The True Nature

of Christianity

by Tom Minkler

Summary

Summary

I tried to summarize it all in a few key sentences, but this is the best I could do, since everything is connected to everything!

The one and only God is "YHWH" or "AHYH" in Hebrew (Exodus 3:14-15), which means "I AM (that I AM)" or "I WILL be what I WILL BE," which can also be understood to mean "BEING." YHWH is translated "Lord" (which simply means "master") in modern English.
The word "God" is from the plural word "Elohiym" which means "strengths." So "God the Lord" IS "The powers that be."
God is incomprehensible to human beings, so any human attempts to define it are only approximations (In the same way insect language cannot even begin to describe the complexity of human beings.)
God cannot be a "he" in any way, and human words like Father and Son could never be exact or literal. They are only attempts to describe the indescribable. The mark placed to identify the center of the circle is not the actual center itself.
In the same way, the Bible describes "hell" as both "fire" and "darkness." Neither is intended to be literal; they are both attempts to describe the unfathomable in human language, to give us a "sense" of it.
If God is omnipotent, timeless, and created everything, then EVERYTHING that ever happens is HIS FAULT. If he didn't want it exactly this way he could change it or would have made it different. Or he is not omnipotent.
Good and bad, like all opposites, such as tall and short, light and dark, belief and unbelief, don't and can't exist separately. They are like two sides of one coin, but much more like two graduated "ends" on a bell-shaped curve of ONE THING, only existing relative to each other.
And those opposites can NOT be divided in half. That duality, like Genesis says, "Is ALL good." Freewill = Good + Bad (As a demonstration of this, get a piece of paper, noting that it has a left half and a right half. Take a pair of scissors and cut the left half off and throw it away. Look at the piece of paper. Note that it still has a left half and a right half. Bad is only the "left half" of all possible acts.)
So "Heaven" and "Hell" could not be separate places, rather the closer you are to God, the more you are in "heaven," the farther you are from it, the more you are in "hell." This explains how it is both "works" and "belief" that "save" us. The more we do of both the closer to God we are. Those places are INHERENT in what we do, not imposed on us from outside.
The "law" is only God's instruction manual (that he "revealed" or we "realized") for how the universe works. It shows us that we are all imperfect "sinners." God cares what we do only because he loves us and doesn't want us to hurt ourselves or others.
The word "sin" means "miss the mark." Our sins are our imperfections, everything that keeps us from continually hitting the target of perfectly beneficial action and getting the prize of complete wholeness ("holiness"). Sin is a condition, not only a sum of individual acts. The individual grains of sand are inconsequential in terms of the beach - you'll never get rid of he beach by trying to remove individual grains of sand.
Our imperfections do contain their own punishment (in an overall sense), because the laws of nature have their consequences. If you drop your hair dryer in the bathtub, you get electrocuted. If you lie, it causes problems. If you're gay, it causes problems. If you're born with one leg, it causes problems. If you're retarded, it causes problems. What part of "nobody's perfect" don't we understand?
We inherently eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and bad, cutting everything in half and "judging" it. We try to make ourselves like God because only God understands it, so only God can judge correctly.
Because if "smart" is "good" and "stupid" is "bad," then I've decided that God created me "wrong," since all of us are actually somewhere in between. This causes us to be ashamed of who God made us and put on "fig leaves" to cover our true selves. It is our inherent belief in good vs. bad that separates us from God, which is (at least) EVERYTHING.
This is why Jesus came to demonstrate two things:

God loves us totally and completely exactly how we are; our "sins" (imperfections) are totally, always forgiven, because God made us this way.
To reach "wholeness" or "perfection" (heaven) we must die completely to our "selves" for the good of the world, doing our best to act in perfect harmony all the time.

Whoever has ears to hear let them hear. If you can grasp this, God bless you. See, God doesn't "decide" to bless you or not, it's something that's in inherently built in, based on what you decide to do. All things work together with God.
Jesus had to die because he had to show us that just talking isn't enough, we have to DO what we believe, otherwise our beliefs aren't. By dying he became the "embodiment" of the truths of God. That complete self-sacrifice for the good of the world is the ONLY way to heaven.
It so happens that is the way of the Buddha as well (but perhaps Buddhism is missing the actual relationship with the real, live "Spirit" of God).

