dan the man

What did He mean?

'I am the way, the truth and the light; no man 

cometh unto the Father but by Me.'

 (John 14:6)

this is a fundamental part of the Christian religion.  however, theologians have come up with three different interpretations of this very fundamental passage.

First:  this means that we can only obtain salvation through knowing and coming into a relationship with Jesus Christ.  This is the traditional view held by many Christians, especially evangelical Christians. simply put, if you do not believe in Jesus, you cannot obtain salvation.

Second:  Jesus meant that we had to live our lives, or at least do our best, in the way that He did.  there is ambiguity in this view on the level of success needed to obtain salvation.  i don't believe that this philosophy is very strong; it seems to be a weak interpretation.

Third:  this last view basically starts with the fact that none of us are worthy to get to the Father.  we are all sinner and there is nothing that we can do that would make us worthy for Him or for heaven.  BUT God is merciful and has sent his son to take the fall for our sinful nature.  in the above quote, Jesus is noting that it is through Him, and through Him only, that we are able to get to God.  this does not necessarily require belief in Him because Jesus has already taken the punishment for us. 

i just wanted to stimulate some discussion from my (few) blog readers.  i'm fairly certain that nick and david will comment but i hope that others join in as well.

interesting

this is an extremely interesting concept, a completely different interpretation of scripture that does not contradict it but vastly contradicts traditional interpretation.

"The 'second coming' of Christ is a transformation of human consciousness, a shift from time to presence, from thinking to pure consciousness, not the arrival of some man or woman.  if 'Christ' were to return tomorrow in some externalized form, what could he or she possibly say to you other than this: 'I amd the Truth.  I am divine presence.  I am eternal life.  I am within you.  I am here.  I am Now.' "   -From Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now.

New Calling

so it seems as though although i've changed my major since my freshman year, i'm being called to do the same sorta thing.  my freshman year i had planned on being a chemistry major with the ambition of going on to be a doctor.  the reason i wanted to be a doctor was so that i could go to mexico or another third world, spanish speaking conutry and essentially work for free.  the reason i wanted to do this is to escape the profit-driven mentality that i feel is inevitable in American capitalism. 

however, after some soul searching, i realized that going through with this plan would only be running from the problem.  certainly, it would help a lot of people, people that need this sort of aid.  but i just felt that i would be "copping" out by running from the problem.  i had developed a real interest in philosophy and i felt that if i could develop a philosophical theory, i could make some real differences in this way.  so i am now majoring in spanish and philosophy and planning to be a philosophy professor. 

it's rare that the plans in my life don't change a million times.  a few weeks ago i was at a seminar when the speaker pointed out that American Christian evangelicals are great at being charitable with money but that because we don't give our time, we never really make a difference.  that is incredibly true.  so this made me start to consider giving some time to mission work, or as i like to call it, service.  a few weeks later i went on a weeklong awareness trip to the US/Mexico border and this more or less made up my mind that i would like to donate at least a year to service before grad school.

i have an idea for a program i would like to start on the border.  the problem i noticed down there was that the men are defeated.  imagine living in a culture where the only thing that you are taught is that the man is supposed dominate and provide for the family.  now imagine moving to the border to help your family and not being able to find work and then having your wife find work.  this is a complete role reversal and is completely distressing and confusing the men, not to mention contributing to the violence and problems that are everywhere at the border.  so what are mission groups doing? first, they are doing wonderful work, but from a male perspective, they're only making things worse.  almost every mission/service organization is a feminist or female based organization teaching the women empowerment.  this is great, but how about addressing the problem at the source?  who is talking to the men and teaching them how to treat women? no one.  so that's what i want to do.  i want to start a men's shelter and a men's co-operative to help them earn some dough. 

if you have any comments or suggestions to help me with this, please let me know.