"Who Do You Say That I Am?": The Historical Case for Jesus

Jesus asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" They said, "Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." And Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven."  - Matthew 16:13-17

Who is Jesus? In Jesus’ own day, people had some theories: Maybe he’s John the Baptist come back to life. After all, he had started to become a lot more publicly known just as John had been arrested and then killed. Or maybe Jesus is the prophet Elijah returned from heaven, which would signal the coming Day of the Lord and His judgment upon the nations. Maybe he’s the second coming of Jeremiah or one of the other prophets--John’s Gospel reports that Jesus had demonstrated at the temple early on in his ministry, just like Jeremiah had centuries earlier. As creative as each of those answers were, as much as each explanation had something going for it, all of those explanations were wildly wrong. In our own day people still have their own answers to that question: Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that Jesus is really Michael the Archangel; Mormons believe that Jesus is a mere man (and half-brother of Lucifer) who became one of many gods; Deepak Chopra and Richard Rohr claim that Jesus was an Eastern mystic who achieved a higher state of consciousness, known as the “Christ consciousness,” which resulted in him becoming known as “Christ” as a signal of his accomplishment; some people say that he survived the cross and ran to France with Mary Magdalene; or that he was really the Apostle Paul. Scientology claims that Jesus is a viral idea that was forced upon an alien's spirit about a million years ago. I can't fully explain that position to you, because I don't have any experience with this next thing either: in 1970 John Allegro, a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar and lecturer at Manchester University, wrote an entire book called The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross arguing that the story of Jesus is really an allegorical code for using hallucinogenic mushrooms. Some internet personalities have even tried to argue that Jesus never existed. Given all of this confusion about Jesus, some purposeful, and some of it by people who are honestly misled, it would be worth our time this morning as Christians who are witnesses of Jesus, to understand more about what the historical case for Jesus really is.

HISTORICAL WITNESSES TO JESUS

The first piece of evidence is that there are a good number of historical witnesses to Jesus outside of the Bible. The Roman historian and high-ranking official, Tacitus, writing in 116 AD, in the middle of his comments on the reign of the Roman Emperor Nero, wrote that “Christ, from whom the name [Christian] had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.” Tacitus did not know Christians, he did not like them, and he was definitely not a Christian. But he did know about Jesus. And what he knows is that Jesus was a Jewish man from Judea, who was crucified by Pontius Pilate during the reign of the Emperor Tiberius, and that a religion or “superstition” developed around him which temporarily halted after he was crucified, only to unexplainably come back and spread all the way to Rome--for reasons that he couldn’t speculate on. 

The Jewish general and historian Josephus wrote a long history of the Jewish people that he completed in 93 AD, and in it he mentions Jesus in two places: in one he focuses on James, who he points out was “the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ,” and in the other he writes an amazing passage about Jesus, which only survives with additions except in one manuscript, but here is a reconstruction of that passage by scholars: “At this time there appeared Jesus, a wise man. For he was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people. And he gained a following both among many Jews and among many of Greek origin. And when Pilate, because of an accusation made by the leading men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so. And up until this very day the tribe of Christians (named after him) has not died out.” So Josephus confirms that Jesus lived during the time of Pilate; that he was considered a teacher, had a reputation as a miracle worker, and had followers among both Jews and Gentiles; that he was crucified at the suggestion of Jewish authorities. Added to that, Josephus also had his own separate sources about the death of James the brother of Jesus, because that death led to a complaint against the high priest of the day and resulted in a change in power, so it was politically significant. 

There are other references to Jesus by people outside of the Bible who were historically close to him, but between just Tacitus and Josephus we have a pretty good outline of some basics of Jesus’ life: He lived during the reign of Tiberius Caesar (who reigned from 14-37 AD); he was a Jewish man from Judea; he was called the Christ (which is the title of the Jewish Messiah); he had a brother; he had a group of followers; he was a well-known teacher; he was regarded as a miracle worker; he was accused by the Jewish leadership of the day of an offense which caused Pilate to have him crucified; and the movement around him was halted temporarily after his death, before gaining a new energy and spreading all the way from Judea to Rome itself.

BIBLICAL WITNESSES TO JESUS

So our first piece of evidence was historical witnesses outside of the Bible, which I only mentioned two for the sake of space. Our second piece of evidence is the witness of the Bible itself. It’s important to remember that the Bible isn’t just one book, but it’s an entire library of histories, and biographies, letters, and visions, poems, and sayings, by many different authors over a long period of time, over a huge geographical area. 

Now, it’s true that non-Christian historians don’t accept the truth of the whole Bible. But even they still have to accept that there is good historical material in the Bible. Here’s what the Atheist Bible scholar Bart Ehrman says about that: “[T]he Gospels, their sources, and the oral traditions that lie behind them combine to make a convincing case that Jesus really existed. It is not that one can simply accept everything found in the Gospels as historically accurate… At the same time, there is historical information in the Gospels. This historical material needs to be teased out by careful, critical analysis… [the Gospel writers] were historical persons giving reports of things they had heard.” He writes again, “These accounts did not appear out of thin air, however. They are based on written sources—a good number of them—that date much earlier… Even these sources… were based on [earlier] oral traditions that had been in circulation year after year among the followers of Jesus. These traditions were transmitted in various areas… throughout the Roman Empire… It appears that… many of them go back to the 30s CE. We are not, then, dealing merely with Gospels that were produced fifty or sixty years after Jesus’s death… We are talking about a large number of sources, dispersed over a remarkably broad geographical expanse, many of them dating to the years immediately after Jesus’s life.”[1] 

In the academic world Historical Jesus scholars come from all sorts of different religions and perspectives, so they take an attitude of suspicion towards the Bible. At the same time they can’t deny that all of these Gospels were written about Jesus within 60 years after his death (30 years for Mark and 60 years for John), while many living witnesses to Jesus' life and death were still around, and that these written Gospels are themselves based on earlier sources. So non-Bible believing scholars have had to come up with a series of tests for what to accept from the Gospels. Different sayings and stories about Jesus have to pass through restrictive criteria before they’re accepted as genuine. Thankfully, even under these restrictive criteria, many of the Gospel’s traditions about Jesus pass the test. 

