What Insight Do We Need? ...

Wednesday, Nov 14, 2012. Before we can talk about how to gain insight, we should determine what insight we need! Before you can plan a journey, you should know where you want to go. Otherwise it is very difficult to choose you vehicle, to take a car or public transport, to walk or to fly …

Insight into what? …

What do you want to know? What do you like to understand? What is it that you aim for? Do you have your personal goals? Do you have something, you would like to explore, something you would like to understand? Do you have questions you always wanted to be answered?

Often, we focus our attention to a limited framework in time and space. We know some people, we want to reach something with them. We think about the next day, or the next weeks … perhaps work towards some exam next year or towards a promotion. We do not think about something far away somewhere on this planet, or something which will come in some decades …

I always wanted to gain insight into physics, into the fundaments of our world, into the natural laws which guide our activities, into the theory of relativity and the quantum theory. That was years ago, when I was in school. So I chose to study physics and today, after many years, I have a reasonable understanding of these theories. I have the feeling that I got the main ideas, though you can continue to do research here and our understanding of nature is not complete.

Insight into God and the bible …

There is a second area I always wanted to get insight into. It is faith, it is God and the bible. I wanted to know what is behind religion. I wanted to know what is true about the texts of the bible. I wanted to gain insight into faith and what it is all about.

And step by step I explored various possibilities to gain insight here. I learned a lot in school, read modern philosophers and theologians, all the historical critical theories about the New Testament. For me, it is a positive thing to be critical - that just means to look carefully and try to find out, what is behind something. So I started my personal journey to explore faith … and found astonishing insight, exciting facts, a God who is so majestic and breathtaking, that it is difficult to express the feelings and insight I found.

I also found that it is not the study, which gives you insight, but that every human has access to the Lord in faith. It is faith, that opens the door. Faith is not just an act of your mind, but of your life. It means to open your life for him. It means to approach him and talk to him, ask him to show you who he is!

My insight into faith started with steps of faith. It started with prayer. I asked the Lord for insight, and he gave me what I asked for.

Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. (Romans 10: 13) and

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. (Matthew 7:7) (Roland Potthast) ... more texts