Okay, so once again I am breaking away from any theme specifically related to writing as a Christian, and I am going to talk about the offense that IS JESUS. The title of this blog might be a bit misleading or the such, as I just wanted a catchy title in hopes of sparking interest in the post. Jesus and the flat earth theory connect only in the fact that I will be referring to the theory in a bit as an example for something.
So, yesterday this idea just popped into my head (I tend to believe God gave me this idea), to talk about why it is that people who don't believe in Jesus go so far out of their way to try and stop everybody else from believing. I started thinking about all of the facebook groups out there about atheism, agnosticism, etc. Then there is the online articles arguing against the faith. I started thinking if they don't believe in Jesus, then why do they care? I started thinking about all of the things that I don't believe, for instance, other faiths, global warming, the changing of gender roles and identity, the flat earth theory, etc. I started thinking that even though I don't believe "in" these things, I'm not starting groups or writing articles and focusing all of my time trying to convince other people to not believe in them either. Simply put - lets focus on the flat earth theory, which I find to be a ludicrous theory, a theory that falls short of any scientific evidence. Those that believe this - from my understanding - say that all of the photos and videos of the earth's sphere are fakes. They simply ignore a lot of things and choose ignorance. Now (with the exception of this post) you don't see me trying to convince these people that they are wrong. I simply shrug my head and secretly call them idiots and fools for believing something so contradictory to reality.
So, here is the kicker - many non Christians would say we Christians believe in Jesus ignorantly and faith in Him is contradictory to reality. I can definitely see the point here. There is such disagreement between the origin of the earth, from old earth to new earth, from evolution to literal creation, and EVERYTHING in between. So, I get this point they are trying to make, after all, there seems to be evidence to support both claims. There are even a sect of believers that fall into what I would call them "Theistic Evolutionists". Now I have not studied this concept in great depth, but theistic evolutionists believe in the scientific principles that it takes time, heat and pressure to create the various elements we have in our solar system (diamonds for example). Because of this they believe the big bang theory did happen - or at least in some way (nothing to something). I do not know - nor care to study (at least right now) - the idea of human evolution in this theory. Anyway, the point is, there is a lot of controversy over the reality of Jesus and the Bible.
Here is the thing with Christianity - many don't know that Christianity in itself can be logically argued. There are philosophical arguments that can point to Jesus - or at least to "a creator of the universe" no matter if you fully believe in evolution, theistic evolution, or literal creation. I teach a bible class at the school that I teach at, and it is my favorite class to teach. We had studied the 4 arguments for the existence of God. Ontological (the nature of God), Teleological (design and purpose), Anthropological (evidence from the innate belief structures of pretty much all of mankind), and Cosmological (evidence by nature) arguments. So, to say that belief in God as portrayed by the Bible is inconsistent with reality is a fallacy. It can definitely be argued. Just like it can be argued that a mouse trap had to have had a creator, or Mount Rushmore didn't "just happen".
any who...I digress. So I started thinking, if someone doesn't believe "in" something, most of the time we might just call the person that does believe in it an idiot or fool and move on with our lives. This tends not to be the case in regards to Jesus, so why? Well Jesus himself told his disciples that he would offend people. Sure enough, he does. It is okay to say God (probably because most people have their own personal view of God that bends to their will), but by saying Jesus everything changes. Why? Mainly because Jesus is not a gray issue. If you say you believe in God...what kind of god? What is the benefit? Is it a god that suits you or what? Once we say we believe in Jesus, everybody knows what he stands for....Righteousness, Holiness,, judgment, etc. The sad thing is that many don't view Jesus or Christianity with having love - this is completely our fault. We tend to show judgement over love - but that is a different blog. In short scripture tells us all these rules not to do and to judge each other, but the epistles are specifically talking to and about believers, not unbelievers. The gospels are for the unbelievers.
So basically Jesus is so offensive because a sinful world doesn't want to be sinless - we enjoy it too much! Those atheists and others who fervently proselytize into their own faith - and a faith it is - do so, because they are trying to run from God. one of the Anthropological arguments for the existence of God is the fact that from the beginning of time, in all cultures, man has created a god or gods of some sort to worship - this implies that the true creator has placed in His creation a desire to worship Him. A study years ago (take this for what it is worth as I do not know who, when, where, or anything about the study - or even where I heard it from - as it was around 15-20 years ago) had atheists take a lie detector test and they asked if they believe in God. Only a very, very small number registered as a truth.
So, it is my belief that everybody wants to try and disprove the reality of Jesus because it suits them better, rather than admitting our dependence on something greater than ourselves - admitting that we are not in control, admitting that we don't have power, admitting that we must be subjected to a higher authority.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you found this post interesting.