Truth or Consequences
Everyone would like to feel that there was a benevolent force at work in the affairs of man, guiding and controlling those things beyond their strengths. It is very pleasant to contemplate a place where fear, pain and sorrow are replaced with love, peace and comfort. Yet, although these kinds of attributes are universally accepted as what God represents, man chooses to disbelieve in the only person to overwhelmingly prove his claim as their personification. Jesus Christ, said he was the Savior of the world, and he was willing to die to prove it, but was his claim true or was he the most horrific of liars mankind has ever known. As one who has spent over twenty years personally investigating ,verifying and experiencing the results of these claims, I feel capable of arguing their authenticity.
There are two logical alternatives if Jesus was not who he claimed. Either he was an outrageous liar or a lunatic, insanely convinced of his deity to the point of self-destruction. One cannot detach the good deeds and teachings, for which he is famous, from the fact that he taught that he was the Son of God and the only means of eternal life. The two were so completely interwoven that they are synonymous in scripture. Therefore it is impossible to declare him a good teacher, moralist and reformer without accepting his claim as the savior of the world. An agnostic once argued that Christ was simply someone who, having been trained in the Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah (Savior), had set out to fulfill them to win for himself a place in history. However this argument shows the ignorance of those who attempt to argue on a topic of which they know very little. Although it might be possible for one to perform a number of actions and mannerisms, defined by the seers of hundreds of years earlier, it would be quite difficult to arrange one's parentage and time and place of birth, as well as the manner of one's betrayal, death and burial. These factors are historically proven by many sources completely apart from the Bible. Flavius Josephus a historian and Roman appeaser of the first century, wrote in his Antiquities, of Jesus' ministry, following and resurrection. Cornelius Tacitus, Lucian of Samosata and Mara Bar-Serapion, all non-Christian Gentiles, attested to different aspects of Christ's historical legitimacy. Furthermore, Professor Peter F. Stoner, in his Science Speaks, calculates the probability of one man's fulfillment of just eight, of the hundreds of prophecies the Bible records Christ fulfilling, as 1 in 10 x 17, or 100 quadrillion. He compares the possibility to the odds of a blindfolded man finding one marked silver dollar in a pile of one hundred quadrillion silver dollars two feet deep, covering an area the size of Texas. And finally, if Christ was indeed a liar, he would have had to be a very stupid or committed one, to maintain his declaration as the Son of God when faced with terrifying death on a cross.
We now come to the argument that perhaps Christ was unintentionally lying, indicating that he must certainly be either insane or mentally deficient, to declare himself God incarnate. It must be recognized that although it might appear lunacy to die for one's declared enemies and claim divinity, it is inconsistent with an ability to debate in a manner which was undeniable genius and to teach with an authority and clarity the lawyers and professionals of the day could not match . What lunatic could have drawn the masses which followed Christ everywhere He went. And while insanity might offer a convenient excuse for saying "love your enemies, and pray for those who despitefully use you.", it does not explain the fact that these are the kind of ideal actions a merciful God would desire. If Jesus' principles and teachings were the ravings of a wild man, then would it be logical to conclude that love, heroic self-sacrifice and peace that passes understanding are qualities that only the insane can so marvelously explain? Were His discernment of the thoughts and intents of those who plotted against Him mere coincidence? One study of the morals and directives He taught will clearly dismiss any such conclusion.
Is Jesus Christ the Savior and God incarnate or not ? There are only two possible answers to this question. If he was consciously deceiving the masses who followed him, then he was the most heinous of liars completely deserving of the death and torture he received. If he was insane, then the majority of the things that society has held as truth for thousands of years are worth questioning. However, if neither of these hypothoses are correct, as substantial evidence indicates, then it would appear that Christ's claim at Savior and LORD is real. As for the this author, they have been proven real in my own life, but even if they had not, I can not conceive of a more worthwhile lifestyle to live, than the one taught by Christ.