an entirely different starting point. I do not have to set up a desire or an expectancy that I am intrin­sically superior and then feel inferior because I do not reach it. If there is anything that throws the windows open and lets the sun in, it is this. The struggles of superiority and inferiority in the total framework of the biblical teaching can be healed in just as profound a way as guilt feelings. As Christians, by the grace of God, let us act upon what we say we believe.

  Christianity has another strong point here, and that is that when I find these marks of tension or conflict upon me, there is something that can be done about them. Whatever may be the mark of sin in me at any point, whenever I find these marks upon me in any situation, I am not at a dead end, because the blood of Jesus Christ can cleanse me from all true guilt, not just once, but as many times as I need. There is always the possibil­ity of a truly new start within a totally rational framework. Thank God that there is always this possibility, upon the basis of the infinite value of the blood of Jesus Christ shed on Calva­ry's cross.

  Finally let us consider some aspects of a positive psycholog­ical hygiene. As a Christian, instead of putting myself, in prac­tice, at the center of the universe, I must do something else. This is not only right, and the failure to do so is not only sin, but it is important for me personally in this life. I must think after God and I must will after God. To think after God, as he has revealed himself in his creation and especially as he has revealed himself in the Bible, is to have an integrated answer to life, both intellectually and in practice. On any other basis I do not have this. On any other basis but this I am shut up to that phrase I find in Ecclesiastes, that under the sun "all is vanity." When by the grace of God I think after God, I can have intel­lectual integration. I no longer need to play games of hide and seek with the facts that I dare not face.

  Now the same is true in the integration of my personality, of the whole man. I must will after God. There is only one in­tegration point that is enough, and that is God himself. As Paul wrote to the Ephesians, "Be not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking among your-selves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:18, 19). Paul is talking here about wine as a false integration point. In contrast, if I have the Holy Spirit as my integration point and through him as the agent of the Trinity I am in commu­nion with the whole Trinity, I can have joy and peace, and a song. I do not have to go along whistling to myself in the dark; there can be songs in the night that come from the inside out. Now this example uses wine, but we can understand here that it is not only wine, and becoming drunk. It is also any other thing which is made to be my final integration point instead of God himself. In my university days I have put many a man to bed who tried to find his integration point in alcohol, and I had to give him a cold shower at four o'clock in the morning because of his thick head. "Excess"—there is no real joy in it. This is trying to find an integration point that is not enough in itself. And any other integration point besides God will lead to the same end. This is not just a theological or psychological trick. This is what I am. And nothing less will integrate the whole me, because that is what I was made for: to love God with all my heart, soul, and mind. Being in any other rela­tionship is not enough. There are parts of me that are not en-compassed by any other relationship.

  There are many points of false peace and integration, and it is well to recognize them. Entertainment is one. Do we under-stand that even right entertainment can be the wrong integra­tion point and be just as wicked and just as destructive as wrong entertainment if I put it in the place of God? There is nothing wrong with sport. Many sports are beautiful, but if sport becomes my integration point and my whole life turns upon knocking one second off my time on a downhill race, I am destroyed.

  It is the same with material things. In the Christian teaching there is nothing wrong with material things as such. We do not have an aesthetic system. But it is perfectly possible for a Christian to be a materialist, with his car or his stereo set. The man who tries to find his integration point of life in his possessions is the man who is a practical materialist.

  Even good music and good art must not be allowed to be the final point of integration. The artist struggles to bring all his diagonals and horizontals and verticals together in his painting so that as you are looking at it you have a feeling of peace and rest. This has a place, and it is certainly not wrong in itself. But if it is a false integration point, in the sense of being the final
integration point, and if your final rest in this world depends upon looking upon a well-balanced set of ver­ticals, horizontals, and diagonals, it is a false integration point. Music is the same. Music does give us rest. It is fine to be able to put on a recording of the music which brings you to quiet­ness, but it is not enough as the final integration. It is not only the bad thing, but also the good thing itself which can be de­structive.

  It is the same with sex. Much sex today is merely an attempt to find some reality in a world that appears to have no meaning whatsoever. Often it is an attempt to "touch bottom" in a universe that is thought to have no bottom. If sex is made an absolute integration point it is totally wrong. It is not just sinful sexual relationship that I am talking about. I mean also sexual things in their right relationship, if these become our final point of rest. They are made to be a point of rest, and as such they can be beautiful, but as our final point of rest they are destructive. And eating is exactly the same. Compulsive eating can also become a point of final integration.

  Intellectual pursuits can offer false integration points. Intel­lectual pursuits can be to the glory of God. But today much in­tellectual pursuit is not a pursuit of truth, or a search for truth, but a game—and the best game one can play, more exciting than skiing or chess. We here at L'Abri believe that Chris­tianity does have intellectual answers, and that every man deserves an honest answer for an honest question. But this is not to be the final integration point. The integration point is God himself. It is possible even for Christians to put always more intellectual questions between them and the reality of communion with God. Even right doctrine can be the false in­tegration point. Theology today is often a superior game, just like the game of general intellectual thinking. It is a most excit­ing intellectual sport. If I had to choose a game to fill up the absolute vacuum of being a non-Christian and having no absolute meaning to life, in my experience I could find no game across the whole philosophical spectrum as exciting as playing the theological game. And almost all modern liberal theology is just a game; it is pure gamesmanship. But even orthodox doc­trine can become merely intellectual, a final integration point, and can actually shut us off from God rather than opening the doors to him, which it is meant to do. And religious organiza­tions, including good and true churches, and programs which are right in their own place, became poison when they become the final end.