Here is a more complete summary, divided into sections by subject.

God

God is incomprehensible [Romans 11:33-36, I Corinthians 2:11] and therefore indefinable. Therefore any human words or concepts used to describe God, its thoughts or its actions, will be inaccurate. For example, if God is omnipotent across time, then human words like "plan" cannot apply to it. Human thoughts, words and concepts are never exactly accurate anyway. We can picture a perfect circle or imagine dark without light but neither exists in reality.
God cannot possibly really be a "he" because that is a human word with specific connotations, including a penis and a range of chemical levels in a physical body. There are no other characteristics exclusive of a "he."
God is also described as a "father." But he can't be exactly like any father we know, because all earthly fathers are flawed in some way. So "he" is really something "else"; something "more than" or "different than" a father. This is another imprecise attempt to describe the indescribable in human terms.
"God the Lord" means "The powers that be" and we are supposed to call it "I AM." [Exodus 3:14-15] (I will using this name for God here, as "he" has commanded.)
God said "I am," not "I am part of what is."
However, I AM manifests itself as a spiritual presence that can be FELT and KNOWN. This is what is historically called the Holy Spirit. (There is always the possibility that this presence is imagined, or is some type of internal awareness or manifestation of the eternal, but it feels as real as anything you can see or touch. Honestly, don't doubt it for a second.)
Things that make you go hmmmm: You know when two people are in love? Or when you meet someone and right away you "feel," that something for them, like love, hate, indifference, utter disgust, admiration, loathing, lust, enmity, fear, dispicability, i.e., that connection/feeling there, but what really is it? Could it be that's what I AM is, only multiplied by 4 billion or however many of us there are here (on earth anyway)? The connection we all have with each other? Genesis says that I AM "breathed" life into Adam (mankind). So we are all outward expressions of the life-breath of I AM. Are we all manifestations of the universal soul? Are we all drops of water in an ocean of God? Is God the "Soul of the Universe"? The "Soul of The Whole"? And the "spirit" is just the wholeness showing through.
Things that make you go hmmmm: If we substitute words such as "life" or "existence" for the word God (I AM) throughout the Bible, does it really change its meaning?
But if God is somehow a woman, then it's Father Nature, OK?

The Bible

The Bible is a collection of writings by human beings who, although inspired, are by definition fallible, along with all the copyists, translators and those who decided which writings would ultimately be included in what we call the Bible. To say otherwise is to imagine a reality that I AM did not create. You can make it up in your head, but there is no reason to believe that I AM has ever worked that way or that he needs to, unless you can't handle ambiguity, which you're still stuck with anyway.
The Bible is interpreted by anyone who has ever read it. Everyone who reads or even hears anything has to interpret it to begin with to even understand what it means.
Many things in the Bible are never interpreted as literal, such as Jesus saying, "If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out." We use our human grasp of common sense and reality to say that can't be literal. When he says you must "eat my flesh and drink my blood, most Christians say no again. But when Jesus says God is his "father," why is that literal? Jesus also says many times to humans that God is OUR father ("Our father, who art in heaven..."). Why is that NOT literal, when the word for father is the same? In every case we have to decide what is meant.
The Bible contains contradictory, irreconcilable elements and proven inaccuracies, but that doesn't mean you can't believe anything it says or that it isn't inspired or true in an overall sense. Why would it? There is a lot of evidence for its basis on factual events. To determine what the Bible means, each person has to ask I AM for the real truth, use their own instincts and common sense, do their own research and consult those who have greater knowledge of lingual and historical contexts. You can argue that the Bible is the infallible word of I AM but that doesn't mean anything in any real sense because we still have to figure out what it all means. But it is our main source of information about Jesus.
The human brain has difficulty handling complexity and ambiguity and is always trying to define and label things, which leads to oversimplification of complex concepts, thoughts and ideas. This is explained in Genesis 3 when humans eat of the tree of good and bad, inherently dividing the world into pairs of opposites (such as black and white, smart and stupid), when each set of opposites is really two ends of one continuum; a gross oversimplification.

