I’ll admit, I’ve been wracking my brain trying to figure out how to end this series. Nothing came to mind (well, lots, but nothing great) for the last week or so. As I was looking through the posts and their topics, the simplicity, the paramount role of Jesus, the Son of God, became painfully obvious. And therein lies my point. No talk of the essentials is complete without at least mention of The Essential. No conversation is complete without due focus on “the Author and Perfecter” of our faith. But I think many of us, myself included, have lost sight of Jesus.

Jesus is too elementary

From a young age, the Sunday-school-attending youth learns the answer to everything is “Jesus”. But, many of us become numb to the underlying truth to what we’re being taught. It’s not that Jesus is the “right” answer, but that Jesus is the answer to everything. As in, at the risk of falling into the Sunday school trap, every care, concern, worry, issue has resolution in the person of Jesus. It is that every burden which I’ve laid on Him and let Him have control over has become resolved. Every trial for which I’ve thought myself too weak, when I’ve asked for strength, He’s lent it to me. But, somewhere around middle school I became numb to this fact and I’m having a tough time fighting my way back.

Jesus isn’t a crutch

If religion is the opiate of the masses, then consider me addicted, but please can we not call Jesus a crutch? Community, if anything, is our crutch; Jesus is salvation. Literally, Jesus saved my life coming into college. There was a very dark night a few weeks before my freshman year where ending my life didn’t seem all that drastic. However, that was the night I decided to try out going to a college ministry, you know, the whole religion thing. I went to the first meeting of the year and didn’t leave but four years later. Deeper still, I know that my shortcomings have moved me further from God and there are no amounts of good deeds I could do to earn back His favor; there is no amount of goodness I could amass that would ultimately end up in my going to heaven. No, I need something far more valuable than a life marred in pride and imperfection.

Jesus is life

What do these crazy words mean and why do Christians keep spouting them?! If we’re to believe that God is perfect and Life itself (as its Originator) and that anything that falls short of Him is simply imperfect and at least not fully life, then we have to imagine that there is some element of death in our very bones. We have to imagine that at least some of us, some of our very core will cease to exist given this current state. What if God really loved us so much that He’d do anything within His power to give us the option not to die? What if God actually loved our souls so much that He gave a sacrifice that would even please His perfect Self and allow us to experience Him for all of eternity? Friends, this is the gravity of Jesus. This is the moment to step back and soak in all the glory of God and His immense love. This is when we fall in love with Jesus, as He’s loved us so dearly that He would willingly be our sacrifice.

Jesus should blow us away. Fully man, fully God aside, the person of Jesus should cause our brains to throb at the thought of His love and goodness. The quintessential nature of Jesus to our everyday being, livelihood and individual breath should be on our minds constantly. We should read about Him, contemplate Him, love Him, share Him, and enjoy His presence as He is more valuable than all the world. He is the reason the world is still turning, but somewhere along the way, our little worlds get jilted off their axes and we become off-kilter. What do you think about righting that today and asking Jesus to show you just how important He really is and always has been?