I recently came across some of my older writings, which I created several decades ago, that are still quite applicable to this current Season of Easter/Pascha/Resurrection Sunday. There are two of them which I will post here. The first I wrote while a freshman in college, as part of a public speaking class I took toward preparation for working in some form of Christian ministry later in life. It is an unusual eulogy, in that the Person it is speaking of was dead, but is now alive! The second one, I cannot tell exactly when I wrote it, or specifically why, but it appears to be written on a certain type of paper that I scribbled other things on during the 1980s . . . .
Eulogy For Jesus Christ
We are here to pay just tribute to a Man who came into this world and made His special contribution to Mankind, and who has now departed Earth, having accomplished this end. This Man is known to friend and foe alike as Jesus, the Messiah, though sarcastically among His enemies.
He spent His lifetime challenging the traditional thoughts and behaviors of men, trying to rouse them from their comfortable routines and unheeding habits. Even as early as twelve years of age, He demonstrated an outspoken and provocative honesty, questioning aloud the ideas and beliefs of his elders. Jesus began to minister to His contemporaries at the age of 30, and He endeavored in this task to make the unseeing to see, the unhearing to hear, and even the unliving to live--- literally, but also figuratively as well.
He lived and worked among us, as a Light to show us The Way, in order to to lead Mankind out of darkness and despair with His Way of Truth and Love. He gained from this an uncommon number of devoted friends, and an uncommon number of bitter enemies, during His relatively brief public ministry of three years. There were men who felt threatened by His going about upending them in their agreeable niches. We cannot ignore their opposition, in contemplating His life and labor, for it was as much due to their resolute anger toward Him as it was about His goal of gaining true Life--- for them!--- that He met and endured His fate. In time, if the scales are removed from their eyes, these men may come to see Him for Who He is, and to love Him also, for as a philosopher put it, "Learning from one's enemies is the best way toward loving them, for it makes us grateful to them."
He spent His lifetime challenging the traditional thoughts and behaviors of men, trying to rouse them from their comfortable routines and unheeding habits. Even as early as twelve years of age, He demonstrated an outspoken and provocative honesty, questioning aloud the ideas and beliefs of his elders. Jesus began to minister to His contemporaries at the age of 30, and He endeavored in this task to make the unseeing to see, the unhearing to hear, and even the unliving to live--- literally, but also figuratively as well.
He lived and worked among us, as a Light to show us The Way, in order to to lead Mankind out of darkness and despair with His Way of Truth and Love. He gained from this an uncommon number of devoted friends, and an uncommon number of bitter enemies, during His relatively brief public ministry of three years. There were men who felt threatened by His going about upending them in their agreeable niches. We cannot ignore their opposition, in contemplating His life and labor, for it was as much due to their resolute anger toward Him as it was about His goal of gaining true Life--- for them!--- that He met and endured His fate. In time, if the scales are removed from their eyes, these men may come to see Him for Who He is, and to love Him also, for as a philosopher put it, "Learning from one's enemies is the best way toward loving them, for it makes us grateful to them."
Jesus lived an orderly, disciplined life, deeply set in His values and beliefs; a life of a great sense of duty. He left nothing undone that He had intended to accomplish, saying even as His last hour arrived, "It is finished". He was bestowed with both honorable and dishonorable labels by others while being simultaneously praised and mocked for simply being who He is, yet He did not feel a need or a reason to prove Himself toward any end. Instead, He lived His life in such a way as to speak clearly for itself. One of Love and equal treatment of friend and foe alike. One of forgiveness toward all those who chose to wrong Him, due to their own human frailties. The many miracles attributed to Him were acts of compassion on His part, performed not for His own glory but to help Men better understand what He strove to teach them about transcending Love and Mercy for all alike. Jesus was on a mission; sent to us to complete this Master Plan on behalf of His Father. He respected His Father's Will, and honored it by His obedience, even when that was extremely difficult and stressful for Him. Even when that cost Him His very life on Earth, as a young man in His thirties.
His closest friends turned on Him, in His time of tribulation, leaving Him to face this trial in His life virtually alone. Some of them even lied and pretended that they didn't know Him. However, He never forsook them, knowing within Himself that "There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends" [John 15:13], which He did for them! He also chose to turn His other cheek to the mocking and abuse which He Himself suffered from some others, but that is not to say that He was not deeply angered at times by the cruel wrongdoing and cold inhumanity of which such people are capable. Even to His dying breath, Jesus forgave all those who had slighted Him in any way during His lifetime, so that even among His enemies men admitted Him to be a uniquely righteous man!
