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I was talking about this before, where God saves us from high interest rates, and the necessity of going to the doctor for the ingrown toenail rather than saving us from sin. But then, that’s only part of the situation.
The central problem we humans have is that we seriously misunderstand the nature of the universe. Any of us with half a brain and the ability to look at the universe realize pretty quickly that the universe is not about us. That’s a correct understanding. Many of us leave it at that because, well, we can’t get over ourselves. Like that guy in “About a Boy”, we see our lives as TV shows about us. When faced with the realization that self centered life is hollow, we find ourselves focussing on “society” or on “stuff” or anything to hopefully keep us believing that there is some meaning. It’s what Kierkegaard calls “despair”. Smart guy, Kierkegaard.
This stuff can only keep us so far, though, as when we look into the cosmos, and the vast expanses of interstellar pace, and the shortness of our own period of life here on this tiny ball, we learn that our short life spans are insignificant in the grand scheme of both time and space, and that there was a time with no life, and given the freakish improbability of life, there will probably be none when the sun finally gives out and we cease to be even as a race.
Most people give up here. They either invest all their time in convincing themselves that humanity matters, contrary to all the evidence, or simply give up and become those horribly depressing people who dress in black at coffee shops.
Indeed, those are the rational choices, based on the evidence I’ve given so far.
But then, there’s Jesus.
Contrary to some movies by the more loopy skeptic set, Jesus was a person who actually existed. Who actually taught during a historical period that is identifiable, and was falsifiable. A man who was crucified on a cross, and then, if the story is true, rose from the dead on the third day.
Many here say “but that’s impossible”, and I agree, if the premise is that the universe is as we’ve believed it to be. But then, that is probably a point of the resurrection. It’s impossible, unless we’re wrong.
And see, we’re wrong.
Jesus came into a place and time that told a story. That story is that the universe is indeed not about us, as the evidence suggests; that things have a point, as the evidence of our own hearts suggests, and our very desire to see a “point” in things suggests. Yet the point is not us. The point is a loving, powerful and just God. One great enough to create a universe, and good enough to create love. This God actually fits the evidence.
And the resurrection creates the dissonance to show that we are wrong, and the God that is the point is really there. A God who resurrected Jesus to validate what Jesus told us about a grander purpose; one where we are created….. created to love God….. and separated from God by a desire to BE God, to BE the point in the universe.
When we decided to BE the point, we live a lie, and we all know it’s a lie. We need a saviour, not from worthlessness, not from despair or immorality (those all those come from it), we need a savior from our sinful desire to be God, to make something that isn’t God into god.
We need a savior from us.
And into that story, that context, that grand sweep told through thousands of years of history in a single people in the middle east steps Jesus.
He said “come unto me, all that labour (even labour to avoid despair) and are heavy laden (even with the realization that they are not central to the universe), and I will refresh you”.
He also said that those who see him, see the father, the real point of the universe.
He offers the real salvation, not a mediocre call to get rich and have 2.2 kids, but communion with a real God, that is infinitely worthy, who is the point, and who offers us the ability to enjoy him forever.