As we begin to share the “wisdom” of the Resurrection, let’s think about the practical distinction between wisdom and knowledge in the popular way we use language today. They are synonymous when we talk about God. That is not so of us. Knowledge can be without wisdom (‘understanding’). We can ‘know’ loads of stuff about so many subjects through education and experience—that also include ‘spiritual’ experience or ‘encounters’ with God (think about the Transfiguration of Jesus in the Gospels)—yet not understand what that ‘knowledge’ means. Given much of modern education, we tend to be more ‘book smart’ (data savvy) than ‘wise.’ This is very important to how we relate to anything, whether we consider the subject to be ‘worldly’ (secular) or ‘spiritual’ (sacred). It has to do with our ‘worldview’ (‘the big picture’ of universal reality) and paradigms on particular subjects (‘point of view’ or perspective on individual matters).

Let me give you an example of what I am saying from my own life.

I am a below average person with no remarkable social status, education, or achievements. I am a high school dropout with a G.E.D. A southern guy in the nation’s ‘Bible Belt’ who, ironically, was a true heathen having never even attended a church service until I was 16 years old. I was unspoiled by the ‘propaganda mill’ of a ‘religious’ family since no one in my family ever spoke of the subject or participated in any religious observance (that I remember). Well, with possible exceptions of Christmas and Easter. But I was ignorant of the meaning of these, other than the cultural icons of Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.

I hadn’t read a single verse out of the Bible that I am aware of. I had never seen Billy Graham or any other televangelist on TV. We were fans of Star Trek and the sci-fi genre of entertainment. I vaguely remember having heard the 23rd Psalm, maybe in the context of a movie or TV series, which to me didn’t seem like a great advertisement for God: “The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want(?!)” With press like that, who wanted anything to do with religion? This formed the way I saw reality. Then I came to faith in Jesus, which began a process of renewal, which is the subjective “spiritual” act of participation in the Lord’s Resurrection.

Worldview is important as it relates to our understanding of God (theology) and Scripture (interpretation). (Think back to what I mentioned about to my pre-conversion point of view and how I understood the 23rd Psalm.) And NOWHERE have found worldview issues to be more true than in relating to the Resurrection! Let me give you the good new and the bad news.

The good news is that even ‘mere Christianity,’ the faith that traditional church teaching and preaching introduced me to when I finally chose to listen, had the power to change my worldview. It connected me with the mysterious world of the Bible and its God. This gave me a vague view of Jesus, though that was enough light to turn my downside-up vision of the world and its God right-side-up! It started a slow process of re-education, or what Paul called “the renewal of the mind” in Romans 12:2. It began to liberate me from the prison my old worldview had created. More on that later…

Do I dare be so impolite to mention the bad news? I believe I would lack integrity before God and humanity if I didn’t. The way the convention church teaches ‘faith’ in God eclipses the meaning of Jesus’ Resurrection. Which means we in the Christian community don’t understand Gospel as well as we think we do. That has immense implications that in retrospect I feel robbed me of the revelation I am now gaining by my focus on the Resurrection of the Lord.

We have reams and libraries of information and media on devotional materials, ‘salvation’ tracts and sermons, theology, and other Christian related institutions and centers of academia. But I challenge anyone to look and see how much material one can find on the Resurrection of Jesus, THE CENTRAL event of the Gospel that literally sets it apart from any other religious system. What is the “Good News” about? In a nutshell it is about the history of the cosmos reaching the conclusion God intended for creation through the Resurrection of Jesus. All history before this was in preparation for the revelation of the life of God (“glory”) fully shared with His creatures. According to Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:7, this “glory” was intended for the cosmos before its creation yet hidden in a “mystery” until “the fulness of times” when the conditions were satisfactory for its revelation. Creation was pregnant with this “Life,” but it still needed to give it birth. Christ achieved the conditions necessary for the revelation of “the glory of God” through His obedience.

