Jesus as "a" way, Christ as "the" way.

[Cobblers Apprentice]

I open this thread hoping for some genuine discussion/dialogue. I am familiar with the various Biblical verses that are quoted that would appear to make the claim that Jesus and Christ are totally interchangeable. However, I am also familiar with the writings and the lives of many devout Christians who are seeking, not so much to "deny" such verses, but to understand them in a light that opens the "way" to non-christians, to those of other faiths, and even sometimes of no faith at all.

This is done in a spirit not of contention, but because of my own experience - not least on another Forum where virtually every week we welcome new members whose testimony is that for years they have felt the need to "hide" their doubts from their own congregation, and who are seeking a broader understanding of the Christian Faith than one primarily based upon an "inerrant" Bible understood in a "fundamentalist" way.

A few words from Thomas Merton are in order.......

Merton is responding to a passage from Irenaeus, one of the early Church Fathers, who wrote...."If you are the work of God wait patiently for the hand of your artist who makes all things at an opportune time........Give to Him a pure and supple heart and watch over the form which the artist shapes in you........lest, in hardness, you lose the traces of his fingers......"

Merton comments......

The reification of faith. Real meaning of the phrase we are saved by faith = we are saved by Christ, whom we encounter in faith. But constant disputation about faith has made Christians become obsessed with faith almost as an object, at least as an experience, a "thing" and in concentrating upon it they lose sight of Christ. Whereas faith without the encounter with Christ and without His presence is less than nothing. It is the deadest of dead works, an act elicited in a moral and existential void. To seek to believe that one believes, and arbitrarily to decree that one believes, and then to conclude that this gymnastic has been blessed by Christ - this is pathological Christianity. And a Christianity of works. One has this mental gymnastic in which to trust. One is safe, one possesses the psychic key to salvation......

From my own reading and experience, many today are finding that the "encounter with Christ" can never be reduced to any formula or particular theology, or creed or doctrine. That any such "encounter" is the work of the Divine who has no favorites, and Who causes the spirit to blow where it will.

Once again, I do not seek to be contentious. If any wish to ignore this, please do so.

 

[tessiewebb]

I open this thread hoping for some genuine discussion/dialogue. I am familiar with the various Biblical verses that are quoted that would appear to make the claim that Jesus and Christ are totally interchangeable. However, I am also familiar with the writings and the lives of many devout Christians who are seeking, not so much to "deny" such verses, but to understand them in a light that opens the "way" to non-christians, to those of other faiths, and even sometimes of no faith at all.

This is done in a spirit not of contention, but because of my own experience - not least on another Forum where virtually every week we welcome new members whose testimony is that for years they have felt the need to "hide" their doubts from their own congregation, and who are seeking a broader understanding of the Christian Faith than one primarily based upon an "inerrant" Bible understood in a "fundamentalist" way.

A few words from Thomas Merton are in order.......

Merton is responding to a passage from Irenaeus, one of the early Church Fathers, who wrote...."If you are the work of God wait patiently for the hand of your artist who makes all things at an opportune time........Give to Him a pure and supple heart and watch over the form which the artist shapes in you........lest, in hardness, you lose the traces of his fingers......"

Merton comments......

The reification of faith. Real meaning of the phrase we are saved by faith = we are saved by Christ, whom we encounter in faith. But constant disputation about faith has made Christians become obsessed with faith almost as an object, at least as an experience, a "thing" and in concentrating upon it they lose sight of Christ. Whereas faith without the encounter with Christ and without His presence is less than nothing. It is the deadest of dead works, an act elicited in a moral and existential void. To seek to believe that one believes, and arbitrarily to decree that one believes, and then to conclude that this gymnastic has been blessed by Christ - this is pathological Christianity. And a Christianity of works. One has this mental gymnastic in which to trust. One is safe, one possesses the psychic key to salvation......

From my own reading and experience, many today are finding that the "encounter with Christ" can never be reduced to any formula or particular theology, or creed or doctrine. That any such "encounter" is the work of the Divine who has no favorites, and Who causes the spirit to blow where it will.

Once again, I do not seek to be contentious. If any wish to ignore this, please do so.

To doubt is unbelief, pure and simple. While I do not believe the Bible as we have it is the entirety of God's speaking and wisdom, it is a ground work of principles on which Christianity is based. In a relatively short book, He is uncovered to us as the Great I AM. Jesus is THE Christ. Why torture the principle to separate it? To make any other way to God acceptable? Jesus did not say I AM a way. He said He is THE way. The Door. Anyone who comes in by any other way is a trespasser.

