The Boldness of Christ

8/14/2019 The Boldness of Christ

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The Boldness of Christ



The Boldness of Christ

"The high priest said to him, "I charge you under oath by the living God: Tell us if you are the

Christ,the Son of God."

"Yes, it is as you say," Jesus replied. "But I say to all of you: In the future you will see the Son of

Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven."

Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, "He has spoken blasphemy! Why do we need any

more witnesses? Look, now you have heard the blasphemy."

Mathew 26:63-65



When Jesus said He is the "way, truth and life" (John 14:6) and that no one

comes to God except through him, he was consciously setting off a relentlessworldwide battle.

Although Jesus, who was also called the Prince of Peace, said He came to theworld so that we might have life, and when leaving this world to meet the FatherHe has given his followers His peace (John 14:27), He has also made it clear inMatthew 10:35-37 that, in order to actually there be peace and life in the world,it was necessary first that a distinction between the children of God and thechildren of the world was done:

“For I have come to turn 'a man against his father, a daughter against her

mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.'

"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”

Obviously Jesus was not here allowing His followers to declare a holy waragainst the infidels, or to set about any kind of persecution of their opponents.He said only that this distinction would happen naturally, through the freedom ofchoice of each man, because whoever does not take his cross and follow Him isnot worthy of Him. (Matthew 10:38).

How is it possible however, in a world with such a cultural diversity, that onesingle religion can become so absolutely hegemonic among so many all others?If it is difficult to conceive of this hegemony within a single nation, how to expectthat people with histories and cultures as essentially different from the historyand culture of the Jewish people would be willing to recognize Christ as the onetrue Messiah, the Savior of the world? How to accept the fact that God hassingled a historically insignificant nation, born from long struggles against theenemy nations around her, out of so many greater nations of her time, to be thecradle of the spiritual redemption of the world?

The idea of facing a single valid choice can be daunting and unsettling for mostpeople in our time, raised in a culture which main feature is the multiplicity ofchoices. However, God revealed himself to mankind only once, through Israel,and that is why Christianity is the only true expression of this revelation.Christianity is the first and only true spiritual teaching, revealed by God to theworld. God spoke to the world through men, who wrote down His redemptivemessage under the inspiration of His Spirit, and not inspired by anyphilosophical ideas or by any spiritual beings, as happened with the world'sreligions.

There are two kinds of faith: the unstable, sterile and subjective human faith,and the genuine faith that produces conversion of life and salvation, which is



freely given by God to those who sincerely seek Him. This true faith is availableto all who humble themselves before God, acknowledging His sovereignty andperfect will, and their total dependence on Him:

“Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you

up in due time.” (1 Peter 5:6)

Christianity has accomplished, over the centuries, the wondrous feat ofbecoming a universal religion, professed not only in Western countries, but inmany countries of the East as well. Many would quickly attribute this hegemonyinitially to the political imposing of Christianity as the official religion of theRoman Empire by Constantine and, later, by the Roman Catholic Church, at theheight of its power. Although this is partly true, and unarguably many"conversions" to Christianity were due to mere political reasons (as in the caseof Constantine himself), or to social motives, as still happens today, it is alsoundeniable that Jesus’ Gospel has produced, since the dawn of Christianity,

many significant conversions, motivated by a genuine expression of faith.

Most people are typically familiar only with the dark ages of the Roman CatholicChurch, but not with the benefits bequeathed by Christianity to Westerncivilization. Thomas E. Woods, who holds a bachelor’s degree in history fromHarvard and his master’s, M. Phil., and Ph.D. from Columbia University,retrieves this memory in his How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization(Regnery, 2005). Woods reminds us that Christianity was responsible not onlyfor most of the ethical foundations that shaped Western civilization, but also forthe first steps of science and of the academic teaching institutions, for thefundamental principles of law and for the first charitable institutions. The merit ofthe hegemony achieved by Christianity throughout history however, should notbe credited to the efforts of the Catholic Church, whose methods were oftenquestionable, but to the power of truth inherent in the Christian doctrine.

