25 years ago Christ's love, power and presence became a living reality in my life and it still is; he is still my deepest obsession and my soul's greatest delight.
I didn't know very much about him then (I still don't feel I do) but I know more now than I did then. Then I knew enough to sense (however inarticulately) how much he could meet my needs and answer my deepest questions. Now, I am captivated by how far reaching he is how sovereign and holy and yet how tender and near he is. I tremble when I consider it for long, tremble both in terror at how little I comprehend the ineffably sublime one and tremble in utter bewilderment and joy that HE loves me!
I have known many different times and seasons over the years. I've become a dad, lost a dad; moved house and set up a home. I've married, changed job roles and struggled under the weight of my failings and shortcomings. I've known periods of inner melancholy a season long numbness and I've known ecstatic enthusiasm and drunken extraversion. I've felt abandoned and been let down, and I've argued with close friends and my wife. I've wept over my anger at my children and I've become depressed by how incapable I am of changing. He's been there in every moment, and his presence has never been far away. No matter how many steps I've taken away from him I've found that whenever I turn back toward him he's right there behind me. It's not that I've always known his presence close-by, at times I've felt more like an atheist than a Christian but these seasons have always passed and the fruit they've yielded has always been richer than before.
You see, the thing is - Jesus is alive and Jesus fills all and is in all.
His word is my light (even if I choose to ignore it) and in it I see him, meet him and know him. When I was a new believer fresh out of University the New Atheism of new Millennium was all anyone was talking about. In their eyes, and in the eyes of my concerned friends, I was a brainwashed fundamentalist, a believer in fairy tales and someone living a delusion. I had many a conversation with friends who tried desperately to save me from my delusion - the more honest of attempts I was/remain truly grateful for. I used to tell people 'please save me' and 'please show me where I'm wrong' and I meant it, I mean it still.
But notice how things have and are changing in our cultural landscape. Intellectuals are turning to Jesus once again, rediscovering for themselves the beauty and wisdom of the crucified messiah and as they turn I'm grateful that I'll still be where they left me, still holding onto Jesus.
I don't claim to be a good disciple of Christ, there's a dozen or more ways I wish I knew him more and followed him more closely; but my delight isn't in my fidelity to Jesus, my delight is in Jesus' commitment to me!
How can all this be I wonder. How can this wandering rabbi, turned lord of glory so dramatically conquer all who have stood in his path? He casts a shadow over civilisations sometimes prominently, sometimes obscured by other things but always he's there. He satisfies the human soul more than anything else. No philosophy or ideology or meaning making explanation of things has ever had quite the impact on so many people as he. And he's still doing it now. He's still here for anyone (for you?), who is willing to turn to him whether in honest enquiry or in desperate prayer.
I intend over the coming few months to lay out why I believe in Jesus and what Jesus means to me. Should anybody read it, I hope they'll be drawn into my joy and drawn into knowing him more for themselves but as with the apostle John however, I write this not for any reader but for myself. I write this for myself, I write this - to make my joy complete.
Jesus, I love you. I was made for you and my heart was restless until it found its rest in you.