Jesus – Page 5 – Scribbling Theology

2024

17/02/202414/08/2025 Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

Some may or may not know I took a year off writing (despite this, I’ve had the most views since I started writing). In 2023, I posted one blog (I felt compelled then). It is 2024, and I’m slowly emerging out of blogging hibernation. From my first blog in 2015 to my next, as is faithful with most things in life, my theology and thoughts on Christian spirituality have evolved. I look back on my first blog and chuckle. I’m sure I’ll look back on 2024 in another ten years and cringe. Since I started blogging, I’ve started and graduated from bible college. I’ve married and remarried. I’ve gone through different jobs, moved around, and gone through various churches (finally, I’ve found a nice one to rest in). I’ve had my doubts and struggles. I’ve wanted to walk away from the faith. I’ve wanted to give up and try other things. Yet here I am, still tripping after Jesus (good blog title).

So what does this year hold for Scribbling Theology? More meaningless ramblings of a guy who has literally no idea what he’s talking about (I guarantee that). We’ll discuss God’s creation, beauty and some of the not-so-traditional ways of engaging with God. On the flip side, we’ll discuss the importance of finding a healthy community of believers where you can flourish. We’ll talk about liturgy and the importance of ancient rituals and beliefs. We’ll talk about how stories, both new and old, can transform us and lead us deeper into ourselves (collectively and individually) and into the presence of God. I’ll review a book or two (to start you off read, “How to Know a Person by David Brooks”), a podcast or three and maybe spin a poem. I don’t know where I’ll start or finish. But as always, Scribbling Theology has been an outlet, a creative and even spiritual practice that has helped me to release and vent my own thoughts.

2022 Mix Up: My Five Favourite Blogs of the Year

02/01/202314/08/2025 Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

Happy New Year!

The Best Books I’ve Read In 2022

31/12/202210/08/2025 Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

The Soul of Desire: Discovering the Neuroscience of Longing, Beauty, and Community by Curt Thompson

To some people, the desire to be known might not come as a shock. However, God used this book powerfully to expose my innermost desire: to be known by Him and the people around me. Curt Thompson writes poetically, eloquently, with sophistication and depth that only the most artistic neurobiologists could write. Thompson masterfully weaves faith, psychology, and the world’s beauty into a rich and profoundly moving tapestry of transformative meaning for the indigent and broken Christian.

When Everything’s on Fire: Faith Forged from the Ashes by Brian Zahnd

If my Christian journey can be defined by one word for the last few years, that would be deconstruction (and reconstruction). Deconstruction has become increasingly popular lately, and Brian Zahnd is a clear voice through the flames when your faith seems to be burning down around you. Zahnd writes with intelligence, wisdom, and prophetic vigour as he reflects on his journey through the fire while bringing together some of the most critical voices of the past and present. Zahnd encourages the deconstructing Christian to commit to reconstruction and that Jesus is worth clinging to.

Saving Us: A Climate Scientist’s Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World by Katharine Hayhoe

Climate change is arguably the biggest threat to humanity; as Christians, we are obligated to play our part. Katharine Hayhoe is a passionate climate change scientist who loves Jesus just as much as she loves the world he created. It is a part of her mission to help churches see the importance of living out our Genesis 1-2 mandate and care for the world as intended. This book helps the already converted and the sceptic bring together seemingly opposing worldviews so that they may live faithfully and with urgency.

How to Inhabit Time by James K. A. Smith

In this book, James K. A. Smith writes to help us (as the blurb describes) develop a sense of temporal awareness. Many Christians, even just people in the west, lack the ability to live wisely in our cultural and historical moment. I’m still working my way through this book. Still, Smith writes with philosophical sophistication, historical awareness and sharp cultural discernment as he moves the reader away from their own individualistic perception of history and into how to be influential kingdom-minded people in their moments of history.

Sabbath by Abraham Heschel

I was reluctant to put this book on my list, not because I don’t think it deserves to be in my top five, but because when I finished the book, I wasn’t entirely sure what I had just read. Sabbath is a classic Jewish work on the “architecture of time.” For Heschel, the sabbath day was the day in which every other day led to. It was this sacred temple in time that allowed God and his creation to come together in a kairo-protest of the worldly powers that be.

Scribbling Journal: Entry 3

17/12/202214/08/2025 Camaron G. W. SmithLeave a comment

Tis the season…

A book in the bible I often return to is Ecclesiastes. A particular passage that comes to mind is:
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

The funny thing about this time of year is that Christmas confuses the seasons and the times. It is far flung from the sacred holy day it once was. Christmas has become a bubbling cauldron of consumerism, suicide, crippling debt, and anxiety with a pinch of hope, a sprinkle of love, and a snifter of joy.

For me, Christmas has always been about presents. As a child, I would often wake up when it was still dark to find gifts at the end of the bed or under the tree. I’d be excited as I desperately hoped for pokemon cards or a new N64 game (The Legend of Zelda was my favourite). My parents spoiled me. My mum was a crafty character. She’d often hide or pretend that I wouldn’t get so much, and then when I least expected it, bam! There’d be a new bike or a new gaming console. Thanks, mum. As I got older and my parents separated, I started paying close attention to those around me. Especially in my young adult years, I saw that Christmas became less enjoyable for most people because putting together the perfect day was more important than people “just being.” But who can blame them? The perfect Christmas day is every other day of our lives turned up to eleven.

I love Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 because life is ordered, simple, and easy to understand. Life is hardly that easy, unfortunately. For many of us, every day is an anxiety-riddled, depressed-filled, hope-flickering Christmas day that we all try to manage. Like Christmas, Jesus fights for the spotlight in life. We often shove Him off into a dark corner after a quick chat as we eagerly unwrap our other presents.

