Though I have been speaking figuratively, a time is coming when I will no longer use this kind of language but will tell you plainly about My Father.- John 16:25

January 30, 2008 Floyd Ray Gage

Why did Jesus have to speak figuratively when He came? Why couldn’t He have just spoken plainly to His disciples? We know why He spoke in parable to the crowds, because He said that it was so many would not understand what He was saying. Only those who had a heart to understand would do so. Even when Jesus was with the disciples, there were times that He spoke in parables and in veiled language. Why was this?

The same is true of us today in that there are times that Christ cannot tell us something straight out. He has to go through other means to get us to the place that He can speak plainly to us. We get frustrated at times by this and that is why it is important to understand why He is doing this.

One reason is that we may not be ready for the information that He needs to share with us. If you have ever tried to explain certain issues to a child, you know what I am talking about. The child cannot absorb certain truths if they are plainly spoken. He or she may not have the knowledge base to do so. The child may not understand certain terminology or concepts and so you have to put the explanation in language that the child can understand.

The child may not have the maturity level to grasp what you are saying even if he or she has some knowledge of the concept. The child might react in a manner that hinders understanding if you try and explain the concept to them in a straight forward, unfiltered way. You therefore help the child understand by finding the right approach. You usually have to relate it to their experience. Sometimes you have to share it with them in stages, monitoring how much of the concept they can deal with at their stage of maturity.

I am sure you can see many analogies here to the way our Lord must deal with us. We are not ready many times to deal with certain spiritual truths. The Lord then must use terminology and situations that we understand. He must also give us small doses of the truth at time so that we are not overloaded with the totality of the concept that He is trying to teach us.

There are times that we get frustrated and want to scream at the Lord to just show us what He wants (or maybe we have done some screaming at Him). We must understand that God loves us and cares for us. He knows what we can handle better than we know. We must accept that His timing is not only best for His plan it is best for us and our development as well.

Another less benign reason that God must help us understand spiritual truth in a round about way is that we may be resisting the truth. We may understand it and be able to grasp it, but we may not like it and therefore we try to resist what He is trying to do. Those who deal with others in a counseling situation have to deal with this at times. You are counseling others and they know the truth about themselves or about some situation or other person, but they are not willing to accept the truth at this time.

In this instance, the only way to get the truth into their hearts is to get them concentrating on something else and let them ease at the truth from a different angle. God may do this to us as well. God may be taking us down paths that may not seem to relate to the truths He has been trying to teach us. As we have resisted, God has changed the game plan and is approaching the truth with us from a different angle. Trust Him!