So I saw Talladega Nights on the tube the other night. I like Will Ferrel (in tee-iny doses) and this was one of his funnier ones imo. That’s not so much the point of this post though. At one point his character Ricky Bobby (a spot on parody of a Nascar driver) was saying grace with his smokin’ hot wife and his sons Walker and Texas Ranger and this is what he said:

Dear Lord baby Jesus, lyin’ there in your ghost manger, just lookin’ at your Baby Einstein developmental videos, learnin’ ’bout shapes and colors. I would like to thank you for bringin’ me and my mama together, and also that my kids no longer sound like retarded gang-bangers.

and

Dear Eight Pound, Six Ounce, Newborn Baby Jesus, don’t even know a word yet, just a little infant, so cuddly, but still omnipotent. We’d just like to thank you for all the races I’ve won and the $21.2 million, LOVE THAT MONEY! That I have accrued over this past season. Also due to a binding endorsement contract that stipulates I mention PowerAde at each grace, I just wanna say that PowerAde is delicious and it cools you off on a hot summer day and we look forward to PowerAde’s release of mystic mountain blueberry. Thank you, for all your power and your grace, Dear Baby God, Amen

This goes on for a bit and his wife finally points out that Jesus grew up. To which Ricky says that he likes the Baby Jesus best. That leads to some equally funny lines from his partner Cal about how he envisions Jesus and of course by this point you should probably just rent the movie if you even cracked a smile. Anyway, not the point.

The point of this post is I think that we all are guilty of picking the Jesus we like. Heck even those who may not be Christians have their own way of thinking about Jesus, “Oh he was a really good man.” or “Jesus was a great moral teacher.”. The last one just gets me in a funny place because he was actually teaching things that ran somewhat contrary to the moral teachings of his day.

There are those Christians that have painted Jesus as some sort of Modern Macho Man. Then there’s the sheep carrying, soft blue eyed girly Jesus. I’ve even seen a sort of Black Power Jesus. He may have had a kung fu grip, I’m not sure.

All of these different aspects ignore the whole picture of Jesus as a man, as God, as the union of the two that is perhaps the greatest mystery of Christianity. Sadly, part of that is because not even the gospels give us the whole picture of Jesus as a man. That’s because that’s not the point of the gospels anyway, but it would have been nice.

In spite of the fact that we don’t have a more complete picture though, I would encourage you not to cherry pick your particular Jesus icon. Jesus was (and is) incredibly complex and he was many things; teacher, carpenter, son, the God-man, butt-kicker, lover of all mankind. This month as we celebrate one tiny aspect of the person of the Christ, remember that no matter how well you think you understand him and who he was or was not don’t stop seeking him.