After reading a recent slow news day report about how the beatles are more popular than Jesus I thought I’d do my own research on the subject. The results were not very surprising with Jesus being much bigger than the beatles.
http://www.google.com/trends?q=jesus%2C+beatles&ctab=0&geo=all&date=2009-9&sort=0
Blue line is Jesus and red Beatles by the way
One interesting thing I did notice is that although Jesus is far more popular on searches this is not reflected in the way newspapers report things. Do the newspapers having something against Jesus?
Jesus Jesus
Jesus usually makes it a habit of appearing to people in their hearts but just occasionally his image pops up in unusual places. Here is a story where he pops up on a factory wall in the Ukraine.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/6200994/Jesus-Christ-appears-on-factory-wall-in-Ukraine.html
Jesus in funny places
What is life all about anyway? Why do I exist and what is my purpose in life? There are plenty of philosophies that believe we are here by chance and therefore have no purpose. But if what Christians say about Jesus is true then Jesus has some very important things to tell us about life.
There is a prevailing idea around at the moment that life is about pleasure. The way to decide what is right or wrong is to simply consider what would bring the greatest pleasure. This falls down on a lot of fronts, of course, not least because what pleases me might not please someone else and how on earth can I decide anything when I don’t know the long term implications. What pleases me now might turn out to be a disaster for me later.
Jesus has another perspective on life. Jesus tells us that life is not about pleasing ourselves but is about loving and serving God. It is about doing the will of God.
Now, as it turns out, doing the will of God does often bring a great deal of pleasure but not always.
Just before you decide that this is nonsense and you’d rather go back to the pleasure principal you might like to think about the great people from history that we remember the most. Do we remember those who lived for their own pleasure or do we remember those who were willing to sacrifice their own pleasure for the benefit of others. The most inspiring people are those who are willing to sacrifice themselves for the benefit of others. Jesus once said “no greater love has anyone than to lay down their life for someone else.”
Jesus can tell us just what life is all about and gives us a sense of purpose more than anyone else. Why should I bother with Jesus? Because Jesus gives me a reason to live.
Jesus jesus christ
Is there a God? If there is, what is God like? Does God ever bother with us? Is God good or evil?
Regardless of your reasoned responses to such questions they are questions that we find it hard to get good answers to. Philosophers have debated these issues for thousands of years and they still can’t give us an absolute answer.
We need someone who can answer questions like this – someone real.
The vast majority of historians agree that Jesus existed. There are good reasons to believe that the gospels of the New Testament give us a pretty good idea of what Jesus taught.
If Christians are correct in saying that Jesus is God then the things that Jesus said about God are of paramount importance. The discussion must move from does God exist? to can I believe Jesus?
This is why we all have to think about who Jesus is and what Christians have to say about him. If Christians are right about Jesus then many of the questions are answered.
I’m not suggesting that we ignore the thinking process or that somehow you have to be braindead to believe in Jesus, in fact I think the opposite. Faith isn’t just about what is in your brain but thinking does play a part.
We have to bother to find out about Jesus because if it is true that Jesus is God then we have to see the world in a different way.
Jesus
There are some questions about life that are difficult to answer. Is there a life after death? Does God exist? If God does exist how do we get into heaven? Etc. These are all questions that philosophers as well as ordinary people have been trying to answer since ancient times. If we knew the answers to these questions it might make a big difference to the way we live and the way the world is.
Many religions have tried to answer these questions but they tend to talk in terms that are hard to understand. But what if Christians are right about Jesus?
Christians claim that Jesus has the answers to these difficult questions. This isn’t a matter of arguing over the difference of words or whether one myth or another makes more sense because Christians claim that 2000 years ago there was a man who had the answers. A man that, if you had lived at that time, you could have touched, spent time with and even questioned about the answers he gave.
In fact Christians go further and say that this man was in fact God himself.
This is a startling claim and is made all the more amazing because Christians say that this actually happened. It isn’t just in some old story or some old myth but that Jesus was a real person with answers.
Now this goes beyond whether Christians have done the right thing or not. We have documents that can be traced right back to those who were eyewitnesses of Jesus Christ. If these documents are to be believed then nothing said by anyone else in the world is as significant as this one carpenter from Nazareth.
Why bother with Jesus? Because Jesus might just be the one who can actually answer the questions that we all want answers to.
Jesus Jesus
Why should I bother about Jesus? Is a very important question to ask. What is so important about Jesus that he should bother me 2000 later? There are many historical people but I don’t spend my time reading their writings – save perhaps for when I read a history book. Isn’t Jesus just someone else from history?
