There was a boy that liked to play with a rubber ball. The ball was a gift to him when he was first born. His older brother taught him how to bounce the ball against a wall and catch it when it rebounded.
The boy absolutely loved the game and spent hour after hour learning where and at what angle and speed the ball would return to him.
One day his father noticed that the boy was no longer hurling the ball at the wall, but he was trying to throw it over the wall. The wall was too high and the boy did not possess enough strength to succeed. So his father sat him on his knee and explained this to him. He told him that although his older brother could throw the ball high enough to clear the wall he could not and that he should not feel bad about not having the strength to accomplish his goal.
So the boy resumed the game that he so loved and his father returned to the house.
Sometime later the boy began again to attempt to throw the ball over the wall. The boy’s father enjoyed watching him play and so he was aware the boy was trying to do something that he had been told was not possible. The father was a strict man and he considered scolding his son for not believing him, but more than strict he was a loving father and he admired the son for his burning desire to do the impossible.
If you did not understand this parable let me explain it to you.
The boy is a young Christian, the ball is the Word of God, the wall is the world, his older brother is Jesus, and of course the father is our Heavenly Father.
When we are first born spiritually we are given the Word to understand everything, but when we think we know something about it and we throw it at the world the world only bounces it back at us, because the world does not understand it nor does it want to. The harder we throw it the harder the rebound.
At some point we decide to throw it over the wall so the world will not be able to bounce it back, but that is not the plan of God and we are not strong enough. Jesus is strong enough to clear the wall and when he does some of the people of the world will try to understand and then God will grant understanding and they will be able to turn to Him and be saved.
Sometime in the near future God will throw the ball so hard it will destroy the world and that will put an end to the game, but I am sure that our Father has a new and better game for us.
God tells us to teach and gives some of us the ability to do so. Then he tells us not to call ourselves teachers, because we have one Teacher. What seems a dichotomy is not at all. It is something like teaching the Word and because we do we would call ourselves the Word (or word).
Man is always striving to be something we are not. We read Isaiah 64:6 and think our righteous acts have become clean because we have turned to God. It is true that we should attempt to be like God, but it is not possible. We are told not to sin, but we do and though we are told not to it is not possible.. We attempt to teach and though we try, and we should, it is not possible. God is not looking for success as man does; He is only looking at our desires that are in our hearts. If success were of the utmost importance He would give us the ability to succeed. He can throw the ball over the wall.I can not call myself any more than a student. I’m just throwing the ball against the wall.
There are some problems with my game. Sometimes I throw the ball and hit a brother in the back of the head because he was not looking. Then he becomes angry and heaves the ball at me instead of the wall. Then I sling it back at him, because I feel that he should have already understood and that he should not have been standing there in the first place. Then we all stop trying to understand the Word which is the game and instead of the word bouncing off the wall it begins to bounce off us!
I started this blog because I know iron does not sharpen iron. Most of my brothers have no experience sharpening tools and I thought they would be happy to learn truth, but they have acted like the world and bounced truth right back at me. They have assumed the role of our older brother and claim to be teachers when the Word specifically states not to do so. They think, and rightly so, that if iron can not sharpen iron then they can not teach and their sense of direction is being questioned. But everything should be questioned and even if we do not receive the answer that we want it doesn’t matter for we are saved anyway. We learned that by questioning God; that time we received the answer we wanted.
However I believe our Heavenly Father is happy with their attempts to teach the world about Him: even though it is not possible. The only thing I see wrong is their attempt to be called a teacher. I understand that to call myself teacher would be to rob Jesus of his glory and to rob Jesus is to rob God.
Now I hope that I didn’t hit anyone in the back of the head again? Should I stop playing because you aren’t looking? How could we learn anything if I only said what you wanted me too?
Can you overlook my inability to be gentle and play with me instead of against me? At least be Christian and forgive me for sounding like a teacher.
Posted by astudent