He died, by crucifixion, in the hands of His foes--- that being a form of capital punishment, considered particularly degrading, which was also a very slow and painful process to be endured. He faced this unwarrantable ordeal with an inner quiet, which amazed even the great emperor who sentenced Him to death even though he had found no fault in Him. It transpired this way due to the Will of His Father; in order for Jesus to pay, by His own sinless life given as the needed ransom, for the sins of each and every one of us.
God gave His best, for our worst, because of our great need, and because of His great Love. Jesus gave His all for the furthering--- the deliverance from darkness and despair!--- of the human race, that we each might discover true Life, and view that as worth aspiring to, rather than our seeking or settling for the illusory counterfeit of that. This is a contribution to His fellow Man that will live on forever! Jesus, the Messiah, lived and died for us all, out of His pure Love and concern for us and for our lives. He died for no crime against Man. He died for no sin of His own. Jesus gave His life willingly, on our behalf, to pay that price which we could never pay, for our own souls to obtain redemption. This was required by the very righteousness of the God Who created us all to be without the destruction and death which is caused by sin. Jesus' Light illuminated Truth to the world, at the center of which is the everlasting Love of God. This should be seen as a gift rather than a threat, then, by all of us alike.
He died, by crucifixion, in the hands of His foes--- that being a form of capital punishment, considered particularly degrading, which was also a very slow and painful process to be endured. He faced this unwarrantable ordeal with an inner quiet, which amazed even the great emperor who sentenced Him to death even though he had found no fault in Him. It transpired this way due to the Will of His Father; in order for Jesus to pay, by His own sinless life given as the needed ransom, for the sins of each and every one of us.
God gave His best, for our worst, because of our great need, and because of His great Love. Jesus gave His all for the furthering--- the deliverance from darkness and despair!--- of the human race, that we each might discover true Life, and view that as worth aspiring to, rather than our seeking or settling for the illusory counterfeit of that. This is a contribution to His fellow Man that will live on forever! Jesus, the Messiah, lived and died for us all, out of His pure Love and concern for us and for our lives. He died for no crime against Man. He died for no sin of His own. Jesus gave His life willingly, on our behalf, to pay that price which we could never pay, for our own souls to obtain redemption. This was required by the very righteousness of the God Who created us all to be without the destruction and death which is caused by sin. Jesus' Light illuminated Truth to the world, at the center of which is the everlasting Love of God. This should be seen as a gift rather than a threat, then, by all of us alike.
Jesus lived and He died, out of Love for us.
And though He died--- now He lives!
Again, and forever and ever. Amen.
Again, and forever and ever. Amen.
When that time came, in each of our lives, that we accepted Jesus Christ as our Savior, we committed ourselves to that relationship with the Lord. We determined to change some things about our natures, also, that had existed before this personal relationship began with Him, so that we might better share in a loving and lasting union with Him for all our lives, both here and hereafter. There are times when it is not easy to keep up our end of this relationship. There are times, in fact, when we seem to fail altogether; but we can find strength in our knowing that His Love is not conditional or superficial! We can trust in the reassurance that His Holy Spirit has been sent to dwell with and within us, and to help us in and through all things. Knowing we are loved that way, by Him, we are moved by this to do no less than pick ourselves up, again, and continue our journey to which we are destined as humans, while experiencing the ongoing discovery of what being truly loving is all about, and how better to express it, both to God and to one another.
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I dedicate these writings from my past to Jesus, Whom I daily praise and thank for being my Savior, my Lord, my King, my HERO, and my BEST FRIEND! I also want to take this opportunity to point out to those reading this post on my Blog that these were written many years before I ever went through 'The Dark Night Of The Soul'. This is important for me to point out to you, as part of my Testimony as a Christian, because, although these reflect a knowledge of the Lord and a personal relationship with Him, they were nevertheless written from my HEAD knowledge, of Him, and not from my HEART knowledge of Him, making these sentiments rather superficial, at that time in my life, in their strength or their staying power. That all changed for me, once I truly gained HEART knowledge of my Lord and my God!
