In God-birthing Michael Dwinell challenged us to see ourselves as nurturing souls, capable of giving birth to all sorts of weird and wonderful things. The author was an Episcopal priest for 35 years and is now a brother in the Order for Christian Workers. In this soul-stirring and inventive paperback, Dwinell sets up a scenario whereby a journal of Jesus is discovered when the remains of Mary Magdalene are unearthed. The words of the man from Nazareth speak to us across the centuries and draw us closer to his flinty integrity, his unique burdens, his vision of the kingdom of God, and his perspectives on family, disciples, walking on water, cleansing of the temple, cursing of the fig tree, and more.
In the introduction, Dwinell states: ”I realize that taking the step of imagining Jesus' experience at various points in his life and ministry could be considered by some to be bold, or indeed, arrogant. But imagination is the spiritual organ of the psyche. It is the soul's gift to us. Imagination enables us to perceive and experience the ultimate reality that lies just beneath and is woven through and through penultimate reality. It enables us to receive and experience the presence of God veritably humming in and through all ordinary events. It is, therefore, arrogant, and unfaithful not to imagine.”
Reading these adventuresome interpretations of events in the life and ministry of Jesus, we sense his vulnerability, his errors, his anger, his fear, his suffering, and most of all, his intimacy with God. This is not the winsome and effete Jesus so often presented in Christian Sunday Schools but a man in the flesh, taking measure of who he is and all that is going on around him against the hard edge of truth and the openness of a child experiencing the exhilaration of a sunset.
There is so much that is fresh and formidable on these pages. Here are just a few of the many things we liked about From Within the Heart of God.
• This Jesus remembers that his birth brought on the killing of many baby boys. He carries this burden with him and says prayers for the dead every day.
• After the death of his cousin and friend John the Baptist, he realizes that there will be no safety or security in his life. In these times, we can identify closely with him.
• Jesus wonders whether the disciples will ever pull themselves together and see that what they cherish in him, they must reverence in themselves.
• Looking at his hands, Jesus recalls his days as a carpenter and marvels that those same ten fingers are now used to heal others.
• In these interpretations of Jesus, women turn him around and also teach him. For example, the woman at the well reveals to him his ignorance and the woman with the issue of blood rocks him with her passion and risk-taking.
• Jesus is bewildered by the closeness he feels to Judas and stunned by the vehemence of his own words to his birth family.
Open this book to any page and you might just find what you need at the moment. This is exactly the kind of thing that happens with inspired works that are unspooled from the imaginal realm!
