Why do some products have that difficult plastic casting? You bring home your latest gadget from the store. Upon taking it out of the bag,, you have to wrestle with multiple layers of steel-like plastic to be able to even touch your new product. You try ripping the plastic with your hands, but you quickly lose that battle. Scissors help, but they 4require a certain angle of slice and dance with your wrists. After several minutes of frustration, you are finally granted access to something that is often granted access to something that is often one-forth or even one-eight of the size of the original packaging.
Phew.
But despite your battles with this type of packaging, do they ever prevent you from buying the next thingamajig or doohickey? Of course not. It's just packaging. If the product is desirable enough, you're going to buy it and open it no matter what.
Imagine a world without packaging, a world in which things, people and ideas were presented in a way that they truly were. No pretense. No plastic. What if we could just get what we needed a without that exterior plastic casting?
This is the problem with religion today--many feel they can't get through its layers of packaging. In times past, religion has indeed been a vehicle of corruption and violence. It has been blamed for incompetent government and the launching of world wars. Pastors, priest, and clerics have manipulated the spiritual needs of individuals for their own profit. Countries have been torn apart because of one religious sect battling another. In more ways than one, many of the accusations that have been brought against religion are correct.
This frustration with religion's track record-- what it appears to be, its "plastic exterior"--is certainly true of one of the world's largest organized religions, namely Christianity. Many are hostile toward the church, but love Jesus. Many feel suspicious of membership and organization, but are open to the figure of Christ.
Gandhi, the great leader of the twentieth-century Indian independence movement, once said, "I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ." There seems to be a large contrast between Christ and Christianity. Perhaps you've felt this way too.
The True Jesus
The irony is that Jesus was so anti-packaging. In His preaching, He called out the abuses and misdeeds of the religious establishment. In the Sermon on the Mount, He said, "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill," (Matthew 5:17). Jesus came to illuminate the true meaning of religion, "the law and the prophets," that had been twisted and abused.
In fact, the Scriptures that He preached even predicted a false, corrupted Christianity to come in the future. It would cause global suffering and persecute those at odds with its teaching, which misrepresented God. It would "make war" with anyone that disagreed with it and "prevail against them," (Daniel 7:21). But despite the abuses of religion in the past and in the future, Jesus did not seek to destroy it, but to illuminate its true meaning.
Before His death on the cross, Jesus was brought before Pilate, A Roman ruler, When Pilate questioned Him regarding His arrest by Roman soldiers and the Jewish leaders, Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now My kingdom is not from here," (John 18:36). Jesus taught that true religion was not about worldly success or personal gain, but something beyond this world.
What Jesus came to offer is a pure and genuine spirituality, a transcendent yet supremely practical way that not only addresses our human problems, but even solves Divine ones. How can a God that is all-powerful, all-present, and all-knowing allow for suffering? How does a good deal with evil--with force, or with something else? Jesus' solutions were something this world had never seen before. "My kingdom is not of this world."
Imagine a Christianity without its packaging. What if you knew the true intents, teachings, character, and reasoning of Jesus Christ in the way that He meant them. No pretense. No plastic. What if there was a way to understand Christ in His purity?
What if your could understand love, peace, joy, and faith deeper than what Hallmark uses on its cards--as Jesus Himself talked about them and demonstrated in His life?
What if your could understand Jesus' teachings without the political biases and religious interpretations that have muddled them for centuries?
What if Jesus wasn't a crazed rabble-rouser, or merely a good teacher? What if He was something more than anything any human being could conjure up, more than one in a long line of wise men?
Here is what one writer had to say about the true Jesus: "Jesus was a perfect pattern of what we should be. He was the strictest observer of His Father's law, yet He moved in perfect freedom. He has all the fervor of the enthusiast, yet He was calm, sober, and self-possessed. He was elevated above the common affairs of the world, yet He did not exclude Himself from society. He dined with publicans and sinners, played with the little children, and took them in His arms and blessed them. He graced the wedding feast with His presence. He shed tears at the grave of Lazarus.
"His zeal never degenerated into passion or His consistency into selfish obstinacy. His benevolence never savored of weakness nor His sympathy of sentimentalism. He combined the innocence and strength of the child with manly strength, all-absorbing devotion to God with tender love for man. He possessed commanding dignity combined with winning grace of humility. He manifested unyielding firmness with gentleness..We have not six patterns to follow, nor five; we have only one, and that is Christ Jesus."
Beyond Religion
Do you want to get through the packaging? You would be making a decision that millions of people need to, but are afraid of. You would be making the first step toward seeing, knowing, and even believing in the pure person, character, and life of Jesus.
Take this step by reading the most comprehensive book on Jesus life, teachings and prophecies: The Desire of Ages, Just as the title intimates, this book shows why, in spite of the "packaging," Jesus inspires hope, transformation, and devotion.