I'm sorry you have posted this. If you are unaware of just how great a wedge your thinking is into people's lives, consider this: If He is promoted as A Way, we have effectively opened the door to hell for those who would love to have OTHER ways to salvation. Why not believe in Him as He has stated is the WAY to salvation? John 10:9 "I AM the Door: by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture."

I'm convinced you posted this in a sympathetic way, feeling for those who have "doubts", but truly you are not doing them any favors by furthering this mistaken and ungodly doctrine. In opening the "broader" understanding, as you say, you are encouraging those with "doubts" to walk the path that leads to destruction of both soul and body.

 

[Grazer]

Doubt is not the same as unbelief. Unbelief suggests you're mind is made up. Doubt is a position between states, in this case between belief and unbelief in God. As the dictionary puts it;

noun
[mass noun]

a feeling of uncertainty or lack of conviction:

Sent from my HTC Desire S using Tapatalk 2

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

To doubt is unbelief, pure and simple. While I do not believe the Bible as we have it is the entirety of God's speaking and wisdom, it is a ground work of principles on which Christianity is based. In a relatively short book, He is uncovered to us as the Great I AM. Jesus is THE Christ. Why torture the principle to separate it? To make any other way to God acceptable? Jesus did not say I AM a way. He said He is THE way. The Door. Anyone who comes in by any other way is a trespasser.

I'm sorry you have posted this. If you are unaware of just how great a wedge your thinking is into people's lives, consider this: If He is promoted as A Way, we have effectively opened the door to hell for those who would love to have OTHER ways to salvation. Why not believe in Him as He has stated is the WAY to salvation? John 10:9 "I AM the Door: by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture."

I'm convinced you posted this in a sympathetic way, feeling for those who have "doubts", but truly you are not doing them any favors by furthering this mistaken and ungodly doctrine. In opening the "broader" understanding, as you say, you are encouraging those with "doubts" to walk the path that leads to destruction of both soul and body.

hi tessiewebb, thanks for your response. I would have to say - at least as I understand it - that there is a difference between "faith" and "belief". To doubt ones beliefs can be a sign of faith, not a lack.

To clarify "doubt". The doubt can be seen in such words as written by Merton in a letter to the feminist theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether, when, speaking of the Church, he said......."I believe it.........but wonder if I am nuts to do so........(though) there is a real sense of Christ in the world which I don't doubt for an instance.......is that presence where we are all saying it is? We are all pointing in various directions and my dreadful feeling is that we are all pointing wrong."

In the writings and the lives of those I often learn from, who seek to speak of "Christ" beyond any necessary link to "Jesus" in a Biblical fundamentalist sense, they appear to be able to encompass/embrace such a "fundamentalism" as often found in Protestant churches, within Christ ( whereas, as far as I can see, often those of a fundamentalist view exclude all viewpoints but their own, and equate their own with the "view" of God )

For them, and for me, it is not "ungodly" to understand the "work" of Christ as being beyond the confines of a particular Church, be it Protestant , Catholic of Eastern Orthodox. Or at least, to ask the question should not be declared so.

All the best

 

[Butch5]

I open this thread hoping for some genuine discussion/dialogue. I am familiar with the various Biblical verses that are quoted that would appear to make the claim that Jesus and Christ are totally interchangeable. However, I am also familiar with the writings and the lives of many devout Christians who are seeking, not so much to "deny" such verses, but to understand them in a light that opens the "way" to non-christians, to those of other faiths, and even sometimes of no faith at all.

This is done in a spirit not of contention, but because of my own experience - not least on another Forum where virtually every week we welcome new members whose testimony is that for years they have felt the need to "hide" their doubts from their own congregation, and who are seeking a broader understanding of the Christian Faith than one primarily based upon an "inerrant" Bible understood in a "fundamentalist" way.

A few words from Thomas Merton are in order.......

Merton is responding to a passage from Irenaeus, one of the early Church Fathers, who wrote...."If you are the work of God wait patiently for the hand of your artist who makes all things at an opportune time........Give to Him a pure and supple heart and watch over the form which the artist shapes in you........lest, in hardness, you lose the traces of his fingers......"

Merton comments......

