For those of you with little or no knowledge of the book, here is one passage that demonstrates why I like it so... Jesus and Mack are just lying by the dock, looking up at the stars:
Stillness had fallen like a blanket, and all Mack was really aware of was the sound of water lapping up against the dock. It was he who eventually broke the silence again.
“Jesus?”
“Yes, Mackenzie?”
“I am surprised by one thing about you.”
“Really? What?”
“I guess I expected you to be more,” be careful here, Mack, “uh... well, humanly
striking.”
Jesus chuckled. “Humanly striking? You mean handsome.” Now he was laughing.
“Well, I was trying to avoid that, but yes. Somehow I thought you’d be the ideal man, you know, athletic and overwhelmingly good looking.”
“It’s my nose, isn’t it?”
Mack didn’t know what to say.
Jesus laughed. “I am Jewish, you know. My grandfather on my mother’s side had a big nose; in fact, most of the men on my mom’s side had big noses.”
“I just thought you’d be better looking.”
“By whose standards? Anyway, once you really get to know me, it won’t matter to you.”
The words, though delivered kindly, stung. Stung what, exactly? Mack lay there a few seconds and realized that as much as he thought he knew Jesus, perhaps he didn’t... not really. Maybe what he knew was an icon, an ideal, an image through which he tried to grasp a sense of spirituality, but not a real person. “Why is that?” he finally asked. “You said if I really knew you it wouldn’t matter what you looked like . . .”
“It is quite simple really. Being always transcends appearance—that which only seems to be. Once you begin to know the being behind the very pretty or very ugly face, as determined by your bias, the surface appearances fade away until they simply no longer matter. That is why Elousia is such a wonderful name. God, who is the ground of all being, dwells in, around, and through all things—ultimately emerging as the real—and any appearances that mask that reality will fall away.”
Silence followed as Mack wrestled with what Jesus had said. He gave up after only a minute or two and decided to ask the riskier question.
“You said I don’t really know you. It would be a lot easier if we could always talk like this.”
“Admittedly, Mack, this is special. You were really stuck and we wanted to help you crawl out of your pain. But don’t think that just because I’m not visible, our relationship has to be less real. It will be different, but perhaps even more real.”
“How is that?”
“My purpose from the beginning was to live in you and you in me.”
“Wait, wait. Wait a minute. How can that happen? If you’re still fully human how can you be inside me?”
“Astounding, isn’t it? It’s Papa’s miracle. It is the power of Sarayu, my Spirit, the Spirit of God who restores the union that was lost so long ago. Me? I choose to live moment by moment fully human. I am fully God, but I am human to the core. Like I said, it’s Papa’s miracle.”
Mack was lying in the darkness, listening intently. “Aren’t you talking about a real indwelling, not just some positional, theological thing?”
“Of course,” answered Jesus, his voice strong and sure. “It’s what everything is all about. The human, formed out of the physical material Creation, can once more be fully indwelt by spiritual life, my life. It requires that a very real dynamic and active union exists.”
“That is almost unbelievable!” Mack exclaimed quietly. “I had no idea. I need to think more about this. But, I might have a lot more questions.”
“And we have your lifetime to sort through them,” Jesus chuckled. “But, enough of that for now. Let’s get lost again in the starry night.” In the silence that followed, Mack simply lay still, allowing the immensity of space and scattered light to dwarf him, letting his perceptions be captured by starlight and the thought that everything was about him... about the human race... that all this was all for us. After what seemed like a long time, it was Jesus who broke into the quiet.
“I’ll never get tired of looking at this. The wonder of it all—the wastefulness of Creation, as one of our brothers has called it. So elegant, so full of longing and beauty even now.”
(BTW, that statement about creation is from C. S. Lewis.)
