1.3 Remember Rabbit Ears?

Listen to this segment of the blog:

This blog was born out of two deaths in 2021: my three-year-old granddaughter, Millie, and my faith. It is a travelogue of my second journey in search of meaning. Its primary intended audience is – me. You see, only as I write do I get a good glimpse of what I think, and only as I review it in black and white do I understand what I believe. That is my goal: to come face-to-face with what I genuinely think. My secondary goal is to leave a record of this exploration for my grandchildren and their children, hoping it may benefit them one day. It is not my intention to offend or convince but to merely think out loud. I hope it will be of some help to you.

As a catalyst for my thinking, I engaged John's account of his friend Jesus. I read it as one would “a Rorschach reading or inkblot interpretation,” as Crossan warned against, “which is when an ancient text means whatever your modern mind decides it means.” For this exercise, I trusted myself to interpret.

In the previous segment, we looked at life and how it’s connected physically to our original ancestors and spiritually to our creator. We explored how this life force contains intelligence and energy to enlighten our consciousness, enliven our bodies, and illuminate others. This light brings into view injustices that we could not see previously and, when acted upon, can change the consciousness of a whole generation.

Today, we will examine how we can “see without seeing,” “hear without hearing,” and see and hear without “receiving.” Beware, there are fresh insights ahead.

JOHN CHAPTER 1 

10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.

Back before there was streaming video, cable TV, or rooftop antennas, we had antennas on top of our television sets called "rabbit ears.”

The trick to Rabbit Ears was to adjust them for each channel. If not, your picture was fuzzy or just video snow. Each channel had a particular frequency, and the antenna had a unique position. The adjustment process often took two people – one to change the position of the antenna and another to say, "No, no, no, back to the left," then, "Now, back to the right a little," and finally, "right there, that's just right.” Sometimes, aluminum foil would be on the tips of the antenna to improve its reception. 

In the verses above, John is not criticizing the world or “his own” for not recognizing Jesus but teaching a lesson on “knowing” or recognition. We think of seeing and recognizing as the same thing, but they're not. Recognition is a matter of adjusting the rabbit ears of your consciousness. Contrary to the famous saying, seeing is not necessarily believing. Even when we see things with our eyes, we may not recognize what they are. We can’t recognize what is outside the boundaries of our current consciousness. 

This should not seem strange to us. Science tells us there are things we cannot see right before our eyes. I noticed the limited range of human vision and hearing in the chart above. “Even if our eyesight is 20/20 and we have normal color vision, the range of electromagnetic radiation we can see is limited to a tiny portion of the full spectrum.” - from the website All the Light We Cannot See. There are frequencies we can't tune in, therefore, things our eyes cannot see, and things our eyes can see but our consciousness cannot recognize. We cannot accept or receive if we cannot see clearly or recognize. Such was the situation with John's people. 

However, there is hope because we can widen our bandwidth, adjust our antennas, and focus our consciousness over time. If we don’t see it, it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, only that we don't see it yet. As we get better at the adjustment process, we will grasp how things exist before we become conscious of them and long before we see them. For example, the flower already exists within the seed. We can visualize the flower in our imagination, plant the seed, and soon see the flower with our eyes. It's just a matter of time. 

Along that same line, here are two sobering thoughts: 

When I was younger, it dawned on me that I was not only someone's great-great-grandson but also someone's great-great-grandfather. The only missing element in this is time.

Also, what we want to see exist must come through our consciousness first. It is the method by which we create our reality.

This is where the concept of visualizing goals and manifesting reality comes from.

More on these later, but remember that consciousness is on the spiritual level; time is on the physical level. John's lesson for his people and us is that we must grow our consciousness to see, recognize, and accept/receive more. How do we do that? Through contemplation. We must begin to see future reality in our Imagination first and then in our lives as time unfolds. This practice is the biblical definition of faith. Noah, Abraham, and Jesus did it, and we can, too. Watch what John says below.

