Integrity in a Whole Life
One must especially be honest with themselves and when they find the courage to make a choice, no matter how small, they must be particular about how they incorporate that choice into their life.
If one commits to a thing, one should follow through with the thing. One should also commit to not doing a different thing that would contradict or discourage the doing of the thing that one had initially committed to. Integrity is more than just the affirmative; it is also about the negative.
This is where the idea of the near occasion of sin becomes important. If I have honestly resolved to avoid a particular sin, then I must also be honest about the things which make that sin more likely. It is not enough to say that I will not commit the sin. I must also be willing to avoid the circumstances, habits, places, or occasions which I know tend to lead me toward it. If I knowingly place myself in the near occasion of sin, I have begun to contradict the very choice I claimed to have made.
I think this is what Christ means when he says: But let your speech be yea, yea: no, no: and that which is over and above these, is of evil.
It means living with wholistic intention. It means not splitting from the whole truth even in the small and secret places of your life. To live one's life fully integrated with truth and consistency is to live one's life in communion with the divine.
God is everything but a contradiction. His attributes may at times seem contradictory to the simple and human mind, but in reality he is not. He is Good, therefore he cannot be evil. He is Love and therefore he cannot be hate. He is omnipresent, therefore he cannot not be present. His will is set on these positive attributes and they cannot be moved.
God would not change.
God would, however, choose to limit himself. Here, perhaps, we have found an interesting exception. God, being omnipresent and all powerful, in the person of Jesus Christ, limits his omnipresence and his power. He endures the shackles of mortality and yet those shackles cannot truly hold Him. They are shackles only as long as he allows them to be. He is limited only as long as he wills Himself to be. At the same time, He is still divine. He is still constantly willing all of creation into existence.
The comedy of Moses' exchange with God about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in the book of Genesis is that God's mind, by definition, cannot be changed. His will is for Goodness and Truth and he is all knowing, so he cannot be forsaken. Moses is daring enough and foolish enough to think of debating God. He presents God with knowledge as if God had not already known it. He insists upon convincing God of what is truly God, as if God did not already know. I guess this story may be teaching us something about God's will for His people to bring petitions to him, but I think that is besides the point.
God knew what was true, good, and beautiful. God always knows and he always will.
He presents himself as potentially changing because that's what we are used to. Because everyone we encounter, including ourselves, is constantly changing, we struggle to understand the one who doesn't change. We struggle to understand the complexities of His will without artificially applying change to them.
All of this is to say that God doesn't change. We often do. But, if we are to pursue God we ought to try and change less. If we are oriented away from God, we ought to change, but if we choose something that is neither particularly good nor evil, we ought to commit to it in all aspects that the choice requires because in this continued commitment we may find ourselves changing in a different way. We may actually find ourselves slowly becoming more like our divine model. We may become more and more oriented towards God.
The hand of Providence brought me in my drifting to the very doors of the British Linen Company’s bank. (Stevenson, Kidnapped)
