Jesus quite clearly believed in change. In fact, the first public word out of his mouth was the ancient Greek imperative verb metanoeite, which literally translates as “change your mind”. How a forgotten reality can change everything we see, hope for, and believe is a core message of The Universal Christ. Yes this is a simple concept of change is so difficult for most of us to embrace. We are creatures of habit who develop powerful patterns of thought and behavior. On a psychological level, our brain cells form neural pathways that grow stronger every time they are used. The more often we repeat a thought or action, the more normalized and embedded it becomes. It’s no wonder that Jesus’s opening statement in the Gospel’s is “change your mind.” The more attracted we are to our perspective, the more difficult any change will be.
“Resurrection and renewal are, in fact, the universal and observable pattern of everything” and reassures us that “the Beloved protects us into and through death, just as the Beloved did with Jesus.” But simply knowing that we are protected “into and through death” doesn’t remove the loss that change inevitably brings. The author Mike McHargue writes about how change connects us to this “pattern of everything”:
“One day I will die, and in time my atoms will go back to giving life to something else. Much farther along the arrow of time, our own sun will explode and spread its essence across the sky. Our sun’s dust will meet with other stars remnants and form new stars and planets of their own. The universe itself exists in an eternal pattern of life, death, and resurrection. “
From the changing of the seasons to the graying of our thinning hair, change is everywhere around us. Our bodies grow rapidly throughout our childhood and then complete an overhaul, renewing most cells in our bodies every seven to ten years. If your muscles are not challenged, within a matter of weeks they will atrophy; if our relationships are not deepening, we will eventually grow apart. Every day we have the opportunity to avoid and ignore change or to embrace it and all the possibilities it can bring.
