Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe." (John 20:27)
A Word of Hope
Some things are so familiar.
Some things I've never known,
But there's something about the risen Christ
That will not let me go.
This is the chorus of a song I wrote a couple of years ago in my final stages of reconciling the Jesus of my childhood with the Jesus of my life. While I was still deeply devoted to his message, I just couldn't get past some of the things that the Christian tradition had "done" to it. How, for example, could he speak so deeply of the love God has for us while so many evils are committed in his name?
Easter is upon us, and with it is a deeper reflection of the risen Christ. It could not be better stated than by Marcus Borg in Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time:
"I complete my story of how I met Jesus again. I once saw the Christian life as being primarily about believing. Like many of us, as a child I had no problem with belief, but at the end of childhood I struggled with doubt and disbelief. I continued to think that believing was what the Christian life was all about. Yet no matter how hard I tried, I was unable to "do" that, and I wondered how others could.
"I now realize that the central issue of the Christian life is not believing in God or believing in the Bible or believing in the Christian tradition. Rather, the Christian life is about entering into a relationship with that to which the Christian tradition points, which may be spoken of as God, the risen living Christ, or the Spirit. And a Christian is one who lives out his or her relationship to God within the framework of the Christian tradition. - It is a relationship that involves one in a journey of transformation."
It truly is about how God craves relationship with each and every one of us and how the human soul craves it just as much. And I am never more convinced of this than on this day we call Easter.
Prayer
Lord, yes! We are an Easter people! Transformed, alive, and in dear relationship with you through the love of the risen Christ.
Marcus Borg is Hundere Distinguished Professor of Religion and Culture at Oregon State University. He has written eleven books, including Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, the best-selling book by a contemporary Jesus scholar; The God We Never Knew, named as one of "ten best books in religion for 1997; The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions (with N. T. Wright); and Reading the Bible Again for the First Time, another best-seller. He has been national chair of the Historical Jesus Section of the Society of Biblical Literature, co-chair of its International New Testament Program Committee, and president of the Anglican Association of Biblical Scholars. His books have been translated into seven languages, and he has lectured widely throughout North America, including the Chautauqua and Smithsonian Institutions, and overseas (England, Austria, Germany, Belgium, Hungary, Israel, and South Africa).
D'Anna Chance, Contributor
