at gracelet on sunday night i read a whole chapter from the christ of the indian road. the chapter is called the concrete christ. It begins...
India is the land of mysticism. You feel it in the very air. Jesus was the supreme mystic. The Unseen was real to him. He spent all night in prayer and communion with the Father. He lived in God and God lived in him. When he said 'I and the Father are one' you feel it is so. Jesus the mystic appeals to India, the land of mysticism. But Jesus the mystic was amazingly concrete and practical. Into an atmosphere filled with speculation and wordy disputation where men are often drunk with the wine of their own wordiness he brings the refreshing sense of practical reality.
and then Jones launches into an inspiring telling of the story of Jesus from birth to resurrection reflecting on his teaching, life, miracles, death, resurrection. he lists one inspiring thing after another. it reminds me of the sermon of a good black preacher who reels off one item after another to build the sermon to a climax and work the crowd. he concludes...
There is no deeper need in India and the world today than just this practical mysticism that Jesus brings to bear upon the problems of life. 'No man is strong who does not bear within himself antithesis strongly marked' The merely mystical man is weak and the merely practical man is weak, but Jesus the practical Mystic, glowing with God and yet stooping in loving service to men, is Strength Incarnate.It is no wonder that India, tired of speculation, turns unconsciously toward him, the mystic Servant of all.
when i read a book i often either underline bits i like or write them out - it helps me chew over them again. so i have written this chapter out for my own benefit. if you are interested in the whole thing download concrete christ [pdf] or buy the book.
"Jesus the practical Mystic, glowing with God and yet stooping in loving service to men, is Strength Incarnate."
reminds me of one of the things David Bosch says about the way Jesus (the incarnation) undermines dualism....he says that on the cross Jesus was at the same time most earthly and most heavenly - profoundly spiritual and undeniably worldly.
these things are a deep challenge to the view that somehow spirit and flesh are incompatible. thank God for ESJ and Bosch who offer important correctives to our (my!) dualism.
Posted by: geoff | October 25, 2005 at 12:25 PM