The First Christian Encounters Jesus

good evening and welcome to this is Jesus for our final talk this week has been a week of opportunity for students across Oxford to encounter the real Jesus we've been delighted to be joined by dr. Tim Cal and he's speaking the ceiling - I'm the hand straight over to him he'll speak for around 30 minutes after which time I'll be an opportunity for questions you can text in your questions and that will be behind on the screen after we've dealt with a few questions they'll be about a little bit of time right we'll just give a short conclusion and then we'll be out of here by about 9:15 so Tim straight thank you Oh Saturday night here you are and Here I am what am I doing here on a Saturday night in town hall there are other homes to go to but you're here I'm glad you are and we've been looking all week in the evenings at the basic two answers Christianity is to the big philosophical questions like who are we who are human beings and what's wrong with the world and what if anything will put it right and I've done my best I just want you to know a little personal note I've got a I have a granddaughter who's 15 months old name is Lucy and she can perceive far more than she can express right now and it's a grief to her and all Christians feel that way all Christians feel if you could you see or experience something of absolute beauty and then you come down off the mountaintop or come away from the seal or wherever you were and you try to convey it verbally to somebody else it's very very frustrating all Christians feel like that I'm no different so in some ways trying to convey the beauty of what Christianity is answers are these aggressive questions has been something of a grief to me and yet you've been very kind and receptive and so let's conclude this way you can't look at Christianity's answers to the big questions unless you deal with the issue of faith and we all know it seems like everybody knows that the answers that Christianity gives about Christ and about the cross and about everything else are only operable in your life if you have faith but what in the world is that and actually there's a lot of confusion about what what does Christian faith me let's take a look at the last of the encounters of Jesus Christ with individuals that we've been looking at all week in the Gospel of John is a New Testament book it's this little booklet that is on your seat and I'm going to read this encounter with Mary Magdalene is on page 60 years it by its chapter 20 and I'm going to read it to you in two stages and walk through it the first part if I was on page 60 we'll start at the heading that says the empty tomb and I'm going to read down the verse ten and the little superscripts our numbers our verses the first part is going to tell us that Christian faith is impossible and it's rational the second part we're going to read is going to tell us that Christian faith is graceful existential an individual I think this is a it's this is a good most practical of all the talks Christian faith is impossible rational graceful existential and individual the first 10 verses the middle of page 60 let's read them together I'll read them early on the first day of the week while it was still dark Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance so she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple the one Jesus loved and said they have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we don't know where they have put him so Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb both were running but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first he bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb he saw the strips of linen lying there as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus head the cloth was still lying in its place separate from the linen finally the other disciple who had reached the tomb first also went inside he saw and believed they still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead then the disciples went back to where they were staying let's stop right there this is the first part of the story I said what we're going to learn from this passage is they faith is impossible Christian faith is impossible and is rational now when I say Christian faith is impossible I'm trying to get your attention it's a wee bit of an overstatement but not too much I'm not saying it's impossible to have Christian faith what I am saying is it is impossible for you or me to produce it without outside intervention and help now the way that comes across and I mentioned is if any of you were here today at the lunch hour notice that Mary Magdalene alone Peter and John the disciples of Jesus love we understand is John the author of the book Peter and John no other disciples are there you know the Apostles the Twelve Apostles here's Mary - on a third day after Jesus is dead and what happens she sees the tomb the stone is rolled away and she immediately said runs back and says they've taken the body now as I said this afternoon Jesus Christ has been saying to his disciples over and over and over again I'm going to die and rise again on the third day it's actually especially and say the Gospel of Mark some of the other Gospels it's very obvious gospel mark chapter 8 he says I'm going to die and rise again mark chapter 9 he says I'm going to die and rise again mark chapter 10 so I'm gonna die and rise again a few more detail each time trying to get it across the disciples he had said it so often that the enemies of Christianity had put a guards in the tomb that comes out in the book of Matthew so why in the