Believe That?

I had an interesting conversation with a young woman recently. She summarized what she knew of Jesus Christ by stating: You expect me to believe that God became a half-God, half-man being who walked around the world for awhile, died on a cross, then rose again and wants me to eat his body once a week? You've got to admit what we believe about Jesus does sound a little strange.

I told her that it does sound mysterious. As finite creatures, we find it difficult to understand an infinite God. It is a great mystery! I told her that I came to accept this profound mystery even more deeply as a result of what happened when I was on a mission trip in Guatemala. Our team was working with girls ages 12-18 who were labeled special needs. The variety of special needs was enormous. Over a hundred girls were housed together with only a few staff members to care for their needs. There were girls who had mental and physical handicaps, but the majority of the girls had been the victim of some kind of sexual abuse. In my work with victims of sexual abuse I know that it can take 6-18 months of intensive therapy for a girl to find the release of false shame and forgiveness that leads her out of a prison of bitterness. However, we were there for only one week teaching them that they were beautiful in God’s eyes. In the middle of the week, I was back at the hotel sitting by the pool feeling overwhelmed by the needs of the girls and my desire to make a real difference. I could see that our efforts were like a drop in the ocean compared with what they needed. I felt the helplessness of not being able to give the girls what I saw they needed and what I wanted to give them. Even if I could come back, learn to speak Spanish, and live there, I could not possibly provide the amount of therapy that would be needed. It would take about twenty therapists and specialists to meet the needs of these girls. I felt God showing me through this huge reality that was far too big for me to fix that I was giving them what they needed most. I was teaching them about Jesus and His love for them. Nothing else can truly fix what is so wrong with this world.

Jesus is a mystery. It is mysterious to consider that through believing that He is the Son of God and that He died for my sins, I am transformed into His likeness and am deemed worthy to live with God in heaven. I cannot fathom how Jesus can make every single thing that is so wrong with this world right again; but He promises He can, and He says that He will.

Isaiah 55:9 says, As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. Anyone who truly ponders the reality of Jesus—and the loving and generous God who cares for even those who mock who Him—should be mystified! But that is our God. That is our Jesus. He is the only way to fix what is so wrong with this universe. I will never fully comprehend it either. Yet it makes more sense than anything that man can think or come up with to fix a whole universe.

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