In an article I wrote a while back, Jesus - The Man, The God, The ???, I talked about a dilemma faced by a lot of Christians when it comes to the dual personality of Jesus Christ. Though lived only a short time here on earth as a human being, Jesus left the whole humanity - both believers and non believers alike - with enough to wonder and worry about what to make out of Him. Jesus, the very foundation of Christianity, can also be a stumbling block for many of its believers, especially when faced with questions from skeptics. In a world where more and more people are walking away from God to embrace newly found comforts of Science and Technology, Jesus is often a joke. Ordinary Christians often find it difficult to defend Jesus and their faith because they are are believing in a God - not just any god, but the only Son of the Creator of all things seen and unseen - who has long hair and beard, who wears a simple cloak, who sweated, felt hunger and pain like an ordinary human being. Many of the non-believers of Christ are willing to accept him as good man - a good teacher, a good leader, a wise man, even a prophet - but not God. We often take this view from a skeptic as an acceptable one, relived that we are not dealing with somebody who is totally against Jesus Christ. But how acceptable is that view of Jesus as a good man who taught his followers many good things including a beautiful prayer, a man with god given abilities to perform miracles? As Christians, should we compromise with the world around us about this view of Jesus? Is Jesus - a good man, better than no Jesus at all?
The problem with the idea that Jesus was a good man because of His teachings and wisdom, or even that He was a prophet, falls apart because of His teachings and actions itself. Here are some of the things that Jesus told and did with His disciples and others who came to hear Him:
1. The woman said to him, "I know that the Messiah is coming, the one called the Anointed; when he comes, he will tell us everything." Jesus said to her, "I am he, the one who is speaking with you" (John 4:25,26). Here Jesus is talking to a samaritan woman who has no idea who he is, and look how Jesus is introducing Himself to her - as the Messiah. How could anyone consider him a good man with good morality if this is what he does - going around and spreading lies about himself to the unsuspecting?
2. Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I AM" (John 8:58). Here Jesus is taunting the Jews by taking the name of the Lord; the Jews considered the name of God so holy that they refused even to say it out. "I am who I AM" (Exodus 3:14) is what God told Moses when he asked for God's name, and by saying "I AM", Jesus is telling everybody that He is God. People were ready to stone Him as soon as they heard this, and we call him a wise man?
3. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Child, your sins are forgiven" (Mark 2:5). Humans are not allowed nor able to forgive sins. Instead of just healing the paralytic man with his special powers, Jesus went one step further by telling him that his sins are forgiven. Why would any good man with god-given special abilities do that, great prophets like Elijah or Elisha never claimed to forgive sins while performing miracles? So, what makes Jesus so special?
4. "And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, ... I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven..." (Matthew 16:18,19). God re-named Abram to Abraham before making him father of His chosen people; changing names is God's way stripping off the old, He is creating something new from the old and calling it with a new name. With the new name, the new person is also given a great task. Here Jesus is acting like God again by changing Simon's name to Peter, and offering him the keys to the kingdom of God, a great task indeed. What good teacher would do something like that to his disciples - people who left everything and followed him when He called?
5. Thomas answered and said to him, "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28). Jesus is allowing Thomas to worship him, He is not telling Thomas to stop calling Him "Lord" and "God". Is this the quality of a good teacher - allowing a mis-informed disciple to call him God, without bothering to correct it and say that he is nothing more than a good human being with good moral values and lots of wisdom?
This is what C.S. Lewis, the well known author of The Chronicles of Narnia said in his book Mere Christianity, "I am trying here to prevent anyone 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 the 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 patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us."
Obviously not much of a choice here, either Jesus Christ is the Lord and God as He claims, or He was a liar. Whether he lied on purpose or because he was so crazy that he thought that he was god has no significance at all, either way it was a lie. Goodness is the first quality people notice in Jesus, but to call Him 'just a good man' we will have to overlook a lot of things that he has said, done, and allowed others to do. There is no middle ground between Jesus the God and Jesus the man, either accept Him as Lord for everything He has said and done, or deny Him as a bad man for everything he has said and done. A lot of people have given up their lives to defend Jesus' name and teachings. It is not fair to any one of them to call Jesus 'just a good man' if He was deceptive in any way, form or shape. When we keep our mouths shut whenever somebody say that Jesus was nothing but a good man, we too are denying His divinity, and falling into the trap of those who got the crowd to say "Crucify Him" (Mark 15:14).
"The one who comes from above is above all. The one who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of earthly things...He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but no one accepts his testimony. Whoever does accept his testimony certifies that god is trustworthy. For the one whom God sent speaks the word of God" (John 3:31-34).
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