What Ben & Jerry told me about Jesus
Last night I picked up a new Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream called “Imagine Whirled Peace.” It’s this amazing Caramel and Sweet Cream-swirled Ice Cream with chocolate peace signs and toffee pieces throughout. It was amazing. This morning I saw the top in the trash and it got me thinking . . .
The Ice Cream is dedicated to John Lennon and his song “Imagine” (duh). Other than the twenty-something idealists that plan on saving the world, most people scoff at the notions in Lennon’s song of no borders, no religion, and “world peace.” I typically fall in this scoffing camp, but why do we? What doesn’t resonate with us when people start talking like this?
This reminded me of my old roommate. A non-practicing Jew who would say he is practicing, just in the way he deems appropriate right now in his life. So, like I said, non-practicing. But I digress. I had a talk with him once about why Jews don’t believe Jesus was the Messiah. I pointed out all the different prophecies and such and he responded by telling me that there was one prophecy - the most important one - that Jesus never fulfilled. The Messiah would bring about world peace. As long as there was still warring and killing and death and disease, the Messiah had not come.
I gave the typical response you would expect us Christians to give - a non response that really didn’t help him, it just told him (as we were nearing where I was dropping him off at) how there was this “already but not yet” dimension to what Christ accomplished and the “peace” Jesus ushered in that we can experience now was primarily spiritual, not temporal. Feeling I had won the discussion, I dropped him off and slept soundly that night. I only realized this morning, over two years later, staring at an ice cream lid in the trash, how incomplete and unhelpful my response was.
Instead of showing him how his presuppositions may have actually been wrong, I simply offered my opinion and said it was right. This is tantamount to Paul walking up to Athenian leaders on Mars Hill in Acts 17, pointing to the statue to the unnamed god, and saying “that’s wrong. Jesus is right. Repent.” No, he meets them on their philosophical worldview turf and shows how what they believe actually points to Christ ultimately. So what would I say to Julian now?
I realized this morning that the problem here is (as I’m seeing more and more in America) humanism. That “man is the measure of all things.” We all have this dream and desire for that which we call “world peace,” but our arrogance comes in our insistence that this “peace” come from within ourselves - from within humanity. Actually, it’s not an outright insistence as much as it is an unquestioned assumption. What if “world peace” would not come from within humanity, but from without? What if Jesus did accomplish achieving perfect spiritual and temporal peace with God, man, and creation? What if this peace were sitting there, within our grasp - within our reach - if we would but take one moment to look outside of ourselves? What if the perseverance of all that is antithetical to peace comes not from outside of us (bio-socio-cultural-econom
To non-Christians: you are like one who has mud on their face and hands and keeps trying to wipe away the mud, but you only make it worse as you strive and try. Christ has taken all the uncleanness you bear on Himself that you might not. Repent from your love of this filth and believe Christ has the righteousness you seek.
To Christians: peace is yours! Trample not the blood of Christ underfoot as you release the cross from your gaze under the fear of unaccomplished peace. Trust that peace has come to the world, and it is not a political, economical, or philosophical system. It is a man named Jesus. Repent for your seeming need for some part of your peace to come from within yourself and believe that it has come from without. It is done. It is finished. Enter your master’s rest.
Thank God for Whirled Peace.
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Great post, Paul! Very helpful in me thinking through that…Although I still like your “already but not yet” concept, I mean, the temporal side of that peace is part of the prophecy, isn’t it? It’s just not yet consummated…