But isn’t Jesus ‘The Way’?
You’re right, I give in; Jesus is the Way. I mean he said he was the Way so he must be, right? Yep, but it’s important to note that Jesus said HE was the Way, and the statement is made in the context of finding your way into a relationship with God.
Jesus answered,
Jesus answered,
“I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”[i]
This was an issue of His personhood not His methodology. Jesus, the person, is the Son of God and the only way for us to find our way back to God is through him. This is not a popular concept for postmodern thinkers but contrary to popular beliefs there can be absolutes in a postmodern world and the person Jesus may just surprise you! Worryingly many Christians have wrongly used this concept of Jesus being the Way to become close minded and polarize others. However if we are to look at the methodology of Jesus we see that he loved to break out of the box.
This was an issue of His personhood not His methodology. Jesus, the person, is the Son of God and the only way for us to find our way back to God is through him. This is not a popular concept for postmodern thinkers but contrary to popular beliefs there can be absolutes in a postmodern world and the person Jesus may just surprise you! Worryingly many Christians have wrongly used this concept of Jesus being the Way to become close minded and polarize others. However if we are to look at the methodology of Jesus we see that he loved to break out of the box.
Methods and Madness
It’s important to note that whilst our message is timeless and never changes, our methods are not and therefore they will always need to change. This should not merely be dictated to us by the timeframe or culture we are living in but more so by our understanding of each individual person and situation we are dealing with. For instance when Jesus healed various blind men it was done in similar cultures but he did it in all different ways. To one he spoke to the condition, to another he processed him through it by spitting in his eyes and asking him to explain what he saw, to others he touched their eyes, and still to another he made spit mud pies, smeared them on his eyes and told him to go wash it off.[ii] There are other accounts but these four incidents alone give us great insight into the reality that whilst Jesus personhood was absolute his methodology was very fluid. Even though He is The Way there is also plenty of different ways for us to approach how best to relate to others and their individual situations. Even though their condition was the same, they were all blind (we might use friendlier terms like visually impaired or sight challenged), Jesus was still able to find different ways to relate to them and we should do the same in our approach to relevantly reaching into others worlds.
How Way Out of the Box are you willing to be?
© Book excerpt from 'Church, Relevant! What?' by Andrew Schaper (to be released in 2009)
