Jesus the Legend

by Rev. Gina Johnson

So the first time that I ever actually heard the song “Build a Boat” I was sitting in Pat and Terry Immel’s lower level and Pat and Travis had been kind of goofing around trying some things cause they're both these extraordinary musicians and they were like, “Hey! Check this out.” They played through it and, you know, sitting there watching someone who's become a very dear friend of mine, Pat, and watching of course Travis, who means so much to me, just meant the world to me.

But then as I was listening to the words of the song, I thought about how extraordinary it is to know that, with Jesus in our lives, it can rain, it can storm, the floods, the waters can rise; it can shake the house, it can even come crashing through the windows and it's okay. That's what that song's about. It's saying I'm gonna build a boat. Maybe I don't see the clouds. Maybe I'm not feeling the drops yet, but when they come, bring them on because I have Jesus, which means I have God, which means I have the Holy Spirit. I have the full empowerment of the I Am.

Anytime I hear that song I can't help but reflect on all the ups and downs, all the ebbs and flows, all the times a storm has been there and the rainbows and the sunshine that follow shortly after and they just remind me that that is possible because Jesus showed us the way. Jesus is the one who chose in all of his enlightenment, knowing that he didn't even have to but he chose to walk among us, live among us, be with us and demonstrate the fullness of who we are through who he is. That's why that song holds a very special place to me. It's very fitting as we dive into the conclusion of this three week series Jesus: the Man, the Myth, the Legend.

So, if you remember in that first week we talked about Jesus: the Man. We were looking at some of those simple things like, you know, Jesus got tired, Jesus got hungry, Jesus had moments where he had to step away, and we got to see the fullness and connect with Jesus because we, too, have those moments. We, too, have those times where we're tired or hungry or need to step away. We, too, have those moments where we have to face certain emotions and certain challenges and, wow, we really come in tune with what it means to be spiritual beings in a human experience. That's what Jesus showed us as he was there in the Garden of Gethsemane, as he was facing that challenge, as all aspects of humanity were displayed in the fullness of him. He also was able to persevere and remind us that in our connection through Jesus as human beings we also have the strength and the endurance to face any challenge in life. We can cry out to the Father in our full humanness and then rise above the circumstance in the fullness of our divinity.

The next week we were visiting some of the myths around Jesus and what's funny about these myths is we can constantly see how these little things can cause us to split hairs. These little things can cause us to have division. These little things can cause us to forget who we are and there was a reminder in that message that these things really hold no weight. It's not a matter of whether he was born in this season or that season or that day or this day. It's not a matter of what color was his hair or his eyes or how tall was. Did he speak with an accent or did he speak this way? None of those things matter.

When we look at the bigger picture, we recognize a significant factor. In fact, Jesus taught and demonstrated that what really matters in the big picture is the trueness of who we are. We don't have to look for the things that separate us from one another, but instead we can look for those things that unite us and that is that we all are children of God, that is that we all are here to serve a great purpose of bringing love, of bringing grace. We're here to learn together. We're here to be challenged together. We're here to lock arms and navigate our individual journeys while navigating alongside one another. There's no need to get caught up in it while this person says this about Jesus and this person says that. Don't lose sight of the lesson because you're so focused on the little minute details of the teacher. Look past the teacher and see the lesson.

So today we're here to talk about Jesus: the Legend. When I think about the classic legend of Jesus, when I think about what would be the traditional message that has come through ever since I was little in understanding Christianity and even Catholicism because my mom was Catholic, it can be summed up very easily in the Apostles Creed.

I believe in God, the Father, Almighty Creator of Heaven and Earth. I believe in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to hell. The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended to heaven and is seated in the right hand of God the Father Almighty. From there he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.

Right? That sums it all up. Jesus came. He was born of a virgin. He lived his life, taught us a couple things, but really it was about him getting nailed to the cross so he could resurrect in three days, and done and done. Now we have salvation. Everyone come and grab your ticket. You all get to go to heaven, and that's it. The bus door is open. Let's all get on now.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with the Apostles Creed. As a matter of fact, they said it quite a few times when I was younger and it's beautiful. There is so much truth to it: Jesus the Son of God, was conceived with the Holy Spirit, with the Virgin Mary, he did endure challenges and suffering at the hand of those who persecuted him, he was crucified, he died and he showed us that he transcended death. The illusion of death was before us and yet he showed us that he did not die. He was in a resurrection as he ascended to heaven and now he is with us and also seated with the Father always. So if we mess up and fall short, we can fall under the teachings that tell us that's okay, because once you believe in Jesus you have grace and you have mercy to wash over you, to cover you, so just keep on trucking; everything is taken care of.

