Thread: Individualism
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Old 06-03-2015, 06:58 PM   #12
zeek
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Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: Florida
Posts: 4,223
Default Re: Individualism

Quote:
Originally Posted by OBW View Post
It appears you are over-thinking it. That I may not be able to fully figure out what it is simply from Jesus does not make it what I think it should be. Rather it makes it what I think Jesus is saying it should be.
Maybe you haven't thought it through. On this and other forums people argue about who Jesus was and what he taught. That suggests to me that they have an idea, and image and conception of who he was and what he stood for over against their conception of themselves. If they believe he was God or sinless or a model of compassion or self sacrifice, and they feel obliged to follow him or obey him it is because he represents to them an ideal of what they should be instead of what they have been or what they are. In other words, he is the image of their ideal self. If that isn't the way it seems to you then how does it seem?

You have argued for obedience to Christ's commandments. That is an important piece that was missing in the WL's ministry. But, Jesus is more than commandments. In this way, he exceeds a list of commandments like the ones in the Old Testament. The ideal that he represents to us is the motive power that draws us to surpass ourselves. Jesus is the image of a person who embodies our highest values that pulls us out of our small selves and our little lives.

Quote:
Of course, the more honest I am, the more it will not necessarily align with what I would otherwise think it should be. And the more self-centered and narcissistic I am, the more Jesus is just a better me. And we have once again created God in our image. An age-old problem that began at the fall, and was very largely displayed in the golden calf at the base of Mt Sinai.
If we create Christ in the image of what we have been we are displaying the age old problem--the old man or old being. But, if Christ appears to us as the embodiment of our highest value, that's not a problem. That's the new man or new being. Jesus as our ideal of what we would be acts as an attractor to pull us out of our old selves up into authentic meaningful life.
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Ken Gemmer- Church in Detroit, Church in Fort Lauderdale, Church in Miami 1973-86


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