Jesus for The Academic
Jesus made sure to do everything to make sure that you arrived at the same moral decision about the Heavenly Father, our Creator. He was willing to die to get this message across. In college I came across a book by Camus titled “The Stranger.” It’s about a criminal that tries to win his case by getting sympathy as a seeming martyr. The claim of innocence is made based on the cynical supposition that if Jesus was forgiven and granted a whole religion, that anyone can get away with anything as long as they played the role of martyr.
This idea is also illustrated in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov when the brothers quarrel over a different life philosophy that although might stem from the same place each branches in completely separate directions. One brother argues that all is possible and his view on religion is that its only purpose is to control the masses. In other words, control over the mass population is necessary because otherwise people would try to get away with anything.
I know all about the academic opinions about Jesus, both from the literary revival period to current academic videos on Youtube. The enemy’s time is short and I expect an increased stance against Jesus will be made public more abundantly and frequently. On a side note, the popular belief as to why God has revealed the timeline to us through prophets is that God wants us to know that he’s God; the truth is that God is competing with Satan about the knowledge of future events and, whereas Satan heads in destruction, God points us to Heaven. Back to the videos, there’s one titled “Who was Jesus, Really?” by William Lane Craig where the presenter psychoanalyzes Jesus and basically labels Him a self-absorbed narcissist that thought he was the gift of god.
The Truth is, Jesus is God, the only Godly creature to come to life that is capable of dying the death he did to retain his identity as the True God. As much as I hate admitting it, I’ll never comprehend the Power of Love as my only fuel for life unless God wills it. And I have great self-esteem.
We might be led to calling Jesus a sucker (you know, a gullible and naive victim of peer pressure) or a master manipulator only out for his own gain that suffered his inevitable consequences. But the only correct opinion is derived by our ability to identify with God in relative terms as in the parable of the tenants.
The Parable of the Tenants (Matthew 21,33-46)
There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey. When vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce. But the tenants seized the servants, one they beat, another they killed, and a third they stoned. Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones, but they treated them in the same way. Finally, he sent his son to them, thinking, “they will respect my son.” But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another, “This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.” They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes? They answered him, “He will put those wretched men to a wretched death and lease his vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce of the proper times.” Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the scriptures:
“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; by the Lord has this been done and it is wonderful in our eyes”?
Therefore, I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will produce its fruit. The one who falls on this stone will be dashed to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls. “When the chief priests and the pharisees heard his parables, they knew that he was preaching about them. And although they were attempting to arrest him, they feared the crowds, for they regarded him as a prophet.
This is only the beginning of this conversation. Please see these key-points for a recap:
We’re all prone to mistrust of God
There’s only one God, Creator hence Destroyer
God does not cater to the powers of this world
God relates to us by our own nature