So, what do you think about Jesus? Miracle worker, brilliant teacher, companion, leader of twelve, son, brother, compassionate one ~ all of these we have seen of him in Matthew’s gospel. But what have you done with him? It seems like some people just want to have him around, sorta like that Elf on the Shelf character they display at Christmas. Set him on your mantel, ready to be accessed, should you need him … otherwise, he’s just a compelling character—not one that you have let into your heart and mind, one who would radically rock your everyday existence.
What have you done with what you have learned
about this miracle-working Son of God?
Even as one synagogue ruler sought Jesus out to do what he knew only Jesus could do—awaken his daughter from the dead—other religious leaders looked on, and condemned Jesus and his behavior. Appears there was no neutrality about Jesus.
Take a look:
“As Jesus went on from there, [from the synagogue leader’s home and very-much alive daughter!] two blind men followed him, calling out, “Have mercy on us, Son of David!”
When he had gone indoors, the blind men came to him, and he asked them, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?”
“Yes, Lord,” they replied.
Then he touched their eyes and said, “According to your faith let it be done to you”; and their sight was restored. Jesus warned them sternly, “See that no one knows about this.” But they went out and spread the news about him all over that region.
While they were going out, a man who was demon-possessed and could not talk was brought to Jesus. And when the demon was driven out, the man who had been mute spoke. The crowd was amazed and said, “Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel.”
But the Pharisees said, “It is by the prince of demons that he drives out demons.” Matthew 9.27-34
No neutrality—while most rejoiced in amazement at the great and loving works done by Jesus—others aligned him with the devil. But, have you noticed? It is still true today: there is no neutrality about Jesus, Son of God. While some <even whole religions> try to reduce him to just a good moral teacher, this cannot be done! To make this point eloquently and brilliantly, I quote the great C.S. Lewis:
“I am trying here 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 the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. 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 with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”1
Jesus Christ always was—from the beginning—very God of very God, one of three persons of the Trinity. Though at just the right time in history, Jesus was born God incarnate—God taking the form of a human being, born as a baby, his coming prophesied some 700 years beforehand. Jesus came to show us God the Father, and even explained to his followers, “If you had really known me, you would know who my Father is. From now on, you do know him and have seen him!"2 He came to offer life … real life.
So, do you know the Miracle Worker? I love this impassioned summary and challenge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzqTFNfeDnE3
Do you know my Jesus? Please don’t leave him as a ‘Jesus on the shelf’, just a nice idea to be brought out when it is the season, or when you need him. He came to work a present-day miracle in our lives, making us new in relationship with him.
No neutrality with Jesus
Christine
1 - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
2 – John 14.7
3 – “That’s My King” by Dr. S. M. Lockridge