Core Christianity

Christianity is the belief that "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." [Romans, 3:23].
Things that make you go hmmmm: This is also inherently evident, in that we are imperfect since we are limited by space, time and our own mental limitations and perceptions. We cannot possibly know what is ultimately best for our neighbors, the whole world or even ourselves. And I AM had to create us a certain way, as part of nature, for our survival, which is by nature incompatible with goodness. (Plus, we are made out of PROTEIN!) These facts are obvious from the existing human condition. These innate shortcomings are our state of "original sin," as the word "sin" means "to fall short." Our "sins" are our "shortcomings."
The good news (Gospel) is that Jesus came and died for our sins, making the ultimate sacrifice so that our sins are forgiven [John 3:16] and we are reconciled to I AM.
Jesus is the incarnation (or the "embodiment") of a pre-existing truth, as the Bible describes that he, the "Word," was with God since the beginning of time. [John 1:2] So WE ALWAYS HAVE BEEN reconciled to I AM.
All we can do is accept his free gift; nothing we do on our own can put us completely right with I AM (the Pharisees were already trying that).
Things that make you go hmmmm: Is Christianity as described above really any different than the following?:

The idea, after accepting that your sins are forgiven, is to "confess your sins and repent," which simply means to admit you are not perfect and to "change your mind" or "change your heart" from wanting to do it your way (which is inherently flawed), to wanting to do it God's way (which is to do what is best for the whole), and to foster a personal relationship with God. The key is that you can personally KNOW GOD as it is somehow manifested to us. But your sins have already been forgiven; there is nothing you can do on your own to make this true. "Heaven is populated entirely by forgiven sinners, not spiritual and moral aces. And Hell is populated entirely by forgiven sinners. The only difference between the two groups is that those in heaven accept the forgiveness and those in Hell reject it." [Robert Farrar Capon from "The Mystery of Christ…& Why We Don't Get It"]
Christians believe all of this by FAITH.

Jesus

As I AM cannot really be a he, and the word "father" is an imperfect description, so Jesus cannot really be a "son" because that is an imperfect human word with specific connotations. If I have a son, he is not me, but Jesus is supposedly both God and God's son.
Jesus said that God is his father, but many times that God is also our father.
Jesus seems to say that he is separate from God, but also that he IS God.
If Jesus was man and Jesus is also I AM, either:

Things that make you go hmmm: Jesus said: "I and the father are one."[John 10:30] But if you understand the concept we are all really one. This could be what he means when he claims to be I AM. Or that you can't separate the message from the messenger. This may mean, as the Bible says, that since Jesus is the "Word," God's pre-existing truth, it is that truth that has existed forever, which is inherent in I AM and creation. There are other statements Jesus makes that support this interpretation. For example, Jesus also says that he IS the sick and the poor. [Matthew 25:40]
Jesus is not the physical body of the person known as Jesus, because that didn't exist with God in the beginning. "Jesus" is the "Word," which is the teachings, actions and way of life of Jesus. THAT is what is God. Everything Jesus said and did is the "embodyment" of God's truth for, with and in us. The things he said and did are the expression of Immanuel, "God with us." It is how we, as physical humans, are supposed to relate to the universe and everything God created. "Jesus" is how everything works.
Things that make you go hmmmm: Jesus also said that "no-one gets to the father but my me." If I AM is everything, then we can't get to him but by me either, and by you, and by everything else that he created either. We can't get to I AM as long as we think he is something separate from us. See above where Jesus says that he and the father are one. We definitely can't know I AM if we don't understand what he is to us, and Jesus has the answer to that question.
When we are commanded to treat our neighbors as ourselves, that does not mean to treat them as we would IF THEY WERE us, but to treat them as ourselves because they ARE us.
Jesus also lived and died to show us that to reach heaven, we must die to ourselves and our own, inherently flawed way of living, and turn to a new life through I AM, for him and others. This is something we cannot do without I AM helping us. And he cannot help us if we don't let him, or ask him. This is called living in Jesus instead of living in sin, and it is the only way we will reach "heaven."
Jesus denied ALL social, economic and familial hierarchies and boundaries.
Jesus cannot be “perfect,” because that word is completely meaningless. There is no such thing. “Perfect” only means in comparison to some fabricated standard. Is there a “perfect” tree? A perfect rock? The only way you can answer this is by creating some “perfect” standard (that doesn’t exist) and comparing the rock or tree to that. For instance we can picture or describe a perfect circle. But in reality one will never exist. Everything is exactly what it is, no more no less; a “perfect” representation of itself. Jesus cursed a fig tree for not bearing fruit when it was out of season and called people fools; if I do those things I am committing sins.
When we interpret what Jesus says, we mustn't forget that he came at a specific time as a member of a specific religion for a specific purpose.
Jesus died, and since he did not have to, he must have died for a specific reason. In any case, he knew more than me or you.

