My problem with "My Jesus"

Jesus is a lot more than the God-made-man and the Redeemer for most of His followers. By taking a human form, Jesus encourages us to have a personal relationship with Him - something we don't quite able to do with God the Father or the Holy Spirit. "My Jesus" is a term we are very much comfortable with especially in times of sorrows and troubles. Having an understanding that Jesus is with us in our sufferings and sorrows help us to cope with it better. 

With so much goodness to offer, the personification of Jesus has also caused so much trouble to many of the followers. It is easy for "my Jesus" to turn into a trap, a false comfort zone and excuse for those who fail to deal with rejection, for those who want to impose their beliefs on others, and for those who judge others only to wash their hands later. Having a Jesus of my own can also create a feeling of self-righteousness, a feeling of moral superiority and spiritual pride. Such an attitude can lead us to judge everybody around us to be morally wrong and spiritually inferior. Atrocities against humanity in the name of Jesus Christ such as the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades were, for the most part, results of people compartmentalizing Jesus, by picking and choosing a Jesus useful to meet their ends.  

As individuals, we often hold in our hearts a certain kind of pride, a certain arrogance for having a personal Jesus. We look up to this personal Jesus in times of rejection, sorrow and need. Surprisingly this personal Jesus that we look up to is hardly ever the Jesus on the Cross. We like to look up to a Jesus who was a celebrity with thousands following Him wherever He went; a Jesus who multiplied bread; a Jesus who healed the sick and the suffering; a Jesus who rode into Jerusalem like a king. We hardly ever allow "my Jesus" to be the one who practiced, "Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you" (Matthew 5:44); the one who asked us to sell everything we have and follow Him (Mark 10:21); the one who said, "Neither do I condemn you" (John 8:11); the one who resisted, "He saved others, let him save himself..." (Luke 23:35).

Jesus Christ provides a firm basis for respecting people regardless of their behavior towards us. "My Jesus" is not so private after all, it shouldn't be about satisfying our selfishness or imposing our beliefs on others, it needs to be about having a medium to mend our differences and to fend off greed. It should be a humbling experience to know that the Creator of this universe has allowed us, the fallen, to call Him "mine". "My Jesus" is God who came to forgive transgressions and save us through His life and death. He told us to repent and transform, not to boast and judge. Having "my Jesus" does not allow anybody to morally outperform anybody else; "my Jesus" is for those who admit their failures and acknowledge their need for the Savior. 

(This is a re-post. From time to time, I will be re-posting some of my older articles - from a time when I had three readers. I know one of them was my wife. Of the other two, one of them could be me myself since I was still learning the intricacies of Blogger and didn't know how to turn off tracking my own page views at the time.)