Closer than You Think

After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” (Acts 1:9-11 NIV) 

“Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. David said about him: ‘I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.’” (Acts 2:22-28 NIV) 

As part of my profession I read a lot of things that are nonsense but pass for scholarship. Consider this blurb from the promotion of a recent book: “Few, if any, individuals have had such a profound influence on Western culture as Jesus, even though not a single detail of his life or teaching can be confirmed with certainty.” 

A key component of 19th century liberal New Testament scholarship was the so-called “Quest for the Historical Jesus.” Hermann Samuel Reimarus, David Friedrich Strauss, and Albert Schweitzer were key authors to deny that the gospels presented Jesus as he really was. Rather the evangelists took the real Jesus, invented or exaggerated stories, and placed words on his lips to create their idea of a Messiah. For them, we needed to peel back the fiction to discover the real Jesus and (especially for Schweitzer) use him as our example. 

I am not going to bore you with the details of the problems of this type of analysis. Though this type of work continues to the present day (witness the Jesus Seminar), the gospels have been shown by many very good scholars to be much more reliable than that. 

When I think about this subject, I think that, in one sense, it is not the historical Jesus who lived from approximately 6 b.c. to 30 a.d. who we should be seeking. Though we believe that he lived and taught and did all the things we read about in the Scripture, we were not there and cannot transport ourselves back. 

We do not need to see the babe in a manger or shake the hands of the carpenter in a robe and sandals or dine with the post-resurrection glorified Jesus. That physical Jesus is not with us anymore. We cannot go to a place and seek an audience with him. 

Oh, we certainly need Jesus, but we need him as he is today, not as he was when he walked on earth. We need the Jesus who intercedes with the Father for us. We need the Jesus who sends the Holy Spirit to counsel and empower us. We need the Jesus who forgives our sins and gives us the power to overcome the power of the enemy. 

Let the scholars debate the search for the historical Jesus. Right here, right now, we can talk to the living, saving, empowering Jesus. Seek him today and every day.