Humbled and amazed that You would call my name
I never have to search again
There's a deep desire that's burning like a fire
To know You as my closest friend
Lord, my redeemer, Your blood runs through my veins
My love for You is deeper than it was yesterday
I enter through the curtain, parted by Your grace
Oh, You're the lover of my soul
[Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fC3IRQ8iyw ]
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I realize that one reason I am still a Christian, is I am in love with Jesus. He is my first Love, my Friend, my Companion. I was initiated into this Love as a child. I have fallen out of love with much about my faith, including much of organized “church” and some of its images of God, but my love and closeness to Jesus grows. Jesus, to me, gives the Face of God, and one I can respect, adore, and feel is safe to be close to and share all I am with. That is Love.
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The late Basil Hume, a Roman Catholic cardinal of England, told a story about the image of God – as in, God-image – his mother offered him in his childhood. His mother called Basil into the kitchen and spoke, “Son, I have just finished baking some delicious cookies, and I've put them into this cookie jar. I'm going to leave this cookie jar right here on the table. But don't dare sneak in here and eat any of them. Remember: God is watching you!”
For years, Basil lived in fear of this watchful “God of the cookie jar.” One day, however, it dawned on him. If he had snuck into that kitchen and put his hand in the jar, and secretly pulled out a cookie and eaten it, God would have looked on and said, “Basil, they're so good! Have another one!”
*Albert Haase. Living the Lord's Prayer.
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Sadly, many of us were raised with God-images that have fostered fear and guilt, not the safety of gracious, nonjudgmental love and amazing, unselfish Love. Many persons will respect God, but they refuse to get close to God. No wonder.
Yet, Jesus is the image of a God safe to get close to. Jesus shows us a God free of judgmentalness toward us, fully compassionate for who we are where we are. The “God of 'church'” is often not the Father of Jesus.
Who is this God of Jesus? Jesus called the One “Abba,” and he taught us to pray to “Abba.” Abba is the Aramaic word of tender affection from child to father, and from adult to highly-revered older adult.
The whole life of Jesus, as seen in the Gospels, rests on a conflict between the God-image of the religious groups of his time and his living out the gracious, safe, and warm hospitality of “Abba,” or if you like, “Amma,” Mother.
As we grow in faith, this means openness to adopt new images of God, abandon old images, or shift focus in our use of God-images. Likewise, for some of us we will grow closer to Jesus, and we will find it is in Christ that we see the Face of God most clearly.
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A man in a church I served in the 1980s suffered the sudden death of his young son of age 19. The boy was electrocuted while working on a car and lying in some water. At the wake, I talked with the dad. He said, “God told me I was to be a deacon in the church, and I did not do it. I think that is why he did this to my son.” I was saddened that this father could think that God would kill his son for his father not serving in a role in a church. What kind of God kills children to punish fathers?
Yet, I see now, that such awful God-images are encouraged by widely-accepted images of God taught and preached among many professing Christians. For example, what is the difference between a god who would kill all the firstborn children throughout Egypt to urge the king to let his tribes go free, and a god who would kill one firstborn son for not serving in a position in the church? See, embedded in Scripture itself, and preached and taught widely, are horrendous teachings on God, and these, as in other faiths, are images that need to be abandoned as literal fact.
When I see the Face of Jesus, in my heart, I do not see a God who would kill anyone. That God is always for peace, healing, and unity. That God is not the god who blesses killing and disrespect for persons or other creatures. That God does not send one religion to heaven and all else to hell. Obviously, the Face of God I see in Jesus is so different from the face of god many preach and teach.
Indeed, Christians need to see that the god of Muslim terroists is very alike the god many professing Christians teach. Do you doubt me? Listen to much conservative-evangelical Christian teaching and preaching. The violence in the name of faith through terrorist action is an opportunity for we who are Christians to confess how we, too, have advocated violence in the name of God.
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Tonight, as I listened to Michael W. Smith sing the above song, I was overcome with Affection. Smith had difficulty singing at one point, for he began crying profusely. I, more than once, did the same. The tears were tears of Love. I am so glad I no longer believe much I used to think about God. Yet, through all that loss, my heart has grown closer to Jesus as man and Universal, Cosmic Christ.
I rejoice, tonight, that I am more and more in Love with Jesus. There is much about Jesus I simply do not know, and I do not have to know. See, Loving is more about the heart than what you or I think. Sometimes, we need to admit we do not know, and focus on growing in Loving. Amen.
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*OneLife Ministries is a ministry of Brian Kenneth Wilcox, SW Florida. Brian lives a vowed life and with his two dogs, Bandit Ty and St. Francis. While within the Christian path, he is an ecumenical-interspiritual teacher, author, and chaplain. He is Senior Chaplain for the Charlotte County Jail, Punta Gorda, FL.
*Brian welcomes responses to his writings at briankwilcox@yahoo.com . Also, Brian is on Facebook: search Brian Kenneth Wilcox.
*You can order his book An Ache for Union from major booksellers.
