To this end was I born,
and for this cause came I into the world,
that I should bear witness unto the Truth.
— KJV; John 18:37
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In this series, we shall elaborate on our position that Christ’s Eternal Word is the fundamental reason He came to Earth, and that this is not the same as founding a religion (ref. “Christ Is Not The Founder of Christianity“).
What is Belief?
“Believing in Him” is not believing things about Him, or claiming to have “given our lives” to Him (ref. “Ye Must Be Born Again“).
It is believing in His Message sufficiently to put it into intensive practice, which brings about experiences that reveal It’s infinite depth and timeless authenticity (ref. “Act To Experience To Know“).
To keep The Word we must know The Word, which means we must have studied It personally and thoroughly.
He that hath my commandments,
and keepeth them,
he it is that loveth me:
and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father,
and I will love him,
and will manifest myself to him.
— KJV, John 14:21
Without the knowledge contained in His Message of Salvation, the human race was doomed:
Except ye repent,
ye shall all likewise perish.
— Luke 13:3
When we put aside our self-defeating pseudo-knowledge and study The Word to discover the principles gifted by Christ, we gain real knowledge and spiritual life:
The words that I speak unto you,
They are spirit, and they are life.
— John 6:63
Unfortunately, modern followership of Christ is not a path of ever-deepening knowledge and discovery, but a personality cult administered by religious organisations.
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The Rejected Personality Cult
We can reflect on Christ’s Word primarily with our spirit or with our brains/intellect.
When we reflect on it with our spirit and, above all, seek to put what we have divined into practise, our very nature changes and we set in place a virtuous cycle of ever-increasing spiritual insight and earthly alignment (ref. “Ye Must Be Born Again, Pt 2“).
But when we read the word primarily from a material standpoint, it is natural to ascribe unwarranted importance to the earthly events surrounding Christ’s life, such as the circumstances of His birth, His childhood, His family relationships, persecutions by religious authorities, etc. We miss the forest for the trees.
This is what led to the Christian personality cult of today. Everything was focused on His Personality and His earth-life (and therefore His death too) instead of on His Message, His Word.
But Christ rejected this personality-oriented approach every time He encountered it:
Who is my mother? and who are my brethren?
…
whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven,
the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.
— Matt 12:48-50
And immediately the leprosy departed from him.
And he charged him to tell no man…
— Luke 5:13-14
And Jesus said unto him,
Why callest thou me good?
There is none good but one,
That is, God.
— Mark 10:18
He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory:
but he that seeketh His glory that sent him,
the same is true,
and no unrighteousness is in him.
— John 7:18
His fundamental point in all this? It’s not about me!
Threshing Empty Straw
But on one side we have religious organisations for whom it is all about His personality. It is like a gathering of physicists that ascribe more importance to the details of Einstein’s personal life than his theory of relativity.
On the other hand we have intellectuals who have researched His life on Earth and concluded that He was just a human being to whom Divinity was later ascribed by overzealous disciples. Such people only provide evidence that it is impossible to actually perceive The Nature of The Word merely by reading It (ref. “Act To Experience To Know“).
In the rest of this series we shall cast aside the dictates of the personality cult and apply a Word-oriented lens to statements of Christ relating to the Crucifixion.
Part 2: His Suffering Was Not God-Willed
Part 3: ‘Lifted Up’ Is Not ‘Crucified’
Part 4: Father Forgive Them, For They Know Not What They Do
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