We Learn By Doing

Can we learn about life simply by reading, watching TV or movies?

No. You actually have to live it first. While I believe that many of the lessons that God wants to teach us can be found in the stories we hear, that isn’t the only way that God wants us to learn.

It is important to also go out and live life.

The movie Blast from the Past is essentially about a 35 year old man who is raised in a bomb shelter and the only thing he knows of the world is what his parents have taught him, what he has read in books and magazines (up to the 1960’s) and TV shows from the 1950’s. He’s never seen the sky and has never met another human other than his mom and dad. When he emerges into the late 1990’s Los Angeles, hilarity ensues when he does fit in with real life because what he learned never was real life.

We learn by doing. Many people have expressed this concept – from Aristotle to Freud to Admiral James T. Kirk. But it is more than just a philosophical, psychological or fantastical concept. It is also a biblical concept.

"Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me - put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." – St. Paul, recorded in Philippians 4:9 (emphasis added).
I’m a “movie” guy. I like to watch movies – all kinds of movies. That shows up in my preaching and teaching quite a bit.

But over the last couple of years, I’ve realized the importance of getting out of the house or the theater and actually living as God intended for me to live. I’ve hiked in Idaho, camped in the mountains and, this June, will be trying rock climbing in Joshua Tree National Park (www.truemen.org/mountains). Taking what I have learned about God from books and movies I try to put into practice out in the wild as well as in the wilds of suburbia.

What have I learned that I could put into practice?

To take a leap of faith. God wants me to trust Him. He wants me to trust Him in everything. Like in rock climbing. Trusting in a person that I can see cannot possible hold me up because I outweigh him by about 200 pounds. I can see that he can’t possible take care of me, save me from falling. Yet it isn’t true. It may look true but it really isn’t. Kind of like the movies. I can lean back on the rope and know that I’m in safe hands despite what my eyes see.

There are other things that I’ve learned that I can put into practice, but I’ll save those thoughts for a future devotion.

In the mean time, now that you’re at the end of this email, close it and turn off the computer and step out and live life following God’s leading.

©2008 True Men Ministries.