“God is [Jesus] like, and in [God] there is no un-Christ [Jesus]likeness at all”

—Archbishop Michael Ramsey

Passerby asks, “If, as you say, all the world’s wisdom literature contains something of the will and nature of the Great Spirit, to our benefit, and at the same time, contains a version of god that men created, then how am I to discern the difference? What is of men that I should question, and what is of the Spirit?”

Helder replies, “As you well know, while I hesitate to call myself a Christian, as I once did, I self-identify as a ‘Follower of Jesus’ and a ‘Lover of the Father of Jesus’ who I know as the Spirit or Great Spirit. It is no reflection on the person or on the teaching of Jesus that I cannot identify as Christian, but in my experience, its adherents, while they may rightfully claim to practice the Christian religion, may no longer claim to be followers of Jesus. The religion no longer follows the teachings of Rabbi Jesus.

• • •

There is a standard by which I discern what is of men—and I mean to say, men, as opposed to women—and what is of the Creator Spirit,

‘if it doesn’t look and sound like Jesus,
it cannot be the Father of Jesus.’

While there have been, over the centuries, other human beings who have been incarnations of the Spirit, Jesus was unique; in the quality of his person, he was the first fully human being to have walked the earth, meaning that the quality of the relationship that he modeled with the Spirit, his Father, was what the Spirit had created humans for. Also, in the obvious power of the Spirit in which he was anointed for setting the feet of humanity on the path toward unity with the Spirit, with one another, and with all creation, and in the depth of his teaching, by which humans should have enjoyed a much more fulfilling and satisfying history as “the Kingdom of God” on earth, rather than the one that they chose. Jesus said,

“If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.”

If we want to know what the Spirit thinks, feels, and acts like, we look no further than at Jesus. As the good Archbishop said, “In God, there is no un[Jesus]likeness at all.” In the amount that the ancient documents, whatever the tradition from which they come to us, are consistent with the person and teaching of Jesus, we may trust that they are the excellent words of the Spirit for our benefit. But, everyone is worshiping a god of their own understanding and making, so whenever the ‘sacred’ words they offer are contrary to the person and teaching of Jesus, we may assume that they merely reflect the man who wrote them.”

…everyone is worshiping a god of their own understanding…

• • •

Passerby says, “You say if we want to know God, we must look at Jesus, but all we know of Jesus is what is written about him in the Christian Bible. Can we trust that everything those writers wrote is what Jesus did and said?”

“No, there are a few things to say about that. First, none of the deeds and words of Jesus stand on their own merit. There is an older wisdom to which they all defer. Fr Rohr likes to use the Buddha’s example of a finger pointed at a beautiful full moon; the lesson is not in the finger but in the moon to which the finger is pointing. Similarly, Jesus directs our attention not to himself but to Love, who created all things. Love is the older wisdom to whom Jesus pointed. So…in the same way that we learn to know the difference between the wisdom of the Spirit and the words of men is by looking at Jesus, so we discern the words and deeds of Jesus by looking to what he pointed us to…Love. If it isn’t Love, then it is not Jesus nor the Holy Spirit whom Jesus referred to as Father.”

• • •

“The soul is made of love and must ever strive to return to love. Therefore, it can never find rest or happiness in other things. It must lose itself in love. It must seek God, who is love.”

— Mechthild of Magdeburg.

“Can we truly know what Love is and is not?”

“I know we can, for all humans are created in the image of Her self, which is Love. For a moment, turn your seeing and hearing inward as you have learned from me to seek the Holy, and what do you find there? Is it Love, or is it something else? I expect that you, and almost everyone else, will find Love. Never have I met someone who finds hate at their center when conducting this simple exercise. Although it is theoretically possible for hate to be stronger than Love, as Karl Barth said about hell, “it is the impossible possibility.”

We all seem to know, don’t we, when we love well and when we are not, and we all possess the language of Love. We know these things not by evolutionary accident or intuition; Love means being created in Her image. Love is the ultimate authority to which Jesus pointed.

So then, we know when we read that the words and deeds ascribed to Jesus are truly his, and by inference then, the heart and mind of the Creator, since they are always true to the character of the person of God, Love. Trust yourself to Love.

If it isn’t Love, then it is not Jesus nor
the Holy Spirit whom Jesus referred to as Father.”

• • •

There is more to be said about the portrayal of Jesus in the gospels, which deserves our careful attention.

Jesus himself left no personal record of his teachings…he wrote nothing. All stories of Jesus were written by men who presumably—not to dismiss motive—were well-intentioned, recording events as they remember them. And some of them are writing considerably after the events, which, as we well know, can have a deleterious effect on history. This explains the differing accounts present in the Gospels, and accepting this is true is not a significant problem. Also, I have found it helpful to acknowledge that history does not take very long to become mythology. This is true in the lives of notable human beings (i.e., St Francis, Abraham Lincoln, Gandhi, and Yes, Jesus). Neither do I find this particularly disturbing. If we understand that the value of good mythology is that it gives us a deeper look at reality than historical literalism can ever provide, we know that we have been given a wonderful gift. The rule of Love still applies.

• • •

Another very helpful understanding of the story of Jesus in the gospels I first read is the work of Marcus Borg. While obvious, it mostly goes unnoticed. All the writing that makes up the New Testament is “post-resurrection” and is, therefore, a reflection of, or a mirror, of the community that produced them. So…much that we read in the Gospels is the understanding that the blessed community came to after they had time to process the events together and had agreed on what they experienced. This is the excellent work of the Holy Spirit, a gift, and needs a myth to be received. If the question is, “Is what I read true, or is it a myth? ” The answer, as the good Rabbi said, is, “Yes!”

“Stand by Love.”