I often feel at odds with myself because I know I should be enjoying the gift of Grace more than anything else. Still, the new God of War PS5 game seems so much more fulfilling in the moment. I mean, it’s not like Jesus carries around an axe and slays pagan gods with a broody demeanour. It’s not like Jesus shamed the other gods of the world, had victory over them, and now rules over them from Heaven. Sarcasm, by the way, because he is (weird side thought, who’d win in a fight between Kratos and Jesus…?). It doesn’t always feel like it when every other power inundates me daily. Like at Christmas, it is easy to lose sight of the One in whom love and life are found.

Recently, I had an argument with one of my bosses about the Christmas season. Knowing I’m a Christian, he asked, “what do you think of carols, Cam?” I don’t really like them, I replied, already exhausted with where this was going. Surprised, he said, why now? I rattled off a few reasons I don’t like carols or Christmas in general. I gave statistics on how suicide rates increase over the season, how much waste is used over the holiday, how much food we throw out, and how much crippling debt people go into. After my two-minute rant, he told me, “it’s not Christmas’s fault that people go into debt. They don’t have to spend that much money.” Of course, he was right. What shocked me, however, was not the answer he gave me. Instead, it was the gross oversimplification of the statement. Of course, people can decide not to go into debt, kill themselves, or waste food and rubbish. However, the question we should be asking ourselves is, “why are they?” Why do people need to spend money and ruin Christmas with petty fights that expose the ego? In reality, why do we do anything?

Why do we do anything? For the longest time, I believed that our motivations and intentions were driven by evil hearts that always wanted to do wicked and sinful things. I no longer believe this to be the case. Most of us do what we believe is right in seriously broken ways. There are expectations to this, I’m sure. However, I think most people don’t wake up and decide to murder, steal, cheat, or lie. Instead, our actions result from a lifetime (generations even) of decisions to good that often cause more harm than good. People are trapped in debt because they believe that spending so much money is the right thing to do. They’re afraid of the social consequences of not buying the latest Ipad for their partner or a family member. People kill themselves over the Christmas season because they’ve bought into the lie that what they lack is more important than who they are and the world would be better without them. There are narratives and systems, and ideas being told that cause people to do the things they’re doing. The human heart, of course, would find another way – no doubt. My point is that we can’t simply chalk actions up to the doctrine of original sin and total depravity (for the black and white Christian), or (for the more secular), we can’t just assume people make choices in a historical vacuum void of influence or trauma.

A closing thought. Perhaps we just need a reformation around Christmas, actually in life. As Christmas day was intended, every day should be participated in and meditated on in light of the Incarnation and what that means for humanity. What is that meaning? In the words of Jesus himself, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour” (Luke 4:18-19).

Scribbling Journal: Entry 2

12/11/202214/08/2025 scribblingtheology1 Comment

Jesus came to me first through religious fervour and fanaticism. Christianity was almost a swear word, a kind of “you know who” or a “he who must not be named” sort of thing that, if you had to bring it up, an unsavoury taste lingered upon the tongue in conversation. Far too many stories were heard of priests molesting children and preachers zealously proclaiming “turn or burn” on street corners, causing most people who heard them to ignore their existence, if not shy away in embarrassment for them entirely.

My parents, and their parents, grew up in an age believing religion and politics weren’t things one talked about at the dinner table if one were to have a civil conversation. This is ludicrous because spirituality and politics are some of the most important topics of discussion when getting to a person’s heart. Never have I known a person more than when they painted for me a picture of the world and how they believe it can be fixed. If this kind of conversation were fostered more, maybe we’d be having very different conversations now about identity and the sorts.

It wasn’t until much later that I started to see Jesus as more than a “car salesman.” I had always been interested in mythology and spirituality, and as I started reading about new-age teachers, historians and storytellers, I learned that Jesus was a serious spiritual person. It just took hearing it from someone who wasn’t a Christian first for me to realise it. It still took me longer to trust in Jesus – whatever that means – or at least to give the Christian thing a red hot crack… here I am, still giving it a go more than ten years later.

I can’t tell you exactly what got me into trusting Jesus. Some would say it is the sovereignty of God, and others would say he filled the hole in my life or whatever (in some ways, I have more “holes” and “cracks” now than I ever did). As I got to know it more and more, the biblical story made the most sense of my humanity (or lack thereof), the world around me, and my place in it. I used to believe that the Bible was something you could sit down, read, understand, and walk away with. However, the Bible takes more than a lifetime to master. The Bible is the sort of literature you have to sit with over coffee or tea every day for the rest of your life. It is supposed to be read in a community, and It is the kind of story that moves from only the intellect to the centre of your being.

As I read the Bible more, Jesus started moving from being a spiritual guy who told us to love people (erg!) to him representing me. I can imagine the surfer Jesus that puts flowers in people’s hair and sings kumbaya coming out of the surf, pushing a craft beer in front of me and staring at me in the eye with a look of intense affection and saying, “Camaron, look at me. There’s more to life than what you lack. I can show you how to be more.” I think he would have an Aslan kind of effect on me. When he speaks, he shakes off the salt water from his long curls, but you shudder in fear and awe, and the space he commands has a certain gravitas. But instead of running away, you want more of him. You can’t help but be drawn to His presence. You hang off every word, even if they’re hard to hear.

“When we learn to read the story of Jesus and see it as the story of the love of God, doing for us what we could not do for ourselves–that insight produces, again and again, a sense of astonished gratitude which is very near the heart of authentic Christian experience.”
― N.T. Wright

I pray that we will all have that sense of astonished gratitude.