Jesus MEME

I haven’t done too many memes. However, when Lynn the Braveheart tapped me for this one, I felt rather obligated. For me, it’s rather the same feeling I have when I attend a dinner and someone who knows that I am a clergyperson asks me to say grace. (The prayer I usually pray on those occasions is a very short one that I learned many years ago from a Japanese pastor, Takia Nishazawa: “Lord. We remember.”)

I must admit that, in thinking about this Meme, the first words that came to my mind was the first verse of Kris Kristofferson’s song, Jesus Was a Capricorn:

(1) Jesus was a Capricorn, he ate organic foods.
(2) He believed in love and peace and never wore no shoes.
(3) Long hair, beard and sandals and a funky bunch of friends.
(4) Reckon (we'd) just nail him up if He comes down again.

With Kristofferson’s lyrics out of my mind and shared with you, I’ll go on to my own response. Lynn’s instructions are simple: I am to share five things that I dig about Jesus. Therefore:

Jesus is humble:

If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,
who, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death—
even death on a cross.

(Philippians 2)

Jesus is compassionate:

When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (Matthew 9:36)

Jesus teaches agape (unconditional love):

‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?” (Matthew 5:43-47)

Jesus is just:

The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, sir.’And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.’ (John 8:3-15)

Jesus is Light:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. (John 1:1-7)