Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Liar, Lunatic, or Lord



John 10:30-33 Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.” The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?” The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.”

I live today in the year 2012 A.D., and realize that every time anyone says, writes or thinks about the date, they are affirming that Jesus Christ is Lord, whether they know it or not. The abbreviate A.D. stands for the Latin words “Anno Domini”, which literally translates as “in the year of the Lord”, based upon the birth of Jesus Christ. Am I sure? The years prior to 0A.D. are the descending  years ending in B.C. and B.C. literally means “Before Christ, an epoch used in dating years prior to the estimated birth of Jesus. Everyone should research to find out why the birth of Jesus is the point in time that from which succeeding time is measured because the answer has eternal meaning to every one of our lives. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world, God- the Son, Lord of all, and Redeemer to those who repent & believe. Jesus was “God incarnate”. God is Spirit. Incarnate means “to be made flesh”, so Jesus was “God in the flesh”, the God/Man in this physical world. Emmanuel, translates “God with us”. Jesus Christ was fully God and fully man, sent by the Father to save this sinful world. Rejoice! Who wouldn’t measure all time by Him?

John 3:16-17 & 35-36 Jesus answered, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  35John the Baptist answered ,“The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.  Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

 

But there are those who believe that Jesus was just a good, moral & wise man. C.S. Lewis, former professor at Cambridge University and converted agnostic wrote: “I am trying 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 a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make a choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something else. 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 up with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher, He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

 

John 14:2-4 & 6 Jesus said, “In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going. I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

The Lord Jesus is preparing a place in heaven for you and me. The question is: Who will make the choice to repent of their sins, believe that Jesus is their personal Lord and Savior – a free gift of Salvation by God’s loving mercy & grace? Who will believe and receive?

John 1:10-12He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” 

 

In Christ, Brian

2 comments:

child of God said...

Hi Brian,
Good point C.S. Lewis made. It is either hot or cold for Jesus, nothing in between will do, it is just the way God is.

Blessings brother,
<><

Brian Ray Todd said...

Child of God, The great deception of the "original lie" of the Devil was "you shall be like God" (Genesis 3:5), both attacking God's goodness & sovereignty, and replacing it was ours. Essentially, taking our Marker Lord God off His rightful throne of our heart, mind and life, and putting ourselves on that throne in prideful sin of rebellion. We are the one's who are unfaithful and disobedient to our Heavenly Father. IF we truly see the errors of our ways, sincerely repent and turn form our sins, asking for forgiveness, accept the free given of God in the atoning death of His Son Jesus Christ in our place to pay the penalty price for those sins, take ourselves off the throne of our heart and put the Lord back to reign and rule our lives, then He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and give us eternal life and purify us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). There is a God and He is not me! I shall follow Him. Thanks for writing.