Scripture gives us a pretty clear picture that Jesus was a modest man, with zeal for truth, he did not live a exorbitant lavish lifestyle, he was honest, he did not draw attention to Himself He drew attention to God.
This is partially true, and partially false.
In another thread, I talked about Lazarus. Picture it; Here is Jesus, standing in the middle of a town where Lazarus has died and is lying in a tomb. People are everywhere. They know Lazarus is dead and in the tomb. And what does Jesus do? He proclaims with a LOUD voice, "Lazarus, come forth!" in the midst of all of that.
Now you can try to convince yourself that this did not draw attention to Jesus all you want, but just try to picture it, and just imagine how much attention this garnered. In fact, it drew
so much attention to Himself that this was the one miraculous act that caused the Pharisees to begin to plot to kill Jesus (
John 11:53).
Christians are Christ's ambassadors that means that we are to represent Him and His holiness as accurately as we can in speech, behavior, appearance and attitude. Over and over we are commande to imitate God, be pure, be holy, don'be like the world and be righteous.
This is also true. How do we "re-present" Jesus to the world? It's a question we should all ask
ourselves often.
Jesus said;
John 3:17 (NIV)
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
He also said;
John 13:34 (NIV)
"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
Those are strong words. "As I have Loved you". How has Jesus Loved us?
John 15:13 (NIV)
Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
Jesus demonstrated His Love by laying down His life for his friends. Are we willing to lay down our lives for those people we criticize? If the answer is no, then we are doing a poor job of "re-presenting" Christ. And before anyone comes in with a super-witty, "You're one to talk" response, I'm talking about myself just as much as anyone else here.
These people do reach millions, but do they represent the Gospel and Jesus accurately? Sadly the answer is no.
But see, the thing is, why are you so worried about how others are representing Jesus? Shouldn't you be more concerned with how you are representing Jesus?
Jesus did not live in a palace and did not wear expensive jewelry.
True. But He did wear a seamless robe. That people fought over. And people regularly gave Him money. And He needed a treasurer.
He did not abandon his wife and children.
He did not have a wife or children, but if He would have, I agree that He would not have abandoned them.
He did not do the hokey pokey in the temple and He corrected those who were irreverent in the temple.
Well, the hokey pokey wasn't exactly around in Jesus' time, so I'm not sure that's a valid point.
Also, the people He corrected in the temple were the people that were trying to buy and sell doves for sacrifice in the temple. This had little to do with them being "irreverent" as subjectively implied in your post, and everything to do with the fact that these people thought they could just come into the temple and buy a dove to sacrifice to make things cool. They felt no need to bring their best to God, and tried to substitute an ill-gotten dove from the people in the temple. This is why Jesus overturned their tables and drove them out of the temple.
He did not sell His revelations from God, He had faith God would care for Him.
Very true. We should as well. Freely you have received, freely give.
Jesus did not facilitate adulterers and help them in a divorce and then their marriage, he called them to repentance.
Also true. I think people nowadays give up way too quickly and easily on their marriages. I do, however, believe that the grace of God is available to
everyone.
Jesus did not falsely prophesy or advertise those who did.
No, but He chose some very imperfect people. Let me say that again; He
chose some very imperfect people, one who even went as far as to betray Him. One who denied Him. Men who didn't even intially recognize Him when He rose from the dead. Men whom He regularly corrected and admonished for their "little" faith. These are the guys Jesus
chose.
I think we need to use the strictest possible standards in understanding who Jesus is and how holy, holy, holy He is and then we will begin to understand where criticism comes from.
I think we need to start by realizing that the vast majority of what today's "discernment" ministries get all fired up about and "criticize" is peripheral and non-essential. Then we will begin to understand why the criticism is misplaced.
