Jesus + nothing

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been writing out something of a treatise on why and how my views on complementarian doctrine have shifted over the last 5-10 years. The hope was to answer the questions I’ve been getting more and more often lately—“Why have you changed your mind?” or “Why does this matter to you?”—because I really do appreciate being asked. Too often, instead of approaching one another with curiosity and care, we choose instead to fill in the blanks with our own assumptions, or apply slippery-slope logic: If you’re not a complementarian anymore, where will your obvious disregard for Scripture take you next?

For now, the treatise is resting and waiting for its time.

Today I just want to set my eyes on Jesus.

Jesus—the Master of the chaos. The storm-winds and wild waves obey His voice. When my gaze is fixed on Him, there is nothing I fear.

I don’t fear those who question my integrity.

I don’t fear those who fear the questions I ask.

I don’t fear those who believe that it’s their moral duty to keep the truth controlled and contained.

And I don’t fear that I will end up lost in some blasphemous new belief system, because my eyes are on Jesus and my heart is filled with His Spirit and God the Father surrounds me with His protective embrace. I know that Yahweh has given me a profound delight in His Word, and I have arrived at my conclusions from it and with it, not working against it or around it.

I’m just a person, thinking, and following Jesus wherever He goes—which sometimes means following Him outside the camp.

Sometimes I wonder if we have lost Jesus the same way the Pharisees lost the plot: by shrouding Him in extra guidelines and burdens, binding His hands and feet with our pet rules and statements of faith, and forgetting that our light and our salvation is Christ alone. It’s Jesus + nothing else, not Jesus + complementarianism. Not Jesus + Paul. Not Jesus + my own good behavior.

Jesus.

Plus nothing.