The reification of faith. Real meaning of the phrase we are saved by faith = we are saved by Christ, whom we encounter in faith. But constant disputation about faith has made Christians become obsessed with faith almost as an object, at least as an experience, a "thing" and in concentrating upon it they lose sight of Christ. Whereas faith without the encounter with Christ and without His presence is less than nothing. It is the deadest of dead works, an act elicited in a moral and existential void. To seek to believe that one believes, and arbitrarily to decree that one believes, and then to conclude that this gymnastic has been blessed by Christ - this is pathological Christianity. And a Christianity of works. One has this mental gymnastic in which to trust. One is safe, one possesses the psychic key to salvation......

From my own reading and experience, many today are finding that the "encounter with Christ" can never be reduced to any formula or particular theology, or creed or doctrine. That any such "encounter" is the work of the Divine who has no favorites, and Who causes the spirit to blow where it will.

Once again, I do not seek to be contentious. If any wish to ignore this, please do so.

Before commenting I'd like to ask a question. Are you suggesting that Jesus and the Christ are not one and the same?

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

Before commenting I'd like to ask a question. Are you suggesting that Jesus and the Christ are not one and the same?

Hi butch, no, I am not saying that. What I am saying -affirming - is that the full reality of Christ can be known and lived without reference to the earthly life of Jesus of Nazareth.

First, because in the writing of some of the early Church Fathers (i.e Justin Martyr, Eusebius, St Augustine), in works considered apologetic, they argued that there had been "Christians" before the birth of Jesus Christ. This given that Christ was the Eternal Logos through Whom all things are made.

Second, that it is very much a fact of experience, at least my own, that the full fruits of the life of the "spirit" can be witnessed to in the lives of many who have never embraced the Christian Faith.

Please see this link....

http://conservation.catholic.org/holy_spirit_acts_in_all_creation.htm

So I am suggesting that while for many Christians knowledge and "acceptance" of Jesus can be the "way" to salvation, the "narrow way" is not in fact to be equated with a particular Protestant proclamation of sola scriptura or any theology of salvation built upon it.

 

[Butch5]

Hi butch, no, I am not saying that. What I am saying -affirming - is that the full reality of Christ can be known and lived without reference to the earthly life of Jesus of Nazareth.

First, because in the writing of some of the early Church Fathers (i.e Justin Martyr, Eusebius, St Augustine), in works considered apologetic, they argued that there had been "Christians" before the birth of Jesus Christ. This given that Christ was the Eternal Logos through Whom all things are made.

Second, that it is very much a fact of experience, at least my own, that the full fruits of the life of the "spirit" can be witnessed to in the lives of many who have never embraced the Christian Faith.

Please see this link....

http://conservation.catholic.org/holy_spirit_acts_in_all_creation.htm

So I am suggesting that while for many Christians knowledge and "acceptance" of Jesus can be the "way" to salvation, the "narrow way" is not in fact to be equated with a particular Protestant proclamation of sola scriptura or any theology of salvation built upon it.

Ok, I think I can for the most part agree. Here is the qualifier though. The Scriptures say that Jesus at His death was in the heart of the earth for three days. There He preached to those who had died before His coming. I personally (can't back it up with Scripture) believe that He will do this again for those who never heard the gospel. In the end everyone comes to God through Christ, I don't think there is "another" way.

 

[thightower]

Christ in the greek means the annointed one. So using the name Jesus Christ means Jesus "the annointed one by God". This is where my faith in him comes from. I see Jesus as fully God and fully man. In order to recieve salvation we must put our trust in Jesus, for he is the way to the Father. For God is the only one to forgive sins.

 

[farouk]

Christ in the greek means the annointed one. So using the name Jesus Christ means Jesus "the annointed one by God". This is where my faith in him comes from. I see Jesus as fully God and fully man. In order to recieve salvation we must put our trust in Jesus, for he is the way to the Father. For God is the only one to forgive sins.

Good post.

Blessings.

 

[smaller]

Please see this link....

http://conservation.catholic.org/holy_spirit_acts_in_all_creation.htm

So I am suggesting that while for many Christians knowledge and "acceptance" of Jesus can be the "way" to salvation, the "narrow way" is not in fact to be equated with a particular Protestant proclamation of sola scriptura or any theology of salvation built upon it.

Are you Roman Catholic CA?

 

[Randy]

How can one have the Spirit of Christ in them and not know Jesus lives.