Over the next few blog entries I’m going to think about this question and attempt to answer it in some way. I think it is a very important question to answer. If Jesus is just another historical person with some interesting things to say then I have some more important things to be spending my time on. But if Jesus is who the church says he is then everything else I might spend my time on seems a little insignificant.
The first point I want to make is that we should bother about Jesus because he is at the centre of something very important that happened around 2000 years ago so that after Jesus things would not be the same in the world ever again.
Jesus isn’t just another person in history. Jesus introduces a way of thinking about life that is different from anything that came before or since. There are similarities, of course, with other religious figures and philosophers but Jesus has some very unique things to say and do. We don’t do justice to other religious leaders or philosophers or for that matter Jesus if we just ignore the differences and focus on the similarities.
Some of the important things that Jesus spoke about will be covered in other posts but for now I want to make the point that something incredibly important happened in Israel/Palestine 2000 years ago and it centres on the figure of Jesus.
This dramatic change is worth exploring for itself. Understanding this change could have a very positive effect on the life of individuals and the world today.
If you doubt this importance then consider that more books and more films and more songs have been written about Jesus than any other person that has ever lived. Even today people’s interest in Jesus does not diminish. There is even an atheist group know as Atheists for Jesus.
Jesus is worth bothering about because no one else has ever had such an impact on the world. If you are looking for answers to the deeper questions of life (and everyone should be) then you have to be bothered with Jesus.
Jesus jesus christ
Some people are not very impressed with the church. They look at the bad side of church history and conclude that the church has not followed Jesus Christ very well and so perhaps the church doesn’t have the moral authority to talk about Jesus. Of course they are right – in some ways.
The church has done many things in the name of Jesus Christ that are just plain wrong and can’t be excused or explained away. There can be no defense. But then Christians don’t claim to be perfect and every day seek God’s forgiveness. The church is not immune from power struggles, pride and selfishness. Of course it also saddens Christians that the bad is remembered whilst the much greater good that the church has done is ignored.
Yet despite the churches failings it is clear from all the evidence we have (both from the New Testament and other historical sources) that Jesus founded the Christian church so that his message could be taken throughout the world. The message of Jesus and who Jesus is was entrusted into the hands of the Christian church – something which the Christian church has been very aware of and careful about since its earliest days.
I’m not suggesting that this makes the church perfect but I am suggesting that Jesus knew what he was getting himself into when he founded the church and yet he still did it.
This doesn’t mean that Jesus belongs to the church. The church doesn’t have any copyright of Jesus and people are free to look at the evidence for themselves and draw their own conclusions. It is sad that at times in it’s enthusiasm for preserving the message of Jesus it sometimes persecuted those who thought differently. However, the church does have a responsibility for saying what it believes is the message of Jesus and for speaking out against what it believes is not the message of Jesus.
So then you are welcome to ask anyone what they think about Jesus but if you want to know what Jesus thought about himself you have to go to those Jesus picked to pass that message on – the Christian church. Of course this is a complex issue but understanding the essence of who Jesus is, what he taught and what that means for the world is the very reason that Jesus created the church in the first place (as well as for worship, service, etc).
Thoughts christian, church
I just watched Close Encounter of the Third Kind (again) with my children. I always find the part where the big space ship comes across and the aliens come out very exciting. It’s something about feeling that child like excitement about what it would be like to actually meet an alien.
It then got me thinking about God. How often do we feel that child like excitement about meeting God? There should be more excitement of course about meeting God than there should about meeting aliens.
Then it got me thinking that perhaps we often find it difficult to follow Jesus because we have just got so used to him being around. We have lost our excitement and anticipation that should be there when we meet Jesus. There is a gospel story about a short man climbing a tree just to get a glimpse of Jesus. This is the kind of excitement that we need to have each day.
Now I’m sure you are aware that when you get used to having things around the excitement of them tends to dwindle, so how do you keep the excitement alive?
With Jesus I think it comes from thinking about him and what he has done. This is one of the reason Christians are always banging on about the cross. Not just because of what happened but because it’s amazing and makes you feel excited about who Jesus is.
To follow Jesus we need to feel excited about being around him and learning about him. Without this excitement our faith tends to die away until it doesn’t matter much to us. Let’s try and get our excitement about Jesus back and then perhaps following him will be that much easier.
Thoughts discipleship, jesus christ