I’m reading an excellent book called Waking the Dead by John Eldredge. The subtitle is “The Glory of a Heart Fully Alive.” This book is written for followers of Jesus who have settled a bit, I think. At least that’s what I had done. I knew I wanted more, but became hopeless because trying hard wasn’t getting me anywhere — which makes sense, given the numerous scriptures about effort alone, apart from a real dependence on God. This book showed me in part what I was looking for: why I needed to depend on God in a land of “abundance.” I don’t worry about where my next meal is coming from. But I need to depend on God just as the Israelites did in the desert, depending on his next provision of manna for food.

I need Jesus for Life. Something occurred to me in the shower this morning, which relates to the previous sentence. I resolved to make a google search because I figured the aphorism I came up with might have been said before. “Truth unapplied is meaningless.” Well, I didn’t find it, but I’m sure it’s been said before. 2 + 2 = 4 is meaningless unless applied in some way. Pages of solved orbital equations are meaningless unless Cassini is launched. Now, the truths contained in those pages could be applied in other ways, perhaps a computer animation of a trip to Saturn, or even through a physicist’s mental trip there. But these truths are far easier to apply than the truly deep, eternal truths.

Perhaps I shouldn’t say easier. Easier glosses over what it takes to apply some truths. “I need Jesus for Life” is easier in theory for me to understand with my intellect than E=mc². But the effort of the spirit it takes to apply it — that’s intense. Believing this truth requires me to depend on him, because without him my life is plumbing the depths of the Mandelbrot set — interesting, beautiful at times, but ultimately unsatisfying — “haven’t I seen this all before?”

Waking the Dead, well, “awakened” me to the truth that my heart is good (once redeemed by the perfection of Christ), and more importantly for me, real. It’s important, and needed to be healed of some pains that made me shove emotion and people and God himself away whenever confronted with them. The deepest eternal truths are not understood by our finite minds, but rather they are discerned by our hearts, which touch the eternal, sense the infinite. I should clarify: the book didn’t really awaken me. Just like 2 + 2 = 4, and just like this journal entry, it spoke of truths that required application to make them meaningful. The application came in the form of prayer, and Jesus revealed places in my heart that were broken. Actually, that’s not quite true either. Jesus initiated the whole process. He had to, because I normally avoided thinking about those broken areas at all costs. But before I came to the section in the book on healing, when I wasn’t reading, the thoughts arose, with the feeling that he was bringing them - not to punish me, but to prepare me for healing.

And the book then was merely a filter for truths contained in scripture. “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” (Psalm 147:3). Jesus quoting Isaiah:

For this people’s heart has become calloused;
       they hardly hear with their ears,
       and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
        hear with their ears,
        understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.

It is important that Jesus doesn’t say “forgive them” or “instruct them”. He offers healing for the calloused heart, if we turn. My problem, which the book has helped me see through, is that I have believed the lie that there is no heart. It’s a key lie in the strategy of Truth’s enemy to destroy God’s creation. I was willing to agree with this lie because it seemed to offer protection from the fact that my heart was broken. It needed healing. But covering the wounds without healing just allowed them to fester. These were things I had never really taken to Jesus, and he asks for all of us. When I did, I experienced freedom and a weight lifting off my soul that I had carried for years. Relief and hope came hand in hand, along with greater intimacy with Jesus; I could trust him with more. And what I trusted him with was a part of my heart that I had held back. It’s a great step in the process of becoming whole, in the process of becoming truly alive. Jesus promises to make us fully alive, and deep down, that is what we’re all looking for.

This is also when I came up with independently, and thus understood (just like in school, huh?), the unapplied truth aphorism. This process, this journey, wasn’t about learning the rules, figuring out the infinite ways I can optimize my path through this fractalized universe, and then trying harder to make it “work.” The step I had just taken was a baby one, and I had a lifetime of walking with Jesus yet to go. For in the end, the ultimate Truth, the one science and religion and all human endeavor are getting glimpses of — the ultimate, infinite Truth, unfathomable in our finite minds — that infinite Truth is God himself. I just went to look up the scripture I wanted to use here, and suddenly understood more about the passage, about doubting Thomas, about why we need Jesus and not some other road, and my faith in Jesus was confirmed more deeply as I looked at why Jesus said this: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.” He was answering Thomas’s question: “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” I fear that the truth that touched my heart depends on my history with Jesus, and I can’t give it justice here. But it boils down to this: in order to know truth, we must know Jesus. And knowing Jesus isn’t saying a particular prayer, or attending church on Sundays, or becoming a missionary. These things may be expressions of getting to know him. But knowing him is a relationship, the most intimate relationship possible, and one which can make our other relationships come alive, our work come alive, our heartache cease. And thus it isn’t a ruleset, and it doesn’t have an end. It’s a lifelong friendship with the God of the universe, who entered our world to talk to us, to heal us, to forgive us, and to love us. “He is the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15) and through him we “have life, and have it to the full!” (John 10:10). Gospel means “Good news” and good news it is indeed! Praise God!