For example there’s the criterion of multiple attestation: This is when two sources who don’t know each other say the same thing. For example, for reasons that are kind of hard to go into now, it looks like Matthew and Luke didn’t know each others’ Gospels when they were writing. And yet, they have this amazing amount of material in common that they couldn’t have got from each others’ writings and which doesn’t appear in the Gospel of Mark, which both Matthew and Luke quoted from heavily and used as one of their sources. From a lot of these common materials, and others, scholars are able to tell for sure things like that Jesus spoke Aramaic, spoke in parables, taught about the kingdom of God, debated with the Pharisees about the Jewish law, had twelve disciples, and celebrated passover. 

Then there’s the criterion of embarrassment. This test is used by scholars to sift for historical material that would have been embarrassing to the first Christian leaders, and which wouldn’t have been included unless everybody already knew about it. This includes things like Jesus being crucified, which was a shameful method of execution reserved for only the worst criminals, traitors, failed insurrectionists, that kind of thing. This is not a detail that you make up if you want people to accept your message. It would be like spreading the message of a guy who was killed by electric chair, not just by the state [the Roman Empire], but at the request of the local neighborhood watch [the Jewish authorities]. Jesus’ baptism by John is another embarrassing detail, because it was a baptism for repentance from sin. Scholars point out that Matthew’s Gospel goes out of its way to mention that John the Baptist didn’t think Jesus needed to be baptized, and they say that Matthew is trying to save face for Jesus there because he can’t deny that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist. Another thing from the life of Jesus that passes the criterion of embarrassment is Jesus causing a disturbance in the Temple, which is recorded in all four Gospels (so it passes the first criteria of multiple attestation) but it also would have been highly scandalous to Jews and the polytheistic Romans for a religious leader to cause a disturbance at a temple or sacred space. Nonreligious Bible scholars say that the Gospel writers couldn’t erase an incident like this which would have been well known, so they had to include it and try to clean it up a bit. 

There are also different criteria which point out that when something seems to reflect Jesus’ Jewish background in an incidental way, it’s more likely to reflect a genuine tradition about Jesus. So for example all of the Gospels were written in Greek, but historical Jesus scholar Craig Keener points out that there are certain words or turns of phrase that “make no more sense in Greek than in English, but… make perfect sense in Hebrew or Aramaic."[2] In addition there are many details in the Gospels where the writers seem very familiar with the geography of Galilee and Judea, or where some of the exchanges reflect Jewish concerns that are genuine for the place and time but are not really spelled out—they’re incidental details that come together to show that what’s being shared is genuine. 

Taken all together, here are 17 facts about Jesus that are so well-supported that the vast majority of even non-Christian scholars accept them: 

(1) He was a Gallilean Jewish man, 

 

(2) he grew up in Nazareth, 

 

(3) his native tongue was Aramaic, 

 

(4) he was baptized in the wilderness by John in the Jordan, 

 

(5) he had a traveling ministry through Galilee 

 

(6) he was followed by a group of disciples, both men and women, 12 of whom he named as his apostles 

 

(7) he taught about the kingdom of God, 

 

(8) he often spoke in parables, 

 

(9) he was reputed to be a wonder worker who cast out demons and healed people, 

 

(10) he showed and preached compassion to people whom Jews commonly regarded as unclean or wicked, 

 

(11) he engaged in debate over matters related to Jewish law, 

 

(12) he went to Jerusalem at Passover the week of his death, 

 

(13) he caused a disturbance in the temple, 

 

(14) he had a final meal with his inner circle of disciples that became the basis for what Christians call the Last Supper, 

 

(15) he was arrested at the behest of the high priest in Jerusalem, 

 

(16) he was crucified under Pontius Pilate in 30 or 33 AD, 

 

(17) he was genuinely believed by his disciples to appear to them shortly after his death, in experiences that convinced them that God had raised him from the dead. 

 

For those of us who read the Bible regularly, you might read that list and think, “Well, that sounds like just about everything.” And you would be right. I think this is part of why God arranged for four biographies of Jesus to make their way into the Bible—because these sources, compared with one another even by skeptical scholars who are suspicious of the Bible, make the majority of the details about the life of Jesus simply undeniable. Even Paul's letters, which are earlier than most or all the Gospels, are an important source in what they say about the historical Jesus, but unfortunately we don’t have space to get into that—though if you're interested, you can read about that by clicking here.

HISTORICAL JESUS SCHOLARSHIP IS MOVING IN A FAITH-AFFIRMING DIRECTION

The third and last piece of historical evidence for Jesus (for right now) is that the discussion is continuing to move in a faith-affirming direction. Historical Jesus studies are moving really fast—30 or 40 years ago scholars generally would have said that there’s not much you can say about Jesus, historically. Now it’s a lot different. A lot of Christians have gotten involved in the discussion and pushed their other scholars on things, and there’s a lot more consensus and a lot more details about Jesus that are being affirmed today than there used to be. 

