The Fear of the Lord

Yesterday my team went to downtown Juarez and hung out in the plaza. Do you ever find yourself in a situation that makes you feel really small? It can happen in many different ways, to be sure. And it usually is a good thing . . .

Have you ever been stunned by how the world is bigger than you thought it was, or how the scope of people in it is vaster than you'd ever imagined?

Yeah, these are sentimentally-charged questions. But nonetheless, I felt these things yesterday. I felt small. Not insignificant, but just little, as though my mind was incapable of grasping everything it wanted to understand.

Being in a different culture can really open one's eyes to the variety that exists, and has existed throughout history, in the way people view their world. I suppose I should say the world, since there has only been one world, and he who thinks that the world revolves around himself is in for a surprise.

So. There are many, many people in the world, and each has a worldview that corresponds with culture, family background, place in history, personal experiences, as well as personal identity. That's a lot of variety. A lot to examine and understand. And this variety can make us feel small.

And now you might think I'm going to tell you that we should examine and understand our differences. But I'm not.

Sometimes our minds stay at a surface-level understanding of things because we stay within our own worldviews (unconsciously done). We take for granted the way we look at the world because it comes naturally to us, and on that level, it's actually easier to perceive our differences than our similarities. We know who we are and how we think, and comparing this with others comes naturally. At the surface-level of things, our differences are quite obvious.

What I am saying is that I think people have infinitely more commonalities than differences. And this, due to our surface-level thinking, is what we have not fully understood. A proper worldview involves the truth of a bigger picture. It's deeper than what we see on the surface. And it makes me feel even smaller.

Now, sometimes when I write I get myself into a pickle trying to understand things that I don't have all the answers for. Which I'm sure nobody has ever done before.

Right now I'd like to be able to say, "And here is a list of all our commonalities!" I can't give a list. But what I can offer is this:

Proverbs 1:7

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge."

Or, as some translations of the Bible put it,

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."

And as I always encourage: let these words be not just an enigma, not just a time-old truth, not just a concept to behold. Concepts must be wrestled with, truth must be craved, and understanding must be built on apprehension, not assumption. Only then can truth actually begin to transform one's living.