When people say Jesus Christ is coming again do not believe them, for Jesus Christ never left you - FB meme

 Found on FB:

Transcript:

When people say Jesus Christ is coming again do not believe them, for Jesus Christ never left you. Did he not say, "Lo, I AM with you always, even to the end of the age?" Then how can you look for him to return? Scripture states that Christ was taken up into the kingdom of heaven (which is within) and that he will come in the same manner as he was taken up. If Christ (God's creative power) is in you, he cannot come from without. Although he seems to be invisible, Christ has never left you, as you cannot detach yourself from imagination.

This is a "new-agey" interpretation of the return of Jesus. We say this because there are people who kinda don't like what the Bible says, so they want to reinterpret it to suit their own ideas, while simultaneously retaining a superficial connection to the faith. 

These are truth claims. Truth claims require source information. If one claims the truth, one must document it objectively. It is one thing to claim a personal truth, but it is entirely another to expect someone else to embrace it. Once a personal truth contains an imperative (you must believe this truth also), then it no longer is personal truth. It becomes objective truth requiring an objective source.

So they set out to tell what the Bible actually means. You've had it wrong all this time, and they have some truth to tell you.  

The Meme

Is it true that Christ never left us? Yes. Does that mean He did not leave? No. We find it interesting that the hyper-spiritual new ager has difficulty with the spiritual vs. the physical. Which is the simple thing that negates the entire meme. Jesus physically left but is spiritually present in His people. Which means when He says He will return physically He is telling us the truth. 

Spiritually, Jesus never left:

Mt. 28:20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.

Jn. 14:18-20 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Before long, the world will not see me any more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.

Jesus left physically:

Jn. 16:7 But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.

Jn. 14:2 In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

The point of the meme, however, is a bit more insidious. Notice that I AM is capitalized. That is not because Jesus is the I AM, it is we who are I AM. Jesus is an idea, not a person. We are Jesus in the sense that our spiritual awakening joins us to the divine. That is, we become aware of our spiritual linking to the creative, which has always been with us because it is us. We are the universe and the universe is us in a seamless interconnection of existence. This means that Jesus is indistinguishable from us. Thus I AM is I.

This is what the cryptic statement you cannot detach yourself from imagination means. It seems like a nonsense statement, but is perfectly consistent with the true intent of the meme. You are the I AM and you create via your imagination. All you need to do align with that power which is already within you.

As we continue reading we find the meme is again partly correct, that Jesus will come in the same manner as he was taken up. The meme drops this train of thought, however, and moves back to asserting He never left. But He did leave, as the meme acknowledges. So in what manner did He leave?

Ac. 1:9 -11 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. 10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. 11 “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

He physically departed and eventually was hidden by the clouds. The angels tell the men standing there what happened and what will happen, a fact left out by the meme. They say that Jesus was "taken from" them. He was taken "into heaven." He will "come back in the same way." So we should simply reverse the order of events. He will descend, hidden the clouds at first:

Re. 1:7 Look, he is coming with the clouds...

...and become visible to everyone: 

...and every eye will see him...

The new-ager likes the idea of the spiritual indwelling, but not the physical return. If Jesus is already present, perhaps one of a thousand spirit-guides available to the enlightened ones, then the triumphant return of the Alpha and Omega (Re. 1:7) needs to be tamped down and negated. Thus the indwelling life giving Spirit of God becomes little more than a cuddly puppy.