Part #4: The Most Personal Is the Most Ultimate

In my speculative opinion, I would say Jesus of the Good Messages in the New Testament is the meeting point of God and the human, that Jesus' message and Jesus himself are the crossing of the finite and the Infinite. Jesus is the Chosen One. The nature of Ultimate Reality (God) is Good, Personal, and Loving. What is most personal is most Ultimate.

Jesus represents not only someone who had ethical insight such as in saying "Love your enemies"; more importantly he personally lived out his statements (when he rose above his own ethnocentrism, which sometimes shows up in his speaking).

He demonstrated the love and moral idealism he spoke of, became the image of God. He revealed God most clearly in not violently resisting the Romans, in rejecting the tempting motivation to mount a revolution like the Messiah was expected to do according to the Jewish Scriptures. He also rejected other temptations many charismatic individuals have succumbed to in history such as to use their power and influence to control and manipulate. Instead of giving into humanity's incessant egotism, he humbly gave of himself ultimately.

Infinite Truth and Goodness and Love showed through his temporal self.

Exactly how all of this works out depends on one's Christology. I tend toward a lower Christology similar to Henry Emerson Fosdick or Walter Rauschenbusch.

I think God at times shines through other "human windows or images" too such as Martin Luther King, but often the Infinite in the finite is tragically marred, distorted, or destroyed by the sinful acts of the human. For instance, in MLK's case the FBI caught him committing adultery repeatedly, being very unfaithful to his wife.

Of course, as I referred to in my first post, we don't know what weaknesses Jesus had that didn't get written down that may have dulled his being the Son of Man, Son of God. However, I am not one of those kind of textural critics who think they can get behind the text, not of the sort of scholars who cast doubt on most of the received text or even question whether Jesus ever lived. Nor am I like the more conservative ones who think we have a mostly accurate recording of Jesus' words and acts. I think Jesus was very much a human being in whom God indwelt.

I also think the personal is reflective of the Ultimate, that Jesus is the Christ because I've been influenced by the philosophical views of individuals like John Cobb and Daniel Day Williams who considered personhood as more real and more important than the physical and the cosmic. It is via the personal that the universe is being influenced eventually to move toward the more spiritual.

Currently many of the big weights in science and philosophy consider human consciousness a "fluke," and they laugh dismissively at those who think that human consciousness represents anything real or important in the Cosmos. They call such theistic outlooks "species-ism" and emphasize that on the contrary, humanity is just one twig on a branch of evolution existing for no reason or purpose.

In my opinion, they are woefully wrong and we can already see the very bad influence such thinking has on humanity.

In the past, I've also had spiritual experiences which have given me a new way of seeing Life. On a rather mundane level, I've encountered a deep love for Jesus to the point I've been overwhelmed.

On several occasions, I've experienced God in what I suppose would be called "openings" or mystical awarenesses which also lead me to think that what is most personal is most Ultimate.

In those very personal encounters with God, I was highly aware, most rational, not overwrought emotionally or out of control, but very much balanced, not delusional. I was so aware of my finiteness, yet expansively aware of the Infinite. And felt boundless love despite my very temporal insignificance.

Later when I was reading Friedrich Schleiermacher's On Religion: Speeches to Its Cultured Despisers, his passages about the Infinite encountering the finite suddenly jumped off the page reminding me of my own encounters with God.

Change your mind, take up your cross and follow Jesus:-)

To be continued:-)

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox