Subj: Christ living 

Dear Fred,

I am dealing with a lady who is wonderful in her Christian belief and does a great job in her work of Managing the Village where we live.  However, she has problems when people are unkind or unthankful - reasoning that because she serves them so well, this should not be so.  You would get the picture.

Do you have an Grubb extract or other brief writing that might address those issues in right ways?  Please send it to me if you have.

God bless

______________

Dear ___________,

Thank you for writing.

I'm pretty sure I have an idea of the problem you describe. I run into it a lot because I experience the same thing in my own mind when I "think people should be kind or thankful" because I have given to them in some way.

I can't think of anything particularly that Norman wrote that deals with that, nor anything in particular I have written. Norman in general always said that in "pointing fingers" at other people we have three pointing back at ourselves, since in a general sense what goes on in the lives of others is not usually our business, and not usually ours to judge or determine which course is best for others. That's common sense, as well as the general way we live in the world.

But obviously there are times when we become involved and are God's agents to move things one way or another as the Spirit moves us. But even in that we tread lightly, because God is still individual in each.

So those are general things I can say, and it's difficult to go beyond those general things because I don't know any other way to respond to the situation you present, since I'm not personally involved.

But I wonder what "result" you're looking for? Are you looking for a way to "adjust ourselves" where we don't have the attitude run through our minds that "people ought to show more gratitude when I've gone out of my way to do this for them."

Christ would never have that attitude, right?

So therefore this lady you describe, should not feel this way? Since Christ wouldn't feel this way?

The thing is, Christ DID feel that way, from time to time. Even expressed it.

There is a pervasive, seemingly worldwide mentality, that says that if I were a holy person, I would not ever feel or experience such things as resentment, judgmentalism, hatred, prejudice, jealousy, pride, etc. That if I do feel those things or have those attitudes running through my mind then I am still self-oriented, non-loving, or at the very least unknowledgeable.

I think we give lip service to the fact that Jesus was "tempted in all points like as we." It means He experienced every thing, every possible thing, which means more than you and I experience because we luckily got a much smaller portion. He experienced EVERY POSSIBLE TEMPTATION any human being could ever experience.

(Interjected thought here: When I begin to think of Jesus being "tempted in all points like as we" and knowing that His Life poured out of the Eternal, the nature of His humanity becomes clearer, because I see more and more the union of God in Christ and ourselves. Were it not for the crying, the hunger, the need, the fire of self, the chaos of freedom, the doubt and uncertainty inherent in existence on a moment by moment basis, there would be no framework, no highway, no riverbed, upon which the Water of Life could flow and inundate and flood. EVERY THING -- and that takes in quite a lot -- that humanity has experienced, known, been tempted with -- Jesus experienced. And in experiencing EVERYTHING ALL of humanity experiences, He walked as the Spirit walked, did the Father's will, because the pull outward "out" of God's kingdom became instead for Him a springboard into the ever present Life of the Father within Him.)

Do we understand the nature of temptation? That temptation, which means an almost hypnotic pull towards something, something which attract the fulness of our attention, that that temptation, being drawn out like that, is NOT sin? This is important. Temptation is NOT sin.

The Lamb of God experienced every temptation possible to humanity, and did not sin. He was kept by the Spirit.

As are we.

I cannot say if this lady would ever be delivered from the "feelings" of thinking people were unthankful or unkind when she has been helpful to them.

But I can say that you can believe for her that she will know that she is Christ living in her human form, as her very self portrayed in the world, and that even if she does feel and even express feelings and thoughts such as you have mentioned above, that she would know that Christ lives in her perfectly and overcomes every temptation to believe other than the fact that "what the Father does, I do." That she would know in her wonderful Christian "beliefs" that she is Christ living, not by any law or rote learning of principles or ways to act or proper attitudes to have, but by raw naked belief in the Life of God perfect in the present moment accomplished by His Spirit and seen by eyes that see.