There are still two rules for academic scholarship: (1) scholarship is not allowed to say that Jesus is God; and (2) scholarship is not allowed to support the existence of miracles. So for example, here’s the Atheist scholar Bart Ehrman again: “What is the historian to make of all these miracles [in the Gospels]? The short answer is that the historian cannot do anything with them… Suffice it to say that if historians want to know what Jesus probably did, the miracles will not make the list since by their very nature and definition, they are the most improbable of all occurrences [so he’s saying, you just have to assume that miracles don’t exist, and you have to build that assumption into your scholarship from the start]… [but] even though historians -when speaking as historians- cannot say that Jesus really did, for example, heal the sick and cast out demons, they can say that he had the reputation of having done so.”[3] So non-Christian historical Jesus studies will never affirm that Jesus is God, or that he rose from the dead because that’s a miracle. However...

Even here scholarship is moving right up to the line. A guy named Michael Licona has been working to build a historically-based case for the resurrection which has already succeeded at causing other scholars to say that Jesus’ disciples, brothers, and a large group of other people alive during the time honestly believed that Jesus had risen and appeared to them all again. That’s not saying that Jesus actually rose from the grave. But it’s as close as scholarship will ever get to affirming the resurrection. And for his part, professor Craig Keener is pushing other scholars to affirm that Jesus thought of himself as a king who would rule all of the nations at the end of history, thought of his death as important to succeeding in that mission, and then purposely provoked the leaders of the day into crucifying him. That’s not affirming that Jesus is divine or that his death covered all of the sins of the world, but it’s getting us into that territory. Finally, a highly respected scholar named Richard Bauckham has written a book called Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, which is influentially pointing out that in many places the Gospels carry many of the marks of using eyewitness testimony. By comparing the Gospels to other ancient biographies, Bauckham has even pointed out how the Gospels appear to use ancient writing techniques to point out and name their sources for specific things that they say about Jesus. I don’t really have the space here to describe how or why (check out his book in the link), but his arguments have been persuasive to a lot of other scholars. 

So this is a real encouragement to Christians: although you wouldn’t know it by spending time on social media or watching TV, scholarship is continuing to get closer to affirming many of the things that we as Christians believe about Jesus, not farther. And what’s currently coming down the pipeline, what’s currently being debated, is moving in an even more faith-affirming direction.

- Sean

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[1] Bart Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist?, p. 171

[2] Craig Keener, The Historical Jesus of the Gospels, 217-218.

[3] Bart Ehrman, Did Jesus Exist?, pp. 315-316

Being A People of Faith, Godliness, and Hope

"Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ: for [κατὰ] the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, for [κατὰ] godliness, and for [ἐπί] hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began and at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Savior. To Titus, my true child in a common faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior." - Titus 1:1-4

What is the mission of the God's people? The Apostle Paul provides the answer in Titus 1:1-4. Here Paul is writing to a younger leader named Titus, and he starts off with an unusually long introduction about his own personal mission--he's doing this because he is really "centering on the nature of gospel ministry" for Christians in general.[1] As Kenyan theology professor Samuel Ngewa writes, we are supposed to recognize in Paul's introduction that "we are called to the same task that Paul was."[2] So, what are the main themes of Paul's mission, and ours, as part of the people of God? The mission of God's people centers around three things: faith, godliness, and hope. Or, put another way: (1) telling people about Jesus; (2) living for Jesus; and (3) being people of hope.

FAITH: TELLING PEOPLE ABOUT JESUS

The first part of the church's mission is telling people about Jesus. Paul made it his mission to spread the Gospel to all of those who God might draw to himself. Or, as he put it in another passage, "I endure everything for the sake of the chosen people of God, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory" (2 Timothy 2:10). 

Paul dedicated his life to this. He used to be a persecutor of the church who hated Jesus, and he might have even murdered some Christians (Acts 9:1; Galatians 1:13). But God met Paul in a powerful way and turned his life around. From that day forward no one could stop him from telling everybody he met about the mercy and grace that God had shown him through Jesus. Maybe you're reading this and you're the same way. Maybe you were happy with your life, doing your own thing. But then you had an encounter with Jesus and it was like taking your first sip of water and realizing for the first time in your life that you had been thirsty for years. Your life changed as a result of hearing the Gospel, or being around other Christians and realizing something was different about them. But either way, your comfortable life wasn't comfortable any more, and you realized that you needed Jesus in your life. Since then, you haven't been able to keep yourself from sharing the same hope that you found with others. Maybe you got to the end of your rope. You tried to do everything that the world offers to make you feel at peace. You got involved in charity; you traveled; you got involved in the groups, showed up to make a difference at the rallies, tried the drugs, separated yourself from the toxic people, and you said your affirmations in the mirror: "I am a positive and powerful person, I am a positive and powerful person." and none of it did anything! Some of it made things even worse. And then you met Jesus. And not everything was fixed, not everything was solved. But there was something there, some kind of peace or something, that just didn’t have any kind of explanation that you could put your finger on. And after that it was just very hard for you not to tell people about what Jesus had done for you.

Let me tell you about what Jesus did for me. I grew up being bounced back and forth between Winnipeg and Toronto, between my dad and my mom. My mother left my dad and I when I was eight months old. I landed in foster care for a couple of years because my father put my head through a wall when I was five. Winnipeg Child and Family Services released me back into my mom’s care at the end of that time, but she only stuck around for a couple of months and then left me back with my dad. I grew up pretty much exclusively around strippers and bikers. I got into a lot of fights, got expelled from a lot of schools, committed a few crimes that would still be ruining my life today except that I was counted as a juvenile offender—and then I met Jesus when I was 16. I was in the back of a youth center, showed up to a Bible study, and the guy there just opened up the Word of God and told me about Jesus. And at the end asked me if I wanted to pray. And I said sure, I didn’t know what he wanted to pray about. Maybe the peace of the world or something. But he started to say “repeat after me” and led me through a prayer of asking God to forgive my sins and help me follow him. And I prayed that prayer. And I’ll tell you, I don’t think I believed in God when I started that prayer. But when we finished, and it was my turn to pray in my own words, I really did. It was just like faith happened to me. Like something supernatural that I still can’t explain to this day. And after that I just told all my friends about Jesus. They thought I was crazy; I didn’t care. I went back to my school and apologized to everyone I had ever hurt or been awful to. Jesus has changed my life to the point where it just feels like there is no continuity between who I am now and who I was then. Stories about some of the things I did as a teenager just feel like a different person did them. So here’s my deal: I love Jesus. He changed my life. And I want to tell other people about him. So that’s pretty much what I’ve dedicated my life to.

