HOW
CAN JESUS HELP ME UNDERSTAND?
by
The Rev. Dr. Brooks Ramsey I
need an interpreter. I need someone or something to teach me
what it's
all about. The Scripture said Christ Jesus of Nazareth
became the interpreter of the nature and the mission of God in
the world--Jesus as the interpreter. Yes, I can believe that.
The Word was made human and became interpretation for me. ... When
Jesus of Nazareth walked out on the stage of human history,
he revealed the character of God. ... God is interpreted
through Jesus. This great God of infinity and eternity brought
himself
down (or herself down) in the person of Jesus so that I could
understand that the Word did not become word, the Word became
human. The
event of Jesus Christ is the thing that reveals God to me. I can explain it by telling you that as a child
I discovered
the power of the magnifying glass. I discovered that if you
put
that magnifying glass between the sun and the bare back of
someone, you could do a little damage. (I discovered that
when I put it
on the bare shoulder of my mother.) I believe that God, the
sun, is shining all over the world, but in the magnifying
glass it
becomes intense. It becomes powerful. It becomes warm with
heat. I believe that God's love is shown all over the world.
God's
love is trying to break out. Do
I believe that the Christian religion is the only religion
in which God reveals Himself?
No, I have discovered God in
many philosophies, many religions. God
is not limited to just our
religion. God's love is trying to break through to all
people. I think a step in maturity for me was to be able to
accept
Truth from whatever source it came--to ignore the label
and to say, "Is
this true?"--and to know that God is trying to break
through with Truth. But for me, that Truth of God, that
love of God,
shines more intensely in Jesus of Nazareth than anywhere
else in the world. …
Yes,
Jesus reveals God to me, but Jesus of Nazareth also reveals
myself to me. He interprets
not only God, he interprets
who
we are. He is the interpreter of what humanity ought
to be. Culture
and history have presented a pretty dismal picture of
human beings. We are proud, arrogant, selfish, jealous, territorial,
war-like
at times. Out of our hearts spring all kinds of evil
things.
Is that the true picture of humanity? That's not the
picture Jesus gave. He gave us the model of what God intended
when
he created us.
We
have to look at Jesus to see who the person is we ought to
be. We judge ourselves by him. We submit
our
images
of ourselves to the image of the Christ, and in that
light we
can identify
the ongoing mission to become more like him. God became
like us so that we could become like God. That's the
story. He
interprets life to me.
--From “In
the Beginning Was the Word...” by The Rev. Dr. Brooks Ramsey
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