The One Thing We Must Not Say
“Observed C.S. Lewis, the brilliant and once skeptical Cambridge University professor who was eventually won over by the evidence for Jesus,
‘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… 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 … or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God.’"
Who do you believe Jesus to be? Was he mad? It is difficult to reject Jesus as crazy when his teaching did so much to expose the madness around him. Was he a profiteer? It is difficult to suspect him of being clever or manipulative when he lived so humbly and died so selflessly. Did he suffer from delusions of Messianic grandeur? It is difficult to accuse him of this when there is so much in the prophecies of the Messiah that called for a suffering servant, prophecies that perfectly match the life of Christ.
If Jesus is who he claims to be, then your conclusions about him, one way or the other, speak more of who you are than anything else. You can't change what is true. You can only change your orientation to the truth. So, who do you say that he is? It is not Jesus who is being put to the test by this question--you are!
"Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, 'Who do people say I am?' They replied, 'Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.' 'But what about you?' he asked. 'Who do you say I am?' Peter answered, 'You are the Christ'" (Mark 8:27-29).
Illustration Exchange
The Hypostatic Union - The God-Man
“I do not think of Christ as God alone, or man alone, but both together. For I know He was hungry, and I know that with five loves He fed five thousand. I know He was thirsty, and I know that He turned the water into wine. I know he was carried in a ship, and I know that He walked on the sea. I know that He died, and I know that He raised the dead. I know that He was set before Pilate, and I know that He sits with the Father on His throne. I know that He was worshipped by angels, and I know that He was rejected by the Jews. And truly some of these I ascribe to the human, and others to the divine nature. For by reason of this He is said to have been both God and man.”
In this great mystery—called by theologians The Hypostatic Union—Jesus both shares all our needs and fulfills them!
Finding Our Fixed Point
Studies have shown that if you blindfold a man and ask him to walk in a straight line, he will start out well but will soon begin to turn one way or another, looping around in ever tightening circles. It is a phenomenon that has been demonstrated over and over again: without a fixed reference point we cannot keep a straight line.
The strange thing is that it feels like we're walking in a straight line. But we begin to loop and curve erratically – without ever knowing it. We need a fixed point to walk a straight line.
Robert Kulwich, for NPR, observes, "Without a corrective, our insides take over and there's something inside us that won't stay straight."
[Studies of this phenomenon appear in Chris McManus' book, Right Hand, Left Hand, The Origins of Asymmetry in Brains, Bodies, Atoms and Cultures (Phoenix, 2002).]
God’s word is that fixed point for our souls. Its truths are fixed – “forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens” (Ps. 119:89). Thus, it gives us a safe and accurate reference point for our lives.
A person who rejects God’s word as the source of truth may feel like they’re on the right road – they’re going straight – but inevitably they go astray. The Bible says there is a way that seems right to a man (think they’re going straight) but the end thereof is death (Proverbs 14:12).
Amazingly, Jesus didn’t point people to the fixed point, he claimed to be the fixed point. Jesus didn’t say “I know the truth” or “I can point you to the truth”, he said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life” (John 14:6)– He is the sun by which we navigate our lives, the star by which we guide our path. He is our fixed point.
"Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith" (Hebrews 12:2, BSB).