My response to your closing discussion question: The older I get the more I realize, the less I know - meaning that there are very few things that I have any real sense of certainty. It has caused me to be far more generous in my theological and doctrinal conclusions and assumptions towards other Christian perspectives and groups. But also more grounded in the few theological and doctrinal issues that are (from my understanding and historical continuity) explicitly stated, taught, and demonstrated by Jesus as recorded and preserved in the Gospels. Very humbling to realize that the version of Christianity I was handed and experienced has been shaped more by Western Enlightenment and an American culture that values independence and global economic and political dominance than the actual words and way of Jesus.
You are always worth listening to. I agree. Only in my mature years have I had the confidence to question whether what I have always assumed is the correct Christian way and ask how much of it is actually the product of historical influences.
I just happen to be in the stream at the point I'm in, and this is the Christianity I've been raised with, but if I go downstream or upstream, things look radically different. I don't think I'm farther away because of this search. I've never been closer to Jesus, as far as I can tell. I'm finding it helpful, and I hope others will also.
The point is to reJesus everything, but in order to do that, you have to become self-aware, which is the hardest thing of all.
GREAT episode, Chuck!
My response to your closing discussion question: The older I get the more I realize, the less I know - meaning that there are very few things that I have any real sense of certainty. It has caused me to be far more generous in my theological and doctrinal conclusions and assumptions towards other Christian perspectives and groups. But also more grounded in the few theological and doctrinal issues that are (from my understanding and historical continuity) explicitly stated, taught, and demonstrated by Jesus as recorded and preserved in the Gospels. Very humbling to realize that the version of Christianity I was handed and experienced has been shaped more by Western Enlightenment and an American culture that values independence and global economic and political dominance than the actual words and way of Jesus.
You are always worth listening to. I agree. Only in my mature years have I had the confidence to question whether what I have always assumed is the correct Christian way and ask how much of it is actually the product of historical influences.
I just happen to be in the stream at the point I'm in, and this is the Christianity I've been raised with, but if I go downstream or upstream, things look radically different. I don't think I'm farther away because of this search. I've never been closer to Jesus, as far as I can tell. I'm finding it helpful, and I hope others will also.
The point is to reJesus everything, but in order to do that, you have to become self-aware, which is the hardest thing of all.