MBCC Blog

Lent Meditation--Day Thirty

I was recently looking through some old emails that I sent to friends and family while studying in the Middle East during the Spring of 2000.  This particular excerpt is written in the midst of an intense two weeks I spent in Israel and Palestine examining both sides of the conflict and learning about how much pain exists in the Middle East. After reading it, I realized that this view of Jesus is what keeps me coming back when I get frustrated with mainstream Christianity (plus, it fits in nicely with what Bruce just said last weekend)...

• March 14, 2000 - "I will tell you an overriding theme I learned that has never before been so clear to me.  The main thing I realized was man's inhumanity to man.  I went to the Holocaust museum here in Israel (and I've been to them all over the world) but for the first time, I wasn't thinking "Oh, poor Jews, how could this happen to them?"  Instead, after seeing so much destruction in Palestine and looking at the struggling history of the Middle East, I thought, "Oh poor man, how can this happen over and over to man?"  Maybe that sounds over dramatic, but I don't really think it is.  So much of history is just people treating other people as less than human - somehow justifying the inhumane ways they treat them by saying they deserve it.  And it happens all over the world today.  As I was thinking about this, I realized how incredible the message of Jesus really is.  He said to "Love your enemies."  Oh my gosh!  You mean I'm not supposed to kill them or confine them to horrible living conditions or torture them for "interrogation" or hate them??  Wow.  The love of Jesus is truly an amazing thing.  I guess it goes against our nature to love people who are supposed to be our enemies.  But that is the only answer.  The only Truth.  The only way to end Dehumanization.  And that is the message of Jesus.  What a cool guy."

~Jodi Brooks

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty-Nine

Most discussions of who Jesus is are theological, historical, or relational.

The theological ones talk about whether he was fully God, fully human, fully both, or a little of each; whether he resurrected physically or only symbolically... if he resurrected at all. Was Jesus God or only a prophet? Or just a carpenter? The historical ones relate to whether Jesus existed at all or not and how reliable accounts of his actions and sayings are. Sometimes theological and historical discussions overlap, especially when fundamentalist Christians start asking if Jesus was a liar, a lunatic, or the son of God--all the while asserting that he must be only one of the three.

Then, of course, there is a relational Jesus. Friend Jesus. Buddy Jesus. Husband Jesus (with the church as the bride). Forgiving Jesus. Comforting Jesus. Saving Jesus. Sacrificial Jesus. This is the Jesus I was taught to most think of as Jesus. This, the Chinese Republican Church I grew up in taught me, is why Christians are different from Jews, because we supposedly have a personal relationship with God, and the Jews supposedly do not.

What's right now most interesting to me about who Jesus is could be categorized as historical or theological, possibly even relational, but I'm curious about Jesus as a person. Just as I love seeing film clips and photos of Malcolm X laughing and hanging out with friends (instead of being serious and delivering a speech), just as I love seeing behind-the-scenes featurettes and outtakes for my favorite movies, just as I enjoy getting to know people and finding out my prejudgments of them were wrong; so I always wonder about the Jesus behind Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God.

WARNING: Some people may think of even the asking of the following as being heretical. Read at your own risk.

Did his parents ever pretend to him that he was a natural product of sexual intercourse? When did they tell him he came about through immaculate conception? When he was a baby, did he cry a lot, or was it, in fact, a "silent night" when he was born? What were his first words? How quickly did he learn to speak or walk? Did he say stupid things his parents laughed at and thought were cute? What did he do between the ages of 12 and 30? When he was a teenager, did his peers enjoy hanging out with him or think him a weirdo? If someone told an ethnic joke about Samaritans, how did he respond? What was Jesus' penis like? Did he masturbate ever? Were there women in his synagogue who had a crush on him? What kinds of things made Jesus laugh? What did he do for fun? Was he right-handed or left-handed? Did he have to learn carpentry? Did he ever mess up while learning? Were there foods that were too spicy for Jesus? What did he smell like? What did his farts smell like? What was his nightly ritual before going to sleep? Did he snore? Did he talk in his sleep or sleepwalk? Did he used to wet his bed as child? What sights or smells made Jesus puke? What physical ailments, if any, did he suffer from? Is it possible Jesus had a chronic bad back, bad eye sight, occasional epileptic seizures, a receding gumline, narcolepsy, diabetes, even a simple cold or flu? Might he have given himself a stronger immune system than normal humans? Or did he constantly heal himself in his own name? Did Jesus have a favorite story or favorite color? Apart from sin and hypocrisy, what were his pet peeves?

