9 thoughts on re-thinking God and Jesus, and what it means to know them
Jesus spoke of being “in” this world, but not “of” this world. When Jesus was relating to people, unless they received him open heartily they couldn’t “hear and see” into the dimension that he was explaining to them because it had to come from within them. They just related what he said to the world as they understood it, so what he said most times did not connect. They couldn’t see the “life” he was talking about. Jesus even tried to use parables in an attempt to break down people’s mechanistic and worldy-wise mindsets. Jesus was “in” the world but he was revealing a reality that is not “of” this world – a new dimension, a new nature, a new world.
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We have only a small amount of information about Jesus. With this information we visualize his life 2,000 years ago, and try to physically enact Jesus in our everyday actions when relating to the world and other people. What if we put aside all our teachings about the historical Jesus and how we believe he lived and our attempts of trying to imitate that, and instead connect with the spiritual reality of Jesus that he taught is in each of us?
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The reason why self-centeredness disappears as we go deeper is because we are beginning to connect with that universal “oneness” that is running through us all. The all encompassing “body of Christ” if you want it stated religiously.
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It seems what is otherwise a very natural reality or experience, religion makes unnatural. For example, the religious language associated with God, ultimate reality, or the divine seems to remove it from real life. Perhaps we can learn to relate to each other out of a more real and natural place, rather than some specialized place.
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Too often religion focuses us on externals. In this paradigm God, is located up there or out there somewhere. Our spiritual authority or guidance is located in a sacred book or religious teacher. The steps or actions we take in our spiritual journey is an imitation of what others have done or what they told us to do. The shift that will take us forward is turning inward – connecting with the divine reality, authority, and guidance within ourselves. This is also beings us together as one because when we connect to that inner reality we discover that it is a universal oneness that runs through all of us.
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That awkward moment when you realize that your “God” is a false concept. Even if you make the transition to turn inward, if you drag that “God” inside of you, you have the same (or worse) problem. What this calls for is to dethrone that “God” altogether.
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Jesus said he gave up his life for us. So if he did die, then where is his “life” that he gave over for us? The eternal “life giving” spirit is entombed in you – in us! There’s the teacher, and if we become bolder and start letting it out then we’ll begin to get “raised” up too.
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Jesus revealed truth. But rather than embracing the truth, we created a religion out of Jesus. It is not necessary to go here and there, talking incessantly about Jesus and the Christian verbiage associated with it. In my view, it would be better to say nothing at all about Jesus, and just be an expression of the truth Jesus revealed. It’s best that people learn, discover, and relate to the truth in very natural ways. The more we weigh it down with religious concepts and language, the more difficult it will be for people to connect with it. There’s a reason why Jesus spoke in parables, using language, illustrations, and metaphors that anyone could naturally relate to. Religion tends to be a dividing mechanism, but because of the universality of truth, truth has the capacity to unite people.
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I’ve been thinking about what it would mean to live from a more real and natural place. One definition of “natural” is “not having any extra substances or chemicals added: not containing anything artificial.” Sometimes it seems that religion and our heady stuff is the “extra substance,” “chemical added,” and the “artificial.” What if we weaned ourselves off of processed God, and just lived and expressed what was natural and whole from our spirit? What if we connected with our real self inside, and lived from our deepest feelings?
