Celebrate the revolution… or know the Revolutionary

I was watching the movie, V for Vendetta, some time ago and the last words of the movie struck me very deeply (and haunt me still). They were uttered by the character, Evey, who said, “No one will ever forget that night and what it meant for this country. But I will never forget the man and what he meant to me.”

You see, typically the first group would, over time, start to dissipate and be relegated to celebrating that night as a yearly remembrance and holiday (as we do with all important historical events) and live relatively unchanged in themselves. But the second group (in this case the individual, Evey) would live with the life of the revolutionary’s heart motivations and intuitions, likes and dislikes, and passions ringing and imprinting on her own. When you really get to know someone and love them there is a part of them that takes residence in you that you can’t escape from. Anyone who has ever lost a father, or mother, brother, sister, spouse, friend (heck even a pet) will know what this means (and this should cover most of us reading this).

Jesus spoke to many but lived day in day out with a few. These few were forever marked by His life. I think the one disciple of Jesus that captures Him quite profoundly is John. The reason for this?

I was reading a book that told a story of I think it was Corrie Ten Boom and she was arguing with the Lord in prayer one day about Him having favorites. She complained persistently that while the scriptures state that God has no favorites why then did He let John lean (or recline) against His chest during that last supper. After feeling satisfied that she had stated her case before the Lord she heard His simple reply, “He’s the only one that wanted to.”

Those days being now 2000+ years ago, are we relegated to just celebrating the “revolution” once or twice a year? Or are we invited into something deeper? It is stated that Jesus is the expressed image of God and He said of Himself that if disciples had seen Him they had seen His Father, if they had known Him then they had known the Father. Jesus then later, after He had risen from the dead, said that He must again leave the earth, because if He didn’t He wouldn’t be able to send the Holy Spirit. This same Spirit that enabled Him to be close to His Father while on this earth would come to live and do the same in all.

So if we have this in our lives are we leaning against His chest? The invitation is there, not just in theory, philosophy, theology, or “that’s a good thought” but in living experience that leaves us marked for life.

“I am quite sure that many of you will immediately discern that is just the flaw in a very great deal of popular Christianity today-a kind of objective imitation of Jesus which gets nowhere, rather than the subjective learning Jesus which gets everywhere.”-T. Austin Sparks

Eph. 4:20 – “You did not so learn Christ.”

I will end this post with a quote that my friend Ryan Cook had posted recently on Facebook.
“As soon as we regard him [God] from without as a mere object of knowledge, or a mere occasion for speculative study, without freshness of heart and the unrest of love, then all is over, and we have in our hands nothing but a phantom and an idol.”- Blondel