JESUS IS THE POINT

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If you are going to be a disciple, it's vital that you be keenly aware that you are a learner and follower of the most unique and amazing person ever-Jesus. I've been thinking lately about how easy it is to become side-tracked with the vastness of the Scriptures and miss the point of it all. That point which the Scriptures present is simply Jesus. Luke, the author of two of the five Gospels, notes how central Jesus is to the Scriptures.

Luke references Jesus, Himself, using the Scriptures to explain His central role. After the resurrection, Jesus joins a couple of disciples walking along the road and He begins with Moses and all the Prophets to explain what the Scriptures have to say about Him.

When Paul was in the synagogue in Thessalonica, note what he said: As was his custom, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Messiah," he said.

In the next chapter of Acts (18) we find Apollos was in the practice of proving from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah. Also when Philip met up with the Ethiopian eunuch, he began with the prophet Isaiah and explained to him the good news about Jesus.

The primary role of the Gospels was to take a teaching strand out of the ancient teachings of the prophets about the Messiah and pull that thread through to a fuller explanation. For instance, Matthew picked up on the teaching that the Messiah will take on the role of the King. Mark pulled through the thread that the Messiah would be the Servant. Luke picked up the teaching as the Son of Man and John presented Jesus as Messiah, the Son of God.

The Scriptures were not written to build a great religious or a theological system. The Scriptures were written to teach us and lead us to Jesus. And, this is the most frequent mistake Christians make. Too many Christians actually worship the Bible. This is what the Jewish leadership was doing in the 1st century and Jesus called them on it. Listen to this: You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you possess eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.

The more I study the various cultures of the world the more I see Jesus as the ultimate fulfillment of them all. I am not the only one seeing this. There are several who are studying the original writings of the Creator-God stories within the many religions and cultures. I love reading and discussing what they are each discovering. Believe me, in every case "eternity has been set in the hearts of mankind" no matter where they are on the earth and Jesus is the natural and ultimate fulfillment of each.

Salvation and eternal life in any culture is not a religious thing or even a theological understanding; it's a personal thing. The person? His name is Jesus. And you are signing up to be His disciple.

WHEN JESUS SHOWS UP

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Jesus shows up "where two or three come together in His name."

When Jesus shows up no one is the same again. · The dead are brought back to life. · The blind see. · The lame walk. · The deaf hear. · The mute talk. · Enemies and rivals become friends. · Women's status is elevated. · The poor are made rich. · The rich realize their poverty. · The lost are found. · The weak finds strength. · The strong are made aware of weakness.

No transformation is more vivid than what happened to the early disciples. They were weak-willed and timid, then found inner strength and courage. The usual reason given for this dramatic life-change is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

The resurrection is no doubt paramount, however I see their transformation coming from something else. Jesus spent 40 days with the disciples, where He spoke to them about the kingdom of God. Check out what Peter shared regarding that time, when he spoke to those gathered in the house of Cornelius: "We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a cross, but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen-by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name."

I think the real transformation took place during the time spent with Jesus, eating and drinking and discussing principles of the kingdom of God. And, this is the same today. When two or three are gathered together in the name of Jesus, He will show up and make a significant difference in all who see Him.

In E. Stanley Jones' book, Christ On the Indian Road, he shares this same principle of Jesus within the Indian culture. He says, "Jesus does not stand before the blind and the leper and the poor and the sinner and discourse philosophically on why they are in such condition, but lays His hands of sympathy upon them and heals them through his servants; and more-he puts his gentle but condemning finger upon the conscience of the hale and hearty Pharisee in the crowd and asks why he has allowed all this."

Jones goes on to say, "Christ is confronting men everywhere. He has got hold of us. A Hindu lawyer of fine ability gave an address to which I listened on the topic, 'The Inescapable Christ.' He said: "We have not been able to escape him. There was a time when our hearts were bitter and sore against him, but he is melting them by his own winsomeness. Jesus is slowly but surely entering all men in India-all men.'"

"How is it possible to limit or demarcate the lines of the Kingdom any more? He steps beyond them, and shocked and frightened like the Pharisees of other days we stand and wonder how far he will go in his warm sympathy and understanding. He eats with publicans and sinners and with the Hindu, too. No wonder H. G. Wells in summing up the influence of Jesus upon human history in his Outline of History exclaims, 'The Galilean has been too great for our small hearts.'"

Now, here's my point. If Jesus brings positive transformation in every life He encounters, then doesn't it make sense for us to introduce everyone we can to this Jesus? You see, when Jesus shows up, no one is ever the same again!