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Orienting your life by the past is not the Christian way, Paul proclaims in this lesson. It is like 20th-century American poet Paul Eldridge once wrote: "Praises for our past triumphs are as feathers to a dead bird." Our pasts don't count anymore, because we belong to Christ (the apostle says).
Of course, the selfish, seedy side of us objects. In his novel Men Without Women, Ernest Hemingway wrote: "The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone..." He is wrong when it comes to the love of God, if not human love. The only thing that hurts in those cases is our sinful selfishness that love overcomes.
Neurobiologists have found that in love and in faith the part of our brain that orients us in space and time shuts down. We lose ourselves (Dean Hamer, The God Gene, esp. pp. 121-124; Daniel Amen, Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, esp. p. 264). When we see ourselves as belonging to God, then we can celebrate with Mahatma Gandhi and say: "The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself."
Of course, the selfish, seedy side of us objects. In his novel Men Without Women, Ernest Hemingway wrote: "The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone..." He is wrong when it comes to the love of God, if not human love. The only thing that hurts in those cases is our sinful selfishness that love overcomes.
Neurobiologists have found that in love and in faith the part of our brain that orients us in space and time shuts down. We lose ourselves (Dean Hamer, The God Gene, esp. pp. 121-124; Daniel Amen, Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, esp. p. 264). When we see ourselves as belonging to God, then we can celebrate with Mahatma Gandhi and say: "The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself."
