Christ the Archetype, Paradigm, Exemplar, Template
Humans live in three domes of reality. The first dome of
reality is “My World”. We try to answer the question, “Who am I?” We focus on
“my story.” a legitimate effort to live one’s life as we search for
significance of our lives. However, our
personal viewpoint is exactly that, your viewpoint. Buddhists have a term “Annatta”, the beguiling mind, viz., just because you see some
things a certain way, that doesn’t mean that it is way that others see it. More
importantly, how God see it? In adults,
this roughly corresponds to the first half of life. How am I going to take the
world by storm? Try it and see. However, don’t forget the words of Pope John
Paul II, “There are no moral freezones!”
The temptation here becomes egoism, viz., I am the center of the universe (and
there is something wrong with you when you don’t realize it!
The second dome of reality is “Our World”. We focus on “our
story “We try to answer the question, Who are we?” We try to find our place in the world through
group identities and loyalties that expand our self-identification. Our
identity markers become our ethnicity, our religion, our group identities, our nationality.
Once more, there is nothing wrong with such efforts so long as we follow God’s
rules. Again Pope John Paul’s caveat
kicks in. “There are no moral freezones”.
The temptation here becomes cultural
narcissism. “We’re number one! We
are the center of the universe and there is something wrong with you if 1) you
don’t think that we are or 2) you think that you are.
Most people, however, move back and forth between these two
domes. Many don’t realize there is a
third dome, the big picture.
The third dome of reality is the “Universe”, God’s world,
Reality or the Big Story. Now the
question becomes “What is the planetary and cosmic reality of which I and we
are parts? We try to find our place in the universe through our recognition of
and immersion in a process that is always operative, both in the universe and
in your and our place in the life of the universe.
The Jesus Movement looks to our Mentor to help us answer
these questions through His everyday life, his death and Resurrection. 1) First
He still teaches us that life is relational.
Nothing exists as a monad. The notion of rugged individualism is a
corruption of the Enlightenment, viz., I can take of myself. From
the time of Jesus, His Movement has spoken of a relational. God is a relationship
of Father, Son and Spirit. If God is relational, it stands to reason that
creation must be relational as well.
2) He still teaches us that life (and death) are learning
processes in which we come to see our place in the universe. The learning will never end. God is mystery, infinitely knowable and
unknowable at the same time. Isn’t your life within the universe, even within
your everyday existence, on ongoing learning process? God is a Mystery, so are
you!
3) God has engaged the paradox of ascent, descent and
transformation as a universal process.
All things are called to life, they grow, change, decline and experience
transformation. Scientifically, the process is named “the conservation of energy, viz., nothing is lost in the universe.
God is still creating the universe and still creating you as part of the
universe. The Jesus Movement calls this
the paschal Mystery. Jesus lived and died and experienced the transformation of
Resurrection. In the first century, our Christians forebears sang “Christ Jesus is the
image of the invisible God, the pattern of creation, the firstborn of the dead.
4)
Creation is driven by a trajectory that leads to new possibilities. Creation
acts that there is a blueprint or template that leads somewhere.
Believing
Christian scientists (not just evangelical ones either) are saying that much of
the Gospel resonates with scientific principles just being named.
That is why that the Jesus
Movement reminds ourselves if the Divine Reality, the Big Picture, the Great I
AM, “in
which we live and move and have our being.”
As the first followers of Jesus sang and accepted, “Jesus is the
Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior”, we
celebrate our faith in that primitive creed as we humbly realize that the first
and second domes of our viewpoints or spirituality are not absolute, but rather
relativized by the third dome of God’s Story.
God’s view of reality must be differently than yours or ours. Who is on the money? 112215AD
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