In light of all this, the path toward strengthening our love is related to honestly acknowledging our sinfulness in the light of God’s goodness, most clearly seen in the sin-bearing suffering of Jesus. Paul once wrote, “where sin increased, grace increased all the more,” and so it is that through the course of our life when, upon various occasions, we see how deeply sin has marked us, it is then that we can come to a fuller understanding of how deeply God graciously covers us. When it becomes clear to us that despite our sinfulness, God has offered his Son, so that we might unconditionally receive his blessing, we become like the woman who anointed Jesus’ feet with oil and cleansed them with her tears. As Jesus said, “he who has been forgiven little loves little,” and likewise, he who has been forgiven much loves much.

The reason our souls are beyond our direct agency is that God structured us to intimately function in him. It was God’s design to have his divine life operate in the depths of our being and in this context to become most fully human. Who we are is bound up in who God is, and given who God is, and the nature of our relationship to him, it should come as no surprise that understanding humanity, both collectively and individually, proves to be such a riddle. Since our being is intimately woven into God’s existence, there is no comprehensive understanding of humanity apart from God’s revelation of himself, a revelation embodied in the person of Jesus Christ, and made accessible by the operation of God’s Spirit.

In relation to all this, there is a critical tension that must be acknowledged in our pursuit of a greater self, or spiritual development. On the one hand we are hired-wired to develop, to seek higher levels of being, and on the other hand this pursuit tends to exacerbate the chief problem of the human condition: a pride that negates trusting in God. Often our pursuit to become more is both intentionally and unwittingly enacted on our own terms. Such a pursuit becomes a recapitulation of the original fall, which was driven by a desire to be like God, without having to trust God, a trust that manifests itself by a willingness to submit to God’s restrictions even when they don’t make sense. As I see it, rushing ahead of the God ordained process is like placing a six- year-old into a jet plane, firing up the engine and saying, “have at it.” Yes, that six-year-old may well have the capacity to become an outstanding pilot, but in his current state he (or she) neither has the mental nor physical development to undertand or properly operate the machine whose power he wields. To prematurely give this child access to such power will inevitably lead to destruction.

In saying all this, I realize I raise the question of what a critical submission looks like, and I have to say that I honestly don’t know. Off hand, I would say that it doesn’t mean we are free dismiss the person or rebel against a person in authority when we disagree with them, because that would effectively be no submission at all. However, I imagine that there are ways to resist or provide a living critique without undermining the basic authority structure.