I was asked this question today and it really made me wonder how many other people have this same question. So I am going to cover the first aspect, in my mind, today of how to look at the question of Jesus. Here is the question: “I believe in God, I pray to Him and ask for His guidance in as many aspects of my life that I can but I don’t know that I fully have a grip on Jesus, where do I go from here?” With so many denominations and differing religions in the world today, this is really a legitimate question that an individual might have. The key in addressing it is doing so gently, if you remember my thoughts on Spiritual Fruit a few weeks back.

Jesus is the one subject that tends to have an emotional impact on people and will always be a point of division between religions outside of Christianity. Whether you view this a positive or negative, He is the context of what is/isn’t truth. The challenge, especially in today’s world, is that there are multiple explanations and mentalities about truth. With the freedom of choice, comes individual reasoning.

1. In our (Western) culture “everyone is entitled to their own opinion of what is and isn’t truth” and when you disagree with that, you have a right to your opinion, and that’s the truth.
2. On the other hand, in some (Eastern) cultures “there is only one way and that is the way you have been taught and you will not deviate from what you have been taught or you be ostracized or killed.”
3. Lastly, there are those who find little to no reason to even embrace the concept of God, Jesus or anything spiritual because it simply “does not exist, because I cannot see, touch or feel Him.”

So, depending on where you come from or who raised you there can be a massive difference in what a person believes or has been “educated” to believe. You cannot blame or look down on someone because they come from a differing culture or mindset. Your role is to picture, emulate or communicate what you believe to be the truth in a loving and gentile way. The more argumentative or belligerent you act, the more challenging the message will be to convey and the less chance of acceptance.

So, for today, I am going to address one aspect of this question. Tomorrow and perhaps in the following days, I will try to clarify the concept further. The first facet is about whether a person actually believes in God or a higher power. This concept is always addressed during a person’s lifetime. Today it is one of the aspects of humanity that is so highly studied you can actually get a degree in (Cultural) Anthropology. The study is defined as a scholarly discipline aiming to describe in the broadest possible sense what it means to be human while studying other humans. The challenge is that these views have often caused wars and even genocide because of cultural prejudices. The one common theme, no matter what part of the world you come from is a generally universal concept of a higher power. 84% of the world believes in “God” and sacred writings indicate the spirit world believes this also (James 2:19.)

If that many people agree and we understand that the odds of “order evolving from chaos” is completely illogical, then we must acknowledge that a higher power exists. With that thought in mind, knowing that we are unbelievably complicated creations, then we must have been formed with a spiritual dimension that must have ways to interactively communicate. If this is true, then there would be a requirement for accessibility between the visible and invisible world. That is our subject matter for tomorrow and how Jesus fits into the picture. Love Dad