Posts Tagged ‘Resurrection’

Three Days That Make Us Different

April 3, 2015

Today is what we’ve come to call Good Friday. I have to admit that as a kid I wondered about that phrase. What’s good about that day? As an adult with thinking skills, I could come up with a lot of reasons to justify calling it good. But still…good?

Good Friday–a remembrance of the day Jesus was killed. Leaders of the day just couldn’t get over their fixation on the way history was supposed to play out. Especially the part that they were to play–that is, they were to lose their jobs. So, they killed the threat.

But, Good Friday leads inevitably to Easter.

Ah, Easter. More than a remembrance. A celebration. Our culture places so much celebration on Christmas. But Easter. Without Easter, we have no faith.

No person of Jewish faith has ever commented on this blog or emailed me directly. But I have had a conversation with a teacher within the Islamic faith.

Within Islam, Jesus is acknowledged as a prophet. Maybe so. I think at that level he was more of a Wisdom teacher than a classical prophet. But then, I’m not a learned scholar. Just a disciple. And he certainly acted as a prophet in several examples.

Within Judaism, Jesus is not recognized. During a recent Bible study, one of the men blurted out (since it’s so obvious to us), “Why don’t Jews believe?”

I found this very consise, rational, scholarly statement from a Jewish rabbi detailing the Scriptures that prove Jesus was not the Messiah. Like I say, thinking people can come up with lots of reasons.

I just finished 1,500 pages of scholarly work showing how Paul (the ex-Pharisee, Jew above Jew) re-interpreted his Scriptures in light of his meeting with the risen Jesus. Jesus, himself, in fact re-interpreted his scriptures.  And he taught his followers to do so. I understand the reluctance to abandon a faith based on what you see as faulty interpretation.

Easter, though, has nothing to do with interpretation of scripture.

Jesus lived. Jesus died. Jesus lives again.

That’s all. Everything else is mental exercise.

Faith in the resurrection is what makes us different. More than that. It’s how lives are changed by the power of God’s spirit when we accept that reality. 

We are different from other religions. But we are also different people. Changed people. That power has been proven over 2,100 years. And it continues to be proven with each new Jesus-follower today.

I cannot help it that so many people claiming the title “Christian” behave so poorly–even to the extent of killing great numbers of people. The power of the resurrection lives in too many of us to deny the fact.

Therefore, I guess we call it “Good” Friday. But it’s all about Easter. Enjoy.

PS. Since my feeble attempts at writing are read around the world, even in places where calling yourself Christian could be life-threatening–my prayers go out to you that you can celebrate the day without fear. And that peace will come to you soon.

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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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The Truth About You

March 19, 2014

John Ortberg, senior pastor of the Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, is teaching a series now on “The Truth About You.” He says, “The truth about you is that you don’t know the truth about you.”

The most famous phrase on this subject is the inscription at the Temple of Delphi, home of the so-called Delphic Oracle, which says, “Know Thyself.” Christian theologians have picked up that phrase over the centuries–including Clement of Alexandria, Augustine, John Calvin.

During the course of years of my meditating, there have been periods where recurring images would come to me. I’d explore the images during meditation. Sometimes reflecting on them. Then some conclusion would happen, and I would never revisit that image again. Doesn’t mean that I forgot them. I just never went back to that experience.

Paul begins his letter to the Romans talking about how sinful we are. Those can be just words. In my meditations many years ago, there was an image that recurred over the course of many months.

One day during meditation, I opened a door and came face-to-face with all of my sins and all of the sins that I was (am) capable of committing. It was a a shocking experience.

Later, I could understand Romans. And other such works. Forget that I’m so good. I know that within me is the power if unchained has great capability for committing evil deeds.

I’ve said that I’m not really a “Lent” person. It was just never in my heritage and I’ve not picked it up very much. If we take it as a time of reflection of how much bad we have done and how much we are capable of doing, then the release from all that sin and evil (a subsequent experience in that series of meditations) is all the more sweet. That would be the climax of Lent–the celebration of Easter and the Resurrection.

Know yourself. It’s hard. It’s necessary.

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