I tell you the truth "Jesus Lives"

Jesus is the gatekeeper. The entrance into the kingdom is through Him. Those that listen and learn from the Father go to Jesus and Jesus will raise them up on the last day. That is the Fathers will.

Jesus is how God chose to forgive our sin. Its not for man to choose how to forgive sin.

In regard to judgments made I would state its the Lords words that will prevail. You have the compiled testimony (NT) and such acts weren't done in a corner. Those claims can't be mistaken.

Take what Jesus said very seriously as it won't do you any good to hear "I don't know you" Thats your choice too make. (Freewill)

Randy

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

Are you Roman Catholic CA?

No. In fact I had a very "low church" upbringing to the point where anything else was just people in funny hats. Nevertheless, one can recognise words of insight when they are spoken (without needing to agree with every dot and tittle)

All the best

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

How can one have the Spirit of Christ in them and not know Jesus lives.

I tell you the truth "Jesus Lives"

Jesus is the gatekeeper. The entrance into the kingdom is through Him. Those that listen and learn from the Father go to Jesus and Jesus will raise them up on the last day. That is the Fathers will.

Jesus is how God chose to forgive our sin. Its not for man to choose how to forgive sin.

In regard to judgments made I would state its the Lords words that will prevail. You have the compiled testimony (NT) and such acts weren't done in a corner. Those claims can't be mistaken.

Take what Jesus said very seriously as it won't do you any good to hear "I don't know you" Thats your choice too make. (Freewill)

Randy

Hi Randy, you may interpret your own chosen book just as you wish. I have found that those that truly "learn from the Father" are people of all Faiths. Such is indisputable. You may wish to deny it. So be it.

All the best.

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

Christ in the greek means the annointed one. So using the name Jesus Christ means Jesus "the annointed one by God". This is where my faith in him comes from. I see Jesus as fully God and fully man. In order to recieve salvation we must put our trust in Jesus, for he is the way to the Father. For God is the only one to forgive sins.

Christ means the Eternal Word through Whom all things are made, the light that lights all who come into the world.

The light indeed shines in the darkness, and the darkness comprehends it not.

Assumptions of just who "comprehends" are easy to make.

All the best.

 

[Randy]

Hi Randy, you may interpret your own chosen book just as you wish. I have found that those that truly "learn from the Father" are people of all Faiths. Such is indisputable. You may wish to deny it. So be it.

All the best.

The testimony from Genesis through Revelation about the God of Abraham Isaac and jacob (The One true Living God) and His Christ (Jesus) to me is indisputable. Thousands of years through many individuals. Rather then deny other faiths I just testify to the truth. "This is eternal life the one true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent" Jesus is the judge so I would of course point you to HIS words not mine in the testimony. It will be the Lords words that prevail in judgments made not ours.

But you are correct when you stated "your choice" to reject those words.
(freewill)

As far as perfection training I follow Jesus who taught one to be like His Heavenly Father.

Randy

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

The testimony from Genesis through Revelation about the God of Abraham Isaac and jacob (The One true Living God) and His Christ (Jesus) to me is indisputable. Thousands of years through many individuals. Rather then deny other faiths I just testify to the truth. "This is eternal life the one true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent" Jesus is the judge so I would of course point you to HIS words not mine in the testimony. It will be the Lords words that prevail in judgments made not ours.

But you are correct when you stated "your choice" to reject those words.
(freewill)

As far as perfection training I follow Jesus who taught one to be like His Heavenly Father.

Randy

Randy, I would just have to say that in my meetings with others, and on various forums, I have heard many "indisputable claims", all different. Seriously. Honestly.

I would also say that it has been, as is, the testimony of many devout Christians that they in fact deny nothing, or reject nothing, by opening their hearts and minds to those of other Faiths. Rather the "work" of Christ is witnessed to in ways that only serve the True God in a deeper way.

Just lately I have been on a Catholic Forum, and read of how at the heart of every Protestant is "obstinacy"; again, another forum where a JW who has spent 55 years studying the Bible in multiple translations has declared that no one has any excuse for rejecting the "truth" as the JW's see it. And so it goes on. And on. Each harbinger of the "one truth" offering subtle threats to any other who has the temerity to deny their own take and version. And each hiding behind the claim that it is the "judgement" of "big brother (Him up there)"- not their own.

So we each must live with our judgements. It is all rather sad in many ways.

All the best.

