Seminar Faith:Third result of the Foundation of Faith: Love relationship with others
- This is section 8 of the Seminar Faith. Comments or questions are appreciated. You can also write to John Eagles.
Love for God comes before love for man... Love for man is part of God's plan... By restoring our faith we come back to union... With God and man in holy communion... Faith wants to be expressed... This is how we're all being blessed...
Third result of the Foundation of Faith: Love relationship with others
It is sometimes thought that to make a foundation of faith is to be centered on God, therefore has little or nothing to do with relating to other people. It is thought that we can sometimes spend time for God, but sometimes we need to invest in our horizontal relationships. It is suspected that people who are crazy for God are somewhat strange and isolated people, not really social and not really capable of building something up in the world.
Nothing could and should be less true.
Because, when we work on improving our relationship with God, in a real way, not just with an imaginary god, then what will God inspire us to do? Who has the most love for all people? Isn't that God? So if we come closer to God, would God not give us more desire to love other people?
The foundation of faith is also the foundation to love other people. It is the foundation to gain God's view on people. To gain God's view on people is to reverse a fallen nature that resulted from the fall, he fallen nature to fail to have God's viewpoint on people.
If we succeed in making a foundation of faith, we gradually come to feel more of God's heart. We can feel it when God loves people. We can feel it when God is sad about people. We can inherit some of God's thoughts about certain people.
The Foundation of Faith and restoration of human relations
The foundation of faith is the foundation for inheriting God's love for people. However, it is only the foundation. We still need to invest in a good relationship with people. We need to learn to love people by giving to them, caring for them, taking responsibility for them. This investing in good relationships with people is a never-ending task.
In a later section of this seminar we shall research more about the meaning of the Foundation of Faith with respect to restoration of ourselves and the world. Here is given a short introduction.
The Foundation of Faith is the first stage of restoring ourselves to our original condition. The second and following stage is called The Foundation of Substance. Foundation of Substance means to make substantial that what was built up in the Foundation of Faith.
Good faith can express in many ways. Always faith needs to be expressed. Faith cannot be something that is kept only in our hearts. Faith in God needs expression, because faith in God means to come closer to God, and when we come closer to God, we shall wish to express God's desires.
God's desires are for the world of nature, the beings and things of creation, that they fulfill the original purpose to become part of God's ideal world. To substantiate our faith can mean that God asks us to cultivate a piece of land, or to build a nice house, to compose a nice song or to do anything that makes our world better. Our faith is substantiated in this way.
Most of all, substantiation of our faith means to express the love of God to other people. Each of us can be a central figure of faith, and once we are a central figure of faith at a certain stage, we become the central figure of the Foundation of Substance. This simply means that once we acquired some faith in the good God, we naturally are going to express this to other people. We make substantial the love that is in our heart.
In relating to other people, we meet new challenges. Sometimes other people don't share our faith in God. When we relate to such people, our own faith may be tested and challenged. The Foundation of Faith (our love for God) and the Foundation of Substance (our love for people) have a relationship of interdependency. The Foundation of Faith is the source and inspiration. The Foundation of Substance gives the confirmation and the feedback. Growth of these two always goes together. They mutually benefit each other, and they can challenge each other.
The person who goes in front in having faith in God will want to share his faith and express his inspirations. The person who receives may be inspired, but also may be resistant or even rebellious. Faith in God can overcome all that, but sometimes only after long periods of struggling and persistent serving of the other person.
When love is not accepted...
Sometimes the person who first made a Foundation of Faith is rejected by other people. The love expressed is not accepted. It means that the Foundation of Substance has not been made. What consequences can this have for the Foundation of Faith?
In many cases this can mean that this Foundation of Faith has to be rebuilt. A Foundation of Faith is never just an individual matter. The Foundation of Faith of a person was always initiated by God, not by the human being. The human being who makes the foundation of faith responds to God. God's aim in asking a person to build up faith is not only to save that individual, but also to help others to increase their love for God. When this goal cannot be fulfilled, a new Foundation of Faith must be made. It is possible that new people must be found for making a Foundation of Substance.
In common language this means that such a central figure of faith who was rejected will need to go through renewed struggles and temptations, must revitalize his or her determination and find new ways and direction to express God's love to people.
Assignments
- Assignments are optional tasks that may help you to get a deeper grasp of the topic of this section of the seminar.
- Try to find parallels between life situations of two known central figures, for example Jesus and John the Baptist, or Jacob and Esau, with life situations of yourself and a person to whom you were responsible to pass on your foundation of faith.
Further reading
- Other articles on ERW that are related to the content of this section of the seminar.
What you should remember
- The foundation of faith is also the foundation to love other people. It is the foundation to gain God's view on people.
- The Foundation of Faith is the first stage of restoring ourselves to our original condition. The second and following stage is called The Foundation of Substance. Foundation of Substance means to make substantial that what was built up in the Foundation of Faith.
- The Foundation of Faith (our love for God) and the Foundation of Substance (our love for people) have a relationship of interdependency. The Foundation of Faith is the source and inspiration. The Foundation of Substance gives the confirmation and the feedback.
- The Foundation of Faith of a person was always initiated by God, not by the human being.
- A central figure of faith who was rejected will need to go through renewed struggles and temptations, must revitalize his or her determination and find new ways and direction to express God's love to people.
Back
- Seminar Faith to go to the other sections of this seminar.
- Seminar Faith:Second result of the Foundation of Faith: Receiving God's Word to go to the former section of this seminar.
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