For reasons that I won’t go into now, not that long ago I suffered a crisis of faith. I don’t say those words lightly. There is absolutely nothing clichéd about them. Not when they come from my heart to yours.
To state it simply: I DESPERATELY need to rediscover who Jesus was, who Jesus is.
So, with a close group of friends surrounding me (lovingly known as my Safe Haven family), I embarked on what has proven to be an incredible journey of discovery of the Jesus of the Bible — beginning with His birth (to last week where, ironically, Jesus tenderly and lovingly restored John the Baptizer’s faith after he suffered a faith-crisis of his own).
What we have been discovering is that the Jesus of the New Testament is nothing like the Jesus that I thought I knew. The portrait painted of Jesus in the Bible is nothing like the depictions of Jesus I had heard for so many years in church or Sunday school.
Most importantly, the Jesus of the Scriptures is nothing like the distortions of Jesus that are too often demonstrated to the world through the lives of so many of His so-called followers.
The fruit of this study? My faith has literally come roaring back. My love for Jesus is sweeter, deeper, richer than it has been in years.
So I humbly invite you to join the journey with us. Every message (to date, 80 of them) is recorded and posted online. You can jump in anywhere (though I’d recommend starting at the beginning). You can travel this trail at your own pace. I simply ask that like me, you come without any preconceived ideas of whom you think Jesus is. Together, we’ll let the Gospel writers paint the portrait for us.
HERE’S THE LINK to the entire (and growing by the week!) archive of every study, free downloads each.
And if iTunes is your thing, HERE’S THE LINK to that too.
I would LOVE to have you join this incredible journey with us, and maybe — just maybe — fall deeper in love with Him too.
Dewey Bertolini 