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I say the essence of Christianity, and therefore the most important aspect of my faith, is the Biblical truth about Jesus Christ. It's a dangerous overstatement, but you can basically deduce why I say Christianity must be Biblical. Whatever else we might think we know, whatever other ideas about Jesus that might seem novel or nice, at the end of the day everything we know about Jesus comes from the Bible.
(Maybe, like me, you've tired of "Sunday School" Christianity, where the answer to every question is "Read your Bible, pray, go to church...", but just because a truth is oversimplified and overused and misunderstood doesn't mean we should disregard it. )
Honestly, it makes a lot of sense to me that God would want to settle things about Christ once and for all. So instead of having us see Jesus through our own private séances or mystical experiences, God gave us a firm, concrete description of Jesus for us to take in and think about. Perhaps it was because He knew that in our time men everywhere would want to define truth and reality by the fraction of existence which they themselves can experience and logically explain.
Certainly most of us have sought some type of personal encounter with that mystical, unintelligible higher power which for some reason we have a suspicion exists and is interested in our lives.
The problem is, at what point is our desire for experience satisfied completely enough to offer us any bit of surety that we have indeed encountered the creator? It seems that we have an insatiable thirst for experience, and an uncanny ability to doubt that experience.
Perhaps we presume that we are better than the Jews who sought something more mystical than a text as proof of God’s existence (1 Cor. 1:22-24). Or maybe we, like the rich man in Jesus’ parable, think that if God would just manifest himself plainly through personal experiences, certainly more would believe in him (Luke 16:27-31).
But the reply given to the rich man is that his brothers have writings, the writings of Moses and the prophets, and if they do not believe based on them, they will not even believe if they encountered a miraculous display of divine power.
If knowing Jesus were based on sheer mysticism and personal experience, who’s to discern between those who really know Jesus, and those wolves in sheep’s clothing who would find “knowing Jesus” a great means of suckering a bunch of zealously generous people out of some major funds?
And after all, if we’re all sinners, can I even trust myself to discern my own mystical experience; to know what’s the real Jesus and what’s the latte that I shouldn’t have drunk at 10 p.m.?
So it makes sense that God would say, “You fallen people can’t trust each other; you can’t even trust yourselves! So I’ll go ahead and solidify everything you need to know about Jesus in one source so you can all get your fill.”
“But Wait!” you scream in frustration. “What about my EXPERIENCING Jesus? You’re telling me to read a book?! I can’t buy it. I need that mystical experience. I mean, what about all the ‘the Spirit testifies with your spirit’ stuff? Are you just throwing that out?” Glad you asked. I've felt that same frustration many times.
But I totally disagree that reading a book about Jesus, written by men who knew him personally and intimately, somehow interferes with you knowing him better.
It seems to me that if the Spirit is going to testify with your spirit about Jesus, then He’ll want to testify about the real deal, and not just some “buddy Jesus” that you’ve invented to make you feel alive and important, like some imaginary friend that only plays the games you want to play and always lets you win.
So, I come to the conclusion that the essence of Christianity, the foundation of everything I believe, is the historical, reliable, propositional, Biblical truths regarding Jesus Christ.
You may not buy that. And I will gladly affirm that it is your perogative to agree or disagree. But I would challenge you to be careful of the dishonest practice so common to our culture: Don't reject the Jesus of the Bible yet still claim to be a Christian.
If you're going to reinvent Jesus the way you want him to be with little regard to the biographies written by his closest friends, at least do him the courtesy of acknowledging that it's not really him you are following. It's not honoring to him, and it's not helpful to anyone when the shell of Christianity is preserved, but the heart of Christianity, namely the historical Jesus, is ignored or misrepresented.
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I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Feel free to leave a comment here or email me at mpsmith82[at]gmail[dot]com.
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3 comments:
"Don't reject the Jesus of the Bible yet still claim to be a Christian. If you're going to reinvent Jesus the way you want him to be with little regard to the biographies written by his closest friends, at least do him the courtesy of acknowledging that it's not really him you are following."
You should not assume that every guy who questions Biblical authority is simply taking the easy way out by inventing some subjective buddy-Jesus that affirms all of his biases.
And you imply that folks who don't necessarily believe in Biblical authority should admit that they aren't following Jesus? Way to take yourself out of the debate by being entirely condescending.
I appreciate your disagreement with the notion "that reading a book about Jesus, written by men who knew him personally and intimately, somehow interferes with you knowing him better." This statement is quite reasonable. But is this really part of this argument? Do you really think that every Christian who's rejected the Bible as a sort of Ultimate Authority has stopped reading it altogether? That they disregard first and secondhand accounts of their Savior (or as you seem to think, their pseudo-savior)?
Anyways, I think you're better than this, Michael. There are plenty of Christians out there who struggle with the idea of the Bible being the inerrant or perfect Word of God, but you have not approached this issue critically enough to be persuasive for them (as of 6 months ago, at least).
Anonymous commenter,
You may be more correct than I would care to admit that I have risked "taking myself out of the debate by being entirely condescending." But if you know me well enough to know I am better than this, perhaps you'll give me the benefit of the doubt here.
"Condescending" is not the right word. I am not saying that everyone who wrestles with Biblical authority is taking the easy way out. I have great patience with folks who are honestly digging through the undeniable difficulties in embracing that conclusion.
But I am saying that anyone who ultimately rejects the Bible as authoritative revelation about who Jesus is, yet claims to know the real Jesus, is cutting their own legs out from under them.
The point is not, "You're stupid if you don't believe the Bible is inerrant and infallible." The point IS, "Be intellectually honest about this."
If the biblical record regarding Jesus is not reliable, what makes us think we have any accurate information about him? Who becomes the authority on what is truly Jesus and what is a mistake?
The answer is, if the biblical record isn't accurate, it's up to you to decide what's right in it and what's wrong. What did Jesus really say and do, according to you?
You're right. "Buddy Jesus" is probably a poor way to say it, but that's the inevitable consequence of saying, "The Bible isn't reliable, but I still believe in Jesus."
I guess it's also worth adding that, when writing this, I had more in mind the Bishop Spongs of the world, men who blatantly reject virtually everything about historic Christianity, yet still want to retain the name "Christian".
But, taken to its full conclusion, my argument must also be applied to those who are on the bubble of embracing unqualified biblical authority or not.
Thanks for the interaction!
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