It is easy to get practical advice on handling the personal concerns that come and go throughout our lives. But who do you trust when it comes to the consequences of how you live your life and wherein lies your joy in life?
That question has entered human minds throughout the ages. I was seeking an answer to it when I asked my dad, “Why are you a Christian?” He replied, “When you can show me a better way to live, I’ll consider that.”[1]
My wording of that question would not have made any sense before the followers of Jesus started calling themselves Christians about a decade after the painful and frightening birthing of his expressed spirit on the cross. However we have always been seeking advice in how to handle our personal concerns and, largely unconsciously, seeking guidance in how to address our vital concerns for life, disclosure, worthiness, relationships, brokenness, and death.
Our spiritual pathfinders have long known this to be true. Though their embodied spirits are no longer with us, the understandings of their expressed spirits fill our scriptures. They were first written down in the languages and vernaculars of the times and cultures of their early followers. They lived tens of centuries ago, but thanks to our historians and linguists, their understandings have been translated into our scriptures.
Unfortunately, it is still difficult to understand what our spiritual pathfinders actually said when their followers came to them with personal concerns bearing on how to live their lives and wherein lay their joy. The issues and answers would have come worded and clothed in the stories, songs, beliefs, symbols, celebrations, values, and understandings embedded in the activities, technologies, and lifestyles of their time.
Our scriptures are vast and inscrutable. We need religious leaders who can unravel what those scriptures says about life in a manner that speaks to us. Unfortunately, our leaders can markedly differ in their interpretations of those scriptures—religious wars being one of the more devastating consequences. So how do you know if our leaders are conveying what lies at the heart of our scriptures and wherein lies your joy. That requires a familiarity with the issues, emotions, and attitudes associated with your finding wherein lies your joy. These inevitably surface when discussing your personal concerns.
We’ve terms for all of them. The tome, World Scripture: A Comparative Anthology of Sacred Texts, edited by Andrew Wilson gives an engaging glimpse of the diversity of the ways our scriptures express them. However, we need to know how our spiritual pathfinders contrasted our guiding spirits when ascertaining the self-orientations of our religious and political leaders. Here are some relevant expressions from the scriptures associated with some widely appreciated spiritual pathfinders from the Middle East, India, and China.
As a Christian, I have always been attracted to the teachings of Jesus. Some of my friends wore a bracelet inscribed with the question: What would Jesus do? Thefollowing Gospel passages implicitly answer that question by indicating how he looked upon our expressed spirits and our underlying concerns for life, disclosure, worthiness, relationships, brokenness and death. It is largely a revision of previously published material[2]. You might enjoy picking out and discussing the passages that speaks to you.
Reflecting Back
How would you characterize a true guide when comes to your most basic concerns and the consequencs of how your life is playing out?
What now are your criteria for choosing a spiritual leader? A religious leader? A political leader?
[1] Mark A. Johnson,
Encountering God (Oviedo: EA Books Publishing, 2015), 2.
[2] Mark A. Johnson,
Abiding in God(Oviedo: EA Books Publishing, 2024); 234–238, 336-346.
