old myspace post # 2

Thursday, May 25, 2006

One dimensional fool in a 3D world some of you may recognize this lyric from a recent Ben Harper song. It was the perfect words to describe what I was feeling and thinking. It's the trap of being right. Objective, in a very subjective world. We all long to be validated, we all long to be accepted, we all long to be right. one dimensional fool in a three-dimensional world. one of the things I have been discovering about Jesus lately is that he was continually asked questions, questions he could have easily answered and spelled out, but instead he sort of dodged the question. He would give an answer, but it was never the answer the questioner was looking for. It's like Jesus was saying, "look, I know what you want, you want to own the correct answer in an easy form that you can share with others and cause them to stand before you in awe. I'm not going to give you that, but I will point you in the right direction." I used get to get pissed at this aspect of the gospels, for if Jesus is who he says he is, then he could written the message of salvation with the stars for all to see. But after rethinking this a little, I now greatly appreciate what Jesus was doing. He was pointing me in the right direction, allowing me to see it and then live towards it. To begin to position myself to receive it and all that it means for living. Jesus wanted us and them to live, to walk, and to love in the manner that was established in the beginning, when He created the world and said "it was good". An example comes from John 6 after Jesus feeds the 5000, the people follow him and he says, "look you are only following because I filled your bellies. You shouldn't just look for food that spoils, but look for the food that gives you eternal life that the Son of Man will give with God's blessing." So they ask, "well ok, what must we do that God requires." Jesus: "the work of God is this, Believe in the one He sent." So they say, "well prove it. Our forefathers ate manna, bread in the desert." So Jesus says, "well that wasn't moses who gave them that bread, it is God who gives the true bread from heaven that leads to eternal life." They say, "Give us this bread today and forever! We'll eat it, we will do whatever you want, just give us that bread! (I imagine they are getting pretty excited about taking a slice of this bread and eating it in a literal sense. they just say him turn a few loaves into many.) In typical Jesus fashion, he says, "Well I am the bread of life," This sort of angers them, and some start complaining, "look man, we know how you where born, how can you say you are the bread that came down from heaven" Jesus takes it one step further and says, "if you want eternal life then you have to eat my flesh and drink my blood." What just happened. They essentially ask, "What does God wants us to do, what must we do to inherit eternal life?" And Jesus answers, "eat my flesh and drink my blood" Jesus, in my opinion, is pointing them past being right, past knowing what we must do, past thinking what are the basic truths that I can sign off on and then tell others they must sign off on to have what I have, and points us to live, live life to fullest, live a life that he describes throughout the gospels. Feed the poor, clothe the naked, stamp out injustice, love your enemy. Become one, be known by Me, know Me, walk with humility, deal with other fairly, put others needs before your needs. I feel we as christians have become one dimensional. We feel we hold the basic truths of life and those on the outside are wrong and must come to us and tell us, "you are right, and I want what you have". Jesus didn't give us straight answers b/c he knows we want validation, power, and prestige. (See religious right and their political agenda and the same can be said of many other things) He knew our potential to pervert this very precious gift. See Jesus was there in the beginning, he understands the created order of this world and his incarnation, words and life on earth point us to that. The christianity of Jesus was not a formula for self-help or for my own gain, but a call for direct action in the world we live. As christians we are invited to be those who point towards good, point towards God moving in this world, to "eat the flesh and drink the blood" of Jesus, which is kind of a description for a relationship, a knowing of each other, a patterning of lifestyles around the words of Jesus. Here is a segment from an interview with Donald Miller, "I believe in absolute truth, probably not in the same way the modern, traditional, evangelical believes in truth. I believe in absolute truth the way Jesus defined it. When he is asked what is truth, Jesus says, "I am". See Christ understands that this is a very complicated issue and what you are trying to get is an answer, so that you can feel right. I'm not going to give that answer, you need to trust me." Jesus is really quite poetic. We have taken his "eat my flesh and drink my blood" (three dimensional) and said the gospel is these 4 absolutely true ideas, do you or do you not agree with them.(one dimensional) G.K. Chesterton says, "it is the mathmatician who goes mad, not the poet. Because the mathmaticians tries to build a bridge across the infinite, and the poet can swim in the sea."