The Revelator Speaks

A. Unabashed Pacifist:

If you ask Jesus, He’ll say “Love your enemies. Forgive those who persecute you.” Most people don’t seem to be interested in what Jesus says…

B. Unabashed Christian:

Holy One,

You are the center around which our lives radiate.
You are the place from which we go out and to which we return.
You are the bedrock, the touchstone upon and around whom our lives gravitate.
We could not, even if we wanted to, escape the gravitational pull that comes from you.
Those who attempt to escape that pull are only reacting to a debased image of you.
I know you’re my home base.
Amen

C. Un-quoting Jesus:

“If I’d only known then what I know now.”

[Not one of the things He said from the cross.]

D. Blog: Revelation

In a dream, I saw the author of what we call the Book of Revelation. He looked down upon Earth and saw those Christians who spend so much time trying to interpret his apocalyptic text. And he said to me:

“Those people must be out of their minds! They spend so much time and energy and money trying to make what I wrote for my time into something that predicts their future. They just don’t get it: It’s not about them. I did not write for them.

“Writing to them, I would say: Woe to you who take my encouragement to those Christians under Roman oppression and substitute it for following the ways of Jesus. Woe to you who seek to earn a living by frightening people with false images of the future. Woe to you who present a wrathful image of the Holy One to obscure the loving God of all. Woe to you when you focus your attention on the bad news of a hopeless future for life on the Creator’s divine Earth and forget about the good news of hope in Jesus Christ.

“Repent of your wicked ways, I say. Hear me: Whatever is good and noble, whatever is pleasing and loving, whatever is compassionate and just, whatever is humble and righteous, whatever gives hope – think on these things. Amen.”

I heard his words and they filled me with joy.