Here is a snippet of the first chapter:
"God With Us"
"His name shall be called Immanuel,...God with us" "The light of the knowledge of the glory of God" is seen "in the face of Jesus Christ." From the days of eternity the Lord Jesus Christ was one with the Father; He was "the image of God," the image of His greatness and majesty, "the outshining of His glory," It was to manifest this glory that He came to our world. To this sin-darkened earth He came to reveal the light of God's love,--to be "God with us." Therefore it was prophesied of Him, "His name shall be called Immanuel."
By coming to dwell with us, Jesus was to reveal God both to men and to angels. He was the Word of God made audible. In His prayer for His disciples He says, "I have declared unto them Thy name,"--merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,"--that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them." But not alone for His earth born children was this revelation given. Our little world is the lesson book of the universe. God's wonderful purpose of grace, the mystery of redeeming love, is the theme into which "angels desire to look," and it will be their study throughout endless ages. Both the redeemed and the unfallen beings will find in the cross of Christ their science and their song. It will be seen that the glory shinning in the face of Jesus is the glory of self-sacrificing love. In the light from Calvary it will be seen that the law of self-renouncing love is the law of life for earth and heaven; that the love which "seeketh not her own" has its source in the heart of God; and that in the meek and lowly One is manifested in the character of Him who dwelleth in the light which no man can approach unto.
In the beginning, God was revealed in all the works of creation. It was Christ that spread the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth. It was His hand that hung the worlds in space, and fashioned the flowers of the field. "His strength setteth fast the mountains." "The sea is His,and He made it. Psalm 65:6; 95:5. It was He that filled the earth with beauty, and the air with song. And upon all things in earth, and air, and sky, He wrote the message of the Father's love.
Now sin has marred God's perfect work, yet that handwriting remains. Even now all created things declare the glory of His excellence. There is nothing, save the selfish heart of man, that lives unto itself. No bird that cleaves the air, no animal that moves upon the ground but ministers to some other life. There is no leaf of the forest, or lowly blade of grass, but has its ministry. Every tree and shrub and leaf pours forth that element of life with which neither man nor animal could live; and man and animal, in turn, minister to the life of tree and shrub and leaf. The flowers breath fragrance and unfold their beauty in blessing to the world. The sun sheds its light to gladden a thousand worlds. The ocean, itself the source of all our springs and fountains, receives the streams from every land, but takes to give. The mist ascending from its bosom fall in showers to water the earth, that it may bring forth and bud.
I hope this wets your appetite to read more of this wonderful book. You can find and read this book online and judge this book and see for yourselves if it's in line with the living word...The Bible which is man's instruction before leaving earth.
Blessings to all of you.
Phew.
But despite your battles with this type of packaging, do they ever prevent you from buying the next thingamajig or doohickey? Of course not. It's just packaging. If the product is desirable enough, you're going to buy it and open it no matter what.
Imagine a world without packaging, a world in which things, people and ideas were presented in a way that they truly were. No pretense. No plastic. What if we could just get what we needed a without that exterior plastic casting?
This is the problem with religion today--many feel they can't get through its layers of packaging. In times past, religion has indeed been a vehicle of corruption and violence. It has been blamed for incompetent government and the launching of world wars. Pastors, priest, and clerics have manipulated the spiritual needs of individuals for their own profit. Countries have been torn apart because of one religious sect battling another. In more ways than one, many of the accusations that have been brought against religion are correct.
This frustration with religion's track record-- what it appears to be, its "plastic exterior"--is certainly true of one of the world's largest organized religions, namely Christianity. Many are hostile toward the church, but love Jesus. Many feel suspicious of membership and organization, but are open to the figure of Christ.
Gandhi, the great leader of the twentieth-century Indian independence movement, once said, "I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ." There seems to be a large contrast between Christ and Christianity. Perhaps you've felt this way too.
The True Jesus
The irony is that Jesus was so anti-packaging. In His preaching, He called out the abuses and misdeeds of the religious establishment. In the Sermon on the Mount, He said, "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill," (Matthew 5:17). Jesus came to illuminate the true meaning of religion, "the law and the prophets," that had been twisted and abused.
In fact, the Scriptures that He preached even predicted a false, corrupted Christianity to come in the future. It would cause global suffering and persecute those at odds with its teaching, which misrepresented God. It would "make war" with anyone that disagreed with it and "prevail against them," (Daniel 7:21). But despite the abuses of religion in the past and in the future, Jesus did not seek to destroy it, but to illuminate its true meaning.
Before His death on the cross, Jesus was brought before Pilate, A Roman ruler, When Pilate questioned Him regarding His arrest by Roman soldiers and the Jewish leaders, Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now My kingdom is not from here," (John 18:36). Jesus taught that true religion was not about worldly success or personal gain, but something beyond this world.