In other words, who is Jesus? It's very easy to say from a theoretical, theological standpoint that he was both fully God and fully human, but did you ever really think about what it means to say he was fully human? I have, and it's these questions (not a bloody Mel Gibson film) that make me appreciate his sacrifice more.

Alan Siu

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty-Eight

Jesus..the name does at times bring mixed feelings.

There are times I feel He is an adversary, at times a brother, at times a friend but never at all someone who does not listen.

His humanity gives me the hope that in the bleakest times God might just be listening after all.

anonymous

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty-Seven

Jesus is the bee, fertilizing each of us so that we can produce the fruits of the spirit.

abby king kaiser

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty-Six

Jesus to Me

To Me, Jesus is oh so very much....

He's the guy I talk to, on a daily basis about all things, big and small
He's the guy I sing for, at church, on Sunday
He's the guy I strive to be more like
He's the guy we pray to over every meal about our blessings
He's the guy I know will never leave my side
He's the guy I ask to be with Walt everyday at work
He's the guy I know wants the BEST in my/our life and marriage
He's the guy who I rely on in scary situations
He's the guy I see in people who are kind-hearted and good
He's the guy I go to when I need clarity in a decision
He's the guy I know will lead me on the right path...forever!

To Me...Jesus is always an amazing force in my life, for so very, very
much!

Morgan Cullen

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty Five

Cincinnati is a mess in the winter.  Simply a mess. It snows and then rains and sleets and then rains and then snows and then ices and unfreezes and refreezes, over and over and over.  Ick. 

My parents backyard is a great place to watch this phenomena from the comfort of the house.  Yesterday, parts of the yard showed through the snow in a brilliant green, but with a huge puddle filling in the rest. The mix of dirt, water, snow and slush, combined with bare grey trees, made the world look miserable.

And yet, in the middle of the puddle, the most brilliant, clear reflection of the sunset and the treeson the smooth surface of the water, reminded me of the clarity in the mess.

For me, this week, Jesus is that clarity.

Abby King Kaiser

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty Four

I've always had this thought in the back of my mind about the miracles of Jesus and maybe this gets by us, since we read about them over and over our whole lives, but think about this:

-Not only does the man in the example from the other day instantly have the ability to hear, but if he can speak clearly, does that mean that he also instantly knows how to form words and say them through his mouth?  And understand the answers through his new found hearing?  A child takes months and years to be able to speak clearly.  People with cochlear implants take years to use them well.

-A lame man is lowered through the roof of a crowded meeting place and is healed and told to pick up his mat and go home - which he does instantly.  Not only is his body given the ability to move, but the physical, neuromuscular ability to stand up, balance himself, bend down, pick up a mat, turn and work his way through a crowd of people and then pilot his way home.  Ask a college engineering team to do the same with a robot and they'll get back to you in a few years.

-A person with a shriveled hand is instantly given a normal hand.  A hand he can use, right then.  Try using a limb that has been in a cast for a while and tell me it's easy - it's not.  And we went into that cast with a completely usable limb; it was just 'out of commission' for a while.

-A blind son is given sight and is so completely healed that the religious officials that have to rule on his state of being can't seem to get it that he had always been blind and have to be convinced by his parents and friends.

And the list goes on!

