Discovering Jesus - Discovery Website

           'The most important question that has ever been asked . . . was put by Jesus to his disciples one day near the town of Caesarea Philippi (Mark 8.29). According to the New Testament, the way we react to it determines our future, not just in this life, but for the rest of eternity. It takes the spotlight off what theologians say, what church tradition says, even what the Bible says, to how we ourselves respond. It is not a question we can delay answering.' (But is he God, Chapter Twelve).
     How would you answer this question yourself? In a sense, any response we come up with is bound to be only a tiny fraction of the truth! Every attempt to define Jesus or explain him is simply to reduce him. In 1897 the Indiana state legislature once embarked on a fruitless attempt to define a fixed value for the number π, which determines the ratio between a circle’s breadth and its circumference. The bill, fortunately, rapidly floundered after the timely intervention of a mathematics professor: since then, modern computers have calculated the value of π to many trillions of decimal places and are still no closer to reaching a definite value! In the same way, any conclusion we reach about Jesus is bound, in the end, to be a simplification. John the apostle put it well when he wrote as follows:

Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.     (John 21.25)       

         Every encounter with Jesus, therefore, takes us on a journey to the heart of the very meaning of life itself, and our relationship to the infinite. In the colourful words of Eugene Peterson, ‘You don’t need a telescope, a microscope, or a horoscope to realize the fullness of Christ, and the emptiness of the universe without him.’ (Colossians 2.8-9, The Message).
         The prophet Ezekiel was once shown a river which he enters up to his ankles, then up to his knees and later up to his waist. But it is only when he reaches the point that he can no longer stand in the water, but is completely overwhelmed by it, that he realises the full extent of what he has encountered! The challenge to each one of us as we progressively encounter Jesus is to risk our all and strike out even further into the torrent of his being. In discovering who he is, we find out who we are ourselves.
            The links below lead to various simple defences of the Christian faith, targeted at different groups of individuals. Some are discursive in style; others have a more contemplative character. But there is, in either case, a clear limit to the power of words. Two heartbroken disciples on the Emmaus road once spent many hours exploring Old Testament scriptures with Jesus, but it was only when the discussion stopped and he broke bread with them that they realised who he was. Similarly, Paul’s many years of studying the scriptures produced only ‘legalistic righteousness’ (Phil 3: 6), but when he met Christ on the Damascus road his theology was transformed in an instant. If we are really open to a deeper encounter with Jesus, in other words, it may come in a manner different from the one we are expecting!

|Discovering Jesus|The Invitation of Jesus|Jesus and Eternal Life|

|Jesus and Human Destiny|Jesus for Sceptics|Jesus: Debunking the Myths|

|Jesus and Other Religions|Jesus for the Despairing|A reflection and a prayer|