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Rector's Blog
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
A recent visitor to our website asked an important question in response to reading my thoughts on the "Jesus Candle."
I suggested that much of what passes for spirituality in American religion involves "personal experience." For many people who find some association with the American Christian tradition, this involves a "personal relationship with Jesus." Or as I said in "Jesus Candle," a "personal experience" of Jesus.
The visitor asks: Are you saying that Jesus can only be experienced through a spiritual intimacy sharing our lives with others? Would an encounter with Jesus, individually and/or personally register as outside your view of an appropriate relationship with Him?
Great question. And it is exactly the right question. What's more, I found the answer embedded in the question itself. I also realized my limits as a writer. I could have been more precise in my earlier post. But that is the point. Dialogue in relationship with others is the only genuine access to Truth.
The answer to the question is "Yes" and "No." It is a compound question, so let's break it up.
First, Would an encounter with Jesus personally register as outside your view of an appropriate relationship with Him?
The answer is, "No."
"Would an encounter with Jesus individually register as outside your view of an appropriate relationship with Him?
The answer is, "Yes."
What a difference one word makes.
The idea of individuality is the arch-heresy of our age, and for a very simple reason. "The individual" does not exist. In both creation stories in the Book of Genesis humanity is created in community. Genesis 1:26-27 says,
Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness. So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
The creation of Man (meaning humanity) is inseparable from the creation of community: male and female.
Likewise in Genesis 2, God creates Adam, but discovers that "it is not good for man to be alone." This clear and unambiguous statement affirms humanity as consisting of persons-in-relation. In the creation story, God did not create an individual. God created a community.
If the biblical narrative is not compelling, science provides ample evidence that the myth of the individual is a destructive falsehood.
Every child is born into community -- the family. Feral children die. (Or, they come to the our 9:00 a.m. worship service.) Long periods of isolation lead to insanity.
An individual encounter with Jesus is an illusion, an impossibility, even a pathology. But, personal encounter with Jesus is a matter of historical record. People for two thousand years have born witness to a profound and life-changing personal encounter with the resurrected Christ, that is, with Jesus.
But having said that, note the important difference between an individual encounter with Jesus, and a personal encounter with Jesus. Personal encounter always takes place in the context of community. I experience Jesus, as I live in faithful relationship with you.
This is what Jesus meant in the parable of the sheep and goats. "Assuredly, I say to you," Jesus said. "Inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me." Give another person a drink of water draws me into relationship with him, and thus with Jesus -- personal, but not individual.
I will try to say this is in the clearest terms I know how. (Forgive me if this sounds philosophical, once again, alas, my limits as a writer manifested.)
The individual does not exist. I have no being, apart from my being in relationship. I am not real, in and of myself. I become real only in relationship with others. Alone, I begin to fade into nothingness. If I remain alone too long, I loose my grip on reality. In relationship I step into the fullness of my humanity.
This personal reality of life in community, for me, is the most compelling argument for the existence of God. It is why I have no choice but to believe. Jesus makes God known within the relational context of human history. In personal encounter with Jesus, I find myself able to enter fully into relationship with God and Neighbor.
Thanks for asking the question. It is exactly the right question our generation must learn to ask.
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