What Jesus came to offer is a pure and genuine spirituality, a transcendent yet supremely practical way that not only addresses our human problems, but even solves Divine ones. How can a God that is all-powerful, all-present, and all-knowing allow for suffering? How does a good deal with evil--with force, or with something else? Jesus' solutions were something this world had never seen before. "My kingdom is not of this world."
Imagine a Christianity without its packaging. What if you knew the true intents, teachings, character, and reasoning of Jesus Christ in the way that He meant them. No pretense. No plastic. What if there was a way to understand Christ in His purity?
What if your could understand love, peace, joy, and faith deeper than what Hallmark uses on its cards--as Jesus Himself talked about them and demonstrated in His life?
What if your could understand Jesus' teachings without the political biases and religious interpretations that have muddled them for centuries?
What if Jesus wasn't a crazed rabble-rouser, or merely a good teacher? What if He was something more than anything any human being could conjure up, more than one in a long line of wise men?
Here is what one writer had to say about the true Jesus: "Jesus was a perfect pattern of what we should be. He was the strictest observer of His Father's law, yet He moved in perfect freedom. He has all the fervor of the enthusiast, yet He was calm, sober, and self-possessed. He was elevated above the common affairs of the world, yet He did not exclude Himself from society. He dined with publicans and sinners, played with the little children, and took them in His arms and blessed them. He graced the wedding feast with His presence. He shed tears at the grave of Lazarus.
"His zeal never degenerated into passion or His consistency into selfish obstinacy. His benevolence never savored of weakness nor His sympathy of sentimentalism. He combined the innocence and strength of the child with manly strength, all-absorbing devotion to God with tender love for man. He possessed commanding dignity combined with winning grace of humility. He manifested unyielding firmness with gentleness..We have not six patterns to follow, nor five; we have only one, and that is Christ Jesus."
Beyond Religion
Do you want to get through the packaging? You would be making a decision that millions of people need to, but are afraid of. You would be making the first step toward seeing, knowing, and even believing in the pure person, character, and life of Jesus.
Take this step by reading the most comprehensive book on Jesus life, teachings and prophecies: The Desire of Ages, Just as the title intimates, this book shows why, in spite of the "packaging," Jesus inspires hope, transformation, and devotion.
Here is a snippet of the first chapter:
"God With Us"
"His name shall be called Immanuel,...God with us" "The light of the knowledge of the glory of God" is seen "in the face of Jesus Christ." From the days of eternity the Lord Jesus Christ was one with the Father; He was "the image of God," the image of His greatness and majesty, "the outshining of His glory," It was to manifest this glory that He came to our world. To this sin-darkened earth He came to reveal the light of God's love,--to be "God with us." Therefore it was prophesied of Him, "His name shall be called Immanuel."
By coming to dwell with us, Jesus was to reveal God both to men and to angels. He was the Word of God made audible. In His prayer for His disciples He says, "I have declared unto them Thy name,"--merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,"--that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them." But not alone for His earth born children was this revelation given. Our little world is the lesson book of the universe. God's wonderful purpose of grace, the mystery of redeeming love, is the theme into which "angels desire to look," and it will be their study throughout endless ages. Both the redeemed and the unfallen beings will find in the cross of Christ their science and their song. It will be seen that the glory shinning in the face of Jesus is the glory of self-sacrificing love. In the light from Calvary it will be seen that the law of self-renouncing love is the law of life for earth and heaven; that the love which "seeketh not her own" has its source in the heart of God; and that in the meek and lowly One is manifested in the character of Him who dwelleth in the light which no man can approach unto.
In the beginning, God was revealed in all the works of creation. It was Christ that spread the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth. It was His hand that hung the worlds in space, and fashioned the flowers of the field. "His strength setteth fast the mountains." "The sea is His,and He made it. Psalm 65:6; 95:5. It was He that filled the earth with beauty, and the air with song. And upon all things in earth, and air, and sky, He wrote the message of the Father's love.
Now sin has marred God's perfect work, yet that handwriting remains. Even now all created things declare the glory of His excellence. There is nothing, save the selfish heart of man, that lives unto itself. No bird that cleaves the air, no animal that moves upon the ground but ministers to some other life. There is no leaf of the forest, or lowly blade of grass, but has its ministry. Every tree and shrub and leaf pours forth that element of life with which neither man nor animal could live; and man and animal, in turn, minister to the life of tree and shrub and leaf. The flowers breath fragrance and unfold their beauty in blessing to the world. The sun sheds its light to gladden a thousand worlds. The ocean, itself the source of all our springs and fountains, receives the streams from every land, but takes to give. The mist ascending from its bosom fall in showers to water the earth, that it may bring forth and bud.
I hope this wets your appetite to read more of this wonderful book. You can find and read this book online and judge this book and see for yourselves if it's in line with the living word...The Bible which is man's instruction before leaving earth.
Blessings to all of you.