world when Mary actually saw this roll away and she must have had must have remember the Jesus 7:30 I'm gonna rise from the dead why in the world didn't she look and say good maybe she didn't even think about it it didn't even occur she runs back they stole it now for a minute I'm going to splay aside why first century Jews would have been that absolutely convinced that the resurrection that Jesus could not rise with it I'm going to go to I'm going to try to go back to the start context and to say why would why would it be the first introduced couldn't believe such a thing but for a moment I like to pull back and just make the larger point that I think narrative makes and that is nobody naturally nobody naturally can believe there is an allergy to belief in God in us or as some theologians say an inability and some of you know that there's different theological traditions inside Christianity that had somewhat different views on to what degree we have an ability to respond to God and but but all of them agree that we actually can't just produce faith without help from outside do you hear that do you understand that allergy that inability now let's let's let's come up to today for a moment like I said I'm looking at the bigger point not for a minute I'll get back to what Mary's problem was Thomas novel very very prominent philosopher American philosopher at NYU in my hometown New York University he wrote a book some years ago called the last words book on histology but there's this fascinating section in the book he is an atheist he is a secular atheist as he says but then here's what he says belief in God makes people nervous it is the fear of religion in speaking of the fear of religion I don't mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility toward established religions and religious institutions in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrine social policies and political influence or as he says we have every right to hate the church pretty soon but then he says I am talking instead about something much deeper in us the fear of religion itself I speak from experience being strongly subject to this fear myself listen I want a theism to be true and I am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers it isn't just that I don't believe in God and natural oh that my belief is right is that I hope there is no God I don't want there to be a god I don't want the universe to be like that this cosmic authority problem that I have is not rare I am curious but I doubt that there is anyone who is genuinely indifferent as to whether there's ago now everybody knows and people often point out that there are emotional and psychological reasons why you might want to believe in God but very seldom do people point out and I think Thomas odd was saying so I'm trying to torture push this home that there are enormous emotional and psychological reasons that we all have to not believe in God at all why do you really think your objective in looking at a book like the Bible or looking at a message like the gospel that if it's true you would lose control of how you live your life you telling me your objective about that so that's what he's saying it's how in the world can you say 'amen time that where you use the word different but what he means is when people sound completely objective I'm looking at the evidence I just don't see enough evidence surely you know that you have a deep layer prejudice there and if you want to acknowledge it you're never going to get close to objectivity never if you have we certainly would be the same in jurisprudence I know there's jurisprudence America and Britain aren't quite the same certainly I know this in America if let's just say you're a judge and suddenly a case comes before you concerning a company and you own stock in that company so the decision will have a huge impact on the price of the value of that stock would you be allowed or would you allow yourself to sit in judgment know why because you couldn't possibly be objective when you know that if they she goes this way you're to lose all your money so you we say you recuse yourself right here's the problem we're all in that state that same book we're all in that same seat when you come the Christianity decide is it right or wrong you have a vested interest in it being wrong but you can't recuse yourself because you've got to look at the evidence and therefore here's what I suggest three things marry only believes because of help from the outside John Peter they only believe because it helped me outside they do not have the ability to believe so here's what I would suggest first of all please doubt your house please look at your doubts and realize you do have a certain amount of emotional and psychological force underneath them you're afraid of it being true it's got to be you know that I hope you know that you'll never be how do I say you let me fair-minded with the evidence if you don't see that number one number two some of you may be over confident that you are objective and yet somehow the evidence just isn't enough for here why don't you consider praying why don't you consider saying we're high god I don't know if you're there but if you are there please help me take this through break the ice if you're not willing to do that you're not willing to see your prejudice say well I don't know if you're there but I do know I'm prejudiced and therefore if you are there and I'm prejudiced please help me get through it but a lot of you here's the last thing I'll say under this heavy a lot of you are actually too anxious the Bible says that you can't believe without