I invited Jesus into my heart and He stopped by for a visit.

I heard a knock at the front door (I rarely have visitors) and expected to find a Jehovah’s Witness.

To my surprise, it was Jehovah Himself!

“Come on in, I’m surprised to see you,” I said.

“Why,” He answered, “I’ve been here all along. Let’s have a little talk.”

We sat in my living room and had a great conversation.

“Can I offer you something to drink?”

“Communion wine would be nice,” He said with a smile.

“I’d offer you supper, but all I have is some Pepperidge Farm whole wheat bread and two pieces of leftover fried flounder from a Father’s Day dinner at the country club.”

He laughed out loud, “You KNOW what I could do with that!”

Then He added, “A glass of room temperature chianti would be nice, you do have some red wine glasses don’t you?”

“I’m charmed with your sense of humor. I knew for sure you had a good one when you matched me up with my last wife.”

He smiled again, an engaging “You’ve been forgiven and I love you smile.”

He nodded at her photograph and said, “No doubt you feel her love every day.”

“Yes, every day. Thanks for the assurance, what a blessing.”

“You know I inspired Ms. Crosby to write the hymn, “Blessed Assurance.”

“You’ve been busy inspiring us for a long time. I just finished reading a book about the Bible and I’m confident you surely inspired the authors of the original manuscripts. I’ve had my doubts about all the translations and transcriptions.”

I got the wine, poured us each a glass, and He asked with a conspiratorial wink, “Did you get it from the spigot?”

“When we moved into this house, the neighbors told us it had a good well and the water was delicious. This came from a bottle of Bell’Agio, you know the kind with the basket around the bottom?”

“One of my colleagues was hidden in a basket.”

“We have no bullrushes here in the mountains–maybe in the swamps of South Louisiana.”

“There’s a question I’ve always wanted to ask you, if you don’t mind.”

“Shoot.”

“Are you very religious?”

“Hmmm….well, I was raised Catholic. John Paul II visited New Orleans didn’t he.”

“Yes,” I answered, “back in 1987.”
“Thirty-two years ago, not even a drop in the ocean the way I keep time.”

He glanced around my living room, which is really a library. Three walls are lined with books. Over the mantle is a shelf on which are some of the books that have had significant influence on my life including the Holy Bible.

There are several copies, in different versions, including one of those with what Jesus said in RED.

As His gaze lowered from the books, He turned towards me and our eyes met. We were thinking the same thing.

I said, “You can tell me how many hairs on my head, but have you read one of those red letter editions lately?”

“Not in a long while.”

“Do you have a preferred version?”

His eyes lit up and he flashed a wicked smile (Is that possible?) and said with a chuckle, “To quote some of my followers from Kentucky, ‘If the King James version was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me.”

We shared another laugh and each had a sip of chianti.

I refilled our glasses.

He walked over to the shelf and picked up my large print edition, “Don’t worry, I don’t need glasses, this is the one with red print.”

“Have you ever considered doing stand up?” I couldn’t resist asking.

“You should have heard me as a teen in the synagogue! Remember, I’m Jewish. I wrote some of Dangerfield’s best material. You think that guy got no respect? Heaven, I gave him that whole schtick about no respect.”

I love this guy!

He found the New Testament and started turning pages faster than I could imagine–He reads fast!

Every now and then, He would stop, point to a passage and exclaim, “I never said that!”

“Or that.”

“Or this one. Unbelievable!”

“I’ve been misquoted.”

I was stunned. “Your saying something got lost in translation?”

“I bet you didn’t know I wrote most of the script for that movie. Bill Murray is one of my favorite actors, well, and of course, Charlton Heston.”

Then He continued, “Are you familiar with the word, ‘gnostic?”

“Yes,” I said. “It comes from the Greek word, ‘gnostos’ when meant, ‘known.’ Today we use ‘gnostic’ to refer to knowledge.”

“Very good, Chip. Now, on a related topic, I’m sure you’re familiar with a collection of items being symmetrical, such as both sides of a building. What happens if you add the prefix, ‘A?’”

“It becomes asymmetrical, without symmetry.”

“Put that same letter in from of gnostic and you’ve got a category of folks who don’t know what to believe.”

“Agnostic.”

“Looking through this revised new English jive version of what’s happening now, it’s no wonder there are so many agnostics in the world–they don’t know what to believe!”

I was speechless.

He could tell by the expression on my face.

We stood, He placed His hand on my shoulder, and said, “Just remember what John and Paul said because they got it right.”

I asked, “The Apostles?”

“No, the Beatles. All you need is love. I am love. Peace be with you Chip.”

He turned and although He left the room physically, I know He’ll always be close.

(Bible quotations for this article are all from the King James Version distributed by the Gideons.)

John 19:14, “And it (the day of crucifixion) was the preparation of the passover…”

    Jesus appeared before Pilate, is ordered to be executed, and is taken off and crucified.

