Blog@GraceJunction

I am unable to hide and contain the giggles, smiles and laughter that swell up within me as I ponder on my memories, as I remember during my childhood days, visits to Balvatika (A Children’s Garden). The best thing about Balvatika was a room full of mirrors, which shows you distorted images of yourself. Its funny to look at a short you, tall and lean you, a fat you, a crooked you; the room rings constantly with laughter, fun and surprises. No matter how good looking and in-shape you are, the mirror just reflects the way it is designed – a laughable you. Now it is ok as long as it is all for fun and laughter, however it could be really shocking, if it happens in real life.

Recently I had been browsing thru the works of a few popular new-age and self help authors. Prolific authors, who are being treated almost with a demi-god status and people take their words as the ultimate dictum on life.

Strangely or co-incidentally, all of them have something to say about one person in particular - Jesus! Now as troubling as sometimes the teachings of Jesus are; equally confusing to me was the fact that few of these authors treated Jesus as a highly learned guru who spread ‘God-consciousness’ (a term I am still trying to understand, based on their viewpoint). I could see one underlying statement in their works - “The teachings of Jesus are too hard and they can’t be followed literally in today’s world”. Many have written books about revolving around the theme- ‘the Jesus, the world and His disciples have missed, now only to be found out by them!!’ Like many, they add “Jesus’ words are too radical to live by”.

When I look back and check history, it’s nothing new that is being said. In fact even during Jesus’ time many left him, when they found His teachings were hard and difficult to follow and Jesus had no qualms about those who left him. He infact raised the bar higher and said, “Narrow is the way and only a few will find it”.

However what is more disturbing is the fact that most of the perception of today’s world about Jesus is derived by looking at ’so called’ Christians. The general conclusion is that people who profess to be Christians aren’t able to live their life as their master/guru wanted, which is a statement I understand that can’t be generalized, however it does reflect the state of those who call themselves the followers/disciples of Christ!

A Christian on the other hand may lean heavily on overtly religious terms like ‘Grace’ and ‘Justification’ to wash his hands clean and will point his fingers into a future event which he calls ‘Glorification’ to refute his opposers claims about lack and want of perfection. But it is still a shocking and painful thing to know that because the world doesn’t see the followers of Jesus walking in the way their master showed, they have reinterpreted the very words of this Jesus. Its terrible to know that due to lack of a true witness of changed lives, they are forced to rethink on Jesus’ words. … I think it is shameful!!

These authors, and many more like them, opine that few have been able to achieve in their lives what Jesus wanted. And all those who did were all saints and lived far away, disconnected from the real world. To them it seems that the bad witnesses available in the real world have outnumbered the saints, which has coerced them to doubt the teachings of Jesus and reinterpret His words.

Coming back to the Christian and he will say, “Given the crooked bent in a heart which is not reconciled to GOD and the effects of sin on humans, the deceptiveness of sin makes people want to interpret the words of the master in their own terms and people would just want to find an excuse to not bend their knees”. But then equal responsibility also lies on the Christian to live a life in a fashion where the reflections of his/her personal life does not cast a shadow on their Master, His words and His intentions.

I think a true Christian should not sleep peacefully at night but rather be in much turmoil and distress when he sees that Jesus’ words are treated and interpreted in a different manner, just cos those following Him, claiming to hear from Him and close to Him can’t keep them!

What I want to ask the Christian is, “Why there are no Elijah’s today who would rise up and shake a nation or a Nathan who would convict a powerful king?” The answer is simple just like everyone else in the world; Christians follow the message of their convenience. Like others outside of the faith, who treat Jesus as a good teacher and take the convenient good things they like from His teaching, so is every one else who professes to be a follower of Christ and yet lives his/her life compromising the words of the Master.

So instead of becoming laughing stock, or appear laughable, and hardly pitiable, if they claim to be who they are, they need to know that the world is looking not just for answers but is also looking for evidence. Its searching for truth and its analyzing its out workings.

The bible means that a Christian is a newsprint that the world reads, and hence its time to clean up and rise up. Its time to stand up and witness !! Enough of Balvatika (playing around like kids)!

PS : I know when we point one finger towards someone, three point towards us.

Tags: Deepak Chopra, Dr. Phil, Jesus Christ, life, New Age, Oprah, Reflect, Reflections, Self Help, Sri sri Ravishankar, Witness, Witnessing

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 at 11:21 am and is filed under Articles, Blesson, By Category, Grace, Life Lessons, Religions, Society, Thoughts, Youth Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.