Radical Jesus - Pt.4 end

If you do not believe in the claims of Jesus, I would be very interested in hearing the reasons why. Why don't you believe them? Some will say, "Well, I don't believe those things because if salvation was such a wonderful thing then everyone would be saved." That sounds rather logical, yet does that mean you don't believe in soap, because there are a lot of dirty people in the world? Would you like to make an argument that soap is of no value at all? Look at all the dirty people in the world. If soap was so good, why isn't everyone in the world clean?

Some have said they believed until God failed to answer their prayers. In fact, Ted Turner claims that at one time in his life he was a Christian. His sister was very sick when he was a boy and he prayed that God would heal her, but she died. After that incident, he no longer believed in God. There are many people like Ted Turner, who have been disappointed because God did not answer a particular prayer. When God did not answer, they concluded that He did not exist. Of course, God is not obligated to answer our every prayer. In reality, I would not want God to answer any prayer of mine that wasn't according to His will. I wouldn't want to force God to do something that He was reluctant to do. So often we think that God is like a Santa Claus that is suppose to respond to our every whim. To reject God because He didn't answer a prayer is as childish as saying, "Well if I can't be the chief of police, I'm not going to play with you anymore! I'm going home! If you don't do it my way, then you won't have me for a friend." This is at best an immature basis for a relationship.

Yet that is the kind of relationship many people try to have with God. "As long as God plays along with my wishes and my desires, I'll believe in Him and I'll play along with the game. But let Him cross me once and that's the end. I won't believe anymore. I'll take my marbles and go home."

Ignorance can also be a factor in rejecting Christ. I heard of a man who said he believed in God and in the Bible until one day he read a section in Leviticus concerning the animals that were unclean to eat. It was telling the factors that determine whether a species was clean or unclean. Mentioned in this section was the hare (which he interpreted to be a rabbit) which according to the passage was a cud chewing animal. Believing that rabbits don't chew cud, he concluded that the Bible contained an error of fact and was therefore not trustworthy. So he quit believing in God after he read in the Bible that the rabbit chews the cud. Interestingly, a bit of research could of cleared up this problem.

Some Hebrew scholars question whether the word in this passage actually refers to a rabbit. The Hebrew word arnebeth (translated hare) is of uncertain derivation. Biologists have also come to the conclusion that rabbits do exhibit a behavior very similar to chewing cud. But the more important point is to note how easily some people will dismiss the entire message of Scripture based upon the misunderstanding of a relatively insignificant particular. Imagine what it would be like to stand before God on Judgment Day with this kind of attitude. "Well, I used to believe in You until I read in Your Bible that the rabbit chews the cud." Could you imagine hearing God reply, "That's not a hare. That's an arnebeth. It's not even in the rabbit family."

I have encountered many people who have tossed out the faith based upon some supposed contradiction or error they have found in Scripture. Many of these problems can be avoided by an understanding of certain rules of biblical interpretation that we need to know and follow. First of all, let me say that I don't pretend to understand everything that is in the Bible. There are a lot of things in the Bible that I quite frankly will confess to you that I don't understand. If I were smarter, I might. However, if my interpretation of a passage is blatantly contradictory to another verse of scripture, then my interpretation is wrong. The scripture isn't wrong, my interpretation is wrong. So many people are ready to say, "Well, the Bible is wrong, because look..." No, the Bible isn't wrong. The interpretation is at fault.

I have encountered many people with faulty interpretations of scripture. If your interpretation of a scripture would cause it to seem ridiculous or foolish, then your interpretation of that scripture is wrong. God didn't say anything that was ridiculous or foolish. Rather than pointing the accusing finger at Scripture, it is more helpful to identify the basic problem with my limited understanding. It is far more productive to confess that the meaning of a passage eludes us than to throw up our hands and cry out, "Hopeless contradiction!" We must make every effort to understand what God is saying. We can be assured that when we discover the proper interpretation of a verse it will be reasonable and rational and will not contradict the rest of the Scriptures.

It is crucial to remember that many of our problems with Scripture are a result of our own personal assumptions and biases. For instance, the Bible says, "Spare the rod and spoil the child." That means that if you don't spank your child, you'll spoil him. It's just a statement of fact, if you spare the rod, you'll spoil the child. When he was young, my son interpreted that as a commandment. He said, "You're supposed to spare that rod and spoil me." Wrong interpretation, son. So there are many passages that can have a dual interpretation based on one's point of view. We may be looking at it in too limited a fashion, rather than considering the verse in its context. When a person comes up to me with a question about a passage, I immediately read the context. Most generally, I catch in its context the correct interpretation and show them that it reads in an entirely different way than what they were thinking.

