God calls us, through Jesus, to love Him with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and all of our strength, and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
This the core of the selfless and life-giving Gospel given to us by the one whom God chose and sent out to us, Jesus.We become whole and complete beings when we serve God and others in His name, and seeking to do this completes our spirits.
Jesus says we are to come to him like a child:
"But Jesus said, 'Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.'" (Matt. 19:14)
Children easily believe, and their love is pure and natural. Children have a faith in God as the Creator and Father of us all.
Childlike obedience, childlike love, childlike trust in God, all lead to a spirituality that leads us into God's presence, and helps us show God to others.
When our spirits are in union with God, we achieve the Spiritual Abundance and wholeness of life that God means us to have.
And Jesus showed us, by the example of his life, teachings and death, that we may become spiritually complete and become all God wishes us to be. This is the amazing and glorious gift that God has shown us through Jesus.
The Gospel that Jesus preached is simple and pure and easily believable:
Love God. Love others. Live Righteously. Serve others. Do Good Works. In this way, we bring in - and actively live in - God's Kingdom.
That is it. Full Stop.
But because we humans like to over-think and over complicate things, we have added much man-made doctrine to this simple Gospel.
Human beings throughout the centuries have polluted this pure message with complicated and confusing doctrines that negate every part of the Gospel as Jesus preached it.
Did Jesus preach (as later men taught) that all men were born evil, and are unable to obey God, without God giving us extra and special powers to do so? Or did he preach that we have the ability to obey God, and will be judged according to our deeds, and that our acts MUST be righteous?
Did Jesus preach (as later men said) that he was equal to God, and therefore we need only worship his Personhood in order to be saved, vicariously? Or did he preach his utter dependence upon God, his Father (and ours) and that only obedience in righteousness leads to our salvation?
Did Jesus preach (as men do) that we must wait for him to come back to earth with an avenging army before the Kingdom of God comes? Or did he preach that we must seek to bring in the Kingdom IMMEDIATELY with our acts of love, compassion and service to others?
Did Jesus preach (as men do) that we can pray to God to attain material wealth, increase our power over others, and have all our physical desires granted? Or did he call us to seek spiritual treasures from Heaven, and to serve God and others even in our material poverty, putting Others above our Selves?
Human beings are born capable, thanks to God's gifts, of doing great and amazing things.
We send rockets to space, explore the deepest seas, and create works of fiction that amaze and entertain us. But we also create excuses by citing man-made doctrines that falsely assure us that we need NOT do Good Works or actively assist our fellow human beings who are in need.
During his ministry, Jesus condemned the doctrines of men, which were being put above the love of God. Men created mythologies and doctrines that put empty ritual and dogma ahead of God's love and our requirement to serve and love others.
Should we be surprised that doctrines of men still dominate the powerful dominant religion of today, Christendom? These strange doctrines we are taught as "Faith" today are encrusted with complicated Medieval theologies that defy definition, cleverly devised to keep us from the simple Gospel of Jesus, as he taught it. They are literally another man's "gospel" rather than the pure and simple one Jesus left us.
Jesus was given God's message and conveyed it simply and clearly to us, just as God commissioned him at his baptism to do.
Let's return to the simplicity and childlike faith that Jesus left us, putting aside the childishness and foolishness that men want to require us to believe in its place.
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