Basic Training

If you want to study the Greek and make your way through those upper level theology courses, that's fine. I've taken some of them myself. But, in truth, I suspect many of us learned most of the theology we really needed to know by the time we were about four years old:

Jesus loves me, this I know;
Because the Bible tells me so.
Little ones to Him belong.
We are weak, but He is strong.

Folks, that is bedrock theology. That's the big picture! Dress it up, tangle it up, or scholarship it up anyway you wish — that's still the thrust of all sixty-six books of the Bible. I don't care if you're four or 104, we're all still "little ones" in Jesus' economy. We are all broken people and in desperate need of his touch. And the good news is he loves us. Thank God, he does!

But allow me to put a sharper point on this. Sometimes we hear something (even if it's a good thing) too often. This is a concept that I speak on in the Retooled and Refueled Seminar. Eventually we stop paying attention. It's as though the words go into ear number one, and the grey matter in the middle doesn't even slow them down before they exit by way of ear number two.

So let me say this same thing in a way that may help us understand but for some will be a little harder to hear: Jesus likes you. I don't care who you are, where you've been, what you've done, or who you've done it with. Have you cheated someone this week in a business deal? Did you profane your spouse last night — or break your promise to her? Did you cheat on a test? Did you do something that makes it hard to go to sleep — or to get up in the morning?

I repeat, Jesus is still your biggest fan. He may be deeply pained in your choices (spelled, s-i-n-s), but he's still pulling for you. He still believes in you. No matter how dark it gets, Jesus is as near as your next breath — and just as vital. As Max Lucado has so succinctly said, if Jesus had a refrigerator in heaven he would have each one of our pictures stuck on the front. That's the God we serve!

When they asked Jesus what was required to get right with God, he essentially said, "Are you serious? Do you really want to know? Okay, then buckle your seatbelts and I'll tell you. It takes two things. First, you must learn to love God from your DNA out — with everything that you have and are. That love must be emotional and rational. It must be deep and abiding — and not dependent on always getting what you want. And second, you must learn to love other folk like you already love yourself. This means you will consider their interests. Sometimes it may mean giving another person your place in line — and moving to their place at the rear." (Very loosely paraphrased from Mark 12:29-31)

Jesus had a way of simplifying things for people like you and me who come from the shallow end of the gene pool. He deliberately chose not to come as a philosopher or an intellectual. Yet, for two thousand years we've busied ourselves complicating the simple, confusing the seeking, and piling burdens on others that we don't even carry ourselves. What if I set about to make Jesus more reachable to others? Then maybe he would become more reachable to me.

Originally published January 27, 2011.