He would probably go back "home," to the Holy Land.
Jesus wouldn’t go to the U.N. to make speeches. He wouldn’t do tourist-type things and see if he could find his birthplace. He wouldn't hang out in coffee shops in Jerusalem to talk religion with the curious. He wouldn't go back to itinerant preaching. He would go to where the suffering is greatest. He would go to Gaza and do rescue work.
He might hate it here on Earth.
Ralph Bowman grew up in Southern California, attended Christian schools, taught drama in California schools, then retired in Southern Oregon. He sent this reverie.
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| Bowman |
Guest Post by Ralph Bowman
I saw him cross the border.
He looked the same, long hair and beard, trimmed but not neat. He seemed determined, no smile on his face. His eyes looked blue, but I bet they were dark brown to everyone around him.
He was sweating, sometimes mopping his face with that slightly torn sleeve. He lacked a cell phone and wasn’t texting when I first saw him. I think the phone was hidden up his sleeve.
The first thing he did was to catch a ride with the fleeing family in the donkey cart. The family didn’t notice he rode on the donkey up front. The donkey trotted south.
A sniper bullet grazed the father and the donkey sped up. Jesus jumped off searching the roof tops. He raised his hand to cease the bombing. A bomb dropped on the hospital nearby and apartment buildings collapsed.
He raised both hands to deflect the next bomb. Refugees in tents huddled and the explosion sprayed body parts here and there.
Jesus wept.
He climbed over stones and concrete cutting his sandal-covered feet. He entered the incubator ward and picked up the dead infant. He began the breath of life -- one, two, one, two, one, two.
The father tore the infant from his hands and wrapped the child in a white sheet for burial.
And Jesus was stunned.
He found an old woman who looked like his mother. Garments covered her head. She was wailing and digging in the rubble for her ancient husband.
And Jesus knelt and kissed the hem of her garment and began digging. All around him were angry young men, their bodies bent in the work of removal. Skin ripped from his hands on twisted steel and rough concrete. He began to choke on the dust. His ears pounded by the screams and muttered prayers to some god of Abraham.
He blessed the diggers. “The meek shall inherit the Earth,“ he mumbled in Hebrew. Hebrew!
Suddenly the people around him began heaving heavy stones at him knocking him down. He began to crawl and pray. He bled from the cuts to his forehead, blood streamed into his eyes. He saw a crowd before him kicking at him spitting on him throwing shoes at him.
Suddenly he rose up and levitated long enough to shock the crowd into silence. He flew over their heads a few feet away. He turned and held out his nail-scarred hands. He offered them fish and loaves he had tucked in his garment folds. They reached eagerly and began to savor their first meal in weeks.
Jesus multiplied the fish and loaves until all the rescuers and victims were singing ancient texts, chanting prayers, and slowly dancing with whomever was at hand. Children ran and jumped and twirled. Old women dusted off their skirts, young men joined arms, young women blushed and averted their eyes. All drank tea.
Jesus then turned wine casks into water. All were cleansed.
He raised his hands to heaven, but the bombs fell once more. People screamed. The children were blown to bits. Apartment buildings fell, crushing hundreds. Tanks ran over the bodies lining the streets. Far away, the U.S. Congress authorized more bullets.
And Jesus wept and almost went home to Heaven. But he raised the hidden cell phone and began to stream the devastation surrounding him. He sent a report to God the father, who already knew.
A shot caught him in the side and he fell forward on fallen bodies littering the wet earth filled with sludge and feces. He lay amid the whimpering, coughing, and groaning injured. No one was there to lift or pull. No one called names, no one bandaged. All had walked away, dragging their injured, and retrieving pots and pans and wedding photos.
Jesus bled. He didn’t fear the roaming dogs and rodents. He wasn’t going to rot. He was Jesus of Nazareth, son of God, son of Mary and angels. He had worn a crown of thorns. He had been nailed to wood. For three days he had faced death, lived death.
He liked the quiet of death almost too much. He had work to do. These people couldn’t hear him when he mumbled. He must get up on one elbow and speak out. He must shout "Hosanna" in ancient Hebrew. If only his old followers were still here they would rouse up the crowd and help get him a staff to lean on until he regained his strength.
He could use some hyssop right now to wake him up. The sound started deep in his chest. His anger flowed forth. He growled and yelled and gnashed his teeth. Suddenly he was on his feet and lunging here and there reaching out for a soldier to whip with the rope around his waist. He struck one young recruit in the eye who yelled in pain, then laughed and hit him with the butt of his rifle. Jesus stumbled on. He weaved like a football halfback dodging, swiveling his hips, spinning away toward an imaginary goal. Suddenly he stopped and yelled in Hebrew, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The shout came forth as a garbled mumble.
The sound of drones whirred overhead. The Hellfire missiles with USA printed on the side sped downward. Jesus was caught between a rock and a hard place. Stay here like a mime at the airport or go home where he could speak in unknown tongues and be understood by everyone. Another explosion made the decision easy. As rocks were falling back down, Jesus rose up. And up. He saw the eyes of pilots raining down hell on earth. Young men, some young women. Their eyes joyful.
He would never understand his fellow men. He didn’t get it. He was too much of a nice guy. Only Heaven made sense. He could never live here again. Too many bad memories.
You could quote scripture all day long it wouldn’t do any good. Back to the right hand of the father. And Jesus, the Son of God and Man went home. So be it.
And the 20,000-plus children continued to die.
13 comments:
No doubt the Prince of Peace would be appalled, but that's why evangelicals believe God gave us Trump.
I guess all of the murder, rape, and torture that the Israelis suffered at the hands of Hamas on 10/7 didn’t warrant a visit from the same false Messiah that the Jews didn’t buy into the first time.
But then again, when you look at what his church inflicted on the Jews since his first visit, you can see how right they were.
“A bomb dropped on the hospital nearby….”
Jesus gets his facts from Hamas “health authorities” too?
On 10/7, Hamas slaughtered 1,200 Israelis. In return, Israel has slaughtered over 23,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and children. The World Health Organization's regional emergency director Richard Brennan says he considers these casualty figures trustworthy. It’s hard to kill that many innocent civilians accidentally. I think they made their point.
Defending Hamas? Defending Israel? “Slaughter the little children to come unto me.”
I've given up pointing out there are no clean hands in this Disaster, as President Obama did, at keast on more public forums. I'm fed up with being labeled an anti Semite for seeking a middle path, one of peace for everybody involved.
Good—and bad—people on both sides, roughly equal in kind. In this instance, anyway. Youbetcha.
Criticism of Netanyahu's policies is as antisemitic as criticism of Biden's is anti-Catholic. The same for Hamas. They're no more Muslim than I am.
THIS is what happens when you let religion and hate control public policy.
This is what the GOPee wants.
"This is what happens when you let religion and hate control public policy".
Like theocratic Iran, and her proxies? Which modern American party conspicuously engages with, negotiates with, even attempts to make nice with Iran?
"Which modern American party conspicuously...attempts to make nice with Iran?"
It must be the same one that tried to make nice with Putin and North Korea, because anyone who thinks it's the Biden administration obviously isn't paying attention.
“Religion and hate” was the proposed category. Let’s stay on topic.
OK: Which modern American party conspicuously uses religion and hate to advance its agenda?
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