The Jewish Carpenter
Who is this guy? Some say merely a great human teacher. But is that really possible?
C. S. Lewis:
Here's the real shock: Among the Jews there suddenly turns up a man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the end of time. What this man said was, quite simply, the most shocking thing that has ever been uttered by human lips.
One part of the claim tends to slip past us unnoticed because we have heard it so often that we no longer see what it amounts to. I mean the claim to forgive sins: any sins. Now unless the speaker is God, this is really so preposterous as to be comic. We can all understand how a man forgives offenses against himself. You tread on my toe and I forgive you, you steal my money and I forgive you. But what should we make of a man, himself unrobbed and untrodden, who announced that he forgave you for treading on other men's toes and stealing other men's money? Asinine fatuity is the kindest description we should give of his conduct. Yet this is what Jesus did. He told people that their sins were forgiven, and never waited to consult all the other people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured. He unhesitatingly behaved as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person chiefly offended in all offences. This makes sense only if He really was the God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin. In the mouth of any speaker who is not God, these words would imply what I can only regard as a silliness and conceit unrivalled by any other character in history.
"Lord, Liar or Lunatic?"
Yet (and this is the strange significant thing) even His enemies, when they read the Gospels, do not get the impression of silliness and conceit. Still less to unprejudiced readers. Christ says that He is "humble and meek" and we believe Him; not noticing that, if He were merely a man, humility and meekness are the very last characteristics we could attribute to some of His sayings.
I am trying here to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: 'I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God.' That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
The two attempts to escape this argument are summarized by Peter Kreeft:
The first escape is the attack of the Scripture "scholars" on the historical reliability of the Gospels. Perhaps Jesus never claimed to be divine. Perhaps all the embarrassing passages were inventions of the early Church (say "Christian community"—it sounds nicer).
In that case, who invented traditional Christianity, if not Christ? A lie, like a truth, must originate somewhere. Peter? The twelve? The next generation? What was the motive of whoever fist invented the myth (euphemism for lie)? What did they get out of this elaborate, deliberate hoax? For it must have been a deliberate lie, not a sincere confusion. No Jew confuses Creator with creature, God with man. And no man confuses a dead body with a resurrected, living one.
Here is what they got out of their hoax. Their friends and families scorned them. Their social standing, possessions, and political privileges were stolen from them by both Jews and Romans. They were persecuted, imprisoned, whipped, tortured, exiled, crucified, eaten by lions, and cut to pieces by gladiators. So some silly Jews invented the whole elaborated, incredible lie of Christianity for absolutely no reason, and millions of Gentiles believed it, devoted their lives to it, and died for it—for no reason. It was only a fantastic practical joke, a hoax. Yes, there is a hoax indeed, but the perpetrators of it are the twentieth-century theologians, not the Gospel writers.
The second escape (notice how eager we are to squirm out of the arms of God like a greased pig) is to Orientalize Jesus, to interpret him not as the unique God-man but as one of many mystics or "adepts" who realized his own inner divinity just as a typical Hindu mystic does. This theory takes the teeth out of his claim to divinity, for he only realized that everyone is divine. The problem with that theory is simply that Jesus was not a Hindu, but a Jew! When he said "God", neither he nor his hearers meant Braham, the impersonal, pantheistic, immanent all; he meant Yahweh, the personal, theistic, transcendent Creator. It is utterly unhistorical to see Jesus as a mystic, a Jewish guru. He taught prayer, not meditation. His God is a person, not a pudding. He said he was God but not that everyone was. He taught sin and forgiveness, as no guru does. He said nothing about the "illusion" of individuality, as the mystics do.
Attack each of these evasions—Jesus as the good man, Jesus as the lunatic, Jesus as the liar, Jesus as the man who never claimed divinity, Jesus as the mystic—take away these flight squares, and there is only one square left for the unbeliever's king to move to. And on that square awaits checkmate. And a joyous mating it is. The whole argument is really a wedding invitation.
Opening the Invite
I long to meet with you, to commune with My people.
It is more about our being one than it ever is about what you're doing for Me. Let that stem from our union, for nowhere else can you know the depth of My call on your life and where I want you than in the time we spend together.
Wasn't the cross about opening the way between us, so we could spend eternity together in the love of the Father, Son and Spirit? All I do for you is My way of reaching out, drawing you in calling you My own. I will never bless where it is not My intent to bring us closer. Please do not lose sight within My blessings for you that would ever cause you to turn away from Me for even a moment. This life is about a relationship: yours and mine.
I long for all My people—the entire earth and everyone in it—to know Me, to know I love them passionately.
When our relationship is strong, it breeds a multiplicity of fruit: fellowship with your brothers and sisters; deeper joy; the ability to trust Me more; healing; a richness to all you do each day; a desire to serve; a hatred for sin; and peace knowing you are eternally loved.
Seek Me first in everything. See Me everywhere. I am
with you always and My love never escapes you. Come and partake of this
banquet of grace I have for you right here, right now. I long for you.
Hear My voice and answer My plea.