However, if Jesus, the enlightened person he was, only came here to walk among us for a brief amount of time, and then experience the cross, to be resurrected and give us salvation, well then why did he live among us as long as he did? If that's all Jesus came here to do, why didn't God just incarnate for a week or maybe a year, and take care of business, give us all salvation, pass out our golden tickets and go about his way?

I believe, though there's all the truth and understanding behind the simple story of why Jesus was here, there is a more complex story to it. You see, when we lock ourselves into “I have salvation because I pray the sinner's prayer and now all I need is to read my Bible every day, go to church and make sure that I repent for my sins I am good, done and done,” when we lock ourselves into that understanding, we miss out on the understanding of why Jesus walked among us, what he came to teach us, what he came to show us, who he came to remind us that we are.

There's a lot of people today who have been reading the Bible their whole life and truly have no idea what it says, and I don't mean that as if I'm some expert authority or there's such a thing out there. I just mean that a lot of people were handed a Bible and told, “Hey, I want you to read this, but this is what it says and this is what you're to believe and as long as you're under this structure of religion, this is the way it goes.” There's a lot of people who show up in church Sunday after Sunday who participate in different spiritual religious practice and still in quiet places are wondering what's it all about, who really is Jesus, and what does Jesus have to do with me and my life and my salvation? What even is salvation? There are people who are in their 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s who have grown up in the church their whole life and still are questioning “What do these words mean? How can I truly accept that I am an extension of God almighty and live this life that I'm called to live when I don't even like reading parts of this Bible because I don't get it?”

It can be a really tricky situation, but when we stop and we look at Jesus and we really allow ourselves to learn who he is, to understand his teachings, to dive into what he was doing and saying, the practices that he was participating in, then we start to understand why he was here and why we're here and why we're here now. You see, that's the legend of Jesus.

It's easy to get caught up in that story, the story that we tell throughout the year, the story that we especially heighten at Christmas and Easter, but if we set that story aside and recognize that there is more to it, then we can understand what he was doing here, why he claimed to be the way, the truth and the life. What did that mean? We're going to look at Matthew chapter 14: 1-7.

Over and over again this passage is used in funerals. It gives a form of comfort as people have lost one of their loved ones regardless of who it is that it’s okay. Jesus went on before us and in our Father's mansion he prepared these rooms for us to then go to. I have to say that although that gives us comfort and assurance, although that is sweet and it continues to paint this beautiful picture, it is also painting the picture that the kingdom is something outside ourselves and if we recall in other verses of scripture Jesus said the kingdom is neither here nor there. The kingdom is within. That's not to say that we don't find peace and comfort for eternity, that we don't have that opportunity, but that is to say that the kingdom is not something outside of ourselves. It's not a physical place that Jesus has run off to go prepare and when we're ready he'll come and load us up and we'll go join him there.

Jesus was sharing with us that that preparation has a lot more meaning than what we tend to give it. It’s more than the idea of when we pass on we have a room, a space in heaven that we're going to you see. The truth is where the kingdom is, is a place where we are always present. My partner and I, we have this phrase that we use when we're coaching and we're teaching and it's called “the journey without distance to a place you never left.” You see, we are always standing in the fullness of the kingdom. That's why sometimes when I pray, I'll pray that we will bring the kingdom here, that we as kingdom workers will build the kingdom here, that we will help remind others who they are in this beautiful kingdom of God.

Jesus, as he walked among us, he showed us that the kingdom was without limitation. He met with everyone. He met with everyone no matter who they were, no matter their status, and he wasn't afraid to speak truth and love into their lives. He wasn't afraid to approach the leper just as he wasn't afraid to approach the prostitute. He wasn't afraid to speak confidently before his followers just as he wasn't afraid to speak confidently before those who persecuted him. You see, the legend of Jesus shows us that he went ahead of us to be fully in his enlightenment. He went ahead of us to help us understand that we are living the eternal life. We have died with Jesus. We are raised with Jesus and so here we are in this present existence, living in the kingdom and it's our job as kingdom workers, as the children of God, to continue to move in that unfoldment, to truly see who we are and to come into the remembrance that Christ displayed before us.

