A Divine Awakening

A Divine Awakening

Our awareness is everything; our waking up is everything. We need to move from the superficial or “outer self” to the true self or “inner self.”[1]

When I consider what it means to crucify Christianity in order to resurrect the Way of Jesus, it is easy and natural to think the process would change something out there – meaning somewhere outside of me, like in the church or the church leadership. It is easy to support change, even dramatic change, when that change applies to others. I confess to quietly but smugly celebrating when what seemed a long-overdue disruption was forced upon someone I dislike. Like many of us, I want to see the bad people get what they deserve. The problem is that my definition of bad people is subjective and personal; the reality is we all get what we deserve eventually, as determined by powers greater than mine. That is the law of reaping what we sow, as taught by Jesus and others, or in other cultures, the law of karma. We create our own realities and life experiences, but the time that passes between a cause, or an action, and its effect, or reaction, usually obscures the connection between the two. In addition, our life-experiences are the product of a complex web of effects resulting from many different causes over differing timelines. As such, resurrecting of the Way of Jesus begins within: with my attitudes, awarenesses, and behaviors.

The Christianity that needs crucifying is not that of a particular church, denomination, or religious belief system. What needs crucifixion is our interpretation and application of what it means to be a Christian. And our interpretation and application of what it means to be a Christian is the product of a tangled web of teachings and misunderstandings from our past. Few, if any, churches focus on leading people to a more Christ-like life, perhaps because they’ve lost sight of their primary purpose. Too often, the church bureaucracy and its organizational needs becomes the primary focus of its activities. Following Jesus can lead to life changes that can be off-putting, difficult, and counter to the non-church-related aspects of their lives. Conflicts arise as we separate church-life from real-life, pitting one against the other instead of merging them as one. Such a merger becomes easier as we remember that Jesus brought a new way of life, not a new religion. Jesus did not start Christianity. Rather, the Christianity of today is laden with increasingly irrelevant structures and organizations, including its buildings and bureaucracy. Church efforts to put and keep butts in seats undermine Jesus’ model of loving and serving others, which requires significant internal change for most of us. Too much of Christian teaching today focuses on controlling individual behavior and scaring congregations into submission with the threat of spending eternity in hell – none of which was taught by Jesus. He didn’t tell us to go to church but to feed the hungry.

The early followers of Jesus – his surviving disciples and students – attempted to continue learning from and sharing his teachings in small groups and house churches, calling themselves the Way. There was no formal organizational structure and no separate buildings. For many years after Jesus’ crucifixion, followers even met in Jewish synagogues. And they were usually not considered a threat to the Jews because they were not trying to start a new religion, but to apply the teachings of Jesus to their Jewish lives. There should be no conflict between following the life and teachings of Jesus and being a Jew or a Hindu or a Buddhist or even an agnostic or atheist.

We don’t need to change our religion, or even claim one, to become a follower of Jesus. The changes required are internal. To the extent we have them, we will almost certainly deconstruct many of our religious beliefs anyway. What changes is our inner awareness of and approach to life. We gradually awaken to the presence of the Spirit of God within everyone and everything in creation. That is the divine awakening. Noted priest, author, and theologian, Matthew Fox, in one of his commentaries¹ about the writings of priest and paleontologist, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), wrote of this need to shift our awareness away from our “outer self” to our “inner self” – from the world out there to the world within. Priest and contemplative author, Richard Rohr, writes, “Christianity…is not about attendance at religious services, proper group-defining rituals, or priestly performances.”[2] In order to know God we must experience God, and few churches can lead us to such an experience. Most churches teach about God, which is an intellectual exercise. Experiencing God is an exercise of the heart and a completely different type of encounter. The former leads to knowledge; the latter leads to transformation.

This is the 23^rd in a series titled Crucifying Christianity, Resurrecting the Way.Life Notes are my explorations into mysteries that interest me. They are not objective truths but invitations for readers to explore, too. Engage with me or explore contemplative spiritual direction at ghildenbrand@outlook.com.

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[1] Matthew Fox, Passion for Creation, Breakthrough, 1995, pp. 1-3.

[2] Richard Rohr, The Tears of Things, Convergent Books, 2025, p. 68.