The Jesus I Never Knew... hmmm

This quarter at Whitworth, I am taking "The life teachings of Jesus" as my biblical lit requirement. I've only been in the class for a week or so but have found myself already thinking, "Wow, Jesus was real?!?!" Now some people reading this might think... "Christina are you serious? Your a Christian, right?!?!" Well, I am a Christian and yes, I have heard in the few years of being a Christian, that Jesus was a real man. However, when you read and study the bible... sometimes it's hard to over look the "magic", "the Umph factor", heck to actually stop and realize that this $70-leather-bond-bible with my name in graved in it... is really just a history book about the past. The bible portrays God as a human in four books, Matthew, Luke, Mark and John. (totally out of order to bother people **SMILES**)

Maybe that is my own issue but I realize in the last few class times, that I put Jesus up in this "Walt Disney, Magical, absolutely amazing, Alpha human" category in my head. It was like Jesus is the Prince Charming in all my childhood princess stories. He was the hero in every Heman, G.I. Joe or any other cartoon series I can think of. Jesus in my eyes was so amazing, so exquisite, so totally real that I found it hard to actually comprehend that he was real. That he actually walked this earth.

The more my teacher puts up pictures of Jerusalem, Israel, and every other ruined, dirty filled city from the time period of Jesus. The more I come to grips with the fact that Jesus was real. The more I come to really grasp how amazing that little history book called the bible is. It's like Jesus went from being some Super Hero in my eyes, to being even more amazing and real. Then it gets me thinking....

When people sit there and question the "realness" of the bible (yes I am guilty of this myself), this history book of real-life soap operas, amazing miracles and little laws about how to love and live. I can't help but think, there is no way anyone could make this up and if they did. Wouldn't they have had Jesus talking to more upstanding citizens, rather than the poor and "common" folk. Wouldn't there be more "warm fuzzy stories" in the bible to appeal to the crowds. Then something else that just got brought to my attention, had someone made up these stories. Jesus wouldn't be talking to any women in the bible. Jesus wouldn't of talked to the woman at the well. Let another woman wash his feet. Let the women be the first to the tomb for Jesus' resurrection. Women wouldn't be in those amazing moments at all. Now I am not saying talking to women is bad (hello I am one **WINK**) but back in the day and still to this day... Women are not regarded as great prizes or worth talking too in that country.

So as I hear my classmates question the bibles facts and why some books were left out. I found this little voice in side that wanted to say... "If Jesus wasn't real and the bible was made up... then what are we looking at in those pictures? What is it about this little piece of sand and dirty property that everyone wants? How is it, that a man that lived 2000 years ago is such a huge topic of subject? Then why is it that we tell time by Jesus' birth? If this man isn't true and the bible is nothing more than a fairy tale.... why are so many people touched by it everyday? Why are we all in this class, spending a arm and leg on this education debating about someone that supposedly didn't live in your mind?" I never said any of that but in my mind... all I could think is, "Man... Jesus is Real!" That just trips me out.

So with every debate that I will have in this class. With every thought that I will bring out of this class. I don't think anything will effect me as much as that moment, when I realized and excepted the fact... Jesus lived here on earth. When that thought becomes real in a person... that's when some of the stories in the bible come alive with more "Umph". That's when Jesus' death becomes more than just that cross around my neck. His pain becomes real and his tears become real. Jesus became someone more than just a story to me this week.