Paul Poulton on realising who Jesus is and the normal things he would of done in his life on earth.

Paul Poulton

I don't usually pray last thing at night, because I've noticed that my thoughts can get slightly skewed. If your body wants to take you to the land of Nod then it's probably best to let it. If I pray, while at the same time, trying hard to keep tiredness at bay my prayers don't usually go well. I pray for my friend Ivan: "Lord please be with (yawn) er, thingy, you know who I mean, er (and then it comes out) you know the terrible guy. No! I'm sorry, I just mean Ivan, not Ivan the Terrible. That was wrong of me. He's not terrible at all, he's a nice man."

So, to avoid praying for Wallace and Gromit, I say all my prayers earlier in the day, which usually works fine. But that does not mean we lose contact with God during the night, he never slumbers or sleeps. The Bible lets us know that even at night our hearts can be touched by God. Perhaps God can sometimes speak to us more effectively when our rational thought is safely out of the way- straight and direct to our inner being. When our physical senses are at rest and our minds are free from the distracting cares of the world, and wholly at leisure to receive a divine impression laid upon our hearts by stirring dreams.

A few months ago I had a dream where I was travelling as a passenger in a car along a coastal road; the objective of our journey was to see Jesus. I asked the driver and the others in the car if they'd travelled this route before and knew where we were heading. "Yeah, I think I have been this way before" someone said, "and I'm pretty sure that this is the right road."

Shortly after this exchange we stopped and got out of the car. Immediately, I saw a green hillside with some people at the top, and I could just make out Jesus among them. I quickly made my way up the ascent and when I arrived at the top I noticed that Jesus was wearing sunglasses. "Why is Jesus wearing sunglasses?" I asked a bystander. "Because the sun's bright," came the reply.

Then Jesus, with some warmth, invited us into a largish size room. Once we were assembled in there he removed his sunglasses and looked at us all. He then raised his voice a little to someone in another room, that I presumed was the kitchen, saying "there's room for another nineteen people." I quickly looked around and saw that there were thirty-one people, including me, already assembled. So I said to the person next to me, "Oh I see, Jesus likes groups of fifty. Do you remember when he directed the people to sit in groups of fifty or a hundred when he fed the five thousand?"

I woke up. But the feeling of seeing Jesus stayed with me. I didn't ask myself any rational questions like "How did I know which person was Jesus?" I, somehow, instinctively knew. As I went about my business that particular day, I walked with the impression that Jesus was with me. The real Jesus, the practical Jesus, the hospitable Jesus.

Christ's tenure on earth lasted roughly thirty-three years, and during that time he drank from cups, ate from bowls, greeted people who were strangers to him, asked questions that he didn't know the answer to unless someone told him. He did the normal human things that you and I do, having love as his basic directive. He also performed supernatural acts and that's where we can lose our vision of Christ.

We put Jesus in a supernatural box and fail to see the pragmatic, factual, functional Jesus. Of course he did supernatural feats: his father was supernatural. However, Jesus performed far more natural acts than supernatural acts; his mother was Mary - a normal human being.

Would Jesus wear sunglasses if he walked on the earth in 2019? Well, if it was sunny, then yes he probably would, however, if you see him and he isn't wearing sunglasses that would be most likely because he gave them away to someone who needed them.

Later in the evening I went for a run in the woods. The sun was golden and beginning its descent towards the horizon. I was by myself on a long straight path with pine trees either side when I saw a man in the distance walking towards me, he wore knee length shorts, a tee shirt, he had a thick mop of black hair and he was wearing sunglasses. As we got closer to each other I looked at his sunglasses and thought "Those are the same sun glasses that I saw Jesus wearing in my dream last night." I carried on running and turned and looked back at the man.