Let’s Be Perfect

The guy came to "preach the good news of the coming of the Kingdom".  How do we know?  ‘Cause he said so.

Today, though, you’ve got preachers and Bible scholars running around explaining Jesus’s teachings with biblical, historical, and allegorical references that you’d have to be a divinity student to understand.

Let’s get something straight . . . Jesus wasn’t preaching to Bible scholars and historians.  He expected the "average, everyday" guys and gals that heard him to understand exactly what he was talking about.

To get his point accross, he used parables and stories that even a dimwit (like me) could grasp.

But most Christian preachers and bible scholars can’t just keep it simple — ’cause if it was simple you’d get it in one sitting.  And if you got it in one sitting, you wouldn’t need to come back to the service every week.  And if you didn’t come to the service every week, you wouldn’t be around for them to keep collecting money.  And if they can’t collect money…

      …nuff said?

So you’ve got people who will do anything and everything they can to explain away the obvious; to complicate simple teachings ’cause the simple stuff just doesn’t make sense to them.

Of course, that’s nothing new.  The same stuff was happening in Jesus’s own time.  He called the scribes and pharasees "blind guides" ’cause they "strain at a gnat and swallow a camel" (you gotta just love this guy!).

The "camel" - the complicated, "hidden" teachings.

The "gnat" - the simple, straightforward, true understanding.

If I ever go on Fear Factor and they have a stunt where they give me the choice of eating a camel or a gnat, I’m doing the gnat thing.

How ’bout you?  Let’s be perfect.

Sorry, you missed it.

The second coming’s come and gone.

I know some of you are expecting a bolt of lightning to vaporize your screen ’cause that last statement is pure blasphemy.

But, it’s the only conclusion I can accept if I start with the assumptions that:

1. Jesus wanted the people he was talking to to understand exactly what he meant.
2. Jesus meant what he said and said what he meant

When all of the folks were marveling about the Temple and commenting on how beautiful it was, Jesus tells them that the temple will be destroyed.  His disciples pull him off to the side and ask for the real 411.

Now, there are a lot of preachers and Bible scholars that want you to believe that Jesus immediately lapses into what I call "hiddenspeak" where what he says really isn’t what he means.  And the only way to understand what he means is to understand the nuances of Jewish history and old testament eschatology.

es·cha·tol·o·gy - a branch of theology concerned with the final events in the history of the world or of mankind

Did’ya know that?  Most folks don’t… and don’t care either.  So, why would Jesus, who hand picked a bunch of regular Joes – fishermen, tax collectors, tradesmen, etc. — to be his followers, explain things to these guys in "hiddenspeak"?  That’s what preachers and Bible scholars want you to believe.

Here’s what I believe. . .

The disciples ask ‘im and he tells ‘em — straightup, no pulled punches.

He talks about famines, and pestilences, and wars, and rumors of wars.

According to Matthew, he throws in the "the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet".  Matthew has a habit of throwing in these obscure Old Testament references and he doesn’t disappoint here.  Our preachers and Bible scholars go wild on this one, but they can’t seem to agree on just what it means.

I don’t know what it means either. . . and I don’t really care.

‘Cause the J-Man ends it all with this"

"Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled."

BAAAYM!!  I guess he darn well told us!

Now, regardless of the impression I might give, I ain’t stoopid.  I know that Christian preachers and Bible scholars want this phrase to mean "…the generation alive when all these things come to pass shall not pass away…"  They have to believe that, otherwise they’d have to admit that either Jesus was wrong (heaven forbid) or they missed his "second coming".

I, however, don’t buy that contrived explanation ’cause:

1. the language (including the original Greek) doesn’t give any indication that that’s what he meant
2. Matthew, who has another habit of "cleaning up" and explaining Jesus’s words, doesn’t add any "explanation" here
3. everything that Jesus says and everything Jesus does indicates that the Kingdom of Heaven is a present thing, not something that should happen way, way, way far in the distant  future
4. I believe Jesus wanted his hearers to understand exactly what he meant and that he meant what he said and said what he meant.
5. I don’t believe Jesus was wrong and as far as I’m concerned, the "second coming" ain’t all it’s cracked up to be. . . it’s more — much, much, more.

So, if the second coming’s already come and gone, what does that mean for me? For you? For the World?

It means only one thing. . . let’s be perfect.

Jesus of Nazereth used this term to illustrate what he meant by sonship.

Had he wanted to let folks know that he was the child of a woman (Mary) then why didn’t he say "Son of Woman?" It would have fit perfectly with the prophecy in Genesis (see Genesis 3:15). And, if he was actually making some kind of reference to that relationship (the mother/son relationship) why reinforce it so often when he’d already denounced it - saying his natural mom and family were of little importance (Matthew 12:48,49)?

If he was talking about his birth through "natural processes", then either he was lying big time or the Gospel writers were. Starting a life from the womb of an untouched virgin is kinda unnatural today - and I’d be willing to bet it wasn’t a daily occurrence 2000 years ago either. If you add on to that a conception through a "visit" from the Holy Spirit. . . well, I’m convinced we’re not talking normal or natural here.

What Jesus was really trying to get across was:

"I came in to this world because of Man."
"I have the nature and the characteristics of Man."
"I breathe, eat, etc. like Man."
"I resemble my parent(s)."

In the same light, Jesus used the Son of God to mean:

"I came in to this world because of God." (John 3:16)
"I have the nature and the characteristics of God." (John 5:19-21)
"I breathe, eat, etc. like God." (John 5:17, 19)
"I resemble my parent(s)." (John 14:9)

Are you a child of God? Then, let’s be Perfect - the same way as our heavenly parent is perfect.