Good and Bad

There is no such thing as "morality." Every single "rule" or guideline that I AM says to obey is ONLY THERE BECAUSE IT IS BETTER FOR US. You could say similarly they are natural laws or laws of nature. I AM is only against sin because he hates to see us hurt. There is no separate "code" or "law" that I AM set up to be arbitrary or just because he felt like it. That is, God did not make these up after he created everything, then "impose" them on us, or "give them" to us, he simply "revealed" them to us, that is they already existed as part of creation and he "told us what they were."
For example, if homosexuality is "bad," it's only because of the inherent difficulties it causes, such as initial feelings of uncertainty, confusion and doubt within the homosexual person, and misunderstanding, bigotry and hatred in much of the rest of society, and because it tends to thwart the prime natural directive, the one key driving force of nature: procreation of the species. But that is all. There is no separate "morality" that says homosexuality is "wrong." And outside of the initial adjustment problems, it doesn't actually "hurt" anybody. If you are born homosexual, your need and right to express your true nature becomes another factor in the choice of what you want to do. And no Christian, no anyone, has the right to judge you for your decision.
I can choose to smoke, and if I do it is only "bad" for me because it hurts and limits me and I AM hates to see me hurt or limited.
Good and Bad, like all opposites, are like two sides of the same coin and one cannot exist without the other. If you try to cut the coin vertically in half, you still have two sides.
Good and Bad more realistically exist in the form of a bell-shaped curve with one at each "end." To draw a line down the middle and send the human who is a teeny weeny bit on the bad side of the line to some horrible eternal pain while sending the guy a teeny weeny bit on the good side of the line to eternal bliss wouldn't really be fair or make any sense. And where does the guy who is exactly half go? Dividing reality into two halves like this, good and bad, is what we were forbidden to do in the Garden of Eden. It is AGAINST the truth, contrary to the undivided reality of all creation.
Belief and Unbelief cannot be divided in half either.

Heaven and Hell

The concept of "original sin" as described in the creation stories of Genesis states that Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" because it would screw up creation. This is saying that once I, as a human, decide I know what is good and bad, I am disobeying I AM and trying to make myself like him, since "he" created the world and only he really understands and knows it. But it is INHERENT in human nature to do this; it is part of our "original sin."
Note that humans were not created good and then discovered evil, but started without knowing good OR evil (which also represents the labeling of all opposites). The original condition of humans not knowing good or evil would have been "good" as part of God's creation.
Our "knowledge" of good and evil also makes us think that Heaven is about being good and Hell is about being bad. THEY ARE NOT. This disobedience (in addition to contradicting the real meanings of those words) makes us think we have to do something, that is, to BE GOOD (which we aren't), to get to be with I AM. It makes us think we are separated and WE have to do something to get to him. We try to make ourselves like him by trying to say that WE will determine whether we get to be with God by how we act, that it is something WE DO or DON'T DO that puts us right with him, when really it is only HE that can make us right with him. But we are not separated from him and we never really have been; it is only appears so to our limited minds. And it is that way because "he" created it that way, not because of anything we did.
Genesis also shows that when we divide the world into opposites, we also screw it up, because if "smart is good" and "stupid is bad," etc, etc, etc, then I am always trying to be something "else," something which I judge "better" and which is "other than" what I AM, which is my wonderful, unique self, with certain levels of stupidity and ugliness, that deserves to be here as much as any mountain or flower, that is wholly and completely loved by I AM as part of his awesome creation.
Note that Adam and Eve were created naked. Being ashamed of nudity and wearing clothing is part of sin. This also symbolizes that once we know that there is "good and bad" we try to cover up who we really are because we are ashamed/afraid that we are not good enough and that God will reject us. But this is disobeying God and it is what puts us out of paradise. Jesus' parables about heaven reiterate this point: it is when we doubt God's acceptance of us that we are out of paradise.
Hell is spoken of in the Bible as fire, but also as DARKNESS. Since it obviously is not both, we realize that they are only trying to describe the indescribable in different ways. Like Father or Son.
Heaven was supposed to be in the sky, above the clouds. It isn't.
Heaven and Hell are not physical places. Heaven is being with I AM, Hell is being separate from him. (Since Heaven was supposedly above the clouds, where I AM is, now we know it is not above the clouds and neither is I AM, but Heaven is still where God is.) Jesus said "The kingdom of heaven is within (or 'in the midst of') you." [Luke 17:21]
Since reality cannot be divided in half, the more you know I AM, the more you are in "heaven," and the less you know him, the more you are in "hell." Think of "being in heaven" as "being in perfect love." Perhaps once our physical reality is gone the implications of this will be more clear.

