A child patterns his or her life
to that of the person he or she idolizes.
Like a child, we as Christians derive our identity from a person, one
whom we can be truly proud of. He is truly impressive. This person’s identity,
which we follow, lasted even after 2000 years after his death. Millions of
people today have claimed to be his followers. The book about him, the BIBLE,
is easily the number one best seller of all time.
It is this person who won for us
our salvation, who restored us to our relationship with God. In him we can have
a full and a new life. Thus, realizing the importance of this person to us, we
want to know Him more fully. We then ask, “Who is Jesus Christ?”
Most of Christians today have
been born and raised as Christians. Due to the negligence of our time, we take
for granted our conviction that Jesus is the Son of God. However, we should
also take note that this was not so for his contemporaries. During the time of
Jesus, people found it hard to accept that He was not just an ordinary person.
“Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James,
Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us? And they took offense
at him (Mk 6:3).
What we want to know is whether
there is any reason not to put Jesus on the same level as Buddha, Confucius,
Lao-Tze, Socrates or other wise men. Was Jesus more than just a great religious
man or moral teacher? History is full of men who have claimed that they came
from God, or that they were gods, or that they bore messages from God. How is
Jesus different from them all?
Three things that make Jesus an
absolutely unique figure in human history. First, he was preannounced and his
coming was expected. Because of Old Testament prophecies, people for a long
time were waiting for the messiah, which saw its fulfillment in Jesus. Second,
once he appeared on the scene, he struck history with such impact that he split
it in two, dividing it into two periods: BC and AD. Lastly, every other person
who came into this world came into it to live. Jesus came into the world to
die. His death was the goal and fulfillment of his life.
To better have an understanding
of who Jesus is, let us try to look about some of the details of his life.
Jesus was a young carpenter in Nazareth. For three years he became an itinerant
preacher. He was never more than 100 miles from his home. He had never been
into cities with a population larger than 50,000.
Within three years he was dead,
killed in little Jerusalem on the fringes of the Roman Empire. He was crucified
for stirring up the people. By right he should simply have faded into complete
oblivion. Instead, he is surely the most famous, honored and best-loved person
who ever walked the earth.
Jesus is a man whose words and
life demand a response from us. He is making claims that affect us. If he is
not God, then we should have nothing to do with him, because we do not want to
be followers of someone who is a liar or a lunatic. But if he is God, then we
should seriously consider him. Our response will have eternal consequences. Who
is Jesus? The answer is in your heart. He is waiting for you!
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