help from the outside without God helping it without Jesus coming to you but speaking to you like he speaks to Mary in all of her feel really hits that second in all of her consternation she's running around and she doesn't just please keep this in mind if you want to believe if you find yourself desiring if you find yourself very interested in Christianity but you're afraid somehow you're not going to be able to come into faith I've talked to several of you at least five of you who seem to say it had said to me this week I'm interested and I'm motivated very interested but I'm really afraid I'm not going to get it right around afraid my motives aren't right or I'm not sure I'm going to have enough faith hear me a sense of Christ's absence may be a sign of his presence because you see I don't think you're capable of one thing to believe without him giving you some help and so if you want to believe is that being afraid that he's not around look at that as a sign that actually he may be right there or elbow just like with Mary's we're gonna see Mary's in tears Mary Jesus is talking to her and she doesn't even realize what we're going to say that he's talking to her you might be in that situation right now you might feel like everything's falling apart and I kind of want something but I don't know how to make it a sense of his absence might be a sign of his presence that he's working already in your life so faith all by yourself is impossible but obviously not impossible to have just possible to develop or produce yourself point one point to the other thing we see in this part of the passage is it faith is rational now what I mean by rational is there's evidence let's take a look again now at why Mary and John and Peter aren't there if you don't know anything about first century culture first century history it doesn't make much sense that Jesus would have said over and over and over again you I'm going to rise on the third day and when you get to the jury day the disciples are not there waiting to see and even when Mary Magdalene sees she runs away as sure there's been no resurrection the reason why this is actually incredible actually it's kind of incredible to us when you read it not knowing anything about the past but if you read a book like I did NT right the resurrection of the Son of God written some 10 years ago a big thick book giving you the stuff a exhausted account of historic evidence for the resurrection Jesus Christ best book written on the resurrection at least 100 readers you'll know that first and Greeks and Romans would never believe that an individual could be resurrected from the dead Greeks and Romans of course Greeks believed the body was bad so the idea of the resurrection of the body who was that the whole idea behind salvation is liberation from the body the Jews didn't have to do the body but the jid some of the Jews like the Sadducees didn't believe any resurrection and the Pharisees and some others believed in a resurrection at the end of time and general resurrection of the righteous nobody believes somebody could rise from the dead here and certainly nobody believed as we said a couple nights ago the Jews were the last people in the world to believe that a human being could be the Son of God they've been taught all their lives like God cannot be human and this transcendent view of God if you put all that together you'll see why first century Jews were every bit as close to the idea the resurrection of Jesus Christ as you are for different reasons the average person here today in Oxford has thinks the idea of a resurrection of Jesus Christ of bodily physical resurrection is crazy why and because of the your post enlightenment naturalism your idea that there aren't such things as miracles that everything is a sign that explains and so on so we're close to it but they were close to it they're every bit as close to the idea of the resurrection that just shows you everybody's close to the eye to the resurrection the idea of in the rising the dead is here for different reasons now if that's true and it is imagine what evidence you would have to get in order to absolutely believe the resurrection of Jesus Christ physical resurrection okay would you go through that for me just right now class make believe I'm your professor and you really need to listen to me what kind of evidence would you have to have to break through your absolute ironclad Dallas York you have these beliefs this worldview that it says that couldn't happen what my evidence would have had to happen to you would have to happen to you if it was supposed to shatter and you would believe Jesus Christ the Son of God and resurrected with it whatever that evidence is that you can imagine how they must have had something like it you see they must have gotten the same kind of evidence because they were as close to it as you were and if that's the case that evidence might be enough for you what's the evidence well if you take a look at some of these books that marshal all the evidence including that book and a little personal no nothing personal tonight I have library cancer about 10 years ago and and I'm fine now however if any of you've had cancer it's an awfully on the crowd so my guess is not many of you had even when they say you'll probably recover I have to say once they tell you you have cancer it focuses the mind wonderfully on life and a meaning of life etc I'm a minister sure but to be told you might die it focuses the mind wonderfully and I had in recovering from the cancer I had a month in which I couldn't do anything I could go anywhere I was actually under quarantine as