12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

John was writing in the cultural context of his time when many had been anticipating the arrival of a Messiah. They had been adjusting their antennas for years, sharpening their focus, and eagerly imagining his appearance. When the time came, they recognized what they had been expecting - and received him. In doing so, they were given the potential to live their daily lives as children of, or “in the nature and image of,” God.

Understanding the concept of being a child of God in our cultural context can be challenging. For some, it may even trigger feelings of blasphemy and idolatry. Growing up, I was taught that I was an unworthy sinner and my only hope was to be a mere addendum to the righteousness of Jesus. However, upon closer examination of John's story, I realized there is another way to look at it. Suppose I step away from my religious upbringing and expand my perspective to see that God is the creator and sustainer of everything in the universe, including me. In that case, it becomes easier to grasp that His life force motivates me, and I am, in fact, a child of God. Genesis 1:27: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

These two verses are as full as a big boy after the buffet. There is so much in them that we must ensure we understand.

Let's start with what it means to “receive him” by looking at what it means to receive a new child into our family.

It means they become a part of our experience and life, intertwined with us, their ways influencing our ways.

Some of John's people recognized Jesus as enlivened by God and received him, his teachings, and his ways into their lives. Later in John’s revelation, Jesus says, “Behold I stand at the door and knock." 

Let's dive deeper into the meaning of "believing in his name." John urges his followers to open their minds to the possibility that Jesus embodies divine intelligence, the "light" that guides them. Jesus' thoughts, words, and actions mirror those of the universe's creator. He is the blueprint being brought to life before their eyes, powered by the same energy that drives the cosmos and causes the tree to grow and the flower to bloom. To believe in his name means to embrace this truth, just as his followers did. However, this requires contemplation, which causes the consciousness to expand and allows us to see not only who he really is but who we really are, designed to believe and act in a new way. 

We have already explored the meaning of the "power to become children of God,” but we must look deeper before leaving the subject. John didn’t say the knowledge or the desire to become, but the power to become. Becoming is a matter of consciousness unfolding into actions that require power or energy. As we begin to act out of our new and expanded consciousness, we will find that we have the energy to accomplish it. We now have the power to "turn the other cheek" and "love our neighbor as ourselves." We will find ourselves operating like God would, just like his offspring. Haven't you heard someone say that a child walks, talks, or acts "just like his father?”  

Let’s get metaphysical. Our words and actions will always reveal our consciousness. Our words and actions are the offspring of our consciousness. Put another way, our consciousness is the father of our actions.

This is also where I began to sense the divide between John's teaching and the message of the church of my youth. John teaches us to believe, act, and become. The contemporary message is much more marketable: believe, join, and go to heaven, almost as if one can be a believer without being a disciple. But I must ask myself, “Which message leads to behavior similar to the fathers’?”

What about repentance and forgiveness? These were necessary for the religious "sin and sacrifice" (clean/unclean) culture of John’s time. To repent means to change your thinking or the way you think about thinking. That’s what John is encouraging his people to do here. Jesus never taught, “Do this, and you will be forgiven.” His message was, “You are forgiven; now go do this.”  

In practical terms, John is asking us to consider that the creator of the universe has a plan for its unfolding, and Jesus embodied this plan in his teaching and actions. This plan has always included you and me. By contemplating this daily, we will bring the vision of our future life into more precise focus. Acting out of this new consciousness, we will discover the energy to take action to turn this vision into reality while developing a character akin to Jesus and our creator. The ancient writers called it "growing in grace and truth."

Seem impossible? Psychologist Ellen J. Langer cites the story of Rocky Balboa, a small-time boxer who becomes a world champion, as one of the countless examples of the possibility of significant change in our culture. Langer says, “They are the subjects of many of our favorite stories. But as much as we believe in stories of transformation we tend not to believe that transformation is for us.”

Key Takeaways

Spending time in solitude will allow your consciousness to expand and your imagination to bring your future into more precise focus.

Just as the stars follow a path throughout the universe, there is a path for each of us that will bring our gifts and talents to fruition, enhance the lives of others, and produce a life of peace and joy.

Next, we will explore what John meant by saying, "The word became flesh.”