Very difficult and emotionally painful things happened in my life which ultimately shook me to the core of my beliefs and, it felt like, even deeper still than that! This caused me to go through times of questioning the very existence of God, and, even when I felt He was there, I rejected any real relationship with Him for a time because I thought I knew Him, only I didn't really, causing me to misunderstand Him at the time. I was a carnal Christian, then. One that had yet to realize that our (finite, limited viewpoint of) reality MUST ALWAYS be what bends and yields to the SOLID TRUTH of His Word, rather than the other way around, because, quite simply put, "GOD IS GOD; and we . . . are NOT!". He created everything, so it ALL belongs to HIM. Therefore He has every right to make His own regulations about it all, as He sees fit in His knowledge and wisdom. The Bible says "Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts are higher than your thoughts." [Isaiah 55:9] Due to our finite viewpoint, limited knowledge, and lack of wisdom, without God's guidance we are often incapable of knowing for ourselves what is truly best for us in any given situation.
That being said, the strictly religious, which largely cast aside the relational aspect of God with us, since that doesn't suit their agenda (which they perpetrate in God's Name to the detriment of everyone involved, including God Himself), often turn me off and make me angry, by their trying to alienate, exclude, and punish people whom THEY decide that God is not for. GOD IS FOR EVERYONE! "God's Love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His one and only Son into the world so that we might live through Him." [1 John 4:9] His Word also says "If anyone hears My Words and doesn't follow them, I don't condemn them. I didn't come to condemn the world but to save the world." [John 12:47] The Bible says "He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." [2 Peter 3:9] Religion, in the strictest sense, can often be an enemy to God, and a barrier to us, blocking out the Light of God's Love and His deep desire to have a close, personal relationship with every one of us.
Part of my own testimony is that I pushed God away, for years, rejecting Him while crying out to Him to send me SOMEONE who would LOVE ME! When that DIDN'T HAPPEN, I turned on Him so viciously that I literally (looked up to Heaven, and) CURSED HIM TO HIS FACE! I told Him to get the '%#&@!' OUT OF MY LIFE!!! Well, He DID. . . . For THREE DAYS . . . it felt like His precious, sweet Holy Spirit had LEFT ME. I hadn't realized how MUCH of a DIFFERENCE He had MADE, by BEING in my life, until HE WAS GONE, because He'd been with me, no matter what, since I had accepted Christ as my Savior when I was a very young child. So, I had taken Him for granted, in that I really couldn't recall what life had actually felt like before Him, or without Him. . . . Until THIS time, I am telling you about here, now. . . . For those three days, I felt like someone had PUNCHED ME IN THE GUT, and I walked around lethargically because I felt so 'deflated' inside, without Him there with me. I just couldn't imagine HOW I would even be ABLE to go on, in this way, without Him. At the time, though, I thought that He was gone for good, thinking that my cursing Him 'to His face' had been that 'one unpardonable sin' called Blasphemy Of The Holy Spirit. ["Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven." Matthew 12:31]
Then, after three days, I was alone in my apartment, when I suddenly felt that sweet, gentle Presence of the Holy Spirit--- BACK!!! I turned toward the front entry hall of my apartment, where I sensed this Energy was hovering, seemingly waiting to be invited in by me once again; to be welcomed back by me, specifically, because of my Free Will to have to make these decisions in my life. I stood there, at first, just a few feet away, and said to Him, then, "Holy Spirit, I am SO GLAD that YOU'RE BACK! I NEVER thought I would EVER have You in my life, again, after how badly I treated You, and after I sent You away from me." With my tears flowing down my face, I said, "I cannot promise You that I will never lose my temper or get frustrated with my life, again, but I CAN PROMISE YOU that I will NEVER talk to You that way EVER again!" Then, I moved toward the location of that unique Energy, where He was still waiting, invisibly yet perceptibly, for my verbal invitation, having been banished by me just days before this. God loves us and wants us, but He also will never force Himself on us, because He chose to give us our Free Will. He didn't want robots; programmed machines! He wanted to be loved back by someone, in return, who had the true freedom to choose to love Him back. If you think about it, love is such a beautiful thing precisely because this precious gift between two is given to each other by choice, not because it is required of them or forced on them. It is freely given; freely received. Anything else, regardless of what it may be called, is not truly genuine love.