That’s the first part of the mission of God’s people as the church: to be people who have put our faith in Jesus, who to tell other people about Jesus, so that they can put their faith in him too.

GODLINESS: LIVING FOR JESUS

The second part of the church's mission is living for Jesus. This is what the word "godliness" means. It means living like people who’ve been transformed by knowing Jesus. It means something a little more than just living a good moral life—though it is that too, but that’s a really narrow way of putting it. Godliness means that your whole life could be explained by what you think of Jesus. So Jesus is who you put your faith in (Titus 1:1). Jesus becomes the foundation for how you make decisions about what you think is good and truthful (also Titus 1:1). Jesus is where you go when you are restless and stressed out and just need to find peace (Titus 1:4). And Jesus is the one you look to as your savior (Titus 1:3,4), who died on the cross to save you from what you really needed to escape from, which was the weight of all your sin. And you run to him -not to a political party, not to a new relationship, not to a financial opportunity; at least not primarily- you run first to Jesus as your Savior, because he saves you from the thing that really matters. He doesn’t just save you until the next election, or the next season of life, or the next financial quarter. Jesus saves you for all eternity.

Godliness looks like having the kind of life that could only make sense if God was at the center of it. I have a confession to make: I still need to be reminded of this constantly. So I had a couple of interactions this week where I was running really busy, and tired, and trying to get a lot of things running all at once, and as a naturally shy person who’s gone through some things before, I started to get worn down. And on Thursday I asked God why I was starting to have a hard time having conversations with people and just kind of interacting, and I felt like God told me, it’s because I’m getting tired out from doing things out of my own ingenuity, and strength, and work ethic. And it’s because I’ve been looking at myself and my own performance too much as the solution for what my family and other people need, and of course that brings out some insecurity because they don’t actually need me, or any person, primarily—what they really need most can only come from Jesus. And so it’s my job to still work hard and to make sure we’re on track, but before those things it’s really my job to point myself and other people to Jesus. And once I realized that, I spent some time just praying and getting close to Jesus, and asking him to help me take my eyes off myself and put them on him so he could do the work in me that really matters. So is being shy, or occasionally awkward, or worn out a sin? No—of course not. I would never say that. But how that got dealt with in my life, where I took that to Jesus and asked him about it and he worked that out with me, and how that changed things in time for the next day where I had a great time talking with all kinds of people—that kind of change is the sort of thing where there was something in my life that was different that could only be explained by a relationship with Jesus. That’s godliness. It’s not morality. A lot of moral people -according to the world’s standard- are pretty godless. Godliness is a way of life that comes from a deepening relationship with God. Godliness is a way of life that comes from a deepening relationship with God. And that’s a big part of the mission of the church: not just to tell people about Jesus; we want to live for Jesus too.

HOPE: BEING PEOPLE OF HOPE

Third, the mission of the church is about being people of hope. In the Gospel, which is the good news about what Jesus has done, we have been given the promise of eternal life (Titus 1:2-3). John MacArthur -who’s been a pastor at Grace Community Church in Las Angeles for over 50 years now- says this:

“Eternal life is the pervading reality of salvation, and the hope of that life gives believers encouragement in a multitude of ways. It is an encouragement to holiness… The hope of eternal life gives encouragement for service… The hope of eternal life also gives encouragement to endure whatever suffering we may experience for the sake of Christ.”[3]

Where does this hope come from? In Titus 1:2-3 we’re told that this hope comes from God, who promised it “before the ages began”—literally “before time eternal." And then “at the proper time” he acted. God exists outside of time. He’s not bound by it. He can pick it up and look around at time the same as you or I could take pick up and take a look at a pen. But then this passage says that “at the proper time” God acted. The God who is not bound by time stepped down for you and me and made himself known in history. How amazing is that? And how did we get this hope? This passage only suggests the answer, when it says that God is our true Savior in Titus 1:3. And then it says that Jesus is our Savior (Titus 1:4). What’s Paul saying here? The God who is outside of time acted inside of time. The God who is our Savior came down as Jesus who is our Savior. They’re both mentioned together in the same breath as the single, true source of grace and peace. They’re both given the same titles, because Jesus is God. And although it’s not mentioned in this verse, we have the hope of eternal life together with God because Jesus took all of our sin and our guilt and our shame, and he nailed them to the cross in his body, where he paid the penalty that we deserved in our place, so that we could be clothed with his perfect goodness. So God has replaced our shame with his honor. He’s replaced our guilt with a declaration of his righteousness on our behalf. He took our shame and put it on himself so that he could give us his perfect holiness. And now he’s invited us into the hope of eternal life where we can dwell together with him in a place where the Bible says there is no sorrow, nor sickness, nor pain, nor crying anymore, for the old things have passed away, and behold, the new has come (Revelation 21:4. He has come to gather up his children to him in a place of perfect justice, and equity, and peace. As the people of God, part of our mission is to live and talk about the hope that only eternal life with Jesus can give.

