I’m what you might call an “eclectic Christian.” I take a little bit from here, a little bit from there, and kind of mush it together into a belief system that makes sense to me. Having read the entire Bible, a chapter a day, I figured I’d continue my reading by exploring the books which the Council of Carthage didn't include in the canonical Bible.
I began by reading The Apocrypha, which is a collection of stories about the Jews of The Old Testament. That was fine. I found a series of tales chronicling a chosen people overcoming adversity through faith. It’s some pretty inspiring stuff.
Once I finished The Apocrypha, I moved on to the Forbidden Books of the Original New Testament, by William Wake. The idea of angels tutoring Mary, as a child, to prepare to be the mother of Jesus was new to me, but it made a certain kind of sense. I could even buy the idea of Mary healing people with Jesus’ bath water. Then I got to tales of Jesus’ early years.
The first Gospel of the INFANCY of JESUS CHRIST Chapter 19: 22-24 ~ "22 Another time, when the Lord Jesus was coming home in the evening with Joseph, he met a boy, who ran so hard against him, that he threw him down; 23 To whom the Lord Jesus said, As thou hast thrown me down, so shalt thou fall, nor ever rise. 24 And that moment the boy fell down and died."
Essentially, Jesus killed a kid for being mean to him. Another story has a boy hitting Jesus, so Jesus retaliates by making the boy’s body to wither into a corpse. These stories depict the power of Jesus, but dismiss the mercy and forgiveness of Jesus.
I don't think we worship Jesus merely because he’s powerful. We worship Jesus because he's part of a loving compassionate God. Power without compassion can be a human failing, but hardly describes the Christian God that I know.
Bottom line, not all books professing to be about Jesus are about the Jesus Christ which Christians have a personal relationship with.
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