always because all radioactive iodine and myself so I had nothing to do for the first time in 30 years out of the last time of my life and I will prop so I sat down and read through it to write 890 page book including all the foot metrics I read all the good nice and it was astonishing I mean over the years here's the problem you must be careful not to just read one account of the evidence or the reservation staff that wasn't enough I dare you to try 890 pages of it or at least something more substantial we put some of it some of us in the book reason for God that you can get here but I've even let me give you one little piece of evidence it's right here who is this opposed this eyewitness John the gospel writer tells us that an eyewitness to the resurrection of Jesus Christ was Mary Magdalene a woman and what all commentators will tell you what all historians will tell you is this in those patriarchal times women were not trusted and therefore women could not give testimony either in Jewish courts or in Roman courts their testimony was considered unreliable because of the pit because of the patronizing prejudice against them and their what their a testimony was not admissible in court and therefore if you are making up an account of the resurrection if you were writing up trying to trying to get fans trying to get recruits you and who never in a million is make a woman the first witness and yet actually Matthew Mark Luke and John the very first eyewitnesses of the resurrection of all women and the the only historically plausible answer to why women Guardian account the only reason why the men who wrote these accounts would put women in when their testimony would not be possible in that time and place to the average reader the reason they put it in there is because it must have happened she must have been there she must have seek she she must have claimed those what it must have claimed to have seen Jesus Christ so there's a lot of evidence for the resurrection actually you can even see it here if you look carefully in the text when uh what Peter does you notice it says that Peter camps along behind and go straining the tomb he saw the strips of linen lying there as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus head the cloth was lying still in his place separate from the linen the word saw is actually the rebirth theory Oh which is you know means not just a sea but to think and process he looked he comes in and it's probably thinking something like this I'm not saying this is long the resurrection evidence there is he walks that he says wait here's this body had been wrapped in cloth and then the cloth is still laying there and where the piece of cloth was over the head over the face is laying in his place still in this place so there is and he's sitting there thinking wait a minute if Jesus had revived and gotten up if they know the great bones would be there to be all torn but if friends had taken the body why in the world would they have desired the body by taking away a naked body they would have kept it great clothes but if enemies were doing it why in the world would they have taken it off and put there nice indeed he's thinking it's thinking he's thinking what's he thinking say now faith is not only rational you can never get all the way the faith through reason but faith is not less than rational because the faith is an act of a whole person and therefore you've got to have a convinced mind you obviously cannot get all the way to faith because faith reason is not the same as faith obviously faith goes beyond reason but it's not less than reason we live in a time in which people say over and over again there's really no objective truth if you want to believe in Christianity if you want to believe whatever faith look if it's relevant for you if it's satisfying to you don't worry about whether or not you know it actually happened it's relevant for you you can believe it yeah Hitler believed something that was relevant for him and we all think he was wrong why because we actually all do come down deep is such a thing is truth and there is such a thing as a standard Christianity will never say believe me only because it's relevant christianity is basically says don't believe christianity because it's exciting and practical and relevant believe it because it's true because it's not true it won't be practical and relevant you're never going to be able to face the suffering that's ahead of you Oh young people if you don't in the end believe Christianity is not just relevant and exciting which it is but it's true now let's read the second half so Christianity is impossible you need help Christianity is rational but we go beyond that of course let's read the last part where it says Jesus appears a very Magnum now Mary stood outside the tomb crying as she wept she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white sea where Jesus body had been one of the head and the the foot they asked her woman why are you crying they have taken my word away she said and I don't know where they have put him at this she turned around and saw Jesus standing there but she did not realize that it was Jesus he asked her woman why are you crying who is it you are looking for thinking it was the gardener she said sir if you have carried him away tell me where you have put him and I will go get him jesus said to her Mary she turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic rabboni which means teacher jesus said do not hold on to me before I have not yet ascended to the Father go instead to my brothers and tell them I am ascending to my father and your father to