So Paul’s mission, and our mission, is about telling people about Jesus so that they can put their faith in him; and our mission is to live godly lives for Jesus; and our mission is to be people of hope.

- Sean

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[1] John MacArthur, Titus, MacArthur New Testament Commentary Series, p. 1

[2] Samuel Ngewa, 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, Africa Bible Commentary Series, p. 327-328.

[3] John MacArthur, Titus, MacArthur New Testament Commentary Series, pp. 9-10.

The Lord's Supper: Past, Present, and Future

"For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." 

- Corinthians 11:26

What is the Lord's Supper? What is this strange, small, family meal that Christians consume together in our church services? The Lord's Supper is called by that name because it is a family meal that was instituted by Jesus for his disciples. Sometimes it is also called the eucharist (literally "thanksgiving"), but Evangelical Christians do not usually call it that, because we do not want to confuse our practice with the Roman Catholic practice where they believe they are re-sacrificing Jesus every week. The Lord's Supper is also often called communion, which focuses on unity between Christians and the invitation to experience the presence of Jesus, which the meal emphasizes. There are different frequencies with which this meal is eaten by different Bible-believing churches (weekly or monthly), different elements involved (bread or wafers; juice or wine), and different ways of eating the meal (coming up front to receive the elements along with a blessing; waiting to partake together). However, we all believe that the Lord's Supper is a meal of remembrance, communion, and hope.

PAST: A SUPPER OF REMEMBRANCE

First, the Lord's Supper is a supper of remembrance where we focus on what Jesus did for us on the cross. Every time we take this meal together, it's sort of like our spiritual Remembrance Day, where we remember the one who died to give us freedom from the oppressive weight of sin. Here is the passage that we often read before we take the Lord's Supper together: "For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”  In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me'" (1 Cor. 11:23-25). The meal where Jesus spoke these words to his disciples was called The Passover. The Passover was all about remembrance. Nigerian Bible scholar Victor Babajide Cole writes that at the Jewish Passover, 

“After the participants had taken their positions at the table, the head of the family pronounced a blessing on the feast and the wine. Then they drank a first cup of wine, in remembrance of having been led out of Egypt… Then they drank a second cup of wine in remembrance of having been freed from slavery. Next the head of the family blessed the bread, which was passed round and eaten… At the end of the meal, the head of the family blessed the third cup of wine and it was drunk to celebrate and remember God’s mighty act of redemption… The celebration concluded shortly before midnight with the drinking of a fourth cup of wine in honour of the consummation when God will take his people to be with him for ever… As the head of his family of disciples, Jesus led the disciples in the celebration of this Passover. [But] he infused new meaning into [it]… Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it. [But then he said, ‘this is my body.’]... The third cup of wine, taken at the completion of the meal, had been in remembrance of God bringing about salvation for Israel. [But] Jesus gave it new meaning [when he said, ‘this cup is the New Covenant in my blood’].” 

Jesus took the Passover supper, which was a supper of remembrance for God’s rescue of Israel, and he gave it a new meaning as a remembrance for our rescue from sin. Tim Keller says “the Lord’s Supper connects the present to the past, because it immediately connects you to the night in which Jesus was betrayed.” We re-enact the story of the Last Supper together as a church whenever we take Communion: We claim that that is our story; and you can say: Jesus shares his table with me; I am a disciple of Jesus; his body was broken like this bread for my salvation; his blood ran red, like this cup, from the cross for my sins; you can hold the cup and the bread and declare that you are provided with nourishment because you hunger and thirst for righteousness, and when you take Communion, you confess “I need Jesus—his presence is like spiritual food for me, his saving death is like a drink for my soul.” And when we say that the Lord’s Supper is a supper of remembrance, we also acknowledge that it’s not just for our benefit: we "proclaim the Lord's death until he comes" (1 Cor. 11:26). Thomas Schreiner put it better than I ever could; he said that “The Lord’s Supper communicates a story to the world, a story of sacrificial love in which Jesus gave up his life for the sake of others… The Lord’s Supper is not only a remembrance but also a proclamation... to the world about the love of God in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.” I also love how the Puritan Thomas Goodwin compared the Lord’s Supper to a sermon, when he wrote: “Of sermons, some are for comfort, some are to inform, some to excite; but here in the Lord’s Supper is everything you could ever hope to expect. Christ is here light, and wisdom, and comfort, and all that you could need. He is here an eye to the blind, a foot to the lame; He is everything to everyone.” This is how we remember and proclaim Jesus in the Lord’s Supper.

PRESENT: A SUPPER OF COMMUNION

The Lord’s Supper is also a supper of Communion. Think along the lines of community - gathering, and sharing, and relationship. In 1 Corinthians 11, the Apostle Paul's constant assumption is that the Lord’s Supper is something that that Christians eat, quote, “when [they] come together” (1 Cor. 11:33). It’s not something they do off by themselves and away from other Christians. It’s something that’s supposed to bring them together as a church. In the church that I serve at, we express this by all partaking together (though there's nothing wrong with going up front to receive, as it displays dependence upon Jesus). We all wait and we eat and we drink at the same time, because Communion reminds us that whether we’re rich or poor, old or young, woman or man, whether we vote Liberal or Conservative, whether we are a pastor or a student or a postal worker, whether we are an elder or deacon in the church or a brand new Christian, whether we cheer for the Roughriders or some other team, our first identity is in Christ and by taking this bread and this cup together we are witnessing that we are all one people, and that we are all united together in him.

