Passion and Faith

A couple of years ago I saw The Passion of the Christ. I was moved to tears by what I saw on the screen. Never before have I had such a potent visual of what may have happened to Jesus so many years ago. There were even segments that I felt I couldn't watch. I closed my eyes as they whipped and beat the character of Jesus in the film. That night I decided I would include this film in my commemoration/celebration of Easter each year. It still serves as a powerful reminder that He endured horrible events because He wanted us to be healed. This is not the kind of tradition that I would tell anyone they need to include in their lives, but I felt it would be helpful, along with the other things you hear and see in churches at Easter, for my reflection. I believe the death and resurrection of Jesus is real, and is historically true.

There are those who seem to seek any reason they can find not to believe in such things, however. Or, at least, not to believe in the Biblical accounts of such things (e.g. Jesus didn't really die during the crucifixion, Judas didn't betray Jesus, he was following Jesus' orders). I recently heard about the Judas story at work. I overheard 2 co-workers talking about it because apparently there was a big TV news story the previous night that investigated the issue. I hadn't heard about it until then.

If I'm being completely honest, I'll admit that hearing about that kind of thing made me at least a little upset. Why is it that people are always coming up with reasons why they shouldn't believe? These kinds of things haven't been common knowledge until now. There may have been other "evidence" that people have come up with for not believing, but if they already disbelieve, is there a need to seek out obscure and barely supported theories and come up with support for them? One document (referring to the Judas thing here) tells people that Jesus asked Judas to "betray" Him, and people are fascinated.

...Sorry, I somehow managed to slip into a rant without realizing it. Incoherent rambling belongs on my other blog. I included this post here because this blog is meant to underline personal growth, and the things that I find inspire such growth.
After I got over my reaction to hearing the 2 stories mentioned above (both of which I have just come across in the past week), I realized something that I thought was profound (notice: realized...this isn't something I feel I can take credit for). These stories are insignificant! Let the scholars dig them up, investigate them, debate them. They have a calling...a job to do. Many of them are gifted and do their job well.

What I have come to realize recently, among other things, is that the faithful of God need to focus on things that are more crucial to seeing that the Gospel is understood and applied. These stories are a distraction. I haven't quite figured out all that we should be focusing on, but at least part of it is communicating the love of Christ in many various ways. In the limited amount of success I have experienced in such communication, I have seen that the reaction is often one of astonishment (in varying degrees). If we focus on communicating the love and message of a risen Christ with the world, it will go much farther than winning even one debate or argument about the obscure things. Those things bear no threat other than what we allow them to.

I'll stop myself in the middle of my unintentional sermon to finish with a final thought. Another Easter has come, and is almost gone. I am grateful again to be reminded that there is something bigger to live for than what is immediately apparent.