my god and your God Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news I have seen the Lord and she told them that he had said these things to her okay let's move on to point three I said and is that somebody's most important point Christian faith is graceful and by the way I'm using two O's it's graceful with two L's here's the point that is all through the rest of the New Testament but we're seeing it in narrative form here before I show you it in narrative form let me tell you what the point is at the very essence of what it means to not just have faith in general but life-transforming jesus encountering saving faith in particular is when you learn the difference between salvation by grace through what Jesus Christ has done rather than salvation by working very very hard and all your moral efforts to earn your place with God those are two absolutely different paradigms they're actually two different Faith's put it like this traditional religion says I obey God therefore I get accepted in blessed and secular I obey God therefore I'm accepted but the gospel of Jesus Christ is I'm accepted by God through what Jesus Christ in the cross has done for me therefore I obey I obey their form accepted or the paradigm is I'm accepted therefore I obey now two people one operating out of I obey their form accepted one operating out of the paradigm I'm accepted because of what Jesus Christ has done therefore I obey therefore I please the guy who's done this for me two people to be sitting right here and both of them spending a lot of time helping the poor working very hard to tell the truth working very hard in general industry integrity charity they can be living the same kind of lifestyles as word externally but for completely two different motivations and in two different spirits if I'm obeying hoping that somehow eventually God will bless me and take my my prayers and my prayers and take me to heaven or something like that if I'm obeying in order to be accepted I'm always I'm always afraid I'm always insecure I'm actually operating out of fear I'm doing it hoping and of course if I feel that I am doing it I'm living like I should your identity rests not in God it rests in yourself that rests in your own abilities and listen friends if if you get your identity out of being a hardworking person if that's your identity I'm a hardworking person that's who I am you will have to look down your nose at people you have to look down on people who you think are lazy if you get your identity out of being a moral person a good person who obeys the moral law you will have to look down your nose that's our identity what has to look down your nose and look down at people who are you think I'm ro but if you obey because you're already accepted you're doing all the things you're doing out of joy you're doing all the things you're doing out of gratitude and you're humbled because you know that even though God knows he loves you freely it's not something you earn so you look at people who are not living like they should you cannot feel superior to them so here we have two people one trusting in their moral efforts one trusting in Jesus efforts and even though that well the circus they might look like they're living the very same kind of lives in the end it produces two completely different kinds of character and it also is completely different you have self-righteousness and bigotry versus humility and graciousness to complete it it affects people around you in such totally different ways and the very essence of becoming a Christian is the transfer the trust you have in your own abilities in your own efforts on to what Jesus Christ has done now as I get across in this narrative right here you see what happens Mary goes to the tomb she looks around she's finally sees Jesus she says teacher Mary he says at that moment especially when he sends her to go tell the world what's happened in some sense she's the first Christian you know why she's the first what's a Christian Christian someone who knows Jesus risen from the dead believes that has had an encounter with the risen Christ for one moment in a sense she's the first Christian was going to the world to tell him do you know what he's done who is very Magdalene we don't know much about it well you know she had been a demon-possessed person and demons were cast out but Jesus Christ shows a woman not a man shows a reformed mental patient not a pillar of the community shows a layperson not one of the Apostles not one of the officers what's he doing how much clearer can he be to say my salvation is not based on breathing it's not based on pedigrees not based on moral attainments I am not really your teacher your Savior I come not to call this strong but the call goes another week I'm going to say to you not by your work but by my work and the minute you understand that the penny drops as it worked and the change happens Martin Luther talks about it like this Martin Luther talks about his experience of conversion he was a mom he was a teacher of Scripture by the way in seminary at were Theological College and yet this is what happened he said I labored diligently and anxiously as to how to understand Paul's word in Romans 1:17 where he says that the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel I thought Paul was saying that the righteousness whereby God punishes the unrighteous and therefore I had no confidence that my merit would suasion then I grasp that the righteousness of God that Paul is talking about is that righteousness which through grace and sheer mercy God gives to us by faith God gives me Jesus record see and the minute