The Lord’s Supper is not just a supper of communion with each other as a Church, though, it is a supper of communion with our Savior Jesus Christ. (1) In the Lord’s Supper, Jesus invites us to eat with him at his table. We dine with him on the night before he was betrayed, when he gave new meaning to the bread and wine. The Puritan Stephen Charnock said “in this action there is more communion with God…than in any other religious act…. We have not so near a communion with a person… as we have by sitting with him at his table, partaking of the same bread and the same cup.” (2) And that isn’t the only way we have communion with Jesus as we take the Lord's Supper. His presence is with us. When we take communion, and we take a pause, we make space and to ask that the Holy Spirit would make us aware of the presence of Jesus in our gathering as we take the Lord’s Supper. When we gather together, and we declare to each other and to God that we are his disciples, and when we gather at his table to remember him and to proclaim the news about his death for our sins and our trespasses, Jesus promises in Matthew 18:20, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them.” At the end of Matthew’s Gospel, he says “behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” So New York City Pastor Tim Keller says, “in a unique way, in a way that is not available any other place, [in the Lord’s Supper] you eat and drink his words, his truth, the gospel; it becomes part of you. You remember that God will spiritually graft his truth, his gospel, his grace into you in a way that’s unique, in a way you can’t have in a quiet time; in a way that you can’t have anywhere else.” When we take the Lord’s Supper, we are entering into communion with each other as we partake together, and we are entering into communion with the very presence of Jesus in our midst as we are gathered together.

FUTURE: A SUPPER OF HOPE

Third, the Lord's Supper is a supper of hope. 1 Corinthians 11:26 says that "as often as you [eat the Lord's Supper], you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." Whenever we celebrate the Lord's Supper, we also look forward to another Supper in the future, when Jesus will return to correct all injustice and wipe away all poverty and to cure all disease, and to heal all division; when he will bring all his people to himself, and the nations of the earth will make no war, and hold no hostages, and build no weapons, and have no secrets, and there will be no oppression, and no hunger, but only peace. Isaiah 25:6-9 tells us that on that day, on the mountain of the Lord, there will be another supper, which this supper looks forward to: “On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine.” Go back with me to the Passover supper, on the night when Jesus was betrayed. If you remember back to the beginning of this post, the Nigerian Bible scholar Victor Babajide Cole wrote about how Jesus “ended the Passover meal with the third cup, and did not go on to take the fourth cup, [which represented] the gathering to God of his people. That cup will only be drunk at the time of Jesus’ second coming. So the fourth cup is postponed. [It’s still waiting on the table.]” When Jesus comes, what’s his gathering going to be? What’s he going to bring when he comes? A supper. When you take the Lord’s Supper, God is whispering to you. He says, “I am unconditionally committed to getting you from here to there; from this bread and drink, to the new bread and drink in God's Kingdom.” We eat this meal in anticipation of the Great Feast that we will share with Jesus when he comes.

CONCLUSION

So on Communion Sunday, we celebrate the Lord’s Supper together. We celebrate a supper of remembrance; a supper of communion; and a supper of hope. This little piece of bread and this little cup are so small, but they represent such enormous truth and beauty and meaning. In these, according to 1 Corinthians 11:23-26, we have the message of the Gospel re-enacted for us. Jesus gave his body for us (v. 24). He brought in a new covenant in his own blood (v. 25). He died for sin, and was buried, and he rose back to life three days later, conquering sin and Satan and death and hell, and he rose up to heaven where he is seated at the right hand of God the Father, from where he will one day come again. (v. 26)

- Sean

Eight Ways to Be An Evangelist (According to the Bible)

Jesus has commanded us to "Go and make disciples of the nations" (Matthew 28:19). Christians are meant to make Jesus known--individually, and together as the church! That's our mission statement. But, Jesus didn't command us all to do evangelism in the same way. We're all built differently from each other. The mission for all of us is the same, but our methods don't have to be. So in light of that, I wanted to outline 8 Ways to Be an Evangelist (According to the Bible).

1. Active Evangelism (Paul). Paul wrote in Romans 1:14-15, “I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and the foolish, so I am eager to preach the gospel.” The heart of Paul was to actively go out and preach the gospel to all people, everywhere, and especially to go to unreached areas where Christ has not been named. Active evangelism is when we go out and find people, and start conversations with them to tell them about Jesus. That’s one way of doing it, and for those who God equips it is probably the most effective way to tell the world about Jesus. God used Paul’s active evangelism to help bring the entire Roman world to faith. But it’s not the only way.

2. Being a Consistent Witness (1 Peter 3). Peter wrote in his first letter to a group of Christians, "In your hearts honor Chris the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect" (1 Peter 3:15). God has used the consistent witness of a lot of faithful Christians to bring people to faith. A consistent witness usually isn’t good at going out and talking to strangers in the checkout line of the grocery store, but they’re very upfront and unashamed about the fact that they’re followers of Jesus, and they live a consistent life. I know a guy named Chris Stein who’s very good at this. And so as time goes on, often the people who are already around people like this -their co-workers, their families, their friends- will eventually ask them more about what they believe.

3. Financially Supporting the Work of Evangelism (3 John). The Apostle John wrote to a group of Christians in the letter of 3 John, “Do all in your efforts for those brothers… [who] have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from [the places where they are going]. Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth.” These supporters are people who aren’t able go and preach the Gospel: they live further away from where people are, or they’re stuck at home due to illness or responsibilities. But John says that by resourcing people who are able to go and reach other people, these prayer partners and financial givers can be considered, quote, “fellow workers for the truth” alongside the people who physically go out to preach the message of the Gospel.

4. Sharing Your Testimony (The Blind Man). The man born blind in John's Gospel said to his questioners, “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25). He wasn’t clever or well spoken, but he confronted his questioners with the power of his experience and how he had been changed by Jesus. Anyone whose life has been changed by Jesus can do this too.