He likely returned to my apartment because God, knowing all, including our heart of hearts, saw and knew that I was MISERABLE WITHOUT HIM, for those three long days, and knew that I regretted ever having rejected Him. Because I had done that, in such an ugly and horrible way, I truly didn't think He would ever come back to me. A human most likely wouldn't have, after that kind of behavior by me toward them. I moved toward where I sensed the hovering, hesitating Energy, and embraced it, the two of us merging together again, as the Bible teaches that our body is the temple of the Lord. ["Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you, Whom you have received from God? You are not your own" 1 Corinthians 6:19] I welcomed Him HOME, and gave Him ALL MY LOVE, that day. As unholy as it sounds, I didn't regret all that had happened, though, only because it was DUE to it that I saw and realized how HE LOVED ME COMPLETELY, to come back to me at all, and that proved to me that HE was actually that Love I had wanted, and waited for, my whole life!
I didn't just LOVE Him, from then on; I also 'FELL IN LOVE WITH' HIM. He is my JOY, my LIFE, my EVERYTHING; my ALL IN ALL! I have been SO HAPPY with Him all these years since! The Bible says that "I the Lord will be your Husband'' [Isaiah 54:5], and He HAS BEEN that for me! He is all that I ever dreamed of, too! He is always truthful with me; He loves me unconditionally; He never abuses me, or leaves me, or forsakes me. He always has my best interests at heart. He knows everything and everyone, so I TRUST HIM COMPLETELY in ALL things at ALL times as I seek His wisdom. That brings me such a sense of peace and protection, security and safety.
I had to LOSE my relationship with God, for three miserable days, to realize how AWFUL and UNLIVABLE life was like, WITHOUT Him! That's what it took, with me. No one would have kept loving me, or has, like HE DID! I had treated Him very badly by taking out my frustrations on Him like I did, on that day. I was very upset at the time, and I REALLY LET HIM HAVE IT, verbally. I was so AMAZED ("Amazing GRACE, how SWEET the sound!") that He even still WANTED to BE WITH ME after that. That's when I realized how BLIND I had been: that the VERY LOVE I'd wanted to find ALL MY LIFE was HIM, with me, always, and FOREVER!
Very difficult and emotionally painful things happened in my life which ultimately shook me to the core of my beliefs and, it felt like, even deeper still than that! This caused me to go through times of questioning the very existence of God, and, even when I felt He was there, I rejected any real relationship with Him for a time because I thought I knew Him, only I didn't really, causing me to misunderstand Him at the time. I was a carnal Christian, then. One that had yet to realize that our (finite, limited viewpoint of) reality MUST ALWAYS be what bends and yields to the SOLID TRUTH of His Word, rather than the other way around, because, quite simply put, "GOD IS GOD; and we . . . are NOT!". He created everything, so it ALL belongs to HIM. Therefore He has every right to make His own regulations about it all, as He sees fit in His knowledge and wisdom. The Bible says "Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts are higher than your thoughts." [Isaiah 55:9] Due to our finite viewpoint, limited knowledge, and lack of wisdom, without God's guidance we are often incapable of knowing for ourselves what is truly best for us in any given situation.
That being said, the strictly religious, which largely cast aside the relational aspect of God with us, since that doesn't suit their agenda (which they perpetrate in God's Name to the detriment of everyone involved, including God Himself), often turn me off and make me angry, by their trying to alienate, exclude, and punish people whom THEY decide that God is not for. GOD IS FOR EVERYONE! "God's Love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His one and only Son into the world so that we might live through Him." [1 John 4:9] His Word also says "If anyone hears My Words and doesn't follow them, I don't condemn them. I didn't come to condemn the world but to save the world." [John 12:47] The Bible says "He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." [2 Peter 3:9] Religion, in the strictest sense, can often be an enemy to God, and a barrier to us, blocking out the Light of God's Love and His deep desire to have a close, personal relationship with every one of us.