When we start to turn inward and recognize who we are, we not only will remember who we are, but we will see that we are divinely connected to God. When we look at Jesus, it's easy to say, “Well that's God in the flesh. Jesus is God.” Then we detach ourselves from it and we think we have something to earn, something to prove, something to reach in order to be as enlightened, in order to be as significant, in order to be in the trueness that we see in God and Jesus. But that's not the case.

Jesus is reminding us in this very passage that when you see him you see the Father and he also is telling us that when we see him and see the Father in another passage that we too are there, we too are in that same place. Thomas was very puzzled by this. Thomas says, “We don't know where you're going. We don't know the way. We haven't seen it.” Jesus is trying to share with Thomas that you have seen it because it is within you. Jesus may be an outside representation of what it looks like to be the I Am, of what it looks like to be with the Father, but he's trying to show us that we, too, are there. When that passage talks about preparing many rooms, or in the earlier translations it says abode, these places are places within the mind.

You see the mind produces a lot of thoughts, which come into words and actions. How many of us have places in our mind that are not serving us? How many of us, if we are not careful, may visit the rooms in our minds that tell us you are not good enough, you are aging and you're not doing it very well, you are too young, you haven't had enough lessons in life to know what to do in this world? Remember all those things that you did wrong over these past years of your life? Are you ready to make those mistakes again because you probably will. When you look around you and you're wondering why you don't have all you wanted to have and things aren't going the way you wanted them to go, well that's because you made your bed, so now you're lying in it.

That's exactly what that is. Do you have those places in your mind? Unfortunately, many of us do and we may be careful to keep those doors tightly shut so we don't have to visit those places, but sometimes things just happen. Sometimes we wake up one morning and we decide, “You know what? Today is a day where I need to teach myself many lessons,” so we open all the doors of our minds and we get flooded in with “You're not going to get it all done today,” “You're not going to do good enough, so good luck,” “You're probably going to run into so and so and you know you don't like so and so.”

It causes a lot of tension in you and we start to go down this rabbit trail of our inadequacies, the rabbit trails of what we can and can't do, but that's the thing Jesus was trying to tell us. “As I come before you, you've seen what the world has thrown at me.” They threw accusations. They threw mockery. They threw bitterness and hatred at him. They questioned his every move. They followed him to see if they could catch him tripping up somewhere. They were always looking at this beautiful enlightened being and trying to say there's no way you can be that perfect. There's no way you can be such a place of love and grace and truth. We want to tear that down because the more that you are demonstrating love and grace and truth and enlightenment, you're making us look bad.

But the truth is Jesus wasn't trying to make anyone look bad. He was trying to say, if I have it, if I can do it, so can you. He was trying to say, “As I walk among you, as I go past the boundaries and the barriers, as I show love in places where people wouldn't even show an ounce of kindness, so can you.” The legend of Jesus is one where I'm not going to be limited by the town I was born in. I'm not going to be limited by the stories and rumors around my mother and father and how I was conceived. I'm not going to be limited by my physical appearance, by the people I keep company with. I'm not going to be limited because I was a Jew. I'm not going to be limited because I drew a following and the government and the religious authorities did not agree with me.

Instead he said, “No. I am my Father's Son just as we are all God's children.” He showed us that not even death on a cross could stop who he is. And when you really get down to it, when you really sit and think about it, he was showing us that not only is this me, but this is you. That is the legend of Jesus. Jesus, who came and walked this earth to show us that even in those dark places you can bring light to those people who have been cast out and pushed aside. They are welcome here just as much as anyone else. When all the stories and illusions of your past come creeping in like story of the girl who was dragged out and thrown before Jesus and the leaders said, “We know all about her. Now persecute her,” and he said, “Go and sin no more,” remember that he acknowledged that there is no separation, that we are all one, that we all have the same opportunities, the same empowerment, the same spirit, the same God and the same love that unites us. Jesus walked before us to show us that we, too, can choose consciousness. We can choose to consciously be aware of the fullness of who we are because of who God is and if God is living within us then how can we be anything less than our Father’s children, than the Source’s children, than co-creators with the Mighty Creator?

