Just another traveler on life’s highway hanging out in the slow lane. It’s quiet. It’s peaceful. Beyond the horizon is rest calling my name. Green pastures, still waters, my cup overflows.
No, Christ is not his last name. Probably most of you are smarter than I am, so don’t judge me too harshly when I tell you that for many years, having heard Jesus Christ mouthed so many times in church, I thought Christ to be a surname. You can understand why I did not get A+ in Vacation Bible School. And Sunday School was more along the lines of play time before entering the church sanctuary where I had to shut up and sit still for an insufferable hour beside my mother.
Then I heard (yes, I did listen sometimes) a visiting pastor say, “Jesus, the Christ.”
Jesus, THE CHRIST! What is he saying? I began to repeat his terminology because he was a big city minister with a Doctor of Divinity behind his name who, I determined, knew a lot more than our country bumpkin preacher and my irreverent uncle who always said Jesus Christ. Well, that theory fizzled with the city slicker preacher’s demise in a church finances scandal, but I stayed with Jesus, the Christ.
Father Richard Rohr, a Franciscan, founder of CENTER FOR ACTION AND CONTEMPLATION, will be focusing during 2019 on “Old and New: An Evolving Faith.” Interestingly for me, in today’s post, he states:
“The teaching of Jesus is our central reference point. We all need a North Star to orient us toward meaning and purpose. As a Christian and Franciscan, for me that is Jesus, who revealed the Eternal Christ.“
He then defines Christ as:
“….the eternal, ongoing union of human and divine, present in and evolving all of Creation since the beginning of time….”
Man has always searched for the divine as evidenced by crude drawings on cave walls to elaborate theologies with a litany of “thou shalt” and “thou shalt not”. Many searchers today look to the heavens for divine guidance. Like I said in my beginning sentences, most of you are probably smarter than I am; therefore, where you look for divinity is your choice and your personal North Star. If it “orients you toward meaning and purpose” in life then seize your discovery and run with it.
Jesus – our North Star, our moral compass, revealing through his life and teachings the Christ, the human and divine union of God, man and all of Creation.
Jesus, the Christ! How cool is that?
lpb quest - the twilight dance 