I love this passage especially:
The more we realize how marvellous were the claims of Jesus Christ, the stranger the whole thing seems to be!
So the better we grasp the reality of resurrection and Heaven - the less convincing seems any possible "evidence" brought out to support it!
The only way that this can "work" (it seems to me) is when we grasp the-whole-thing all-at-once... when, or if, we understand what it is that Jesus did, and its wonder and strangeness, and simultaneously experience a deep conviction of its reality.
That's probably what is meant by "faith" - not so much choosing to believe the extraordinary; as that we need to "get it" and "want it" at the same moment: by the same inner act.
"Both get it and want it" certainly expresses how I feel about the Christian revelation. There have even been fleeting moments where I've felt gratitude to have been brought into existence just so I could witness to Christianity, or at least try to.
This puts me in mind of the "scandal of particularity". It seems so strange that God should have revealed Himself in the way He did...almost crude. And yet, how wonderful and how delightful, how poetic!
Thanks - very pleased you appreciated it!
ReplyDeleteBruce
You're welcome!
Delete