Monthly Archives: March 2016

Mar25

Myers-Briggs, Disciples, and Walking on Water

Posted on by
Standard

MBTI and Walking on Water VickiTalksPrayer.com

I’m a huge fan of the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory (if you’ve never taken this good personality inventory, try it). I am an INFJ, which Keirsey.com calls a *Counselor*.

Counselors, by God-given personality, read things. Books, for one. But mostly people, situations, organizations. INFJ’s read a situation and know at a gut level, what’s going to happen next. They tend to intuit people’s abilities and intentions, too (which makes us good therapists).

But like any good gift, there is a bifurcation. (I learned that fun word from C.S. Lewis. Essentially it means: For every good and perfect gift God puts in us, satan tries to come up with a negative reflection of that- almost an opposite but with a seed of the truth in it- to try to draw us away from the gift.)

For an INFJ, the bifurcation is: being right but being ignored and feeling devastated by the outcome.

Ok, so what the heck does that have to do with walking on water, one might ask? I was practicing my Lectio Divina today on Mark 6- the Jesus walking on water story. I asked myself: I wonder what was each of the disciples’ MBTI?

Then I imagined that if I was one of them, with my INFJ-ness, this would have been the scenario:

Setting: 

Long day feeding the 5000, listening to sermons, healing folks, whatnot…

Problem:

Jesus says to the disciples, “Hey, y’all get in the boat and head over to Gennesaret. I’ll send away the crowds, pray a bit and meet you shortly.”

INFJ-ness kicks in, I whisper to Jesus, because He might have forgotten, “Ummm, are you sure you want to head over to Gennesaret so soon? I mean to say, they asked us to leave last time because you healed the crazy guy by sending all his demons into all their pigs- who all promptly drowned themselves. Think we ought to give it a bit more time?….. AND BTW- You see there’s a storm brewing. Is it a good idea to be in a boat tonight?”

All true and useful observations.

I image that Jesus’ answer would probably been something along the lines of a longsuffering stare (like we parents give our kids) which means, “Quit arguing and get in the boat.”

AND being INFJ, if I was a disciple in the boat and the storm starts railing, I’d be saying to myself, “I told Him so. I’m not a valued member of the team. Why would He make me an INFJ if I wasn’t supposed to use it?”

AH! and then the moment of discernment. There are often 2 true but incongruent realities (if you want more on that, read Lewis’ Till We Have Faces). The earthly, tangible realm is full of storms. The spirit realm is more real, though, and it is full of walking on waters and going to Gennesarets. And whether my INFJ brain can comprehend it, the walking on waters and the going to Gennesarets are the points of it all- I don’t need to understand why.

The following of God’s lead. That’s the point. No matter what our MBTI is 🙂

Mar20

Scripture as Prayer

Posted on by
Standard
Scripture as Prayer

I was reading Mark 4 today. You remember Mark 4? Jesus tells a bunch of parables:

  • The sower (who sowed the word and the seed on good ground brought forth abundantly)
  • The light under a bushel (the one about being responsible for what you hear…)
  • The kingdom of God is like a man who sows a seed and while he waits, it grows
  • The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed (starts so small and becomes large enough for birds to nest)

Then Jesus fell asleep in the boat as he and his disciples crossed to the other side. The a whopper of a storm came and was swamping the boat. How terrifying!

The disciples woke Him up asking why he didn’t care that they were perishing.

Jesus calmly rebuked the wind and told the sea, “Peace, be still.” And it was so.

Then he asked them why it was that they were afraid and had so little faith?

What did the wind and the waves swamping the boat have to do with faith? Usually I will study a passage out. I love good hermeneutics with historical context, word study, scriptural context, etc. It seemed to me that today this passage was calling for more.

A passage like this has much to say at a spirit level, a heart level. Simple study won’t teach me why Jesus fussed at his fearful disciples just because they were about to drown. So I did a Lectio Divina (click here for one way to employ this Benedictine prayer practice).

Lectio Divina is a way to allow Scripture itself to become prayer. One prays as one reads, allowing the Holy Spirit to teach through the Word and at times, sanctified imagination. Often I find enlightenment or inspiration as I read prayerfully.

Today I began to understand that as I allow my heart to be good ground for the seed of God’s Word, that I can become fruitful by His work in me. His work causes natural spiritual growth. And when I am allowing God’s kingdom to grow in and through me, perhaps when the storms come, I will remain fruitful (or at least less fearful).

Of course, I have to give myself some grace. If the disciples who were right there in Jesus’ presence got fearful when their boat was swamping in a storm, I shouldn’t feel so bad when I panic or get out of sorts over my very real stressors. I visualize those disciples bailing out the boat, crying and arguing over whether or not to wake up Jesus and why the heck doesn’t He care what’s happening. I take comfort in watching (in my imagination) Him calming the storm…and though He was chiding them, giving them patient grace.

That’s a good way to pray through my own weaknesses and fears.In praying through that Mark 4 story with Lectio Divina, I was able to ask for grace more quickly myself when I just don’t seem to have enough faith.