I have to ask you all, when you think about the message that Jesus brought before us, do you think about it as a message of acceptance and love, a message that closes the doors to those rooms that do not serve you and opening the doors to love, to grace, to acceptance, to faith? When you open those doors, can you choose to recognize that you, too, are like Jesus? Can you choose to recognize that you, too, can slow down? You can pause. You can retreat and take those moments of prayer and rejuvenation, remembering who you are, and then boldly step forward. Can you choose to not let stereotypes, financial positions, past circumstances, or even fears of the future identify who you are? Can you choose to do nothing? Can you choose just to be and recognize that all that is, is within you, that God is and the provisions of God are bountiful? They're abundant and they're within you.

As long as we seek to find consciousness and presence, as long as we seek to find wholeness, as long as we seek to find eternity outside of ourselves we're going to still be looking because everything that we need, that vast kingdom of God, is within us. The more that we choose to show up in the fullness of the I Am, the more that we choose to embrace the legend of who Jesus was and boldly say “If that's who Jesus was and is, that's who I am,” the more the legend of Jesus is the legend of us.

We, too, are compassionate and caring. We, too, are fearless and limitless. We, too, are abundant. We, too, have eternal life. Jesus did not allow death nor life to hold him or confine him or change the work that he was brought here to do and we too can stand in that same place. It's really, really easy to allow our present circumstance to place a label upon us that holds no truth in the moment.

It may be saying, “Man, I'm getting older. My body's not working the same.” Let's carry that story around for a while and see how much it distracts us from the fullness of who we are.

“Gosh! I'm so young. You know, no one ever really thinks I have anything wise to say. Everyone just thinks I'm immature and no one ever takes me serious.” Let's carry that around and see how it limits us from who we are.

“Oh my gosh! If anyone knew the truth of my past no one would ever accept me. I don't know. I just need to keep putting on this facade and keep wearing these masks.” Let's carry that story around and see how much it limits us.

“Man, if things keep going this way I'm doomed. There's nothing to my future. I don't even know what's to come. How am I going to get through this?” How does that story limit us?

Or we can make a choice. We can make a conscious choice to release all of those stories. We can make a conscious choice to be present here and now because where else can we be but here right now? And what do we see when we are here right now? Well I see you. I see all of you in your highest self and I hope that I am showing up in my highest self. I hope that as I see all of you that I see you and I see the I Am. I see the presence of Jesus. And I hope that everywhere I go I bring the I Am and I bring the presence of Jesus.

The Apostles Creed is beautiful. It reminds us of so many truths and so many significant, and yet insignificant details when it comes to the legend of Jesus. He was a man who came in his full enlightenment. He was a spiritual being, the Son of God, who chose to walk and live among us, to show us the way, and we can dispel all of the myths around him. We can truly grab a hold of what we know and that is that Jesus came here to remind us that we are one with him and the Father. We are empowered. We are the face, the voice, the movement, and the essence of love. If you can see Jesus and the trueness of all that he is, then you can see yourself.

Remember Jesus' legend, Jesus' story, is your legend and your story. You just have to make a choice: am I going to show up as someone who is limited, as someone who is caught up in all sorts of stories, all sorts of challenges, all sorts of places that hold me back, or am I going to show up with my head held high in confidence that as the spirit is present within me I am the spirit? Jesus the man, the myth the legend, his story is our story.

Please pray with me. Our God, there is so much that you give us, Lord, there is so much within us that there can be challenges to fully see ourselves in the trueness of who we are. God we affirm in this moment that we are created in perfection, that we are created in the complete trueness and likeness of the I Am, that there is nothing within this world, nothing outside of us that can limit us or bound us, that when we fully embrace who we are, that when we fully embrace Jesus, when we fully embrace the empowerment, that we, too, have transcended death and are living eternal life. God we give you thanks as we go from this place. May the words that are of your spirit, the words that are of your truth, sit with us, stir in us, and challenge us to be more of who we are and all that is not may it fall away. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.