And for those still listening, where to after “Listen to Jesus”?

How to make sense of all the lies, the doubts, the ruined way of things? How to sort through the ruins of religious beliefs that were once glorious temples to the familiar and the sacred?

Well, the for starters, the building materials were probably not all bad. It was just put together in a certain way that eventually left the Holy Spirit out. T. Austin-Sparks talks about how once Christianity becoming crystalized: turned into an institution that fits the times and pleasures of the people who founded it. In my words, it is like taking a living tree and making it into a dresser drawer. To put it cleverly: to “crystalize” Christianity is to un-Christ-alize it.

Christianity can become like every other religion of the world, if it crystalizes, even if it crystalizes around a person. To guard against this, the story of the person, like a crown situating a diamond, situates the truth of Jesus, but it must never situate it so rigidly that the many facets of the diamond cannot shine His variegated light. The story gives plenty of room for the whole Gospel to swallow a person up the way the ocean swallows up a diver.

Christianity is not a set of rules that helps a person become better if he follows them, otherwise it would be like any other religion. It is situated in a real-life story interpreted in the framework of relationship between God and Humans. It’s a story that invites us to interpret our lives by it, and invites us to become a part of it. For the Christian, Israel’s history, interpreted by the prophets is our history.

What gave a prophet the right to interpret Scripture? How can I trust these so-called prophets to tell me the story in a way that won’t mess me up? Who is to say that as soon as Prophets wrote the Scriptures down, it was just “crystalizing” it again?

That’s a great question. From my own personal experience with the Bible, the more I’ve read it and learned the layers of meaning accessible at any level to which a seeker may dig, the more I see a living intelligence behind the intelligence of the authors. There is plenty of fascinating connection between the whole Library of the Bible which tells an intricate and thoroughly rounded out story, which leaves room for its readers to take part. The treasures of these layers are suited to the hearts that seek them, as if the Scriptures itself could talk directly to each person who is honest and listening.

If a person is going to reconstruct their faith, one has to start with and never leave the person, and the second place to start building is the Book. The Book has guidelines for how it must be read–culturally aware, on its own terms, multiple times, with a group of people. All of these ensure a more rich and correct way of reading it. And not just reading it, but hearing it read to you, and not just listening to it, but chewing on it. The Bible is thoroughly interesting, with many different flavors: emotional, matter of fact, narrative, art, poetry, song, numbers, records, visions, history and more.

In short, “Chew Bible-Gum!” You’re going to get that bad post-flavor taste in your mouth chewing Hallmark movies, news stories, pop-novels, blog posts, and even classic literature runs out of flavor eventually. You will experience only ever increasing flavors, and the flavors will also . . . how do I put this delicately . . . reveal what you’ve got in your insides. It will paint pictures of the most glorious and disgusting parts of you. It takes courage to give the Bible the authority to examine you.

Start in the Gospels, reading about Jesus, then go into the Old Testament and see Jesus’s rich cultural heritage in which it is not too hard to find each of us, nor to find One very persistent Hero who will fight the hardest battles to win back the heart of His beloved.

And not to make this too self-focused, but His beloved means you.

He who has ears to hear let him hear!