"Theory and Practice"
“Wherefore lay aside all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness, the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.”
—James 1:21
I took a course my senior year at Graceland called “The Theory and Practice of Counseling.” Jim Clauson taught the class and in it we explored many different theoretical approaches to counseling. Freud’s psychoanalysis, gestalt, reality therapy, Rogerian methods, existential, and others that I cannot remember we dug into. For our final exam we drew from a hat one of the theories of counseling that we covered during the semester, and we then had to “counsel” a classmate who was given a fictional situation that we needed to uncover and address utilizing the method we had drawn. To demonstrate our understanding, we had to put theory into practice. What was in our heads had to be played out in our actions.
While I have long forgotten the intricacies of the various counseling theories, I’ve oft remembered the difficulty of putting what we had learned into practice. Our walk in the straight and narrow path is very similar. We love to learn. We enjoy our time in Church or in our own personal studies and devotions uncovering all the intricate details of God’s word. But for too many, God’s word fails to make it from the head to the heart and from the heart to the hands. James saw this in the early church, and he counseled them to “be doers of the word, and not hearers only.” (James 1:22)
In our day, A. W. Tozer puts this difficulty into even more vivid detail when he writes in his book “The Root of Righteousness” --
“So wide is the gulf that separates theory from practice in the church that an inquiring stranger who chances upon both would scarcely dream that there was any relation between them. An intelligent observer of our human scene who heard the Sunday morning sermon and later watched the Sunday afternoon conduct of those who had heard it would conclude that he has been examining two distinct and contrary religions.
“It appears that too many Christians want to enjoy the thrill of feeling right but are not willing to endure the inconvenience of being right. So the divorce between theory and practice becomes permanent in fact, though in word the union is declared to be eternal. Truth sits forsaken and grieves till her professed followers come home for a brief visit, but she sees them depart again when the bills become due.”
I took Mr. Clauson’s class as pass/fail. That is, I was just an auditor. I was interested in the material but did not view it as essential to my chosen career. So, I was an interested but casual listener with no real intention of doing or putting into practice what I learned. To this day I never have practiced what I learned so the knowledge I acquired is now long lost and forgotten.
God has given us His word. We find it in three books of scripture, and we find it in the word that was made flesh, even Jesus our Savior. Our scriptures, the written word of God, are not textbooks of facts, information, rules, arguments, and logical propositions to satisfy our intellectual curiosity. They are given to us by God to be so much more and yet our tendency is to just listen or read with interest in what they say than in seeing them as truly essential for our walk in this life. Even what should transform our life. And since what we learned is often not put into practice, we find it difficult to remember what we once knew.
God knew that we would struggle with just words on a page. He gave a codified and written law to former day Israel to help them see their iniquitous ways. And while it clearly exposed their sin it could not save them from its penalty of death because they too were more hearers than doers. Jesus exposed their condition when he said to them, “O ye hypocrites! well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draw nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoreth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.” (Matthew 15:7) There needed to be a new and better way. If mankind could not effectively plant God’s word in their hearts, then God had to take the initiative to do so.
But since God’s word will not return to Him void and as they go forth from His mouth they must be fulfilled, (Genesis 3:30) He first had to do what was necessary for every jot and tittle in what He had already given to be fulfilled. He did this by sending His son, the word made flesh, into the world to pay once and for all the penalty of the law that mankind could not keep. Jesus took our nature, and He also took our place and by so doing, fulfilled the law on our behalf. Jesus told the Nephites, “verily I say unto you, One jot nor one tittle hath not passed away from the law, but in me it hath all been fulfilled.” (3 Nephi 5:65)
The fulfillment of the law made it possible for a new covenant to be established with Israel. “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people.” (Hebrews 8:10) Jesus’ death made it possible for God’s word to be implanted or engrafted into our hearts and James makes it clear that where the former law failed this engrafting could save our souls.
Through this new covenant, established by the baptism of water and spirit, the very mind of God, His Holy Spirit, is engrafted into our hearts. When resident there, the Holy Spirit will make all that God has said in His word come alive in us because we will have a different heart than before and a different nature than before. Jesus told his disciples that “the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost , whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.” (John 14:26)
God’s presence in our lives is what is necessary for us to turn theory into practice, but we must lay aside our filthiness including our own brand of righteousness and receive Him with meekness. We must submit our wills to His will. We must yield to “the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man, and becometh a saint, through the atonement of Christ, the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love.” (Mosiah 1:120) In so doing we will walk in a newness of life. Doing what He asks of us will come naturally
A new year has dawned. It is always a time for reflection and resolve. Let us resolve to walk in the light as He is in the light and find our hearts made truly His.