Being glory vs. Giving glory

What if true salvation is realizing that I am the glory of God?  Isn't that what Paul is hinting at in Romans: "...for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God"?  Or in other words: Everyone has missed the mark (to sin) on what it means to be truly human, everyone is lacking the glory of God.  It seems our predicament is/was not our inability to give God glory, but our inability to relax and 'just' be God's glory.
What if all my attempts to give God the glory (through singing worship songs and serving him and stuff) are actually keeping me away from this deep unity/oneness the Father desires with his child?  
What if God doesn't want/need me to give him the glory?  What if he just longs for the day in which I realize that I am his glory?
And what if that is not pride, but true humility?

New Religion vs. New Creation

What if Jesus never intended to found Christianity?  What if he didn't want another religion?  What if what Jesus taught was freedom from religion?  What if Christianity became exactly that which Jesus critisized in Judaism, a religion seperating people from the love of the Father?  What if Jesus' gospel is so much higher and deeper and wider than what Christianity could hold?  What if Jesus really is the firstborn of a new creation, instead of the founding father of a new religion?

A bigger God

Jim Palmer wrote on his blog "Shedding Religion to find God":

"What if God isn’t a belief system? What if God is bigger than any theology that religion can produce? What if God is bigger than self, bigger than family, bigger than church, bigger than tribe, bigger than nation, and bigger than any creed or set of doctrines we might wrap around him? Could the vision of a bigger God cause us to place higher value on expanding our circles of care and compassion, and working toward a more peaceful world? What if God is love? What if God is peace? What if God is unconditional acceptance? What if God is empathy and compassion?"

Predestined to what?

What if in the New Testament being 'chosen' or 'predestined' or 'the elect' does not so much refer to holding a valid ticket to heaven, as it does to being picked out in order to be a blessing to God and to people?  What if Christianity's failure is the same as that of Israel:  We still don't get that we're chosen, not for our individual gain (personal salvation), but in order to be a blessing to the world?
What if being "a chosen people, a royal priesthood" does not seperate us from and elevate us over our neighbor?  But instead it unites us with them, as we join them in their mess, the same mess that we came from, helping them up into a loving relationship with Father?  Isn't that what Jesus did and still does?  What if he continues to come alongside people, even in the place of the dead (Hades) to which he holds the keys?  What if (his)"love never fails" and never gives up?
What if there can't be an eternal bliss for the elect in heaven (in this life and after), while people are still suffering in whatever hell they are in (in this life and after)?  What if the shepherd doesn't rest until all his sheep are safe?

Freedom from fear & shame

What if we, in western Christianity, don't understand anymore what it really means for Jesus to forgive our sins?  What if it's not just about a 'Ticket to Heaven' or a 'Hell-Free Card'?  What if for Jesus, when he walked this earth, forgiving people their sins used to be all about freeing them from the bondage of shame which seperated them from Father (ie. the paralyzed man in Luke 5)?  What if "Do not be afraid" and "your sins are forgiven" were some of the most spoken words of our big brother?  What if it really is fear and shame that keep us away from a loving relationship with Father?  What if sin is this seperation caused by fear and shame?  What if, trying to manage our own sin, we get sucked deeper and deeper into it by fear and shame?  Would it be enough to just deal with the sin?  Or do we need to allow Jesus to deal with the root of it: fear and shame?  What if religion is just using fear and shame for its advantage, instead of, like Jesus, removing the burden of it?  What if I can live in a loving relationship with Father without fear and shame?

Sin Management

What if living as a child of God is not about not sinning anymore?  What if for God it has never been about us not sinning?  What if, by trying to manage our sin, we're really worshipping sin, sacrificing good deeds on the altar to sin?  What if we're really "free from the law of sin and death" (Romans 8)?  What if there really is "no condemnation" anymore (Did God ever condemn us, or was it our shame that condemned us?)?  What if life is 'just' about enjoying being one with Father?

