In the early 90's I went to Salt Lake City Utah for military training. While I was there I decided to visit the Mormon Temple. Of course, one can not enter the actual temple unless you are Mormon, but you can enter the visitor center. I was impressed with the grandeur of that center. I also recall the giant paintings of Moses and many other patriarchs and saints. What stood out the most was the race of each of those Biblical figures. They were white Caucasians with blue eyes and some even with blond hair.
If you don't know your Biblical history, you may find it shocking to know that most likely all of the people in the Bible were dark skinned, middle eastern, black haired people. You may find it interesting that Moses' wife was probably black. She wasn't like the wife in the 10 commandments movie with Charlton Heston.
If I were a minority in this country, I might find it insensitive to see a white Jesus picture hanging in my church. Why do people accept such a false image of Jesus? What else do they accept that isn't accurate or might be misleading? That’s the question you should be asking yourself. What is the image of god, or Jesus you carry in your mind? How do you know it is accurate? I’m talking about the whole concept not just his picture.
All of us draw our images of god from our fund of knowledge. The problem with this is that we don’t often know whether our source is accurate. I may claim that my concept of God is Biblical, but so does every other person who believes in God, yet why are Christians always trying to improve their understanding of God? Why are there so many books trying to help you see the “right Jesus”?
When I was a Christian counselor and minister I was always helping people see how loving and forgiving God was. I usually met people who often saw God as angry, vengeful, or all about convicting us of sin. I personally had a concept of God that was of mercy, compassion, and forgiveness, etc. So, out of my belief and fund of knowledge, I usually went about trying to convince them that Jesus was all about the good stuff and only sometimes about punishment. After all, the Bible does teach that God disciplines those He loves.
What I failed to acknowledge, and I experience this with Christians today, is that the Bible is very very very clear about God ordering the death of innocent people, children, women, the elderly, and even animals (simply as a sacrifice to a religious alter). It is very counter culture about many things from homosexuality to personal choice and freedom. We tend to skim over facts that don't fit our theology.
However; it's not just religion we skim over. We do it with our spouses, children, politics, other religions, governments, other cultures, races and so on. We often see what we have been taught to see, what we want to see, or what we feel is accurate. Are feelings an accurate indicator of truth?
What would the consequence be if we didn’t learn to dispute what we believe? We might all be racist, homophobic, believe atheists are immoral hedonists, believe in a 6,000 year old earth, live in denial and avoid self discovery, be selfish and self-centered, and purely ethno-centric, etc. We wouldn’t have a scientific method for uncovering truth, or rational decision making models to help us make reasonable decisions. We would believe in Bigfoot, the Lockness Monster, alien abductions and whatever people say about others, and on and on.
In my search for the real Jesus, I came to realize that some things are obvious... once pointed out, but other aspects of my belief were deeply ingrained and not so obvious. I think we can all agree that Jesus was not a blond, blued eyed white guy with Brad Pitt features. What have I learned? What did I learn? I can not accept one person’s concept of Jesus, God, Allah, my neighbor, other races, gay people, cultures or anything without first vetting the facts. To determine if the facts are objective I need to vet them with a rational system.
I can’t read the Bible selectively or devotionally. I need to read it historically and in context and I need to read the origin of the Bible and the Jewish concept of God. I also need to understand it in its original language. I also need to understand the culture of it’s time and the religions that came before Christianity. But most importantly, I need to put aside my own bias, or my need to support my own conclusions before I can look at any fact objectively.
If you are Chinese, Mexican or German would you settle for someone telling you about your culture who had never been there, didn’t speak the language and never read about your history in the original language?
Maybe Jesus was Black, Mexican, Iranian, Swedish or Irish. How do you know what he looked like, taught, thought, or did? If you tell me the Bible said so, I have to ask, which Bible, which theology, which denomination, which church, which parent, which neighbor, which school taught you these facts? Did you ever stop and question? Are you sure that your motivations were objective when you did question? How do you know you weren’t motivated out of a personal belief or need rather than for objective reasons? Did you search other religious claims as thoroughly as the Christian claims? If you didn’t research other religions why not? Was it because of your cultural upbringing, family of origin, etc?
In conclusion, I’d like to challenge you to be a leader, in your own life, rather than a follower of others. Let’s teach our children, and remind ourselves, to question and never ever just accept what someone says is true without first vetting it on our own. Let's teach people to use reason and not supernaturalism, or conjecture to determine truth. Jesus may have been white, but to believe this I’d have to ignore a lot of cultural and historical facts. Is this the kind of reasoning we want to pass on to our future generation? Is this the story you want people to write about you? When you eventually climb to the top of the ladder of life, let's hope you don't discover your ladder was leaning against the wrong wall.
Cheers,
Bill Jeffreys
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