Do you find this surprising? I did. I had NEVER heard that. All I can remember from my formation in faith was about the cross of Christ and what it means. But what the Resurrection meant was never really explained. Cricket-like noise. NOBODY talked about this. It was like no one really deemed it very relatable. I just thought the Resurrection was a fascinating, but mostly hard to connect with other than being an odd testimony about the survival of ‘the soul’ after death that inspires hope for an ‘afterlife’ that makes our anxiety about human mortality more bearable. Everyone can relate to miracles. (Who doesn’t desire one at some point?) Yet it is as though nobody knows what to make of the Resurrection, other than an aid for processing grief at funerals. Generally speaking, it appears as though the Resurrection is a religious myth to help the ‘dying,’ not a faith for the ‘living,’ with the power to remake human existence in a better way and fill the “world” with a better vision of redemption—than the utopian/dystopian ones we see expressed in our present imagination—in order to fulfill God’s original purpose for creating.

Think I am making too much of this? Outlandish? Off-the-wall? Annoyingly narcissistic? Think I am nuts or way too imprudent or grandstanding self-importance? Read carefully the story of Jesus. Many think the same about Jesus. When His is taken seriously, He has always been either loved or hated. I issue this challenge: investigate and seek to discover the BIBLICAL meaning of the life, death, and Resurrection of Jesus and see for yourself if my emphasis is unwise and unwarranted. My goal for this blog site is to help whoever personally wants to discover the CENTRAL event of Jesus’ life that possesses the power “to bring life and immortality to light through the Gospel.”

If you are up for this expedition, brace yourself. This beats Star Trek’s five-year mission ‘to go where no man has gone before.’ It isn’t about a curio shop of encounters of ‘strange new worlds and civilizations’ of ‘heavenly realms’ and ‘spiritual’ experiences. It is about going to the center of the cosmos to find the meaning of EVERYTHING and not just the fringe ‘supernatural’ stuff on the edges. True revelation of the Divine is offensive by nature. It cannot originate from us; it must be given. That is why it is called a ‘revelation.’ But, too, this is one of the major reasons some folks don’t like the Gospel. The truth about God isn’t ‘our truth.’ It is proprietary to Him alone. We seek “equality with God” through “knowledge.” But this kind of knowledge is ‘way out of our league.’ It belongs to God and those He chooses to share it with.

The truth about God He has chosen to be fully disclosed in Christ now through His Resurrection. As one learns to refocus to see everything through the lens of the Resurrection of Jesus, one will find what the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 8:2 VERY appropriate: “The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know.” Put crudely? We too often really don’t know we are talking about. Our pride often blinds us to this too. Yet still there is this intuition that we are missing something very important, but it seems to evade us by being out of our reach. The Resurrection of Jesus is like a slap in the face as a wake-up call. The Resurrection declared Jesus to be the worthy Heir of God’s glory with the power of judgment can save or harden us. Yep. It is just that important, regardless of one’s attitude about it. Our attitude says more about us than Him. Our trust or lack of it judges us, not the truth. All the hosts of the unseen world are at a fever pitch in ecstatic delight praising the worthiness of the Risen Christ. If we choose to ignore the implications of the Resurrection, we will be deemed as fools unworthy of God’s favor. Jesus said in Matthew 25:30, “(But if someone has nothing, even what they have will be taken away from them.) ‘But as for this useless slave, throw him outside in the dark, where people weep and grind their teeth.’”

Prepare to find yourself becoming increasingly unfamiliar with all you thought too familiar. I am reminded of what Jesus said, “He who humbles himself will be exalted, and those who exalt themselves will be humbled.” When we truly become open, things are often very different than we imagine them to be. I have found this to be very unsettling at times. I understand better Biblical commands to “fear the Lord” and how it is “the beginning of wisdom.”

Sometimes the true knowledge of God can be unnerving to terrifying. I sometimes feel as though I am on the precipice of an abyss and feel totally overwhelmed. Upon reflection at times, I find myself chuckling to myself, “this doesn’t sound like all the ‘spiritual’ stuff I hear in normal Charismatic conversation about ‘encounters.’” But the good news is that all the disenchantment and missed wonder of a child that makes you often feel nostalgic, will return with brute force when we become truly open to the Revelation of God in Jesus. And the Resurrection of Jesus is the climax of that Revelation.

I have barely begun. But until next time, more later… (gotta find a spot to land this ‘starship!’)

…BTW, with that bit of housecleaning, welcome to the Living Room…