I was reminded of Jesus, the skandalon, the stumbling block, the trigger of the trap. It was one of those moments when you know something, but then hear it again and know it applies to your life right now. You know it intimately.
I am just very aware at this moment that Jesus really is the trigger. We can talk generally about love and goodness and God and compassion and faith and forgiveness and prayer and meditation with everyone. Even God is seen as a beneficial addition to our lives when we hear that belief in a higher power is helpful in healing and dealing with stress.
But when we bring up Jesus, there's a problem. He's the One that divides us. He's the One who of His own admission says He "did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law - a man's enemies will be the members of his own household." ~Matthew 10:35-36
Jesus is so difficult! When I read of how He lived His life, I love how He pulled ALL people to Himself. He didn't show favoritism, He didn't exclude people from His love and compassion. But then He goes off and says something like, "Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you." ~John 6:53
People run away as fast as they can. Jesus even asks those guys closest to Him, "You do not want to leave, too, do you?"
I imagine the disciples wished at that moment that Jesus wouldn't be so controversial, so divisive - He's forcing them to make a decision, take sides.
Why do we hate to be forced to choose? In love and war we decide, we choose. Why is it so hard when it comes to God?
For people in love and war, it is not a hard decision. There is only what their hearts know to be true: "I can't not love." " I can't not fight."
For those of us who have met Jesus, had an experience like John, only in the spiritual: "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched - this we proclaim concerning the Word of life." ~1 John 1:1 We admit, like Peter, that there's no decision, there's only what we know in our hearts and our spirits and our souls and our minds: "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." ~John 6:68
Only those who do not know Jesus this way have a choice. For the rest of us, we love the Skandalon.
Jesus calls us to love the difficult in Him - the mystery, the unknown, to be satisfied with being unsatisfied, to have Him now but not totally, take the risk that's not a risk, the tension of being in this world but not of it.
It's not easy, but we can't not love, can't not follow.