he understood that it's not a record idea of God and then he saves me but it's a record God gives me and then I'm accepted to say he is the minute I understood that thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and have gone through the open doors of the paradise when I saw the difference that law is one thing and grace and gospel is another I broke through take lastly I said now there's two more but they're pretty brief existential faith is not only graceful it's about grace by gratzman grace is existential what I mean by that you know that it's a very confusing place where she Jesus says do not hold on to me for I have not yet ascended to the Father do not hold on to me I gotta send the father what's confusing is when he meets Thomas he lists Thomas touch him in fact when he meets the women at the at the end of the book of Matthew he lets station they take all this feat so some people think what Jesus is saying is oh I'm too wholly I'm like the burning bush don't touch me here you go but he's clearly not saying that because it looks like in fact the Greek word there means you're grabbing him very tightly don't hold me so tightly he says and then he says I'm ascending and here's what many commentators say and I think they're right Mary was grabbing hold of them because Mary's a loafer and she was grabbing although here and probably maybe squeezing him and saying I'm never going to let you go again I'm ever going to lose you again and you know Jesus is that Mary when I send to the right hand of the Father and I send the Holy Spirit which is my spirit into your life you won't leave me I mean you don't need to hold on to me this way you will have me every bit as much as you have me now if you let me go to my father faith connects you to Jesus existentially faith is not just rational okay I'm going to you know therefore it must be true so okay I sign on the why faith is a personal commitment to him but then on the other hand it's a personal reception he comes he comes near it's existential and lastly its individual reason that's really short is this John gets it right away Peter goes home and thinks about it Mary runs around until she actually lays her hand on him they all had different trajectories different paths you've got to be very careful not to look at some other Christian and say well that person had a dramatic experience that person came along slowly don't compare yourself to other Christians there's a whole lot of different ways you have to believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins you have to admit that you're a sinner you have to believe that he died in your place you have to commit yourself to him but there's so many ways in don't compare yourself to other people faith is impossible on your own it's rational and yet it's existential and it's personal it's filled with grace it's all about grace and as someone individualistic now what we're going to do at this point I have one more thing to tell you about the text but I'll come back after we're going to hear a first-person account and we're going to also in during that time you're going to be texting questions in to me and we're going to do a question and answer after that time right great thanks ed and we'd love to give you now the opportunity to text in any questions that you might have the Tim the way to do that just a text into that number and they'll come up on the screen but in the three or four minutes while we just do that I'd love to invite ever onto the stage over these last few nights we've been hearing stories of students also who have encountered Jesus and Emmas going to tell us a little bit about that in her life right now hi I'm Emma I'm a second year medical LMH a year ago I was sitting where you are now listening to people who seem some sick but just a little bit crazy I don't understand what they meant when I said God changed my life or the Holy Spirit moved me and I certainly didn't see how it applied to me let me take you back to the beginning of my story I'm from a non-christian family and I grew up thinking they're believing in anything apart from what we can see improve was stupid in my Eve I didn't want to open up to the possibility that there might be more to life and I got fixated on all the controversy surrounding the church so I never really bothered to find out what it was all about and then I came to Oxford with no interest or expectation of finding fame of any kind but in freshers week I made friends with two Christian guys they seemed like rational people but when they started talking about Jesus and why he'd done to save us you have to sound a bit weird despite that I couldn't help but be curious about them and their beliefs so after many hours of asking the questions I agreed to her to church with them the first time I went I start feeling uncomfortable and disagreed with almost everything that I said but I went back the next Sunday and without really knowing why I turned up every week after that and gradually I began to think what if I didn't understand properly I believe any of it but I did start thinking what if this is true what if Jesus did die for me what would that mean for my life an amazingly short time later I reached this point I mentioned earlier where I was sitting in this room listening to a talk and something unexpected happened I had heard a lot about who Jesus really was and it was beginning to make a lot of sense to me I'd seen my Christian friends actually living actually actually acting on what they've been telling me and something about their lives seemed different from mine because of it I was pretty much convinced that