An Interesting Life

The guy in the Dos Equis commercials has nothing on Jesus. Jesus led a profoundly interesting life and helped others do the same. He broke the neck of traditional and conventional thinking at every turn, serving as a window into a reality that transcends the terribly obvious. I believe Jesus called this “the Kingdom of God”. We are invited to enter.


Most of us have been taught to picture this regal realm as a blissful afterlife, as if the life we’re living now is merely a second rate parody of the one to come. Unfortunately, this vision, one the one hand, has led to disengagement and escape from the complexities of life. On the other hand, it has led to rigidity, defensiveness, and boredom. It certainly wasn’t Jesus’ vision, as we see him over and over again in the gospel narratives fully participating in ordinary life while adding color and spice to it. One place this can be seen clearly is his encounter with a sinful woman in the house of a Pharisee. St. Luke gives us the details, which I won’t spell out here. Suffice to say that the encounter ends with a grateful woman and one blown away Pharisee. Why did Jesus have such an effect on people?

Well, it’s simple—but not easy! Jesus was visionary and led his life according to that vision. He accepted the sorrowful affections of a sinful woman and chided the rigid agendas of the highly religious. Outsiders loved him; the beltway wanted him gone. But the most fascinating thing about it all is that none of the attention, positive or negative, seemed to faze Jesus. And that’s because his life and message had nothing to do with him. Jesus did nothing for his own benefit. He came to reveal God and His Kingdom.

I sometimes wonder if we pay too much attention to the person of Jesus and not enough attention on what he revealed. We treat him more like a pet than a prophet; more like a mascot than a master. We make him head cheerleader for our private agendas. We wrap him in an American flag as a bastion of ardent nationalism. We give him praise for what he has done without consciously dwelling on what exactly he did. And honestly, what effect will it have if it isn’t somehow manifested in ordinary existence?

The Gospel of St. Matthew tells us that Jesus traveled from village to village proclaiming the good news, healing the diseased, and calming the troubled. He didn’t give them a to-do list or bog them down with platitudes and meaningless dogma. He didn’t tell them how to be healthy, wealthy, and wise. He embodied a new reality, giving it birth out of the lives of the common people.

What is needed today is for us to take a long, deep examination of Jesus’ most wonderful, interesting life and be transformed and renewed by it. We need to spend time and effort cutting through layer upon layer of dense theologies in order to catch Jesus’ vision of the marriage of heaven and earth. We may well find ourselves living in a whole new world as if for the first time.