Lisa notes

6 Ways to Take the Plastic Wrap Off Jesus

By LisaNotes April 20, 2021 Book reviews, Jesus 7 Comments

Packaging can be hard to tear off. When we buy something new, we expect to be able to open it without much effort. But sometimes it requires scissors or a knife. Or if we disobey our mother’s advice, our teeth.

But other times, we let the plastic languish on the item. We don’t unwrap it. We keep it pristine on a shelf, as new as the day we bought it.

Have we kept Jesus all wrapped up, too?

Take the Packaging Off Jesus

For many of us who were born into a family of believers, our origin story with Jesus may look the same. We were toted to church from infancy, never missed a Sunday or Wednesday service, could quote the books of the Bible by 3rd grade (or earlier).

But when we really came to know Jesus, our stories will vary. They’ll be as unique as we are.

Some came to know Jesus first as Savior. Others as Friend. Others as Teacher.

In her new book Freeing Jesus, author and historian Diana Butler Bass describes 6 ways of freeing Jesus, of undoing his packaging, of letting him out of the box.

They include discovering Jesus as:

Friend
Teacher
Savior
Lord
Way
Presence

Bass organizes this book brilliantly to tell her own spiritual autobiography.

But the book isn’t just about her. It’s mainly about Jesus. And about us and Jesus.

As Bass explains, it’s not a theological memoir. It’s a memoir theology. The focus is on theology; the memoir is just there to give it structure.

What is your spiritual autobiography? How and when did you take the wrapper off of Jesus? Which role of Jesus did you begin with, and where are you now?

There are no right or wrong answers. There is no divine sequence. Jesus is all things at all times. We’re just more in tune with Jesus in different ways at different times.

6 Ways to Experience Jesus

Here are quotes from Bass relating to six sides of Jesus that become visible as we free him from the packaging. See which ones relate most to you.

1. JESUS AS FRIEND

“The story of the New Testament is that the risk of friendship is the risk that frees us from fear and reshapes our lives—it is better to go together than to go alone. Jesus befriends us, opening our hearts to genuine love and the capacity to forgive each other, welcome all, and act justly in the world.”

2. JESUS AS TEACHER

“Although Christians call Jesus by many names, those who knew him best mostly called him ‘teacher.’ Of the ninety or so times Jesus is addressed directly in the New Testament, roughly sixty refer to him as ‘teacher,’ ‘rabbi,’ ‘great one,’ or ‘master’ (as in the British sense of ‘schoolmaster’). . . .

“Jesus, who was complete love, the man for others, taught us to go and be likewise. He did not teach rules. He taught that love ruled. He lived what he taught.”

3. JESUS AS SAVIOR

“‘Savior’ may well be the most ubiquitous term that Christians use to describe Jesus. Yet, oddly enough, ‘Savior’ appears only twice in the gospels to describe Jesus. . . .

“At-one-ment was the reason the authorities did away with Jesus. No empire can stand if the people it oppresses figure out that reconciliation, love, liberation, and oneness hold more power than the sword.”

4. JESUS AS LORD

“I had not brought Jesus to anyone. Instead, my host had brought Jesus to me as he welcomed me and invited my heart to be cleansed along with the kitchen. There was something of me that got saved that day, not the other way around.”

5. JESUS AS THE WAY

“In the mystical poetry of John, Jesus uses these terms to explain how he embodies a way of being in this world so close to the heart of God that God can be known in and through Jesus. . . .

“Being a Christian is about finding or getting found by Jesus.”

6. JESUS AS PRESENCE

“Jesus as mystery is, indeed, the Christian faith’s greatest spiritual enigma. A human being who is fully God? That is what Christianity proclaims—that beyond our wildest imaginings, the ever-creating Love of the cosmos made its way into our small, hurting world, living and dying with us and for us, and promises never, never, never to leave us alone. Love is in the world, and inside of us, dwelling with us even as we dwell in it. I cannot explain one bit of that.”

Let Jesus Move and Breathe

Bass explains there are multiple other ways we experience Jesus, too: as Word, Wisdom, Sustenance, etc.

Each way, and each person’s experience, is valuable, in both shaping their own life as well as kingdom life.

“Our frame is so narrow, and Jesus’s is so wide. If only we knew all the Jesuses who have been hidden from view, all the Christs never heard. Thankfully, more voices count now—the experiences of many are arising to bring every Jesus to light the world.”

Bass addresses COVID-19 in the conclusion of her book.

She writes,

“Jesus did not leave us to suffer alone. COVID-19 forced Jesus out of the cathedral into the world, reminding Christians that church is not a building.”

Many of us can attest to this. We are thankful that Jesus has never been confined to a building or an institution.

Nor does he want to be packaged tightly in plastic wrap, sitting on a shelf, never to be opened.

Wherever we go, Jesus wants to be unwrapped and experienced as friend, teacher, Savior, Lord, way, and presence.