Jesus' miracles are astoundingly miraculous because they are WAY more complex than even the unbelievable healing of an affliction - the results seem to be that people are more than restored to health, but catapulted to a state of being that then makes it hard to believe the afflictions were ever there.  They not only are healed, but have complete knowledge of how to use some part of their body many of them have NEVER used before!

And in our sinful state, we are likewise healed and propelled to a state of being that is so far from 'afflicted' and 'crippled' that the world stands around and needs convincing, blind to the facts of the miracle that brought us back to our heavenly Father.

Makes me cry to think about it.

Ben Vincent

Lent Meditations--Day Twenty Three

When I’m asked the question of “Who do you say that Jesus is?” I’m often
brought to the gospel according to Mark chapter 7. At the end of the chapter
there is this story of Jesus healing a man who was deaf. He pulls the man
aside, embraces him, and heals him.

I often imagine the life of this man in the gospel story. I imagine how he
must have felt so separated from the world around him. How he could see
people talking and laughing but he couldn’t even hear the jokes. Even the
times that he might have tried to speak and join in with the others, all
that came out were grunts and mumblings. Where there should have been noise,
there was only silence. Where there should’ve been joy, there was pain.

But Jesus is the one who changes all that. Jesus takes this man aside and
holds him close, like a mother with her sick child, and calls out for
healing. Jesus takes away the pain and replaces it with joy. He takes away
the shame and replaces it with confidence.

So today I say that Jesus is…an intentional incarnational healer.

Mark 7:31-36
    Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to
the Sea of Galilee and into the region of the Decapolis. There some
people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they
begged Jesus to place his hand on him.

    After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers
into the man's ears. Then he spit and touched the man's tongue.  He looked
up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, "Ephphatha!" (which means "Be
opened!").  At this, the man's ears were opened, his tongue was loosened
and he began to speak plainly.

    Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone. But the more he did so, the
more they kept talking about it.  People were overwhelmed with amazement.
"He has done everything well," they said. "He even makes the deaf hear and
the mute speak."

Nick Larson

Lent Meditations--Day Twenty-One

"This is a glimpse of the Jesus whom I have met over the years on the terrain of my wounded self, the Christ of my interiority.  There is a beauty and enchantment about the Nazarene that draws me irresistibly to follow him.  He is the Pied Piper of my lonely heart. It is not the pious prattle to say that the only valid reason I can think of for living is Jesus Christ.  Paul puts it so well.  'There is only one Christ, and he is everything.' (Col. 3:11). 
     In order to be free to be faithful to this sacred man and his dream, to other and ourselves, we must be liberated from the damnable imprisonment of self-hatred, freed from the shackles of projectionism, perfectionism, moralism/legalism, and unhealthy guilt.  Freedom for fidelity demands freedom from enslavement.
     It's a tired cliche, a battered bumper sticker, an overused and often superficial slogan, but it's the truth of the gospel: Jesus is the answer.  Is there any price too exorbitant, any cost too extravagant to pay for the privilege of being able to make your own personal response to his haunting question: Who do you say that I am? 'I believe that nothing can happen that will outweigh the supreme advantage of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord... and I look on everything else as rubbish if only I can have Christ."

Brennan Manning from A Glimpse of Jesus: The Stranger to Self-Hatred (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1993), 49-50.

Lent Meditation--Day Twenty

"Jesus Christ puts confidence in me. 
He must enjoy the learning process.

                              

              mistakes must not scare Him.
He is not threatened by all we must go through
     to grow in His Name."

Ann Kiemel, in "theology" from I Love the Word Impossible (Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale, 1971) pg. 48.

To know that Jesus has confidence in me when I cannot even see to put a foot forward, yet have to keep walking into the dark
To know that Jesus will still love me when I fall is to have a sustaining, trusting faith.

This is the kind of confidence, the kind of faith that I hope, pray and practice for.

Abby King Kaiser