Imagine what it would be like if you were never, ever able to wake from your nightmares. Like being tumbled under the waves and never able to find the surface again. That there is a reality for us to wake to is a gift beyond words.

Whether or not we choose to face that reality is quite up to us.

Truth or reality is avoided when it is painful. We can revise our maps only when we have the discipline to overcome that pain. To have such discipline, we must be totally dedicated to truth. That is to say we must always hold truth, as best we can determine it, to be more important, more vital to our self-interest, than our comfort. Conversely, we must always consider our personal discomfort relatively unimportant and, indeed, even welcome it in the service of the search for truth. Mental health is an ongoing process of dedication to reality at all costs. (M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled)

Thus the startling, disruptive, sometimes brutal honesty of Jesus. The world is stone drunk, and raging at Jesus because he’s trying to keep us from taking the car. Who is being unreasonable?

The spirit of our day is a soft acceptance of everything — except deep conviction in anything. This is where Jesus will suddenly confront the world as a great rock confronts the river flowing ever downhill. He is immovable. The cry used to be for “tolerance,” by which we meant, “We have very strong differences, but we will not let those be the cause of hatred or violence between us.” Now it is something else, where all convictions are softened to second or third place while we all agree to enjoy the world as much as we can. But truth is not like conviction. Conviction might be a matter of personal opinion, but truth is like a great mountain, solid and immovable whether we like it or even acknowledge it. Christianity is not a set of convictions — it is a truth. The most offensive thing imaginable.

Want more? Order your copy of Beautiful Outlaw today