Posts Tagged ‘Jesus’

The Coming of Jesus

December 17, 2015

Christmas is only one week away. I have to admit that so far, other than the tree in our living room, the last two weeks have seemed much like any other weeks except that I’ve been home for most of the time.

It’s advent. We celebrate Jesus’ coming.

The romantics work up sentimental feelings of kids, anticipation of presents and Santa, snow and warm fires, food and family.

Churches put a few Christmas carols in their worship. Maybe light an advent candle. Have a children’s program. Maybe a choir cantata if it’s a traditional church.

We’ll read the account of Jesus’ birth in Luke along with the prophecies.

What we really need to do is project ourselves in contemplation back to the time. Anticipation of something changing, maybe God returning to the Temple, had been building for a hundred years.

Expectations. Simeon and Anna had hung out at the Temple for most of their lives. God had told them that someone special was coming. Every day. Visiting the Temple. Watching. Every person who came. Every baby to be dedicated. Who would be the one? When would he come?

Then one day a baby came. Quietly. They spotted the family and came over to them. He is the one. Finally. We can die in peace. God told us, and he didn’t lie. There he was. They knew.

Jesus came. Many followed him. They tried to do the things he asked of them.Today, many of us still follow him–or try to. We’re glad he came. He showed us how to live.

Even so, with the commercialization, hype, desires for things–not to mention the lack of peace in the world, these things impinge on my consciousness.

Maybe we need him to come again.

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Nothing False Here

April 18, 2014

My wife put the dish of strawberries on the table for dinner. It’s a good six weeks early for strawberries. But these looked perfect. The small firm ones that are sweet and juicy. Not the overly large ones that growers cynically think women buy because they are big not caring that there is no taste and they are hollow.

I see them all through dinner. Time for dessert. Yummm. But no! These are not those sweet, juicy ripe strawberries. I don’t know what gas they bathed these babies in to make them to appear prematurely ripe. These were not ripe. The consistency was terrible.

We are in such a rush to get what we want when we want it that we ignore the consequences of trying to outwit nature.

Jesus (OK, I’m expanding the metaphor here) kept telling his closest followers about the fullness of time and about his time being not now, or his time being now.

They didn’t understand. They thought they knew what they wanted and when they wanted it. But, they were wrong.

There cannot be anything false or misleading about the Jesus we celebrate at Easter. There are people who say even until today that the whole resurrection thing was just a huge marketing ploy. But how long does misleading marketing last? Not long. No 2,000 years.

It really was his time. His first followers would not have changed the world if were just a cynical marketing trick. He so changed their lives that they gave up theirs to spread his message.

Jesus didn’t say “Change your life so that you can follow me.” Jesus said, “Follow me and then your life will be changed.”

It worked 2,000 years ago and it works today.

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Meditations on Meditating

March 14, 2014

We are in the Christian season of Lent. As I’ve said previously, I grew up in a tradition where we did not really recognize Lent. As a kid, I knew that the Lutherans and Catholics chose something from which to abstain during Lent. I don’t even remember going to any special Ash Wednesday services.

I wonder if we practiced Advent mostly because of the commercial hype around gift giving. We had Advent calendars that marked off the days until Christmas. We had Christmas programs at church. We had Christmas programs at school (when approximately 100% of the school’s population is Christian, you could do that).

I’m meditating on Lent this year. Maybe because there is another movie out that, like the one by Mel Gibson several years ago, seems to focus on the death of Jesus. In some traditions, the “way of the Cross” is commemorated bringing to the front of mind the steps of Jesus from Pilate’s residence to the place of crucifixation.

We know the point of Christmas. It is that Jesus came into the world. For Lent, as it leads up to Good Friday and Easter there are two events. Death and resurrection. Tradition has us concentrating for 40 days (plus Sundays) on the death. We have one quick day celebrated by pastel colors and candy to remember the resurrection. And then it’s over.

Read Acts again. Read Paul’s letters. The first followers of Jesus did so because of the resurrection. That was the single most important event in our religious heritage.

Jesus said that he pointed the way to eternal life. John always uses the term in the present tense. Eternal life begins when you choose it. It also carries on to life with-God after we die–physically.

Those of us who meditate deeply understand the distinction of body and soul. We’ve experienced it.

We need a celebration to remember the resurrection all the time beginning with Easter and leading to Advent. It is our life now and our hope for the future.

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