Jesus declared that in the last days, those who don't believe in Him and do not believe His words will have to stand before God to be judged. He said He's not going to judge them. He didn't come to judge the world. He came to save the world. This brings to mind His conversation with the religious leader Nicodemus. Jesus told him, "God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world, through Him might be saved. He that believeth on Him is not condemned." He reiterates the same point here, "I didn't come to judge the world, I came to save it." He affirms His mission was that of saving the world. He said in another passage, "I've come to seek and save that which was lost." To believe on Him is to have everlasting life. It is to be saved from the penalty and the consequence of sin. It is to be saved from the judgment and the wrath of God that is to come against all the unrighteousness of men, even those who have held the truth of God in unrighteousness. "He that believeth on Me," Jesus said, "is not condemned." Paul the apostle said, "There is therefore now no condemnation to those that are in Jesus Christ" It is important to note that Paul did say to the church, "We must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ." But the kind of judgment Paul speaks of is one of rewards for the things we have done while we are in these bodies. It is like the judge's seat at the Olympics, where the various participants come up to receive medals for the victories they have won in the particular event. So we will stand before Christ to receive our rewards.

For those who don't believe in Jesus, it is a different story. They will stand before the judgment seat of God to receive sentencing for their failure to believe the words of Jesus, and for their failure to receive the forgiveness that God offered them through Christ. I am certain that God will give each person a chance to plead their case. But I'm sure at that time every excuse that people might seek to offer will sound so totally ludicrous, most will be unable to even say a word.

So we have seen the claims of Jesus Christ, radical, spectacular, and glorious. He has claimed that He has come to save you. He has claimed that you can have eternal life through believing His words and following His commandments.

The longer I live and the more I see of what the world has to offer the more vain it seems. I see the emptiness that people experience who seem to have attained more worldly goods than the rest of us. In light of the hopelessness of even the best this world has to offer, Jesus' offer of life is too good to turn down. I have no intellectual problems with this whatsoever. In fact, I would have great intellectual difficulties in not believing Jesus Christ, because somehow, I would have to rationalize His miracles. I would have to come up with an explanation for His ability to walk on the water, to raise Lazarus from the dead, and His own resurrection. I'd have to explain how one Man could, by accident, fulfill all three hundred of the Messianic prophecies. I would find myself very hard pressed to try to rationalize these things away. I would have tremendous difficulty giving some kind of an explanation that would be rational or plausible.

Many years ago, I, like most people, experienced a time of doubt. I thought, "Well maybe I'm an atheist. Maybe God doesn't exist. Maybe it is all just the figment of man's imagination. Man needs something to believe in, so he invented a god, and the Bible is simply a collection of stories expressing man's concepts and ideas of a supreme being." That lasted for around a half hour until I started to critically evaluate this point of view. The moment I started thinking, and tried to explain the existence of universe apart from God, I had to yield to reason. To hold on to an explanation of life apart from God would require a mindless state akin to idiocy. I couldn't put myself in that kind of unreasonable state of mind. I would have to believe all kinds of absurdities. I would have to believe that such patently miraculous features of life such as the marvelous ability to see, were created by thousands of fortuitous accidental circumstances. I would have to buy the idea that the perfect structure and function of the eye began with the sun beating down on a little worm and creating a mutation on its forehead. (I don't know how a worm would know what was his forehead and what was not.) But gradually over a process of time, through billions of years and countless mutations, this aberration formed into an eye. So then living things gained the ability to see. This same little worm scraped its tissue so often that it formed scar tissue that became legs complete with fully developed feet. Now our worm is a salamander and can see and walk. Is that rational? Give me a break!

The fool has said in his heart there is no God. A person must take a very mindless position to try to argue away the evidence of design in creation. In my own experience, I found it was easier to believe in God than to deny His existence. Not to believe in God brought forth too many difficulties. I believe in the existence of God, which according to scripture proves I'm not a fool. But every man has to make the choice to believe or not to believe. Jesus has made the claim that if you've seen Him, you've seen the One that's sent Him. If you believe on Him, you believe on the One who has sent Him. He claims that He came to save, that His words are eternal life and that they are not his words, but the words of the Father. The Father is the One who told him what to say and what to speak to us. If you don't believe, you're abiding in darkness and one day you will stand before God at the great judgment. I want to believe! I do believe! I have no problem with my belief.

Father, we thank you that you have provided such an abundance of evidence that any thinking, rational man can be completely satisfied in having faith in Jesus Christ. We can easily believe that He is the Son of God who came to save the world from sin. He came as light into this darkness, and those who hear his words and follow Him, do not walk in darkness but have the light of life. Thank you Lord for the many infallible proofs that confirm the claims of Jesus.

Father, we pray for those who have been wrestling with this issue. Help them to see, Lord, that there is no neutral ground. They either believe or they don't believe. I pray, Father that you will bring them to a solid, strong faith and you will confirm in their hearts that position of faith by your Holy Spirit bearing witness of the truth. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.