WEDNESDAY'S WORD - OBSCURE - Sadell Bradley - 2/10/2021

 

WEDNESDAY'S WORD OBSCURE 2/10/2021 "The genius of any slave system is found in the dynamics which isolate slaves from each other, obscure the reality of a common condition, and make united rebellion against the common oppressor inconceivable." -Andrea Dworkin Join us Wednesday at 7pm for Part 2 I was reading about Church History prior to The Reformation and its obscurantism— the practice of deliberately preventing facts or full details of something from becoming known. I couldn't help but reflect upon how eerily similar the times are now. We seem to be in a never-ending quest to discern whether the information that meets our eyes and ears is true or 'fake news.' OBSCURE means not discovered or known about; uncertain; not clearly expressed or easily understood; hard to make out or define; vague; dim. As children, we are generally taught to trust: our parents and family, authorities, police, coaches, clergy, doctors, teachers, etc. Sadly, we've found many of those sources to have proven themselves unworthy of our confidence. To obscure as a verb means to keep from being seen; to conceal; to make unclear and difficult to understand. It is sometimes hard to conceptualize that leaders and agencies all around us might intentionally hide things, deliberately confuse us, or over-complicate issues to throw us off track...but obscurantism, even Christian obscurantism, is as real now as it was in then. CLARIFY & ILLUMINATE Clarify and illuminate are antonyms to the word obscure. Clarify means to make a statement or situation less confused and more clearly comprehensible; to make pure and clean. To illuminate is to make something visible by shining light on it. Ephesians 5 states that though we were once in darkness, we are now the light in the world. (vs. 8) Paul goes on to instruct us, "Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness; instead, expose them. It is shameful even to talk about the things that ungodly people do in secret. But their evil intentions will be exposed when the light shines on them, for the light makes everything visible." (vs. 11-14) Jesus reminded His disciples in Matthew 5:13-16, you are the salt (the preservative and flavoring) of the earth and the light of the world. Shine your light! John 1:4 says, that light of Christ— that the darkness cannot comprehend, nor overcome, nor extinguish, is meant to dispel the shadiness and clarify the murk we see in this world. BLOWING SMOKE Obscurants in military terms are devices used to hinder visibility. It is a warfare tactic, not unlike the ones that Satan employs on the people of God. One of the names for Satan is diabolos—one who separates people for no reason. If we know we have a common enemy, why are we always fighting each other? Certainly, the devil's obscurantism has divided our internal relationships in the Body of Christ, but he has a more stealthy purpose, "The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." (2 Cor. 4:4) Jesus taught us that in order to shine, we have to keep our eyes pure, and our bodies full of light so that the light that is in us is not darkness. (Luke 11:34-35) Let's be on guard against any obscurantism in His Church.