Losing Him
Losing Him
The Jesus of history has suffered at the hands of critics who wished more than anything else to strip him of his uniqueness or make his name forgotten. Yet I maintain that the more I look at the Jesus of history, and the more I see the inspirational incentive he has been, there is no message as beautiful and powerful as his. If an honest seeker were to sit down face-to-face and ask Jesus the questions he or she would like to have answered, I am convinced that in Jesus’ answers alone the seeker would find hope for the present and confidence in the future. At least Jesus offers answers; the New Spiritualists really don’t have answers. For the most part, they promote silence, literally and prescriptively.
I was recently listening to a group of mystics discussing how serene life is when we serve “Mother Earth.” How ironic, I thought, that following the Japanese earthquake and tsunami nobody questioned “Mother Earth” or asked where she was in all this. After all, it was the earth that shook. Strange, is it not, that those who believe in Mother Earth blame Father God when Mother Earth misbehaves? Maybe this is the ultimate revenge for the gender exploitations of the past.
But maybe that is the key to New Age Spirituality. The answers supplied are only the feelings that one wants to generate, totally apart from any reasoning. That is not true of the Jesus of history and the same Jesus of experience. If one would only give his teaching a fair hearing… But in the volume of words offered today, history is being repeated.
There are at least three scenes I would like to draw our attention to in order to demonstrate how the Jesus of history and the Jesus who offers us life and hope has been lost in the least expected places. Understanding this will help lead us to how and where we might find him.