Miracles finished

Well, as I mentioned previously, I’ve been reading Jeffrey John’s The Meaning in the Miracles, and now I’ve finished :-)

Generally, it’s an excellent book, with some very good insights into what is going on in the way the Gospels are put together. The closing of the book summarises much of the content.

The Gospels present [Jesus] as one of the most gloriously free, unprejudiced, uninhibited – and therefore attractive – individuals who ever walked the earth. The Churches are very far from modelling the same attitudes. That is partly because many parts of the Church prefer to dispense law, not grace. They have not grasped that conversion is a lifelong process; they expect it to be instantly completed at the start of the Christian life. Christian standards of morality (usually interpreted very narrowly as conventional respectability, and all too often only in terms of sex) are presented as entrance qualifications, rather than as goals to which all are aiming but many have not yet reached…The Church is not a sanctuary for the perfected – or those who imagine themselves so to be. It is a free hospital for wounded and joyful sinners who are in the process of being healed. When it finds the humility to see itself that way, it will instantly become infinitely more attractive, as Christ was attractive – by drawing to him all those on the outside who feel ‘unqualified’ to come in.