Let’s take the wrapper off Jesus. And leave it off. He wants to move and breathe in us.

Who is Jesus to you? Which of these 6 ways have you encountered Jesus the most: Jesus as friend, teacher, Savior, Lord, way, or presence?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

For more about Freeing Jesus, listen to the March 29 interview with Diana Butler Bass on the “Things Not Seen” podcast.

My thanks to NetGalley and HarperOne
for the review copy of Freeing Jesus

You Know I Can Hear You, Right?

By LisaNotes April 19, 2021 Encouragement 31 Comments

I glance at the clock. It is 2:03 a.m.

It’s too quiet in the house. I don’t hear any deep-sleep breathing beside me.

Jeff must be awake, too.

I feel him lean over his side of the bed to grab his phone. He must have been awake awhile. He is going to listen to his audiobook to put him back to sleep. It’s a mystery story, but it won’t be intriguing enough to keep him awake.

I see the light flicker on his phone. The earbuds go in. He hits play.

And then?

Is It Really Hidden?

What we do in private may seem like our own business. We think our inner life is invisible to the world. We believe we can keep sections of ourselves cut off from public viewing.

We think it’s possible to have bad thoughts and bad feelings about someone behind their back, and then good behavior to their face.

But can we really? Are we that good at fooling others? At fooling ourselves?

Can we ever fool God?

It Ripples Out

In reality, our private selves are never truly private.

Even if we don’t speak out loud every word we’re thinking, our inner thought life still makes noise in the outside word.

Who we are in private is revealed in public.

We’re not as successful at acting as we think we are. Perhaps we can masquerade some of who we are, but our most basic character eventually becomes known.

That makes it all the more important that we get it together in private.

Cultivating a healthy spiritual life is an investment worth making. For our own sakes. For our relationship with God. For our relationships with others.

Jesus lived authentically. Jesus was authentically kind, authentically good, authentically loving. He was the same on the outside as he was on the inside.

Because Jesus lived clean and whole, the ripples he sent out were clean and whole, too.

Our lives have ripples too.

Sometimes our ripples are heard more loudly and clearly than our actual voices. Even when we think no one is listening or paying attention to us, our ripples are still flowing outward, floating on and on.

I Hear You

As soon as Jeff hits play on his phone, I suddenly become fully awake!

His audiobook isn’t playing only through his earbuds like he thinks. The sound is coming out directly through his phone’s speaker.

I am hearing every word of his mystery, too.

I wait a few seconds. Still playing. A few seconds more. Still playing.

I finally nudge Jeff:

“You know I can hear that, right?”

No. He didn’t know. He thought only he could hear it. He wasn’t aware that his earbuds weren’t properly plugged in.

We laugh about it, and he apologizes. He makes the correct cord/port connection this time and all goes silent again in my world as only he can now hear his book.

May we never mistake that we’re the only ones who can hear the voices in our head.

Others may not hear our literal words, but they’ll still get the message.

Through the way we treat others.
Through the way we talk to others.
Through the way we love others.

We all are listening.

Share your thoughts in the comments.

Further Reading:

Start in Private
Outward improvement begins from the inside.
If You Pray Well, You Live Well?
I want to believe it’s true. But if it is, why don’t we pray more often?

Did You Choose One Word for 2021? Linkup Coming April 21

By LisaNotes April 18, 2021 One Word Community No Comments

Did you choose One Word for 2021?
Do you still remember it?
Are you engaging with it?

Write a blog post giving us a quick update, or leave a comment here at the blog on Wednesday, April 21, for our linkup.

We gather on the 21st of each month during 2021 to share about our words.

If you’d like to receive a monthly email reminding you, along with a few suggestions on how to engage with your word, sign up here.

Now is always the right time to start focusing on your own One Word in 2021!

If you’re on Facebook, we also invite you to join our private One Word 2021 group.

Read more:

Am I Really Just Stupid?

By LisaNotes April 16, 2021 Encouragement, Uncertainty: My One Word 2021 24 Comments

I know we’re not supposed to use the s-word (stupid), at least not around small children. And we’re not to call other people the s-word either.

But what about ourselves?

Have you ever called yourself stupid?

When the Answers Don’t Come

“Am I really just stupid?”

I asked my husband Jeff this a few days ago about myself. More than once, actually. I needed an outside opinion about my intelligence lately, or lack of it, to be precise.

I had signed up as a volunteer partner in an online project. It was an area I thought I had some expertise in. I anticipated contributing to the task.

Until the assignments starting rolling in.

And I felt clueless. How could I perform the work if I couldn’t even understand the questions?

I wanted to panic. I googled; I watched tutorials; I asked around.

But the answers weren’t coming.

I wanted to tiptoe backwards out of the group, unnoticed, silently, to avoid looking stupid.

Stupidity Is My Hot Button

I hate feeling stupid.

No one likes the feeling, I suppose. But as an Enneagram Five, I’m particularly touchy about it. We Fives lean on our knowledge as a crutch to feel secure.