But wait,

the author of the Gospel known as, “Mark,” writes in Chapter 14:12, “And the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the passover (lambs), his disciples said unto him, ‘Where wilt thou that we go and prepare that thou mayest eat the passover?’”

And then in verse 18, “And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, ‘Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me.”

Hmm…According to this writing, Jesus clearly survived the day of the preparation because he ate the Passover meal with his disciples (the Last Supper) in the “Upper Room.”

Image credit: wikicommons

One possible reason for this obvious discrepancy,

according to Bart D. Ehrman,Ph.D., Professor of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, “Is it possible that John has changed historical data to make a theological point, that he’s changed the day and hour of Jesus’ death precisely to show that Jesus really was the Lamb, who was slain on the same day and at the same hour (and at the hands of the same people–the chief priests!) as the Passover lamb?”  This explanation would confirm the identification of Jesus as “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world.” John 1:29, 36.

Should discrapancies between Gospel accounts be considered “errors?”

Does it matter to you if the accounts of the New Testament are historically accurate?

It does to me, for reasons of my own, which are satisfactory to me.

Our guest blogger today is Deacon John Coe. He was ordained as a deacon in the Roman Catholic Church on June 7, 2008 in the Diocese of Lexington, Kentucky. Currently assigned to Saint Bartholomew Catholic Church in Fort Worth, Texas.Retired as Consul from the Foreign Service of the U.S. Department of State after 20 years of service.Retired from U.S. Navy with the rank of Commander.Married 35 years to Luisa Veronica, with three sons.============

Can the Holy Family still teach us anything about what a family should be?  We have always pointed to them as an example of a model family.  But as we look at the plaster statues of father, mother and child placed in a manger, is there still a lesson for the many forms of family we actually experience in our lives?

If all we say about families is they consist of a man, a woman, and their natural child or children, I think we will be leaving a lot of people out.  And the one thing we never want to do in a church that calls itself universal is to leave people out.

Let’s take a closer look at the Holy Family.  It includes Joseph, who is a foster parent.  So perhaps some people would say this family is less than ideal.  And in fact, we know Joseph did something really courageous when he trusted God, and cancelled his plans to divorce Mary.  What must the neighbors have thought?  Mary was pregnant before she even lived with Joseph.  Joseph did this because he loved God, and he loved Mary and the child Jesus.  So, what Joseph shows us in this non-traditional family is the most important element in forming family is love.

Jesus was not the typical child either.  Oh yeah, he was fully human, that’s true.  He was like us in every way but sin.  So completely like us that those swaddling clothes had to be changed on a regular basis.  Otherwise, that manger was going to start smelling worse than a barn.  We forget about that sort of stuff, I guess.  He also was not conceived in the normal way.  As the angel told Mary: “With God, all things are possible!”

Jesus was also an only child.  That wasn’t your typical Jewish family in first century Palestine.  And of course, Jesus was fully divine.  He was just not your typical child.

Scripture tells us Mary was a virgin until Jesus was born.  Our Church [Roman Catholic] teaches she remained a perpetual virgin.  So that means Joseph and Mary lived together as brother and sister.  Definitely not a traditional marriage, neither for first century Jews, nor today.  What a testament to their love of God, and for each other!  Some people in marriages not recognized by the Church choose to live this way as well, so they can receive Holy Communion.  What a great testimony to their love for God!

And then there was Jesus’s relationship to his family.  In legend, we see Jesus always at his mother’s side; or obediently working in his father’s carpentry shop.  Perhaps.  But in Scripture, we see something quite different.  We see the boy who stayed behind in the Temple; so he could sit with the teachers, and listen to them, and ask them questions.  He wasn’t the obedient child that day.  And later, one time when he was speaking to the crowds, we heard Jesus say, “Who is my mother?  Who are my brothers?”  And he answers his own question, “Whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother.

And what is the will of his heavenly Father?  We should love one another.  So Jesus is radically redefining family.  It is not just a small group of people with a biological connection.  Instead Jesus teaches us the family is defined by a relationship of love for each other, based in relationship to the one Father.  Even on the cross, Jesus tells Mary and his beloved disciple they are family.  This was certainly not the traditional understanding of what a family was in first century Palestine.

This is a message of great hope.  If you come here today wondering if you fit in, please know, you do!  If you think your family is nothing like the Holy Family, look again.  Broaden your understanding of family.   If there are people in your life who are away from the Church because they don’t think they will be accepted, because their family doesn’t fit the “traditional” mold, let them know we need them; we need their example of love.

Family is the place where we experience love.  It is where we learn to be loving people.  That doesn’t always happen in the family we were born into.  But Jesus teaches us we can all be part of a real, loving family, if we can set aside some of our old ideas, and join together in love for others, in relationship to our one Father.