all of this was true but I still wasn't willing to admit myself with avivit just in case I was wrong and to be honest I didn't know how to go from understanding what Jesus did for us on the cross to trusting and him personally but that evening I realized all I had to do was ask to ignore my fear of being robbed and ask God for help as soon as I did that something changed and I found that I was able to put my trust in God I'm not trying to make a living for Jesus sound simple or easy because it's wrong but if you're open and willing than the initial step to opening up to him is much easier than you might think and what comes when you do is truly amazing a personal relationship with God is difficult to describe but that's because he's unlike anyone else you've ever met so it kind of makes sense things are a little hard to go into words my relationship with God means that I know that there's an all-powerful being who cares was me first night he's willing to listen to every petty room I have with the world and who will wait patiently for me when I forget him no matter how many times I'm tempted to turn you around away from him and that's why I'm standing here my hope is that some of you will understand what I although a Christians here tonight are saying to you that God loves you if you let him he would change your life just like he's changed mine thanks very much I know we're going to dive straight to the questions so great many people believe in God because they find the evidence compelling however many other religions have compelling evidence is it impossible to look through all the evidence and see which is the most compelling so how can we be certain like oh well don't forget to clean zuv the different religions are the same so for example if if the claim of Islam for Muhammad is he was a prophet a divine prophet you could look at all the evidence and you could conclude that he was if you look at the the claims of Jesus of course the claims of Christianity are for Jesus are far higher so that I guess I would say if all the other evidence for the claims of the other religions you find compelling but you also find all the evidence for the claims of Christianity compelling you become a Christian because the claims are so much more our citations and higher as we said all along the other religions say we have a sage and a prophet who will shoot who has revealed the way to find the divine and Christianity says no this is the divine who has come down in the form of human being that has come to save you not here's how to be saved please come to save you it's just so absolutely different that if you find it evidence for Christianity compelling and the evidence the other religions compelling you become a Christian I think I disagree with many things Paul says would you say is acceptable to subscribe to what Christ Himself says but disagree with the elements of Christianity which seem to be due to social or human sources well I would say if you change I would say it's inconsistent just subscribe to what pricing self says and disagree with the other parts of the New Testament that you disagree with I would say it's inconsistent but the reason why I'm not if the reason why I'm not being too hard on you is this I want you to go to Christ first there's no doubt about it it that is to say if if over here in this part of the New Testament there's some teaching about gender for example or sex that you're unhappy with yeah but the core of Christianity knows I haven't talked about sex or gender during this entire week if you've been here except when you ask me a question about now the reason is nothing that's unimportant part of life but because it's not it's not the core of Christianity teachers as I think I may have said a couple other times if Jesus Christ is the son of God from heaven who died for us and is raised in the dead and physically if that's true then you're going to have to figure out a way of dealing with other parts of the Bible if you think you can live and I know people have accepted Christ and still just not been able to accept other parts of their Testament I think that's inconsistent but it doesn't mean you went in the right direction you went to Christ that's the place to start however I think in the end you're going to find that Jesus view of Scripture and what it means to be what his understanding of script is will eventually lead you to say I don't like some of the things in the rest of the intestine but I'm going to have to I'm going to have to come to grips with it aren't going to have to come in terms with it so I in some ways I'm partly affirming this and saying please don't start in those other places yes go to Christ figure out whether the core things the Bible says about Christ are true to say negatively if Jesus is not raised in the dead who cares with the rest of the Testament says you know absolutely who cares what it says about sex and genuine if on the other hand is true that he says he is and he is the son of God then you will have to go out and find out what else the New Testament said so start with Christ but in the end I think of being consistent not to accept the rest of New Testament thanks the Bible tells us that heaven is perfect however some of my friends our family narrate this how can heaven be perfect if it is a Tennessee without those I know now listen this will this is I hope this is the hardest question I get tonight because it's hard hope I hope there's no more coming this is this part and actually I I want you to know that I before I start to act like I have a good answers in an individualistic society like ours in Europe and