Most people discuss religion the same way they talk about philosophy; that is,based only on superficial knowledge. Few people take the time to deepen theirknowledge of the many religions of the world and of the history of Christianity.The spiritual ignorance of man leads him to instinctively reject the idea of theChristian hegemony. Regardless of the ideological conflict caused by theChristian Gospel, which points out the natural human tendencies, produced by

self-centeredness and hedonism as forces in outright opposition to spiritualsalvation, man has always rejected as absurd the notion of the existence of anabsolute truth. Thus, the Christian exclusivity, intrinsic to his own doctrine, isalways regarded with distaste by the followers of other religions and also bythose who claim not to profess any religion.

However, this antipathy is largely misplaced, since at no time a true Christian orChristian church claims to be himself the "bearer of truth", but that the gospel ofChrist and all the Scriptures are the expression of the absolute truth concerningthe spiritual life, as revealed by God to his prophets. Understanding this truth isan ongoing enlightenment process that every Christian undertakes in their

spiritual walk. On announcing the Gospel, the Christian is not being narrow-minded, arrogant, intolerant, he is only accomplishing the so-called "great





would still have many flaws, for the simple fact that it would still be composed ofhuman beings. The Christian is not sanctified in a single day. Just like theunderstanding of the message of God in Scripture, which is a continual learning,thus preventing any particular Christian denomination of claiming to havereached the full understanding of Truth; the sanctification of every Christian is

also an ongoing process, which will only be completed in the spiritual world,when they can reach the full stature of Christ.

Christianity is an entirely different path in its essence, from the other spiritualpaths shown by the religions of the world. There are three basic concepts inChristianity, among others, which make it a doctrine absolutely unique anddistinct from all other spiritual doctrines: the principle of the spiritual fall of man,the principle of sin and the principle of one single life for every individual. Theseprinciples essentially contradict the teachings of other religions, that mankind isnot irreparably doomed to spiritual death because of sin, but only separatedfrom the Unity or from the Dao, to which they must return. Christianity also

states, contrarily to the other doctrines, that every man lives a single life, afterwhich comes the judgment of his works and his resurrection, and not anindeterminate cycle of existences, along which he would eventually evolve toperfection.

Christ says that only who believes in Him can be saved. This means that wecan not, by our own means, to achieve our spiritual fulfillment, but only by God'sgrace through the vicarious sacrifice of Jesus, we receive salvation and takehold of the eternal life that only Him can give. This is a completely strangeconcept to all other religions, who claim that the individual must build, throughhis works and the devotion to their gods, the path of his own spiritual freedom. Itis clear therefore that the common idea that all paths lead to God is absurd.Either is Christ who reconciles man with the Creator or are the world's religionsthat lead man to God. This is a realization that brings in a high existential,cultural and even political stress, and therefore the human ideology that rulesthe world prefers to ignore it, insisting on the isonomy of all religious creeds.

This ecumenical, universalistic and conciliatory attitude however, will not standfor long. Christ demands of every man to decide on a position with respect totheir spiritual life. There are no uncompromising positions, the choice is clear:with or against Christ, as He said: "He who is not with me is against me, and he

who does not gather with me scatters." (Matthew 12:30). To believe that Jesusis the only way to God means believing in the whole Bible. One cannot believesome things in it that we like but not in others, which we dislike. One cannotmutilate the Gospel as do many spiritual and ecumenical doctrines. Either webelieve God is powerful enough to preserve the integrity of his messagethroughout the centuries, in spite of human interference, or we become atheists,agnostics or even worse, take false spiritual paths or still, as many do, make upour own God and our own customized religion.

The Kingdom of God has already come to the world and in the end times theangel of the Lord will harvest the fields and set apart the weeds and the wheat.

The citizens of the Kingdom of God will reign with Christ, but the citizens of theworld will perish by their own choice, with the Prince of this world.

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The Boldness of Christ