Genesis

Genesis was never meant by I AM to be literal concerning the scientific specifics of how the universe was created, but it explains them in deep ways that are obscured when feeble attempts are made to turn the stories into a factual account. Storytelling is the historical method by which this information was passed on and the way the core truths were able to be remembered. However, when translated correctly, there is actually quite a bit of literal truth there.
The beginning of Genesis is stories about "how creation is," much more than "how it happened." It explains existing truths rather than "events." In a sense, that can be said of the Bible itself, because it is only what the events in it mean that makes any of them mean anything. Know what I mean?

Christian Behavior

As a Christian, I have absolutely NO RIGHT to judge anyone else, since I too am a sinner. In many cases, Jesus said that even he does not judge or condemn.
Jesus Christ NEVER, EVER advocated or even came anywhere near suggesting anything remotely like passing secular laws to attempt to force people to obey anything. In fact, quite the opposite: Jesus says "Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's." If you want to try to make our nation a better place, feel free, but do not presume to try to pass laws in God's name. Remember that "Caesar" in this case is the U.S. Constitution, which we are required by God to obey when considering any laws, such as those relating to homosexuality and abortion.
So any political action a Christian takes or any vote a Christian makes is not supported or sanctioned by any action or direction of Jesus. If a Christian does want to vote according to the type of society Jesus was living with his followers, I suggest that the vote should be Libertarian, to reflect the "heavenly kingdom as opposed to earthly kingdom," "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's" way of Jesus; or else vote Socialist, which is how Jesus lived, where everyone eats from the same table, food is shared and nobody has power or authority over anyone else. Because Capitalism, rewarding competitive behavior with transitory earthly rewards, is about as far from the spirit of Jesus as we can ever get.
For example: Homosexuals should be accorded full rights under the U.S. Constitution, up to, including and beyond the right to marry any consenting adult they choose. As a Christian, my job is to treat my neighbor as myself, because it is right in addition to the fact that I have been commanded to do so. If I was gay I would want and expect the same civil rights as any other human being, and our constitution guarantees them that anyway. Any right you or I have, "they" should have. To desire anything contrary is unfair, illegal and UNCHRISTIAN. As a Christian I am also required to forgive even my direct enemies as many times as necessary.
In John, Chapter 8, some scribes and Pharisees bring Jesus a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery and said "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?" Jesus wrote on the ground and said "Let he who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." On hearing that, all the accusers left and Jesus was left alone with the woman. He said, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? She said "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again." EVEN JESUS DID NOT CONDEMN HER. He said this before he told her not to sin again, and regardless of whether she obeyed him later or not. Note that Jesus did not deny that what she did was wrong according the laws. Later in that same chapter, Jesus says, "You judge according to the flesh, I JUDGE NO ONE."
It doesn't matter one bit whether specific sins such as homosexuality are wrong or right for other people, since so is lust, selfishness, hypocrisy, and many other things, many of which we are all guilty of every day. I cannot get to heaven by being good. Forcing people to obey God doesn't get them one iota closer to God, since none of us can reach him that way. Nor does it help anyone else. Non-christians will only tend to reject Christianity if it is full of self-righteous, judgmental hypocrites. And who would blame them?
However when it comes to me personally trying to do what is best for me, I need to try to find out what I AM wants me to do, because that will be the best for me and everyone else. But this is between me and I AM, and getting to "heaven" does not depend on anything I do.
The Bible is not, and cannot be, about proof. If it proved anything, there would be no need for faith. All you can do is tell people what I AM means to you and let them decide for themselves. If you try to beat them over the head with it, why would they want to listen?