5. The Invitational Approach (The Samaritan Woman at the Well). This is the method of the Samaritan Woman from John 4, who told her neighbours "Come, and see a man who told me all that I ever did.’ So the Samaritans came to see Jesus” (John 4:29). This is what we do when we put on events for people in our neighbourhood, or invite our friends to church, or (wisely) share certain messages on Facebook that we hope will allow others to think and consider the message of Jesus. We might not be able to answer all of our friends' questions or give them all the resources that they need, but we can invite them to some place or connect them with some person who can.

6. The Intellectual Approach (Paul). The Book of Acts records that Paul did a lot of evangelism by reasoning with people and giving an intellectual defense of the faith. In Acts 9:19-22, he "confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Christ." Often when Paul proclaimed Jesus, he did it through reason. So we can find him again in Athens, arguing with the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers: "Now while Paul was waiting at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. So he reasoned... in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him" (Acts 17:16-18). The intellectual evangelist loves apologetics, reasoning for the faith, and proving the truth of the Gospel. This person is a great resource for other Christians as well!

7. The Direct Approach (Peter). Peter was known for being a very direct person who just got right into things and did not beat around the bush. He got straight to the heart of the matter. In Acts 2 we find him confidently engaging with a crowd of people, preaching the Gospel of Jesus and calling people to repent, trust Jesus, and be baptized. People who utilize the direct approach are not afraid to strike up conversations with people and take the Gospel straight to them. Like Peter, these are usually engaging and charismatic people with a gift of gab, a heart for the Lord, and an infectious optimism that makes people want to listen to what they have to say.

8. A Connection With a Certain Group (Matthew). Everyone has a natural connection with a certain group. Since shaving my head, for example, I've discovered that us bald guys tend to share a certain brotherhood. (We also share a life verse: "As for the man whose head is shaven: he is bald, but he is clean," Leviticus 13:40.) Matthew had a connection with a certain group of people on the outside of polite society, and he brought them to hear from Jesus: "[Matthew] rose and followed him. And as Jesus reclined at table in his house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples" (Matthew 9:9-10). Whatever your group is, you probably have a group of people who you are uniquely equipped to reach with the Gospel.

...So as we can see, all of us are called to make Jesus known! But we're not all called to do it the same way. I hope this list of biblical examples helps us all to think of new ways that we might uniquely be called to make Jesus known.

-Sean

Going Back to Galilee: Encountering Jesus Again

"Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.'" 

-Matthew 28:16-20

Why would Jesus send the Eleven Disciples to Galilee? On the surface, it doesn't make sense. Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection both happened in the province of Judea, which is 180 kilometers to the south. Christ's ascension back up into heaven also happened in Judea (Acts 1). Everyone was already there. The majority of Jesus' appearances after his resurrection -including to a group of women, to Mary Magdalene, to two disciples on the road to Emmaus, to most of the disciples, and to Thomas, all according to Luke 24 and John 20- also happened in Jerusalem in Judea. So why is it that, during the 40 days between Jesus' resurrection and ascension, he made it a point to bring the Eleven Disciples all the way up north for a random road trip to this mountain in Galilee?

WHERE DID YOU LAST POWERFULLY ENCOUNTER JESUS?

Here's the answer: I think it's because Galilee was where they had already spent so much time with Jesus, and it's the place where they had first learned to follow him. This mountain might have even been the last place where the disciples got a real glimpse of Jesus as more than just a man: according to some commentators, this mountain could be the same one where Jesus had been transfigured before their eyes (with his face shining like the sun and his clothes as white as light) back in Matthew 17. If that's true, then it's at this same mountain that Jesus chooses to reveal more of himself to them: "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me" (Matthew 28:18).

WHY TO GO FORWARD, YOU SOMETIMES NEED TO GO BACKWARDS

Sometimes in our walk with God, the path forward is to go backwards. Like a slingshot: you pull back in order to have the power to go forward. Our spiritual life can be like that. Maybe you’re reading this and you’re tired, and you’re worn out. Maybe you have some family issues you’re dealing with, or you’ve got a bad situation going on at work; maybe there’s a lot of little things that need your attention and you’ve been pulling some late nights to be able to deal with everything; and in pretty much every way, you’re just tired right now. That’s okay. That happens to all of us. So when that happens, the path forward in our spiritual life is often to go to the last place where you powerfully encountered God, so that you can know and encounter him all over again. Maybe the path forward is to drop by the old neighbourhood and see how everyone’s doing, and to remember how God saved you when you were in your old way of life. Maybe the way forward is to rediscover the places, disciplines, relationships, communities, and ministries that first encouraged you to walk with God in a powerful way, and to rediscover the sense of purpose and excitement you had when you began. And once you’ve done that, once you’ve gone back to your own Galilee -the place where you powerfully encountered Jesus-, knowing Jesus means focusing your attention on him and remembering him for who he is. In Galilee, the disciples are finally ready to know Jesus as he really is.

KNOWING JESUS AS HE REALLY IS

Only when the disciples went back to Galilee were they really ready to know Jesus as the one who holds all authority in heaven and on earth--a statement of divinity, since only God has all authority. The disciples went back to Galilee because what was true for them is also true for you and for me: Before you can help other people to know Jesus, you must know Jesus. And to know Jesus means knowing him personally as the one who holds all authority in heaven and on earth.

I'll finish with this quote from John Piper, a faithful pastor and author, and founder of Desiring God Ministries, whose God-glorifying impact I believe will last until long after you and I are both gone.

