Domesticating Jesus...
Creating Him in the image of our "best causes"...
Co-opting Him into our campaigns...
Baptising our agendas with His blood...
20 years ago I thought that if we focus on Jesus then nothing can go wrong.
Today, I'm not so sure...
because the name "Jesus" can easily be used in a fake way.
Schleiermacher, 200 years ago, was Jesus-centred... but the Jesus he invented was not the real Jesus.
It was a Jesus carefully edited and moulded to fit the sensibilities of religion's "cultured despisers".
Since then, there are endless fake Jesus's - all created as the projection of what we think is "obviously" right, obviously the best human causes.
Obviously Jesus MUST be totally on board with our noblest aspirations...
Jesus obviously would vote for Trump, Biden, Xi, Modi, Sunak, Starmer, Tice, Farage, Macron, Trudeau. Penn, Erdogan, Putin, Zelensky, ....
Obviously....
Obviously, Jesus supports/opposes guns/free health care/tax reduction/increase, sovereignty, freedom, justice, the arts, Manchester United, Liverpool, refugees, border control, nuclear power, energy independence, pacifism/war, ... and the new flavours of Ben & Jerrys...
Jesus is into love and baseball, human-flourishing and self-expression...
well, whatever we are passionate about,
whatever is our most cherished causes....
Obviously.
Some say that they love the red-letter verses of the Bible - as if they are paying special attention to the words of Jesus...
and yet...
Those of us who like red-letter Bibles (as I do)...
Do we really take so seriously His terrifying descriptions of Hell and Judgement Day?
Do we really rejoice in His exclusive claims to be the only way to God - as much as we genuinely rejoice at His overturning of economic/social systems?
Do we really listen to what He says about money, lust and violence?
Don't we edit out and dilute the Jesus who makes us uncomfortable?
Some are not so thrilled with the social & economic revolution of Jesus Kingdom... but they love the other-worldly righteousness and eternal perspective.
Whether we like the Jesus who gives us heavenly blessings or the Jesus who is a political & social revolutionary.... are we really facing up to the whole of the real Jesus?
The great 19th century scholar Wrede said "It finally comes to this, that each critic retains whatever portion of the traditional sayings can be fitted into their construction of the facts and their conception of historical possibility and rejects the rest.”
We all too easily pick and choose what we like about Jesus... but fail to take ALL of Him seriously.
Albert Schweizer - "There is a danger that we offer the world a Jesus who is too small, because we force Him into conformity with our human standards and human psychology.
To see that, one need only read the Lives of Jesus written since the 1860's, and notice what they have made of the great imperious sayings of the Lord, how they have weakened down His imperative world-condemning demands upon individuals, that He might not come into conflict with our ethical ideals, and might tune His DENIAL of the world to our ACCEPTANCE of it.
Many of His greatest sayings are found lying in a corner like explosive shells from which the charges have been removed.
Most of His elemental religious power has been drawn off from His sayings to prevent them from conflicting with our system of religious world-acceptance.
We have made Jesus speak another language - a language from our time - rather than the very different language which He really held."
Robert Terrell writes - "Schweitzer said that [scholars] had looked down at the dark, cloudy water at the bottom of a well, saw their own ambiguous reflection, and declared it to be Christ.
It is always nice to convince yourself that the Messiah you claim to serve looks exactly like you.
That means other people need to change rather you needing to change.
That’s nice and comfortable.
Of course, it is also idolatry."
The real Jesus is the Jesus of the Creeds and the Jesus of the Divine Kingdom - the Jesus of the Prophets and the Apostles, Word and Sacrament, Church and Cosmos.
He sets up kingdoms and pulls them down again.
He sits enthroned above the earth, surrounded by angels, archangels and all the company of heaven.
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"Is he—quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”
“That you will dearie, and no mistake,” said Mrs Beaver; “if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or else just silly.”
“Then he isn’t safe?” said Lucy.
“Safe?” said Mr Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”
"The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" by C S Lewis
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Nobody knows the Son except the Father.
Jesus has a Name that nobody knows but He Himself.
We cannot contain Him in our own little causes and campaigns, philosophies and psychologies.
Only when we START with Jesus rather than our own cherished values and principles can we hope to take Him seriously.
"Jesus comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, He came to those who knew Him not.
He speaks to us the same words: "Follow me!" and commands us to obey.
He commands.
And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is".
Albert Schweitzer