A prevalent tendency these days is to label Jesus a teacher first instead of a Savior. This belief will only lead to disillusionment, and ultimately...sadness. We must know Him first as a Savior before His teachings can have meaning for us, or before it can have any other meaning than that of an ideal that leads to despair. Imagine coming to men and women with defective lives and defiled hearts and polluted mainsprings, and instructing them to be pure in heart! What is the use of giving us an ideal that we cannot possibly attain? For in the end, we would be happier without it. If Jesus were only a teacher then He would be nothing more than a moralizing huckster, who tantalizes us with standards we cannot touch with a ten-foot pole. But if we are born again from above, we know Him first as a Savior, and we also know that He did not come to this earth only to teach us: He came to make us what He teaches we should be. Without being born again, and without the impartation of the Holy Spirit, the message and words of Jesus Christ have little meaning other than mere vapors of mental assent.
Good post! And good reminder that even though the teachings and instructions in the Bible are really important, we also have to take off our old self and put on the new self - which is renewed in knowledge and in the image of our Creator (Col 3:9-10)
ReplyDeleteI'm better off without Jesus...I was miserable as a Christian, much happier as an atheist. Not saying that everyone is necessarily better off without Jesus, I don't have anything against him, I think he was an extremely wise teacher for his time and had some really cool and radical ideas about how to live a happy life...but I like taking responsibility for my own life and actions, and I feel I do this better without him :)
ReplyDelete@ Healing Leaf---> Amen!
ReplyDelete@Lauren----> Thank you for taking the time to post here! Atheistic views are just as much of a belief system/religion as Christianity. Thus, I'm curious about what led you to abandoned the Christian faith? Most people who walk away from Christianity, were most likely hurt by the institution/the church, or those representing said institution. In the past the church, as well as the "christian" schools I attended, lacked the element of love, and preached a gospel of guilt and shame. I just hope you were not a causality of such experiences.
Blessings to you and yours!
Mark
Church going 'll not give the joy you seek without first having that personal relationship with Christ. Christianity is not just a religion, it is a call to be like Christ.
ReplyDeleteC.E.O.---> you are absolutely correct! Thank you for taking the time to reply. Blessings to you and yours!
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree with your post-- without the Holy Spirit we would be unable even think about living out all that He asked of us. His standards were impossible to achieve on our own, in our own humaness and thus, showed us the need for a Savior.:)
ReplyDelete@GTM: Thank you for stopping by and for your wonderful spot on comment!
ReplyDeleteIf I am following your logic correctly, then I would First have to believe in hell. And that I needed to be saved, from it. Is that not correct?
ReplyDeleteFor if, not. Then what is Jesus a Saviour from?
But if, correct. Then what kind of a God would create such a place?
The latter question is a diversion, of course. As the correct question is not "what kind of a god", but "why" would a god create such a place? To burn all the bad people? Hmmm? Then why create them in the first place?
You see, once you start down this road of thinking. Then you will find the answer to Lauren K's declaration, as God "has" given us the responsibility for our lives and actions. It's just that, she/we, want that responsibility to be on our own terms, and not His, or anyone else's. And it "is" on our own terms when you think about it. I mean, when you examine all the laws that man has created for himself, and reduce them down to their simplest form. You find that they are the very Same laws as given us by God. Don't steal, don't kill, don't commit adultery. These are all Our laws. Man's law. More, these are the laws "we" as individuals, enforce upon each other. Don't steal from me, don't do anything to harm me, Do Not Betray me! And last, but not least. "Don't be a Hypocrite!"
All of which, is why Jesus said, "Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. (Mat 7:1-2 KJV)".
Note the "again", at the end of that statement. For should you kill, not only will you be judged as you have judged. But for the hypocrisy as well.
Knowing these things, there is but one law that an atheist, or anyone, should concern themselves with. Atheist will recognize it as a "physical" law, and not one that can be argued with. It is however, a spiritual law (that has been manifested in the flesh/physical), and the very one to which Jesus was referring in His statement.
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
So how does a physical law correlate with the premise of your post? Simple. To say you're better off without Jesus, regardless of if you think He was "just" a teacher, or not. Is to say you're better off without science. Or even the knowledge, of how things work.
~ BH
@ Comic--->First of all, I want you to know that God created us for His companionship, and to enjoy His wonderful creation. God created us in “Our/His image”, and we were meant to be His work of perfection. I know that you basically asked why God would create something that He knew would ultimately go haywire? Well, from a human perspective I would say it is the same reason we have children. For we know that when we have children, they will eventually make mistakes/bad choices that will cause them great pain and anguish. As parents we know these pitfalls and try to instruct our children well...but inevitably they will sometimes chose the wrong path. We are God’s children; not God’s robots or puppets.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of Hell also troubled me a great deal in the past. For like you said (paraphrasing here) the idea of Hell/eternal punishment really is not really a choice, in that “Believe in ME or else the fire-pit for you” seems like a trick-bag. Hell is basically being out of the presence of God. Now because God is the God of order...the place reserved for those who have chosen not to believe in God/receive eternal life through Christ Jesus, is a place of total chaos and torment. All the people that you probably despise in this life will be waiting there running amok and lamenting their own spiritual state. So if you reject God on this side of life, the alternative is a place separated from God for all eternity. Now if God let everyone into heaven, even those who hated, or rejected Him in this life, He would be nothing more than a cosmic rapist, who forced people/souls to be in His presence against their will. In short, if you hate Him while you are on earth, why would you want to be with Him in the afterlife?
Secondly: I think you are falling into the same trap many atheists do in the sense that you are offering false alternatives. Many Atheists say that the choice is either God or Science. When in fact God is totally compatible with Science.
I will be doing a second part of my review of Hawking’s “The Grand Design” in which Hawking fell into this same trap. Hawking’s main point was that because “gravity exists, there is no need of creator.” So he assumes that the universe created itself out of nothing. Well, I can tell you that gravity is far from being nothing; so who created gravity? Well- Hawking presupposes that physical laws can somehow create something. But I, and many others, disagree. Now if you take Newton’s second law of motion, which may account for a few cannons of a pool ball on a pool table…however, Newton’s law of motion has never, in the history of mankind, caused a pool ball to move one inch; it takes humans with pool sticks to create the motion. So what is Hawking’s explanation? Well, M-Theory. M-Theory basically talks about gravitational pull and vibrations within eleven dimensions. M-Theory is what Hawking claims Einstein was ultimately looking for. Now, I’m not going to get into string-theory here, but you can see that Hawking is going out on a limb with M-theory/and the Multiverse. And even should M-theory- Mulitverse prove to be true, this would still not disprove God; actually it would give more insight to Gods creative power.
Lastly, Hawking states: “ God wasn’t needed to light the blue touch paper”. Now what I would ask Hawking is: “Where did the “Blue Touch Paper come from?” For physical law presupposes that there are already physical agents for that law to act upon.
So be careful when you offer the false alternatives of God or Science…for people just might choose God; and then where would you be;->
Thank you for visiting and for your comments!
Blessings,