How could Jesus be the Answer?

How could Jesus be the Answer?

After all, life is complicated. People are intertwined and connected in very sophisticated ways, and many problems that used to resolve on their own now simply multiply and grow bigger... How can Jesus be the answer? Is this merely an assertion by Christians?

Time marches on for us, and our lives are pretty short in the scheme of things. This human experience is easily understood historically by looking at politics, economics, or demographics. For many people, this is enough, and they feel “reality” is understood. But I believe we all know that there is more to life than these artificial categories of numbers and events. Just as there is a spiritual dimension to our everyday life, so there is (by necessity) as spiritual dimension to human history. It is easy to try to confine spiritual things to the realm of religion, and satisfy another “facts and figures” category. However, there are certain spiritual things that just won't fit. One of these is the phenomenon of God's revelation to us in the Bible.

Far from being an abstract muse from ancient forests, or a religious justification for previous wars, or the product of isolated groups of self-promoting clergy, the Bible emerges above human experience as something truly authored and inspired from somewhere else.

The amazing shock is how God has revealed Himself in and through history. The Bible makes it clear that God has been working all along, and remains working today to bring about the consequences of faith and doubt among us. Another amazing fact is that God spoke through people like us to bring us His message; people in circumstances often far worse than ours.

And to what does the Bible direct us? It directs us to faith in one individual, one person, the divine Son of God Jesus Christ. Christ is anticipated first and in later writings celebrated as the crux of human history. His preeminence is inescapable in the pages of God's revelation.

To deny this reality is to dive off the deep end of skepticism, and in spite of all probability to remain there. Detractors will always find excuses and temporarily convincing lines of reason. And yet the Bible exists as it is, and it says what it does, with no apology needed. God's Word points us far above the circumstances of our current despair, to salvation from God, freely available by grace through faith. If we would only read and believe.

Whatever you may be facing, ultimately Jesus is the answer.

Happy b/c of Jesus

Pastor James

Life of Jesus, as if we were college students

How about some talking points?  This list of facts follows the introductory section of a very well-used introductory religion textbook.  My observation here is that it is reported that very many "professing Christians" don't even accept these points as working presuppositions. So here you go- wrestle with this. 

The Life of Jesus

• Born between 4 and 1 BCE in the Judean city of Bethlehem.
• Spent his youth in the Galilean village of Nazareth.
• When he was 30 he went south to the Judean wilderness, where he was baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan river.
• John the Baptist appears like an OT prophet in the NT.
• John the Baptist was apocalyptic, warning people of God's imminent judgment.
• John the Baptist called on sinners to repent
• John the Baptist called on them to be Baptized in water as a sign of spiritual cleansing.
• Jesus' preaching agreed with the preaching of John the Baptist, as did much preaching of the early church.
• During his 3 year ministry that followed, Jesus was more or less an itinerant preacher who travelled around with a group of disciples, or students.
• Jesus spoke with authority on the OT scriptures.
• He said the KOG was coming so people should repent, or be sorrowful and willing to change from their sins.
• He said there would be a new era of peace and holiness.
• Jesus companions and followers grew as he travelled.
• These included women, who are prominent in the gospel.
• Jesus was friends with women
• Jesus ate with women in public and in private
• Jesus' women followers stayed with him even in his final days when others abandoned him
• Jesus was on the “cutting edge” rejecting social norms of the day
• Jesus became very popular.
• This caused opposition and resentment from the clergy guild and the religious establishment of his day.
• Jesus seems to have know about this, and that dark days were coming for him and his followers.
• He warned his disciples that rejection, suffering, and death awaited him there.
• Jesus travelled to Jerusalem and arrived just before Passover.
• The gospels described a triumphal entry in where Jesus was greeted.
• Jesus entered Herod's Temple, and “cleansed” the temple by driving out those who had businesses there. This caused a problem.
• Jesus taught in the temple for several days, and then the authorities planned against him.
• Within hours after celebrating a “Last Supper” with his disciples, Jesus was brought before a council of Jewish leaders.
• He was accused of blasphemy
• He was handed over to the Romans
• Pilate thought Jesus was a public threat,
• He ordered Jesus execution.
• Jesus was crucified (hung on a cross) on a Friday, just hours before Passover began and less than a week after he had entered Jerusalem.
• So there is a rough historical outline.
• Matthew and Luke assert that Mary was a virgin.
• All 4 gospels say the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus at his Baptism.
  • In Mat, Mark, Luke a theophonic voice is heard, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” So the gospels link Jesus to King David who was described as God's anointed and son.
  • Jesus is also ID'd as the servant of God who would suffer for the sake of humanity.
    So Jesus was understood by Christians, through an interpretation of certain OT scriptures, to be the Son of God who filled with Spirit of God would suffer for the sins of others.
    All Four gospels say that some of the women who followed Jesus found his tomb empty at dawn on the Sunday following his crucifixion.
  • Some post-resurrection appearances are recorded in some Gospels.
  • When Jesus appeared, his followers remembered how he had predicted the whole thing.
  • In Acts, Jesus stayed 40 days after his resurrection.
  • Jesus sent his disciples out as apostles “one who is sent out”
  • They were to preach to the Ancient Palestinian Jews and the Jews in the diaspora.
  • Jesus then ascended into heaven, bodily, in plain site. A miracle story-
  • As the disciples celebrated the Jewish holiday Pentecost the Holy Spirit descended on them just as had happened to Jesus at his Baptism.
  • Jesus' followers had power, and so the message about him spread.
• The early Christians were mostly practicing Jews. Christianity was originally a Jewish sect, preaching to Jews.

After his crucifixion by the Roman rulers of Judea (in modern Israel), Jesus’ followers proclaimed his resurrection and identity as God’s messiah.

• As the Book of Acts goes on, we see early Christianity open up to Gentiles or non-Jews.
• Some NT books seem to be written for a Gentile audience, and not primarily Jews.
  
  
  
  

Did Jesus Google the Passion?

"Is it reasonable to think that Jesus could have predicted the details of his passion only if he read about them somewhere?  This is not to question the applicability of some of the OT allusions to him; it is rather to question the historical reductionism of some Gospel research."

- D. A. Carson, "Matthew" in The Expositor's Bible Commentary, p. 376, 1984