Who is Jesus Anyway? Is he who we think he is?

 

Who is Jesus anyway?

It’s something I often reflect on, because sometimes the Jesus I see in the Gospels seems very different from the Jesus we see represented in Christianity. It’s something I touched on in a recent sermon and seemed like an unfinished train of thought.

After all, we see Christianity being used a means to push through policies in America, which, to me, make no sense. Making me wonder, have they even considered what Jesus would make of moves to ban books, repeal abortion rights or marginalise minorities.

Here, the church and state in the United Kingdom are really just united in name only, with the risk of the church being seen to endorse Government policy for fear of losing their status of the Church OF England. It then often feels like the Anglican Communion is only being preserved by church leaders compromising their beliefs to avoid an argument, and I wonder what Jesus would make of these political moves in our church.

The horrific acts of violence in Israel and Gaza, which have been disproportionately aggressive, have been divisive and confusing to understand. Meanwhile, our Church has quietly sat on the fence, in case they say the wrong thing which may be antisemitic or not in keeping with Government policy. Surely being able to support the rights of Israelis to have a safe homeland, while calling out their policy against Gaza, which seems intent on wiping out Palestinians, isn’t too difficult. Or have I gone too far? Is a permanent ceasefire asking too much?

Situations like this are nothing new, Jesus would have recognised them, living in Judea occupied by Roman forces. Jesus though, was an outsider.

Then, after several years of deliberation and debate, of listening and confusion over defining what relationships between two people who love each other are supposed to look like. The Living in Love and Faith project, led in December 2023, to our General Synod quietly, almost grudgingly, approving prayers of blessing for same-sex couples to be used in churches, but only in very specific circumstances.

Where would Jesus stand on this, one wonders? He hardly mentions marriage, except in relation to divorce, or adultery, where he is more focussed on protecting women who were exchanged almost as goods in marriage.

Bringing us back to the question, does the church really want the real Jesus? Which Jesus? And why? A few Sundays ago, I said I followed the resurrected Jesus, who gives me hope, but prayed to the troubled Jesus, because that’s who I most identify with.

After all, Jesus was a complicated man, an outsider, who knew the religion he was brought up in well. He was the miracle worker who turned water to wine and raised Lazarus from the dead.
He was a storyteller whose parables simultaneously reveal and obscure.
He was a political provocateur who debated Roman taxes but welcomed Roman tax collectors, who blessed the peace makers and welcomed a Roman soldier.

He was a renegade rabbi who violated purity laws, broke the sabbath, embraced the sexually suspicious, ate with ethnic outsiders, and who profaned Israel's most sacred space, the temple.
He was a man who was rejected by the religious leaders who he may have hoped would accept him.

And he was a deeply disturbed Jesus who said, "Now my soul is troubled."

I do wonder what the established church would make of this troubled outsider, prophet, messiah and carpenter.

Perhaps we need to be more Jesus like and challenge the authorities of our time as Jesus would. I quite like the idea of being the troublemaker on the inside, asking the awkward questions, being authentically troubled and honest and hopeful.

When I wrote this, it was as Lent came to a close, with Holy Week before us. A time when the news was full of war and violence, of injustice and misunderstandings. A time when people I care about are troubled about so many things, not least those I’ve mentioned here.

More than ever, Lent for me this year, was a time of reflection, of wilderness and wondering. A time when trying hard to reconcile church, faith, work, life and people in distress seems like an almost impossible task.

Perhaps all we can do is continue to offer God our own, "loud cries and tears." Our broken hearts and spirits. Our own troubled souls. And most certainly all the pain and violence in our world, like 30,000 people killed in Gaza.

Like the people who feel like outcasts because their homes are unsafe, or they don’t know who they are, knowing they are created by a loving God, but are confused that parts of who they are; are rejected by a Church which is supposed to embody a loving Jesus.

It’s important to know that God doesn’t create all the pain in the world today, that’s happened since the fall and our exit from Eden, but God is not absent, instead God sits with us in our pain, knowing how that feels, with empathy, love, forgiveness and grace.

It’s that Easter Hope of grace, hope and love which sustains me, because even when reconciliation seems impossible, I also know that nothing is impossible for God, that the steadfast love of God never ceases. And when all seems lost, these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Andrew

Editorial. First published in the April 2024 edition of the Link Benefice Magazine for St George & St Cyr