And my crutch was not only kicked away, I envisioned it landing in the dumpster.

Meanwhile, emails were piling up with unfulfilled assignments from the group. My inner ego was under threat.

I opened the next email. But it wasn’t from the group. It was from EnneaThought, a daily newsletter I subscribe to from the Enneagram Institute.

The email said,

“One of your sure-fire ‘hot buttons’ is having your competency questioned. How can you be less reactive to such challenges? Try keeping your cool and listening to the other person’s viewpoint.”

Why not try it? When you know you don’t know, what do you have to lose?

Pride.

This will feel painful, too.

Never Alone

So I resumed responding again to the group. I asked more questions. I confessed ignorance. I gave best-guesses.

I still felt limited…

Granted, I realize no single person is the repository of all knowledge on every topic. (But if possible, I’d love to try!) It’s expected that we can’t know everything. Even the top-notch expert and the simplest-minded child are closer than you think on the intelligence scale.

…but I knew I wasn’t empty.

I did know a few things. And when I prioritize what I want to know, I can learn even more things. Our competencies vary from person to person; it’s as it should be. We each decide what’s important to us and we work on that.

We eventually find out what we need to know, even if it’s not everything we want to know.

I still felt vulnerable…

Not knowing what we want to know can feel us leaving unprotected. As if things are spinning out of control, and we can do nothing to stop it.

…but I knew I was protected.

None of us are left totally alone to figure out life by ourselves.

We can use the intelligence we do have to ask others for help when we need it. (And thank you, Google.)

Welcome to the Human Race

Thinking we’re only stupid can be a trap, just like thinking we’re only smart.

The truth is: we’re all a little of both.

The stupidest thing is overestimating our smartness. It’s smarter to know we don’t know it all.

My online group project still hasn’t ended, but we’re closing in on a successful conclusion. I wasn’t able to help as much as I had anticipated.

But I learned a lot. About the project. And about myself.

I learned I’m safer (and smarter too) without that extra layer of pride that gloms to my character, making struggles stickier than they need to be. We all have pride to kill, and we’re better off with it dead than allowing it to keep rising up for one more breath.

I’m not there yet. I’m not smart enough to kill off pride altogether.

But at least I’m more aware of it this month than I was a month ago.

Am I still stupid?

Yes and no. Just like all of us.

But if I’m smart, I’ll keeping sailing in the same boat with my fellow humans anyway. We’re all floating on a sea of mercy.

Both are smart places to be.

Do you ever feel stupid? How do you deal with it? I’m still grappling with my One Word for 2021, Uncertainty. Share your thoughts in the comments.

If Jesus Is the Way, It’s Good to Be a Roadie

By LisaNotes April 15, 2021 Encouragement, Guest posts No Comments

We left our hotel in plenty of time to get to our friend’s wedding last Saturday.

But our GPS sent us to a strip mall, not a beach resort.

Were we lost?

If Christianity was once called the Way (literally, the Road), its followers were the first roadies.

See why it’s good to be a roadie (and if we finally found the wedding venue on time!).

Read it all here.

I’m writing today at Do Not Depart. Will you join me there?

Surprise, Surprise! I Was Caught by One

By LisaNotes April 12, 2021 Encouragement 42 Comments

Know What to Expect

She is following me.

I take a right into my bedroom. She does, too. I walk into my bathroom. She toddles behind me.

I’m not surprised. When her parents are here, she’s all about holding on to mom and dad.

But they aren’t here this weekend. And when she stays with us, I’m her person. I like that. I’ve come to expect it.

I open the top drawer in my bathroom and pull out the toothpaste. As I brush my teeth, she watches me. But only for a few seconds.

She has other plans.

Unbeknownst to Me

She pulls on the bottom drawer in the bathroom, the one she can reach. It opens easily for her. I keep extras there: emery boards, dental floss, bobby pins.

But what she pulls out is not what I keep there.

Her hands go directly for the two items that don’t belong. A plastic white puzzle piece and a plastic blue puzzle piece.

She grabs them from the drawer, turns around, and walks out. She got what she came for.

I’m left alone to laugh and laugh. She had placed those puzzles pieces there another day, unbeknownst to me.

But she hadn’t forgotten she’d put them there. She remembered.

She has surprised me.

Be Surprised

She’ll continue to surprise me.

If she can surprise me at sixteen-months-old, when I think my youngest granddaughter is predictable, how much more will she surprise me at ten years old? At seventeen? At twenty-four, if I’m still around, Lord willing?

Everyone contains surprises. Just when we think we have someone figured out, they’ll do something unexpected.

And we’ll be surprised.

I love delightful surprises. They come when we least expect them. They sometimes come through coincidences or through nature or through a toddling little grandchild.

And sometimes we ourselves are the surprise.

I want to remain open for surprises.

How will you be surprised today? It’s impossible to know.

How often are you caught by surprise? When’s the last time you surprised yourself? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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