I left at about 9:45 for the beach today. I had previously run to the end of the jetty road and back. There were some descent sized waves breaking on the beach down by the state beach parking lot near Capo Beach.

It felt warm before heading to the beach and the skies were clear.

When I got to the beach, it was just an hour past a deep high 6.7 tide. There was not a lot of sand and the water felt very cool.

I walk into the water and soon realize that I still have a doggie poop bag in my trunks. It’s good to carry these just about anywhere but the water is one place I am sure they will not be needed and I don’t want them to fall out into the water. So I run back to my backpack and deposit the poop bag and then turn back around for the water.

A set of waves rolls in just as I head out and so I pause for a minute to let the waves pass and then head out past the surf line. There are some pretty nice sets breaking just south of me at the primary Strands surf break.

Its cold out here but my body shifts into core protection mode and I feel good. It’s colder than yesterday.

So the other day I was in this zone of thinking about some quantum physics concepts and their relationship to world religious mythologies. It felt good to write about and get off my chest. Its funny how writing about something becomes an act of releasing the idea and letting it move through you and complete a leg of its journey. Almost immediately afterward I am hit by this wave of doubt.

I’m thinking of scripture in general. The nature of the way ancient cultures write about their creation stories and messianic heroes. What makes me think the resurrection of Christ is factually true? Many people today just assume that ancient people are writing with the same sort of mind set as we have. We think of the bible being some sort of historical account of events past. Someone took the time to write these things, why would they lie?

Ancient literature is full of embellished accounts that deify kings and other figures. During the time of Christ, Ceaser being referred to as the “son of god” was common. The story of Jesus Christ is not the only resurrection story of antiquity.

We think that the gospels are eye witness accounts of apostles who spoke Aramaic and were likely uneducated lower class individuals unable to read or write Greek. They are written 30 (Mark) to 50 (John) years after the death of Jesus. And 50 is pretty generous. Many think it is closer to 80. That’s a long time to keep facts straight in a genre of writing that does not have the same regard for factual accuracy as our own culture.

I am thinking and thinking about these things. These are not necessarily new thoughts for me. They also don’t bother me terribly. Since my re-embrace of Christianity, I have given up on any attempt to “prove” the historical legitimacy of the resurrection. My general stance has been that the resurrection is something that Paul clearly believes in and Paul had one on one interactions with the apostles. These interactions are documented in Galatians which is widely believed to be written by Paul even by liberal scholars. I understand that this is by no means a rock solid case.

I am thinking of several things here. When you read Paul’s theology and how he speaks of Christ, his language seems very mystical to me. He never talks about the historical Jesus. Surely he had access not only to the apostles but perhaps others who were alive during Jesus’ life time. Paul’s own conversion story and his own personal experience of Jesus comes via a vision. He briefly alludes to this is some of his letters but the bulk of the story can be found in the book of Acts which was not written by Paul.

It’s probably also worth noting that what we think of today as orthodox Christian beliefs and the development of the cannon of scripture we have today is the result of centuries of philosophical debate in the early church. For a good while in the early church, our orthodox beliefs were not the majority view. If you read through some of the gnostic writings of the Nag Hammadi library discovered in 1945, there is some bizarre strange stuff. It just so happens that the community that held to what we consider orthodox today won some key political battles and gained favor with the Roman emperor Constantine. The victors get to frame our historical perspective.

So what of all of this? What if this Christian scripture and resurrection story sits in the camp of all of the other religious literature of ancient times. What if as these stories passed through the countless hands of various scribes, we got a historically fabricated account of Jesus? A story written and augmented by authors who looked at the world through a very different lense than us during a pre-enlightenment time where everything is complete mystery. Natural disaster, crop yields, pestilence and disease, the movement of celestial bodies and so much other natural phenomena which we have mundane and commonplace explanations for were utter mystery in the early centuries of the common era and perceived as being directly influenced by divine rule and whim.

As I am thinking of this, I am wondering if I am even asking the right questions. I know many in evangelical world could never bring themselves to entertain this question, but is our faith only as strong as the factual accuracy of the resurrection of Jesus. Is that what we are ultimately being asked to believe? Regardless of the historical events that actually happened, I imagine this God as represented in scripture - all knowing and all powerful - is he going to expect humans for millennia to come to agree to some precise sequence of events recorded by other humans that looked at the world in a totally different way? Is he going to base the eternal fate of all of these humans on the side they choose in this agreement? Agree and you get to go to celestial disneyland. Disagree and go to eternal root canal with no pain killer.

Are we to believe that the mindset and worldview of these first century humans is the “correct” worldview? Are we in the 21st century expected by God to campaign for a return to first century theological cosmology?

If I follow through with this thought experiment where the resurrection did not happen, what did happen? Well what did happen is that somehow over the course of centuries, this belief of resurrection became a cornerstone of western thought. Foundational doctrines were crafted such as the trinity and the divine incarnation of God in Christ. Countless lives would be transformed through the story of resurrection. These people all the way up to the present day believed and lives were changed. Clearly something in this story stuck. If the factual content of the story is simply just that - story then one might argue that this story provides clothing for something deeper that required transmission but had no better vessel than this story.

Perhaps it was a story that had to surface in our culture. Perhaps western civilization was at a place in the Roman Empire of the first century that demanded a spiritual paradigm shift that such a story could bring about. We were ready to graduate from war god of retributive justice to a God of grace and restorative justice. We can’t be demanding an eye for an eye anymore. We can go so much further and have such a better experience of life when we turn the other cheek and offer up our cloaks to those who ask.

Maybe I have times where I can’t believe in the Jesus who died and rose again in the world, but I absolutely believe in the Jesus who died and rose again in the writings of the gospels. Did Peter see Jesus walking on water and have the experience of leaving his boat, walking out to him and sinking when he was distracted by the waves? I don’t know for absolute certain. I just don’t. Do I believe that Jesus stands on this ocean I am swimming in with his hand stretched out to me? I do believe. Do I believe that if I focus on him I can walk on the water despite the waves that try to distract me? I do believe. Do I believe in a God that is willing and eager to make himself weak, is willing to walk among us and die to absolve human kind from any guilt? I believe that.

So when communion is served, how will I navigate these symbols that insist I concede to the death and resurrection of the man Jesus? I will choose to believe. These symbols will carry me to something that exists beyond symbol. The belief is the worm hole that brings me to eternal life even if it only comes in spurts and starts.

I’m thinking of the gospel of John that asks so plainly for us to “believe” in Jesus in order to gain eternal life. Near the gospel’s end, the author writes, “But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” I was reading this earlier this week and it just feels like this is an invitation to something deeper than an acknowledgement that certain events transpired. I do believe there is life in the name of Jesus. This narrative that develops throughout the gospel tells of a figure etched in the stone of our humanity. Maybe I can’t bring myself to have absolute certainty in the historical details and timeline of the narrative, but I believe in that Jesus. I absolutely believe that through that name we find an intercessor to the source of all life and that it leads to a life eternal.

Swim was great. I met up with my sister and her partner who are in town for Thanksgiving. It was a really nice visit.