Part of my own testimony is that I pushed God away, for years, rejecting Him while crying out to Him to send me SOMEONE who would LOVE ME! When that DIDN'T HAPPEN, I turned on Him so viciously that I literally (looked up to Heaven, and) CURSED HIM TO HIS FACE! I told Him to get the '%#&@!' OUT OF MY LIFE!!! Well, He DID. . . . For THREE DAYS . . . it felt like His precious, sweet Holy Spirit had LEFT ME. I hadn't realized how MUCH of a DIFFERENCE He had MADE, by BEING in my life, until HE WAS GONE, because He'd been with me, no matter what, since I had accepted Christ as my Savior when I was a very young child. So, I had taken Him for granted, in that I really couldn't recall what life had actually felt like before Him, or without Him. . . . Until THIS time, I am telling you about here, now. . . . For those three days, I felt like someone had PUNCHED ME IN THE GUT, and I walked around lethargically because I felt so 'deflated' inside, without Him there with me. I just couldn't imagine HOW I would even be ABLE to go on, in this way, without Him. At the time, though, I thought that He was gone for good, thinking that my cursing Him 'to His face' had been that 'one unpardonable sin' called Blasphemy Of The Holy Spirit. ["Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven." Matthew 12:31]
Then, after three days, I was alone in my apartment, when I suddenly felt that sweet, gentle Presence of the Holy Spirit--- BACK!!! I turned toward the front entry hall of my apartment, where I sensed this Energy was hovering, seemingly waiting to be invited in by me once again; to be welcomed back by me, specifically, because of my Free Will to have to make these decisions in my life. I stood there, at first, just a few feet away, and said to Him, then, "Holy Spirit, I am SO GLAD that YOU'RE BACK! I NEVER thought I would EVER have You in my life, again, after how badly I treated You, and after I sent You away from me." With my tears flowing down my face, I said, "I cannot promise You that I will never lose my temper or get frustrated with my life, again, but I CAN PROMISE YOU that I will NEVER talk to You that way EVER again!" Then, I moved toward the location of that unique Energy, where He was still waiting, invisibly yet perceptibly, for my verbal invitation, having been banished by me just days before this. God loves us and wants us, but He also will never force Himself on us, because He chose to give us our Free Will. He didn't want robots; programmed machines! He wanted to be loved back by someone, in return, who had the true freedom to choose to love Him back. If you think about it, love is such a beautiful thing precisely because this precious gift between two is given to each other by choice, not because it is required of them or forced on them. It is freely given; freely received. Anything else, regardless of what it may be called, is not truly genuine love.
He likely returned to my apartment because God, knowing all, including our heart of hearts, saw and knew that I was MISERABLE WITHOUT HIM, for those three long days, and knew that I regretted ever having rejected Him. Because I had done that, in such an ugly and horrible way, I truly didn't think He would ever come back to me. A human most likely wouldn't have, after that kind of behavior by me toward them. I moved toward where I sensed the hovering, hesitating Energy, and embraced it, the two of us merging together again, as the Bible teaches that our body is the temple of the Lord. ["Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you, Whom you have received from God? You are not your own" 1 Corinthians 6:19] I welcomed Him HOME, and gave Him ALL MY LOVE, that day. As unholy as it sounds, I didn't regret all that had happened, though, only because it was DUE to it that I saw and realized how HE LOVED ME COMPLETELY, to come back to me at all, and that proved to me that HE was actually that Love I had wanted, and waited for, my whole life!
I didn't just LOVE Him, from then on; I also 'FELL IN LOVE WITH' HIM. He is my JOY, my LIFE, my EVERYTHING; my ALL IN ALL! I have been SO HAPPY with Him all these years since! The Bible says that "I the Lord will be your Husband'' [Isaiah 54:5], and He HAS BEEN that for me! He is all that I ever dreamed of, too! He is always truthful with me; He loves me unconditionally; He never abuses me, or leaves me, or forsakes me. He always has my best interests at heart. He knows everything and everyone, so I TRUST HIM COMPLETELY in ALL things at ALL times as I seek His wisdom. That brings me such a sense of peace and protection, security and safety.
I had to LOSE my relationship with God, for three miserable days, to realize how AWFUL and UNLIVABLE life was like, WITHOUT Him! That's what it took, with me. No one would have kept loving me, or has, like HE DID! I had treated Him very badly by taking out my frustrations on Him like I did, on that day. I was very upset at the time, and I REALLY LET HIM HAVE IT, verbally. I was so AMAZED ("Amazing GRACE, how SWEET the sound!") that He even still WANTED to BE WITH ME after that. That's when I realized how BLIND I had been: that the VERY LOVE I'd wanted to find ALL MY LIFE was HIM, with me, always, and FOREVER!