“[Jesus has] all authority. He has authority over Satan and all demons, over all angels, over the natural universe, over natural laws; over stars, galaxies, planets, meteorites; authority over all molecular and atomic reality: over atoms, electrons, protons, neutrons, quantum physics, genetics, over every chromosome; authority over all plants and animals great and small; over every beat of the heart, every breath of the diaphragm, every electrical jump across a million synapses in our brains; authority over all nations and governments: congresses and legislatures and presidents and kings and prime ministers and courts; authority over all armies and weapons and bombs and terrorists; authority over all industry and business and finance and currency; authority over all entertainment and amusement and leisure and media; over all education and research and science and discovery; authority over all crime and violence; over all families and neighborhoods; and over the church, and over every soul and every moment of every life that has been or ever will be lived. There is nothing in heaven or on earth over which Jesus does not have authority, that is, does not have the right and the power to do with as he pleases… The scope and the magnitude of the authority of Jesus is infinite, because Jesus is one with God the Father. The Father has given him all authority not because the Father can give up being God, but because Jesus is God. And when deity shares infinite authority with deity, he neither loses nor gains anything, but remains infinitely full and triumphant and all-sufficient. This is the lofty claim. Our Lord, Jesus Christ, has all authority in heaven and on earth, because our Lord Jesus is God.” -John Piper, "The Lofty Claim"

Do you know Jesus in this way? Are you amazed by him? If not, then go back to the place or the people or the authors where you last encountered him, whatever that means for you, and dig deeper. I pray that you and I would be a people who know Jesus, and that in knowing Jesus, we would seek to make him known.

-Sean

Every Book of the Bible in a Single Line

Genesis: God makes the world, sin enters in, and Abraham's family is chosen to fix everything.

Exodus: God versus Pharaoh for Israel's freedom (God wins). Then wandering the desert.

Leviticus: Rules for everything.

Numbers: Statistics. Also, more wandering.

Deuteronomy: Recent history of wandering according to Moses.

Joshua: Abraham's descendants conquer Canaan, but not completely.

Judges: Everyone does what's right in their own eyes - chaos ensues.

Ruth: A love story based on poverty and shrewd dealing with relatives.

1 Samuel: Israel gets a king... the story of David.

2 Samuel: The story of David continued.

1 Kings: After becoming prosperous, the kingdom sinks into idolatry and is divided in two.

2 Kings: The story of the two kingdoms continued (they both get conquered).

1 Chronicles: The story of David, one more time.

2 Chronicles: The story of the southern kingdom, mostly, one more time.

Ezra: Rebuilding the temple.

Nehemiah: Rebuilding Jerusalem.

Esther: Esther marries the king, and uses her connections to save the Jews.

Job: Bad things happen to good people.

Psalms: Songs and prayers.

Proverbs: Practical wisdom.

Ecclesiastes: Everything is meaningless. Except for following God.

Song of Songs: Married stuff.

Isaiah: God will restore all things through his servant, the Messiah.

Jeremiah: Weeping prophet who predicts doom and sees it come to pass.

Lamentations: If your home was conquered and your people enslaved, you'd write sad poetry too.

Ezekiel: A prophet living in exile, calling Israel's people back to God and preaching restoration.

Daniel: Hebrew kid goes into Chaldean re-education program, resists it, and climbs political ranks.

Hosea: Takes a repeatedly unfaithful prostitute as a wife, to illustrate God's relationship with Israel.

Joel: Repent.

Amos: Prophecy of destruction against rich, affluent, satisfied Israel.

Obadiah: Prophecy of destruction upon the people of the Edomites.

Jonah: Called to preach repentance to Ninevah; tries to run, and gets angry when people get saved.

Micah: Woe! Restoration. Denouncing! Hope. Destruction! Love.

Nahum: A century after Jonah, Nahum prophesies destruction against Nineveh.

Habakkuk: Believing, but not understanding, Habakkuk questions God's actions.

Zephaniah: During the reign of righteous Josiah, Zephaniah preaches tough love from God.

Haggai: During the return of the exiles, preaches the importance of rebuilding God's temple.

Zechariah: During exiles' return, preaches the importance of repentance and commitment to God.

Malachi: Rekindles God's people, encourages genuine worship of God, and points to the Messiah.

Matthew: The story of Jesus -the Messiah- for Jewish folks.

Mark: The story of Jesus for Roman folks.

Luke: The story of Jesus for women and poor folks.

John: An expanded, creatively told, inside scoop on the story of Jesus.

Acts: History of the first Jesus-followers, and the conversion of a murderer of Christians.

Romans: A manifesto by Paul, the converted persecutor, on salvation by grace through faith.

1 Corinthians: A letter to the worst church ever.

2 Corinthians: The worst church ever is doing much better.

Galatians: A scathing attack on Christian circumcision.

Ephesians: We should all be united together in the truth.

Philippians: Even in prison, Jesus is joy enough for Paul.

Colossians: Life through the awesomeness of Jesus, and not rules and regulations.

1 Thessalonians: Celebration and encouragement for new believers.

2 Thessalonians: A letter regarding the end of everything.

1 Timothy: A church manual written to a young pastor.

2 Timothy: Encouragement to a young pastor from soon-to-be-martyred Paul.

Titus: A church manual written to another young pastor.

Philemon: Paul writes to a runaway slave's Christian owner asking for the slave's release.

Hebrews: Jesus is better than everything in the Old Testament.

James: General wisdom for Christians.

1 Peter: Living as exiles from the world, but as citizens of heaven.

2 Peter: A warning against false prophets and false teachers.

1 John: Marks of true and false Christians.

2 John: Love one another, keep the commandments, watch out for false teachers -- goodbye.

3 John: A tiny letter on church politics. (It's almost as short as this, too.)

Jude: Defend the faith.

Revelation: Either the end of everything, or a surrealist take on current events--or both!