The Lord's Prayer

What if we made the 'Lord's prayer' to be the total opposite of what Jesus was trying to teach?  What if Jesus' main point was to show the closeness of relationship that we can have with our Father, by saying: "Abba, papa, daddy, I love who you are and what you are doing." (my version)?  Instead of: "Our Father who art in heaven, up there, far, far away..."

Love & Evangelism

What if love is really the only way to spread Jesus' beautiful news of the Fathers' love (to evangelise)?  What if there is some measure of love, some measure of the Father's image,  hidden in every person, burried under all that other junk, like hurt, shame and rejection?  What if real evangelism is like going on a treasure hunt, seeking that measure of love in someone, and calling it forth with the love that I receive from Father?  What if any other agenda (like winning souls for Christ etc.) is only doing injustice to the pure motive of love building up love?

"The true lover always believes that love is present; precisely in this way he builds up.  In this way he only entices forth the good; he 'loves up' love; he builds up what is already there.  For love can and will be treated in only one way - by being loved forth."       -Kierkegaard-

One II

What if every one of us is really made in the image of God?  What if His DNA is flowing through every person?  What if we have never left oneness with our creator?  What if the problem of humanity is not that God, because of our sin, is distant from us, but that our sense of shame and focus on our selves has convinced us of this lie (I have to hide; I'm not good enough, not worthy)?  What if this perceived distance is what kills us spiritually, unplugging us from the source of life?  What if Jesus' message is that of the loving Father who just wants to share everything with us, and not that of the untouchable, highly exalted king, way up there on the throne, somewhere in heaven, wherever that is...?  What if Jesus' life-giving spirit is awakening/bringing back to life our spirit, dealing with our shame, and opening our eyes to the truth that we're one with the one who created us to be one with Him (not seperate; not up there and down here; not servant and king; not big God and little human)?  What if so many of our 'worship songs' are full with lies about God being distant?

The last days

What if most of the prophecies in the bible have already been fulfilled?  What if all of them have already been fulfilled?  What if 'the last days' the NT authors wrote about were really as close as they thought them to be?  What if all the things predicted by Jesus in the 'Mount Olivet Discourse' (Mat.24) were really, as he himself said, to be witnessed by the generation of his day?  What if the book of Revelation really contains pictures of things which, back then, were shortly to come to pass (Rev.1)? 
What if 'the last days' (and the end of the world/age) refer to the last days of the old covenant between God and Israel?  What if the king has already delivered up the kingdom to God, and now there is a new covenant: God being father of all, God being all in all? (1Cor.15)

Completely comfortable

What if God, my creator, the one that gave me life, really thoroughly enjoyed hanging out with me?...right now, just the way that I am this minute?
What if there is nothing He'd rather do and what if He'd be completely comfortable with me, even though I see myself as still lacking?  What if He'd be completely comfortable with me, without having to change or wash me first?
Would really knowing that make me sin more or less?  Would there still be room for sin?  What really is sin in light of all this?

The Good News

What if the Good News (the gospel) is not: "Repent, become a Christian, then your sins will be forgiven and you'll get a ticket to (assurance of) heaven."?
But: "Don't be afraid.  Your sins are forgiven.  Your Father loves you.  You don't have to try to manage your shame anymore, it's been dealt with.  Come now from death into life."?
What if differentiating between 'christian' and 'non-christian' is just putting people into a box again, playing a stupid 'us vs. them' game, that is keeping people from experiencing the Father's love?  What if that's not God's heart at all?
What if He really is the Father of all who with outstretched arms is running towards all of us?
What if His outstretched arms even reach into the place of the dead (Hades/Sheol), to which, by the way, Jesus is supposed to hold the keys?

Judgement

What if it is just not true that people have to make a decision for Jesus before they physically die here on earth, otherwise they are faced with eternal damnation?  What if the sentence in Hebrews "...it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment,..." doesn't mean that at all?
What if judgement (krisis in the greek) is actually a good thing?  What if this judgement, this crisis, actually will bring many, many people to their knees and ultimately into the arms of their loving father?