#marcusborg

“And now you’ll be telling stories of my coming back and they won’t be false, and they won’t be true, but they’ll be real.” -Mary Oliver “The First Time Percy Came Back”

This reminds me of the resurrected Jesus. During Lent I pondered the meaning of suffering, death, and resurrection. I read N.T. Wright & Marcus Borg’s book “The Meaning of Jesus” and their differing views of the resurrection. Both these scholars agreed something happened, something significant, something transformative. They agreed that the resurrection is a central tenant of Christianity, that it is the hub of Christianity’s meaning. Without it, Christianity collapses. From there they disagree amiably about what actually happened, what were the actual events. Sometimes I get tied up in theological knots, a snarled ball of yarn. Did Jesus say this or do that, pre-Easter Jesus versus post-Easter Jesus, the varied answers on existential questions like why does evil exist, did Jesus die for our sins, was there something called The Fall of humanity, etc? Are the things written in the Bible true? Here we are thousands of years later telling the story of Jesus coming back, back from the dead, back from the grip of cruelty and suffering. And here we are debating whether it actually happened or is it all just metaphor. This is where I like Mary Oliver’s view on this dualistic debate: it is neither false nor true but rather real.

I had an experience of God when I was 16. I heard God’s voice speak to me, an inner hearing, “Do you want to be part of my family?” Yes, I replied. No where in my realm of experience had I ever known someone to say they had heard God speak to them. Yet I knew it was God, and I knew it was really happening to me. It changed my life from that moment on. I am cemented to God. Some would argue it was just eager longing that I heard, a trick of the mind. Mental illness others might say. A firing of a particular synapse. The event is neither false nor true but it is real.

Is a “wow” moment an experience of God or God’s presence? Standing before a double rainbow, seeing the sun rise over the ocean, experiencing the dance of the Northern Lights- whatever that “wow” moment is, to say God is in the midst of it is neither false nor true but it is real. We are experiencing something bigger than ourselves. That is real.