10/24/2023
It's a Wonderful Life
Sermon: "Jesus Who?"
A World Without Jesus
I was privileged to sit under Pastor Aj’s preaching Sunday. What if Jesus had never been born? What would our world and our daily lives look like if the Lord of Life had come become a human being like you and I?
My favorite book on that subject is by John Ortberg, entitled Who Is This Man? I wanted to share with you a couple of quotes from that came to mind yesterday, listening to AJ’s message.
The first quote is a clever reminder that the influence of Jesus is not easily calculated:
“Jesus is as hard to nail down as Jell-O. Kings think that if they name his name, they can co-opt his authority. But Jesus the liberator keeps breaking through. When people claim his authority for slavery, a William Wilberforce or Jonathan Blanchard sees in him the call to freedom. He inspires Leo Tolstoy, who in turn inspires Mohandas Gandhi, who in turn inspires Martin Luther King Jr. He inspires Desmond Tutu to dream up and pray up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
“The number of groups claiming to be “for” Jesus are inexhaustible; to name a few: Jews for Jesus, Muslims for Jesus, Ex-Masons for Jesus, Road Riders for Jesus, Cowboys for Jesus, Wrestlers for Jesus, Clowns for Jesus, Puppets for Jesus, even Atheists for Jesus.
“Labor leader Eugene Debs claimed him as the friend of socialism: “Jesus Christ belongs to the working class. I have always felt that he was my friend and comrade,” while Henry Ford said his capitalism was Christian idealism. The Quakers found in him the command for pacifism (“when Christ dis-armed Peter, he dis-armed us all”), while Constantine was converted by the promise of battlefield victory through the cross (“In this sign you will conquer”).
And the second quote always evokes from me a robust response, every time I read it:
“Maybe Jesus was just a sympathetic figure who happened to come along when Roman infrastructure was good and Greek philosophy was undermining the gods, when paganism was dying and social systems were collapsing, when stability was down and anxiety was up and gullibility was strong and . . . it was just dumb luck.
“Maybe Jesus was a kind, simple, innocent soul with a good mom and a knack for catchy sayings who showed up in the right place at the right time. Jesus Gump. Maybe his place in history is a remarkable accident. But maybe it isn’t.”
Or, as I am confident in saying, It was definitely not by accident—but by God’s long-awaited plan.
Ortberg, John. Who Is This Man?: The Unpredictable Impact of the Inescapable Jesus (pp. 20-21). HarperCollins Publishing.
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