 

[tessiewebb]

hi tessiewebb, thanks for your response. I would have to say - at least as I understand it - that there is a difference between "faith" and "belief". To doubt ones beliefs can be a sign of faith, not a lack.

To clarify "doubt". The doubt can be seen in such words as written by Merton in a letter to the feminist theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether, when, speaking of the Church, he said......."I believe it.........but wonder if I am nuts to do so........(though) there is a real sense of Christ in the world which I don't doubt for an instance.......is that presence where we are all saying it is? We are all pointing in various directions and my dreadful feeling is that we are all pointing wrong."

In the writings and the lives of those I often learn from, who seek to speak of "Christ" beyond any necessary link to "Jesus" in a Biblical fundamentalist sense, they appear to be able to encompass/embrace such a "fundamentalism" as often found in Protestant churches, within Christ ( whereas, as far as I can see, often those of a fundamentalist view exclude all viewpoints but their own, and equate their own with the "view" of God )

For them, and for me, it is not "ungodly" to understand the "work" of Christ as being beyond the confines of a particular Church, be it Protestant , Catholic of Eastern Orthodox. Or at least, to ask the question should not be declared so.

All the best

Excuse me, but your logic is not complete. Your original post asked what we think about "the Christ" being separate from the personage of Jesus, and here you are saying that you are "only" intending that the Christ is not a Protestant, Catholic or other "religions'" exclusive property. ANYONE who is a Christian could agree He is none of the man-made religious separatists' property alone. That is not what you proposed in the original post. Pretty slippery that. As Festus said to Paul for the wrong reason, I say to you for the right one, "Much learning is driving you mad!".

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

Excuse me, but your logic is not complete. Your original post asked what we think about "the Christ" being separate from the personage of Jesus, and here you are saying that you are "only" intending that the Christ is not a Protestant, Catholic or other "religions'" exclusive property. ANYONE who is a Christian could agree He is none of the man-made religious separatists' property alone. That is not what you proposed in the original post. Pretty slippery that. As Festus said to Paul for the wrong reason, I say to you for the right one, "Much learning is driving you mad!".

Hi tessie, my original post was summed up as follows.......From my own reading and experience, many today are finding that the "encounter with Christ" can never be reduced to any formula or particular theology, or creed or doctrine. That any such "encounter" is the work of the Divine who has no favorites, and Who causes the spirit to blow where it will.

I see no contradiction between those words and what you quote from my subsequent post above. It appears to be your own reading that suggests that I sought to argue that "the Christ" was separate from the personage of Jesus. (Please see my post - number 6 on this thread - to Butch5)

As far as that which you say is the "right reason", from my own perspective it is those who "search the scriptures daily for in them they think they have life" whose "learning drives them mad", this as they get lost in various hairsplitting distinctions. Those scriptures, as it is said, point to Christ. I am simply asking others to ask new questions (although such question are not so new on other Christian forums, where those as equally devout as here are prepared to ask them)

Sadly, you appear more interested in implying that my "learning is driving me mad", which, for those who know me, would be laughable. Really, a childlike heart such as Christ spoke of can exist irrespective of "learning", great or small.

All the best

 

[smaller]

No. In fact I had a very "low church" upbringing to the point where anything else was just people in funny hats. Nevertheless, one can recognise words of insight when they are spoken (without needing to agree with every dot and tittle)

All the best

I only asked as you cited JPII, who's efforts I also appreciated. There are other fine men of faith within the RCC that see these matters 'better' and he was certainly one. There are others as well.

As to jots and tittles, it is Divinely Determined that there will be no agreements. And the jots and tittles address why that is so, and not to the detriment of any who seek understandings therein OR our neighbors.

As Paul said, 'let me show you a better way.' And the better way is clearly laid out.

s

 

[Cobblers Apprentice]

I only asked as you cited JPII, who's efforts I also appreciated. There are other fine men of faith within the RCC that see these matters 'better' and he was certainly one. There are others as well.

As to jots and tittles, it is Divinely Determined that there will be no agreements. And the jots and tittles address why that is so, and not to the detriment of any who seek understandings therein OR our neighbors.

As Paul said, 'let me show you a better way.' And the better way is clearly laid out.

s

smaller, OK, thanks for the explanation.

Anyway, good luck sorting out the dots and tittles.

It always amazes me just how many claim the better way is clearly laid out, yet who all disagree with each other as to exactly what that way is.

And no, please do not seek to justify this. Evidence of it is here on this forum, on other threads.

All the best.