A word about my particular perspective on life...

Since this is my personal and professional site, not sponsored by any other agency or institution, I have the freedom to include information here from ALL aspects of life and living, including my beliefs.  If this site were located within a college web server, the situation would be different (for the same ethical reasons that I would never use class time or office hours for the purposes of teaching a faith perspective).  For this same reason, I must request that if you happen to have further questions about this topic, and if you are currently a student of mine, please bring those questions to me outside of our class time.  Otherwise, I am always available for questions via email, that is, as long as I am around.

Looking for Someone to trust...

Not everyone comes along claiming to be God.  Buddha did not.  Neither did Confucious.  Mohamad claimed only to be a prophet.  However, Jesus did.  He actually claimed to be God, God in the flesh.  This claim is so unmistakably accurate (he actually intended it as we literally hear it, rather than as some metaphor), that his enemies picked up stones to throw at him, and sent soldiers to arrest him because of it.  Those opponents knew exactly what he meant to say.  He said such things as "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6).  During his trial he admitted to the claim, giving the high priest reason to tear his robes.  At one point he plainly said, "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30).

 

There are only so many possibilities. 

Now, as we listen to such a claim, we only have so many possible choices to make about it.  Either it is true, or it is false.  Like any other person's claim of identity, it is either true or it is not true. 

If Jesus` claim to be God is false, then we have but two possibilities:

(1) either he was false and he Knew it was false, which would make him a liar,

or

(2) he was false and did Not Know that it was false, which would make him a bit loony. 

 

We could tell ourselves that he made these statements but didn't know that they were false (conclusion #2 above), that he was not quite there mentally, that he had a mental condition of self delusion.  But if we allow for this, then we have to explain how he did at least these two rather wonderful things: (1) he taught wisdom in lessons that have been used as moral standards for behavior by billions of people since then.  Our problem is figuring out how a mentally deranged person could also be a moral guide for so many, be able to argue with some of the greatest intellects of his time, and lead a life of high integrity himself. 

The other wonderful thing we would have to explain (2) is that, while we might conclude that Jesus was delusional, he was the same person who performed miracle after miracle during his 3-year ministry.  Our problem then is figuring out how a mentally deranged person could also conduct himself with such power as to heal people on contact, even raise a couple of them from the dead.  This option does not fit well with what we know about Jesus; this conclusion is not reasonable given the facts.

 

We could tell ourselves that he simply lied to everyone about his identity, that he was not God and that his claims were those of someone with the clear intent to deceive people (option #1 above).  If he were not God, but then claimed to be God, then this was a specific kind of wrongdoing: he would be among the very worst people of all time because he specifically told multitudes of people to trust him for their eternal life.  It would have been a kind of trap that he set for them, deceiving them into thinking he was a savior when he was simply an ordinary human. 

If we allow for this, then we have the same issue to deal with above when it comes to the life of integrity that he led.  If we allow for this Liar option (he claimed he was God when he knew he was not), then we also have to explain how someone so evil could produce the wisdom and lessons of life so vital to social survival.  If his intentions were so evil to begin with, all the wise teaching that went on for years were actually at cross-purposes with his goal; he would have been working against his own goals.  This option does not fit well with what we know of Jesus; this conclusion is also not reasonable given the facts.

The option we have left is:  what he claimed about himself was true. 

 

This is called the Trilemma by some, indicating that our decision about Jesus' claims leave us in a dilemma with but three choices available.  Either he was a Liar, or he was a Lunatic, or he was who he said he was, Lord.

 

See Josh McDowell's material, especially "More Than a Carpenter" (1977), for further reading about this trilemma.

 So, my challenge was this:  when I consider Jesus' own claims, what he spoke for himself, then I conclude that he is good enough to be trusted, I believe that he was good for his word.  After all, he sealed his words with his own blood, dying not for a crime, but for his identity... and he sealed his words with his own resurrection from the dead 3 days later.  He is no dead savior. We each have our own decision to make about this very significant life in history... the life of Jesus of Nazareth.  Was he just a carpenter?  A liar about his divine identity, and a liar about eternal matters where humankind is concerned?  A lunatic, completely deluded in his mind about his divine identity? Or, was he who he claimed to be?  Can that witness be worth trusting? I think it can.  How about you? Daniel S. Fox, Ph.D. 

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The absolute reliability of Jewish prophets in identifying the promised Savior. The Jewish prophets have held up under the most stringent criteria for their service as prophets of God:  the Law required 100 percent accuracy.   Otherwise, they were to be stoned to death for perpetrating a hoax, lying in the name of God, and assuming spiritual authority where they had none.  The wonderful thing is, they were incredibly accurate -- in fact, 100 percent accurate in every prophecy uttered to-date.    The number of prophecies surrounding the first coming of their promised Messiah totaled well over 300, and every one of them came true, and in the smallest detail.    An address in history   The identity of their Messiah was held in a collection of markers, written throughout the Old Testament, and served as a kind of address in history.  Imagine your own address having not 7 to 10 markers (i.e., name, house number, street name, city, state, zip code), but over 300 markers.  Their Messiah had this sort of detailed description, and all of the prophecies were made at least 400 years before he arrived on the scene of history.    Jesus` identity   Historians record that there have been approximately 40 different men who claimed to be that promised Messiah.  Only one met all the criteria: Jesus of Nazareth.    Peter W. Stoner estimates that for a mere 8 of those 300+ prophecies to come true in one person would be a probability of 1 in 10 followed by 17 zeros.  Stoner, in his work Science Speaks, illustrates this by "supposing we take 10 to 17th power silver dollars and lay them on the face of Texas.  They will cover all of the state two feet deep.  Now mark one of these silver dollars and stir the whole mass thoroughly, all over the state.  Blindfold a man and tell him that he can travel as far as he wishes, but he must pick up one silver dollar and say that this is the right one.  What chance would he have of getting the right one?  Just the same chance that the prophets would have had of writing these eight prophecies and having them all come true in any one man, from their day to the present time, providing they wrote them in their own wisdom" (Josh McDowell, More Than A Carpenter, 1977, p. 108).
The Ordinariness of Faith The issue is not whether a person has faith.  Faith is a common possession of every person.  To walk through a day requires faith in all kinds of things... faith that a chair will hold our weight before we sit in it... faith that cars driving on the opposite side of the road will stay on that side of the road and not cross over the line just when we pass them... faith that the food we order will not infect us with some bacteria.  Faith is a very ordinary thing, and not something that we need to go out an find. Faith is also object-oriented.  That is, we put our faith IN something or someone.  In the earlier example we put our faith in a chair, or we put our faith in a driver.  By this we understand that FAITH IS ONLY AS GOOD AS ITS OBJECT. To put our faith in someone to save us, that person who is the object of our faith, NEEDS to be trustworthy.  We also describe this as credibility; the person needs to be credible in order for us to believe in them. Well, my conviction is that Jesus of Nazareth, who claimed to be more than merely a prophet, who claimed to be the Son of God, is credible -- and as an object of faith, He is someone we can trust.
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