THE CHART MENTALITY

Talk to any teacher and they'll tell you of a common frustration. Let's call it, "The Chart Mentality." The teacher gives the student a chart for the scholar to memorize. The student does due diligence and commits it to memory, dead solid perfect. It's locked in his brain. That's all well and good. But there's a problem; he doesn't know what do with it. To say it another way, he doesn't know how to apply the chart to a given situation. To him the chart, meant to be applied, isn't applied and the chart is a chart is a chart. Although he's memorized the chart, he can't connect the dots and use it in any practical way. He "knows" the chart, but he doesn't understand it. Frustrating!

To memorize the teacher's chart is a good thing, but if it doesn't go anywhere from there, it's useless. It just lies there, stored away in the vault of the student's mind, only to be reproduced in chart form for a test, should the need arise. That's harmful, but when it comes to the Bible, that's downright dangerous.

MOTHER AND CHILD

How so? Let's think about it.

What's the most memorized, most loved, and most quoted verse in the Bible? "Of course," you say, "John 3:16 is the answer to that question," and you'd be right as rain.

Two weeks ago, a little girl quoted that verse to me. She was right-on; dead solid perfect in her recitation. Her mother listened and nodded her familial approval, proud as punch. Both knew the verse. It was in the vault.

 ". . . whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." That's what the last part of the verse says and they knew it.

When I asked them how they knew God is going to let them into heaven, the mother cited (1) her baptism, (2) her personal goodness, and (3) she was raising her kids to be like Christ.

SOMEHOW, SHE SAW THE INVISIBLE INK

Wait a minute. Hold the phone. I don't see those three things mentioned in John 3:16. I see "believe," but not baptism, not being a good person, not raising kids for Christ. They aren't there, but she "saw" them. Why did she mention those three? Why didn't she respond with, "whoever believes in Him" as the answer to my question?

She didn't because she has a chart mentality and she's raising her daughter to have the same. She's not alone. She's legion and that legion is all over the place in our churches. John 3:16 is her "chart," but that chart never came into play when I asked, "Why should God let you into heaven?" She didn't connect the two dots, the chart (Jn. 3:16) and the question, to see that the reason is because of faith alone in Christ alone.

When I underlined the word, "believe" in the verse for them, then the "aha" moment came. The mother connected the dots; she applied the chart.

FLIP SIDE

However, for some, when we connect the dots for them, the "aha" moment is the reverse; the person sees what the chart is telling him, then, instead of saying, "Aha, yes, I see that now," he gets upset. The truth is there, right in front of his eyes as he looks upon the underlined word, "believe," but he bows his neck and goes on the defensive with statements like, "It can't be that easy," "There just has to be more," or "My mother (or pastor, grandparents, father) don't/didn't believe this." (So? Just because somebody didn't/doesn't believe Neil Armstrong went to the moon doesn't make mean that he never walked on the moon.) Instead of becoming noble Bereans and searching the Scriptures with a dot-connecting pen, they refuse to connect the dots leading to the gates of heaven through faith alone.

THERE WAS THIS GUY

There was this fellow I know who was studying for the ministry. In his studies, he read and he heard, "Christ died for our sins." That saying became embedded in his brain and he could easily have quoted it if you shook him awake at 3 AM. Those words were his chart. But, and he'll tell you this, although he could quote it, he wasn't saved.

What? Why not? He wasn't saved because he didn't know, understand, and believe that Christ died for his sins. He had no idea that He needed Christ to die for his sins or he was doomed. He had no idea that he needed to place his faith in Christ alone apart from works. Today, he's a believer, but back in the day when he was studying for the priesthood, he wasn't. (He stopped cold turkey and got out of Roman Catholicism.)

Don't get me wrong, a chart is a good thing, if it leads to application. I got through 8th grade math because I memorized three charts having to do with percentages and the finding of such. (Don't ask me what they were, they're long gone from the vault. Thieves called "Years" broke in and stole them.) For that 8th grade math, all I had to do was to memorize the charts and then apply them to real-life percentage problems and I was home free. Honor roll, here I come!

My point is not that I was hot stuff in math; I wasn't--everything cratered in the 9th grade when I ran into that grief-dealing behemoth called algebra. How I hated, loathed, and despised that monster! I only succeed in the 8th grade because I understood how to apply the charts. I could connect the dots with a vengeance. I never could connect algebra with anything, chart or no chart.

WHAT CAN WE DO?

Instead of letting the conversation degenerate into a "he-says-this-then-I-say-that" (which is witnessing by a chart mentality) do what Jesus did--inundate the person with questions. "What does John 3:16 say?" "What's this word in the sentence?" "Does John 3:16 advise baptism, raising children to be like Christ, or personal achievement?" "In what sense is it easy to trust Someone you've never seen, Someone no one living has ever seen, for everlasting life?" "Why do you think the New Testament conditions salvation on faith alone 150 times if there are works involved?" "Could the thief on the cross have done enough good to overcome all his sins in the time he was hanging on the cross?""How much good do you have to do?" "How long do you have to be good--all your life?" "Since you've learned that raising kids for Christ is the way to heaven, don't you think we ought to go right now and start telling everybody what you've discovered about how to get to heaven?"

What is all this? It's Acts 18:19 in action: "They came to Ephesus, and he left them there. Now he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews." It's like Christ on the Emmaus Highway, reasoning with those two men from the Scriptures.

AND WHAT ABOUT DISCIPLESHIP?

Discipleship isn't by a chart, either. The same holds true--there is the dialoguing and reasoning through the Scriptures, there is the real-life demonstration of serving Christ to real life situations. The Christ-like life isn't lived by an outline, yet so much of Christian education is filling out an outline with three points all beginning with the letter, "B," closing the Bible, and going home. There's no such thing as chart mentality discipleship. So much instruction in our churches is chart mentality instruction. When it's all said and done, the just lies there on the page in a notebook.

There's the chart and there's life, and never the twain shall meet. The chart killeth; the Spirit giveth life.