Ah,
there it is. The first "Zombie Jesus" post in my Fb feed this Easter.
Every year, even before I came back to God, I would cringe at those stupid,
tasteless jokes. This year, I sort of dreaded seeing them, to be honest.
Apparently some folks still think it’s good fun to ridicule other people’s
beliefs as the butt of insulting jokes. But hey, it’s okay ‘cause we have this
thing called free speech, an aspect of free will. So whatever. I’m jus’ sayin’…
But that’s not my main point. My main point is this: I'd actually like to borrow this insulting joke and turn it around. Consider that it is actually a reality, not a joke, only in reverse. And mind you, this is from a Christian perspective, so I don't expect everyone to agree.
But that’s not my main point. My main point is this: I'd actually like to borrow this insulting joke and turn it around. Consider that it is actually a reality, not a joke, only in reverse. And mind you, this is from a Christian perspective, so I don't expect everyone to agree.
Here's
what I'm saying: we are the zombies without the Resurrection – literally
the walking dead – stumbling in a hazy twilight from our own
self-absorbed, self-righteous, yes, sinful, state. Before you get your back up
about that statement, though, consider this: I have to fully admit that after
my re-conversion last year (which I have dubbed my ‘resurrection experience’),
I could look back on the last 20 years of my life and see how deluded, clouded,
lonely, and desperate I was to feel alive in the face of life's rigors or even just the every day confusions and let downs of modern existence. I
wasn’t a walking dirge, by any means; no, I was given to fits of playfulness,
and paroxysms of the life I thought I was living. Only, I wasn’t living, not
really. I tried to reach out in answer to what I now know was God’s call in
ways that didn’t quite work (to put it mildly). I made selfish choices that hurt others and myself. I struggled with depression and anger; anyone who
knew me during those years can be a witness to this. The truth is that
everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, changed when our Messiah came to me
and opened my heart, weeping with me in my losses, and then healing the wounds
I had carried even from my mother’s womb. It was an unexpected, personal,
intimate encounter with him. Nothing had ever prepared me for it. I am still filled with awe and wonder when I contemplate the fact that he had never given up on me. That he has filled me with the true Love that I never thought could exist. A perfect analogy for who I was vs. who I am now is a zombie vs. a real human being with access to the Divine Heart.
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| http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130320.html |
Now, that's just my personal experience; I'm not at all suggesting that it is or should be this way for others. However, whether
it’s believing that God doesn’t exist, or that he doesn’t care, or that we are too
sinful or nasty as human beings for God to reach out to us, sin is believing
the lie that he doesn’t LOVE us with
such passion that he would live and die as one of us, and that it wasn’t enough
that he died to show us the Way – he was Resurrected, to bring us all to new
life WITH him – all because he LOVES
us unconditionally. Yeshua the Messiah showed us how to be real, alive, vital
human beings, sharing ourselves fully in community, not trapped in legalism,
desires, coveting, selfishness or the enlarged egos of our intellectual prowess
or spiritual pride (two sides of the same coin). The Messiah is our REAL life;
he brought us back to life – heart of flesh from a heart of stone. The living
waters pouring forth, rather than the stagnation of souls weighed down by ego
(which includes both ‘I’m perfect’ and ‘I’m worthless’), pride, selfishness,
and rebellion toward God.
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