The Human in the Being

I want to say this to more Christians than I can name.

When did you stop being a human being?

I knew you when you were one. I remember it. But when I watch how you think now, how you move, how you live, how you talk—I can still find the being. It's the human I keep losing. Especially the Jesus human.

When Paul stood in Athens, surrounded by a city stacked with idols, he told them that in God "we live and move and have our being." He was quoting their own poets back to them, using their own words to walk them home. He never argued about the being. We all have that. Rocks have being. Trees have being. Paul was pressing for whose and what kind.

This is what stops me cold: ours is the only faith where God becomes a human being. Not escaping flesh—putting it on. The Incarnation is God’s vote for humanity, cast in blood and bone, bowels and towels.

So when following the most human God who ever lived leaves you less human—harder, colder, quicker to wound, slower to weep—something has gone terribly wrong. And no amount of "being right" can fix it.

The Word became flesh. Jesus came to show us how to be a Jesus human. Not an argument, brand, proposition, leader, or a side. A Jesus human.

I knew you when you were a human being. Come back. The being was never the problem. It’s the human we’re missing. The Jesus human.