Rediscovering Y

This week I've been thinking a lot about 'why'. When you work in I.T it's really easy to let go of 'why' and to start concentrating on 'how'. 'How' puts food food on the table much faster than 'why'. If you are a programmer, 'how' parades itself around in the form of the boss that goes: "x and y did that in two weeks so I expect it to get done in one... Just copy what they did". If you dream of becoming a hacker he tells you that producing the next cool app fastest wins all the accolades - regardless of the fact that accolades is never a good reason to chase anything.

'how' is to life what subsistent farming is to a full time farmer - it will only get you so far. And 'so far' isn't where the man upstairs intended when he knelt in the mud that day, 6,000-ish years ago.

So, I've been thinking. Funny thing about thinking is that if you are very good at 'how' your first inclination would be to see 'why' other attempts are wrong and that lures you, falsely, into thinking that you've experienced a 'why' paradigm shift. The reality, though, is that you know one way (or more) of doing stuff well and you've assumed that, off the bat, yours is the best - you are still chasing the 'how' instead of the 'why'. Now, this isn't to say that sometimes the 'how' that you know isn't really the best way to get the job done. The point here is that understanding the 'why' gives you more just the opportunity to apply a random 'how'. The 'why' helps humble you and expands your understanding of the intricacy of the 'how' so that you then know how to apply it better - kinda like 'why' is the proper way to understand the 'how' and not the other way around.

Ok, I'm tired of putting quotes around 'why' and 'how'...

This morning I was listening to an old VOP podcast (a cheap replacement for actually studying my bible) and the presenters mentioned how James and John said they were willing to drink the cup even without understanding what the cup entailed. The thought that struck me then was that 'life and death is in the power of the tongue'. The other text that crossed my mind was the centurion telling Jesus to just say the word and it would be done. The centurion further explained that he was a captain of a company too and he could tell a soldier to go or come and his command would be carried out. Paul says faith says those things that aren't as though they were.

It wasn't the point of the podcast, but I had a rough night yesterday, and it seemed to me like God was saying to me, this morning, you can say it and it would come to pass if you believe. The concept is so simple it's feels like a lie but the reality is 'in Jesus name' (we'll have to talk about in Jesus' name maybe next week) all things are possible.

I love Fridays. Especially because the following day is the Sabbath. One of these days I'll fully understand the 'why' of it so that the 'how' of keeping it holy would become clearer.