This helps clear up a lot of my ambiguity about using ‘love’ as the primary word for divinity. ‘Withness’ shifts love from the too-fraught emotion to a greater built-in truth of reality.
I’m curious whether you identify ‘not-withness’ behaviors/actions as sin, and if so, whether the remedy is only in Jesus or also in our own corrective ‘withness’ incarnations.
Good question… Yes, I think there’s room to talk about sin, as long as we don’t load it down with all the pre-suppositional baggage, (which I’m sure you are well aware of how all that can go.)
And yes, in this context, sin would be a type of anti-withness… a type of rejection / refusal to live in right relationship with love and with others.
Seen in this way, Jesus does help me. As I emulate his life, I’m invited lay aside my anti-–withness ways … maybe better yet, to transcend and include them, such that their discordant vibrations don’t overtake my life.
I’m trying to figure out ways not to fight that part of myself, per se, but to accept it, confess it, and then let it fall by the wayside. Something like that? 🤔
Wow… I could not love it more. Thank you for sharing this.
God: Withness-ing Love.
Wonderful post. Thanks!
This helps clear up a lot of my ambiguity about using ‘love’ as the primary word for divinity. ‘Withness’ shifts love from the too-fraught emotion to a greater built-in truth of reality.
I’m curious whether you identify ‘not-withness’ behaviors/actions as sin, and if so, whether the remedy is only in Jesus or also in our own corrective ‘withness’ incarnations.
Good question… Yes, I think there’s room to talk about sin, as long as we don’t load it down with all the pre-suppositional baggage, (which I’m sure you are well aware of how all that can go.)
And yes, in this context, sin would be a type of anti-withness… a type of rejection / refusal to live in right relationship with love and with others.
Seen in this way, Jesus does help me. As I emulate his life, I’m invited lay aside my anti-–withness ways … maybe better yet, to transcend and include them, such that their discordant vibrations don’t overtake my life.
I’m trying to figure out ways not to fight that part of myself, per se, but to accept it, confess it, and then let it fall by the wayside. Something like that? 🤔
Withness is the best word for my Advent I’ve encountered in years. Thanks for the insight!
Great thoughts! Thanks Jonathan.