Jesus?
To describe my relationship with Jesus in a word, it’s complicated.
I went through a breakup with Jesus about 10 years ago — after I realized how much the concept of Jesus had been misrepresented by Western Christianity and how many of the teachings and beliefs surrounding him were merely indoctrinations based on false premises. In other words, the Jesus I broke up with wasn’t real but rather a figment of the Church’s imagination.
Back in the day—before the breakup—I called out to Jesus like any good Christian, asking for help, miracles, mercy, comfort, forgiveness, direction…all the usual things. And someone seemed to answer most of the time. Occasionally I experienced profound answers to prayer and synchronicities that could not be coincidental. The only problem was that I had a cognitive dissonance knowing that the Jesus of the Church was a false Jesus. So who was I praying to? Who was answering? My intentions and requests for help could have just as easily been the catalyst for guides or angels or my Higher Self, or some other method of Divine Source to come to my assistance.
Eventually, I stopped praying all together in the traditional sense (giving a supposedly all-knowing deity my laundry list of wants and needs) and transitioned toward what I now believe to be the intention of prayer: silencing myself and aligning to the divine will and greater plan. Of importance, even though my traditional prayers ceased more than a decade ago, I have still seemed to have all the same miraculous interventions, guidance, and synchronicities in my life, and perhaps even more.
Throughout the years, I discovered how many unverifiable supposed historical facts surround Jesus’ existence and how many other God-men or demi-gods (for lack of a better term) before him had exactly the same traditions (i.e. virgin birth, born on Christmas, crucifixion, in the grave three days, resurrection, etc.). All of this added to my questions of his true identity, mission here on earth, and ultimately his authenticity.
I also discovered so many errors and contradictions (including interpolations or later add-ons) in Scriptures that made them unreliable as the sole evidence for Jesus. The lie proliferated by the Church that Scriptures are inerrant, infallible, and authoritative, perfectly preserved over thousands of years via hand-copied (copies of copies ad infinitum) by fallible men through many language changes, is a clever way of suppressing the ability of the followers to think, reason, or question any belief-inducing, behavior-modifying, mind-controlling agendas of power-hungry church leaders and even political rulers throughout the centuries.
I was no longer willing to dismiss critical thinking for the nonsensical circular reasoning that I had been subjected to: How do we know Jesus is real? Because the Bible says so. How do we know that the Bible is true? Because Jesus says so.
Other concepts I grappled with while trying to make sense of the role/purpose of Jesus:
· There is a critical lack of historical records in the writings of Jesus’ contemporaries (e.g. Josephus) that would corroborate any such person with the profound influence that Jesus supposedly had on the region of his ministry.
· Jesus of the Bible never claimed to be “God” in the way he is venerated in the modern Church. In fact, the early Church endured much division and even bloodshed over this later-emerging Western doctrine.
· Jesus never once told anyone to worship him or pray to him (I carefully read the red letters), yet every church and worship song is centered around this practice.
· According to earliest tradition, Jesus included all his followers in the divine family (the Trinity), and even referred to them as “gods” (quoting Psalms). This was not popular then with the Pharisees or today with church leaders.
· Jesus never warned anyone about hell, especially not “sinners.” The only people he warned about judgment were zealous religious leaders.
· Jesus openly declared that God’s love and grace brings all prodigals home — he taught repeatedly that no one is ever lost.
· Jesus isn’t a Jewish or Hebrew name, so exactly who am I talking/praying to when I talk to Jesus? Do proper names matter? In Jewish teaching, your name represents your character, which is why the names of Bible figures always had a decipherable meaning. If my intent is in talking to a particular energetic being in history, is that enough? I still don’t know the answer to that question, which is why I’m hesitant to call on “Jesus” for any kind of help or direction.
· In his teachings, Jesus appeared to claim that we all have the same path and fate as he, of laying down our will and lives for others, if we are to become children of God. In other words, Jesus didn’t die for me. I still have to die (ego death) for myself.
· Building on the previous, it didn’t make sense to me that a God who commanded us not to kill, and who said that sacrificing one’s children is an abomination, would require the blood sacrifice of his son in exchange for our souls. This led to my realization that if Jesus was real, his sacrifice was not required by God, which is actually stated in several places in Scripture (other cross references here):
“You have not desired sacrifice and meal offering; You have opened my ears; You have not required burnt offering and sin offering” (Ps. 40:6).
“…and to love Him with all your heart and with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself, which is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices” (Mark 12:33).
“He has told you, mortal one, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God,” (Micah 6:8).
This led me to consider Nonviolent Atonement theory (and here). In general, I came to see how nonsensical it was for Jesus to have to literally die a gruesome death in order to save anyone and how contradictory it is of any kind of sovereign, loving God to require such a thing.
Early on, I had a lot of anger and bitterness surrounding my realizations about the contrived Jesus (and so many other false teachings I had been shaped by). I felt betrayed, as if I had spent a lot of time and energy courting, worshipping, serving, praying to, trying to please, and dreaming about the Easter Bunny. I began asking the heavens if Jesus was real, and if so, who was he? I asked if I should still be talking to Jesus or not. I asked if Jesus is necessary for my faith and transformation. I asked Jesus to reveal himself to me, like many others claim he had done for them. To this day, the heavens have been silent on the matter.
My church friends warned me about this…that I would fall off the edge into [their idea of] deep confusion and deception if I didn’t stay in church under the close eye of my spiritual overseers. But I must say, it sure feels good to be authentic in my questioning without fear of punishment or any kind of ultimate loss. It feels like breathing to know that I can develop my own spiritual ears and intuition without the need of a pastor fact-checking me. It’s okay to be wrong, or to not know. Thankfully God isn’t mad at me or anyone else because we are not sure or “right.” I mean, if these past two years have taught us anything amid the massive amounts of misinformation campaigns, it’s how can anyone be sure about anything? Humans minds are so easily manipulated. To me this means that we must learn how to tap into our hearts and intuition for guidance, into the realm of spirit.
Truthfully, I still love the teachings of the Jesus of the Bible, who is very different from the Jesus of the Church. According to the Jesus of the Bible, he is our prototype of what we all are becoming through this death and resurrection process. We all face death and resurrection, sometimes multiple times and ways throughout our lives. “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ (the anointing) lives in me” (Gal 2:20). Jesus of the Bible affirmed many times in his teachings, that this is the path that we all must take on our way to awakening to our divine essence of co-inheritors of the promises as children of God in an ever-expanding heavenly family. Yes, I know this is a hard pill to swallow from someone who wrote a book about how Jesus saves everyone. Now we find out that we are actually saving ourselves (with a lot of help, of course). 🙃
I must admit, since I started being more honest with my questions and waiting for clarity, I have had a lot less comfort in my life than when I thought I had all the answers, and when I thought Jesus was sitting in heaven waiting to help me with all my problems. It feels lonelier at times, not knowing for sure who is helping me or who I’m supposed to ask for help. But for the record, I don’t think it contradicts the ultimate message of Raising Hell: Christianity’s Most Controversial Doctrine Put Under Fire. The only possible outcome that makes sense in this Story is that we are here to learn who we are by experience, and that we are ultimately living in a safe universe. As mentioned in my last entry, I still cling to the belief that God is ultimately good, and that Love Wins. It’s the only thing that makes sense of our existence. If I’m wrong, at least I lived my life with hope.
And now that you’ve been somewhat caught up with where I’m at spiritually, in my next post I’ll tell you about the next crazy chapter in my story…
In the meantime, I would love to hear where you’re at on the Jesus dilemma. Do you think I’m off my rocker? Do my questions resonate with you? Have you had any personal encounters with someone named Jesus? Do tell!
