{"id":110,"date":"2012-05-24T08:32:22","date_gmt":"2012-05-24T08:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/meditations.kafkasworld.com\/dir\/?p=110"},"modified":"2012-05-24T08:32:22","modified_gmt":"2012-05-24T08:32:22","slug":"we-are-beggars-this-is-true","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/05\/24\/we-are-beggars-this-is-true\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWe Are Beggars, This is True\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
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\u201cWe Are Beggars, This is True\u201d
\nCopyright 2011 by Shea Oakley
\nAll rights reserved<\/p>\n

In a society marked by more personal wealth, more personal power and more options for self-expression then any other in human history we have almost forgotten that the possession of all three of these things does not solve the basic human dilemma. In the 21st Century West the mantra of our entire culture is \u201cif you can dream it, you can do it\u201d. We have collectively bought into the lie that we are somehow largely masters of our own destiny. The guru\u2019s of self-esteem and self-actualization have deified \u201chuman potential\u201d. We have made idols of the prerogatives we have as members of a materially rich, socially mobile and personally \u201cempowered\u201d society. In doing so most of us in North America and Europe have collectively forgotten what so many previous generations deeply understood, that human life is precarious, short and anything but inherently independent. We have forgotten our mortality, our inborn limitations and our status as a fallen race alienated from the only One who can save us from ourselves. We have also forgotten that our very lives, both physical and spiritual depend on the moment to moment mercy of a transcendent and holy God.<\/p>\n

The general exceptions to this thoroughly human-centered worldview amongst the denizens of the First World are those who have either acquired everything this world has to offer and then lost it or those who have acquired everything this world has to offer and found it meaningless. These are the people who have hit rock bottom and come to realize that we are not the masters of the universe. Rather they are what Martin Luther told us we all are six hundred years ago when he commented that, when it comes to fallen humanity, \u201cWe are beggars, this is true\u201d.<\/p>\n

The problem today is the illusion of self-empowerment. We\u2019ve gotten so used to our age\u2019s technical mastery of much of nature that we have begun to think that mastery extends to ourselves and our individual destinies in some kind of personally omnipotent way. Apparently the reality that the grave awaits us all has become something to deny rather than reckon with (one of the few places that I see an exception to this are those bumper stickers that remind us that no matter how much we exercise we still die.) We also deny that our very power to keep ourselves alive, much less \u201cself-actualize\u201d ourselves, comes not from us, or our will, or our ability, or anything else intrinsic to us. We are entirely without personal power that is not borrowed, through common grace, from the Lord of the Universe and we do not deserve even that. When it comes to facing the Provider of all good things, a Provider that we are all born in collective rebellion against, we truly are the beggars Luther speaks of.<\/p>\n

It is just that most of us don\u2019t know it and don\u2019t care to know it. That is why all the goal-oriented, self-possessed, positive thinking achievers in this culture are, apart from eventual surrender to God\u2019s program of redemption, on their way to the utter loss and futility of a Christ-less eternity.<\/p>\n

I suspect the only way this would reverse itself on a societal scale would be some kind of economic and political catastrophe, the kind of catastrophe that would remove from us all the things in life that we for some reason believe are our birthrights as rich Westerners. Take away all the structures of wealth and political stability that give us the illusion of personal power and we\u2019ll see how long the \u201cif we can dream it, we can do it\u201d philosophy of life continues. Not for long, I\u2019d wager.<\/p>\n

The chimera of the self-made man or woman is just that, a chimera, a fantasy, a self-delusion. Yet this idea permeates the Post-Modern culture of our day and is constantly being pounded home to us by the popular media. It is in a sense the majority religion of our age but it is a bad religion and one that will not survive the ongoing moral decline (to be followed, quite likely, by the economic and political decline) of the Western world. If the Lord\u2019s return isn\u2019t immanent, and civilization of any kind endures, future historians will look back on our contemporary idea of \u201cpersonal empowerment\u201d and \u201chuman potential\u201d as one of the greater follies of history.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

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\u201cWe Are Beggars, This is True\u201d Copyright 2011 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved In a society marked by more personal wealth, more personal power and more options for self-expression then any other in human history we have almost forgotten that the possession of all three of these things does not solve the basic human… <\/p>\n

Read more \u201cWe Are Beggars, This is True\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-christian","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6GkOA-1M","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":639,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2015\/03\/25\/a-deeper-kind-of-love\/","url_meta":{"origin":110,"position":0},"title":"A Deeper Kind of Love","date":"March 25, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2015 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved To love God out of desire rather than necessity is one of the greatest goals of the Christian life. We tend to love Him because of what He can do for us rather than for who He is. It is no doubt\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1436,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/08\/one-view-on-the-spiritual-gifts\/","url_meta":{"origin":110,"position":1},"title":"One View on the Spiritual Gifts","date":"June 8, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"by Shea Oakley Copyright 2022 All rights reserved\u201cNow eagerly desire the greater gifts.\u201d 1 Corinthians 12:31 (NIV)During my many years as a Christ-follower I\u2019ve come to believe it is a good thing for believers to \u201ceagerly desire\u201d and accept all the gifting's God may desire to specifically impart to individual\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":522,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2014\/05\/30\/the-myth-of-theocracy-in-america\/","url_meta":{"origin":110,"position":2},"title":"The Myth of Christian Theocracy in America","date":"May 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved In recent year Secularists have gotten a lot of mileage in the media out of warning of the threat to the United States of a home grown Christian version of Islamic theocracy. This would \u00a0be perpetrated against the nation by those who are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1489,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2023\/07\/05\/when-humanism-turns-lethal\/","url_meta":{"origin":110,"position":3},"title":"When Humanism Turns Lethal","date":"July 5, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2018,2023 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved In my view a \u201cHumanism\u201d that is not based on belief in absolute truth, and a reverence for human life which derives from that truth, will eventually become murderous towards those who oppose it. Such Humanism will finally become as inhuman as\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":46,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/23\/the-myth-of-control\/","url_meta":{"origin":110,"position":4},"title":"The Myth of Control","date":"April 23, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 The Myth of Control Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved \u00a0 The term \u201ccontrol freak\u201d entered our contemporary vocabulary at some point during the late Twentieth Century. 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The human\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}