Isn’t there something a little bit foolish about loving someone that we’ve never met and never seen? I mean, say for example you were reading “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”, would you fall in love with Alice just based on what Lewis Carroll wrote about her? What if we made a whole religion out of it, and called it Aliceanity or something of that nature. Every morning, we read a passage from the book and then every week we’ll get together and talk about how great Alice is and how a particular part of the book struck us in a strange way, or we’ll discuss the differernt interpretations that we can read from a certain chapter. Once a year, we’ll have “rabbit hole day” where we take an opportunity to go someplace we’ve never been before.
Sounds a bit foolish doesn’t it?
So what makes Christianity so special? Why are we the privilaged few that get to “pull off” this sort of thing without looking like the mad hatter?
The answer for most people is that there is something about the Bible and Jesus that makes us want to belive that what he has to say is the truth, and we base the truth on the experiences that we’ve had to date that lead us to belive so. Our faith is the product of knowledge that has been conveyed to us through teaching and the bible, and the sum of our experiences that we believe were the work of God in our lives, and accounts of simmilar experiences in others. But there is no “proof” that God exists. We have enough evidence in our own life to convince us. We have felt his power, and heard his call to us. We’ve opened the door. What if someone said that they felt Alice or the White Rabbit move in their life, and they have enough evidential experience to convince them in the the truth of Wonderland? Is there any way to discredit them without discrediting our own belief structure?
By now you are probably wondering what I’m getting at, so I’ll tell you. It’s foolish to belive in God and Jesus… but we do it anyway, because something inside us tells us that it is ok to be foolish once in a while. The leap of faith that each one of us take is an act of foolishness in the world’s eyes, but it is something we have to do to continue believing. So let’s be foolish. What does it mean to be foolish? When I think of foolishness, I think of recklessness. The definition of reckless says “marked by defiant disregard for danger or consequences.” Another word would be abandon. Reckless abandon. Where have I seen that before? “Jesus told him, ‘If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” (Matthew 19:20) That sounds like what Jesus is calling us to do. Pursue him with reckless abandon. Give up our lives, everything, to pursue Him.
I believe that one of our greatest gifts is passion. We have been given the ability to be passionate about food, family, friends, and most memorably, lovers. As much as we have passion for these things, so much more should our passion be for Jesus and His way of living. It’s a radical shift in the way most of us think about God… but if we claim to love Him, do we owe him anything less?