actually America's more individualistic with you Canada it's really it starts of America then it gets a little bit better in Canada Australia this little bit or anything you are still a little bit more you're more willing to stand in line for example we the queue however the British people stand in the queue you know which already shows you've got a little bit more of a collective mindset Americans aren't going to do that they're just going to figure out their way and the more individualistic the society the more this is not a problem you say well I've got an aside I got to get right and who knows what else is having of it in cultures in which your family is extremely important your ancestors are very important this is a real problem I understand all I can say is enough SIA slows tries to get out a little bit in the Great Divorce I won't even go into it he's actually wrestling with it you were made for Jesus and you're made for God that's going to fill up your joy sensors and I don't believe that is somebody else in your family even now we talk about it it's somebody else that you love has decided that they are going to reject God that shouldn't blackmail you for all eternity that shouldn't be a cloud over your joy for all eternity it doesn't seem fair I mean even now I know in families very often there's a you have a couple parents or you have children and or you have spouses or ex-spouses and very often because of somebody's behavior and a person that you love there's always a cloud you're always walking around through life with a cloud Cathy knows travel Drew's murder charges mother more said once you become a parent for the rest of your life they're only as happy as your unhappiest child think about that in that awful I know some of your saying Hank no children it's really true in other words you can't you'll never you can never so if your child is rebellious or getting or doing stupid things or running off in crazy directions and running their life they say it's my life dad is my life on you should worry about it tomorrow if I get what I want but it's not and you know you're so tied and it's really hard I don't believe that somehow God is going to let that continue it doesn't seem right it does not seem fair so I don't think we need to say somehow God can't fix that or at the door where that kind of blackmail will continue people who do those things in their lives in our life right now those people always create some sadness in us but I don't believe it they're gonna be able to do that for all eternity I didn't babysit one of the traditional sense convinced me you can yeah otherwise that there was a past any Harry Ironsides that was talking to a guy who said pastor I read sighs I don't not believe in sin now I'm sighs well where was bigger than me and heavier than me I said really and he looked at this book that he came down like this on the man's toe and then almost immediately gave evidence of sin so whoever I suppose I'm just beat me here everything you know maybe you don't want it I would Ellison hike what I was I tried to do this on Wednesday night it was a it was talking about the subject of sin forgive me this sounds like I'm doing a little bit of an run I gave a whole 30 minutes and plussing that blog on it and you might want to look at that but what I try to say that night is if you if beacon with in Manhattan with people what I do they say I don't believe in sin convince me in the traditional sense I said well depends what you mean by the traditional sense the Bible has two kinds of definitions of sending they're not contradictory but they're supplemented one is sin is transgression of a wall that is Muslim why you must have killed you must've steal ten commandments and sometimes people say well you know what what I think the moral standards are relative and so sometimes I end up saying all right let me go to the other definition anything you love and center your life on more than God is an ayat I don't think I use the term idolatry on Wednesday night but what I was trying to say is according to the Bible which is the first of the commandments the first attainments design the LORD thy God have no other gods before me did you hear that it didn't say worship me worship other things or worship nothing it just says eat worship me rather than other things there's no possibility of you not worshiping something there's no possibility of you not building your life around something and if whatever that thing is is not God a real God if it's a career or something else it will drive you into the ground it will you may think you're an honest person but if you if main thing in your life is your family if the main thing you like is some political car the main thing in your life is in your career or making money if it's something that's not God you will in the end break the wall it will drive you it will frighten you if you start to fail at it it will destroy your ability to love yourself you know you'll fill yourself loathing yeah if if think if it's threatened you might in vessel you might cheat you might lie so the other what approach to do sin is to say well the Bible talks about sin is anything is more important you than God and I've never had anybody actually but I sat down and spoken to about this that didn't say that's interesting that's pretty interesting so in other words there we don't have to argue about moral standards do you if you don't believe in God you put something in the place of God and you're gonna have a lot of trouble not essentially have your whole life revolve around that and in the long run it's going to lead to breakdown that's what the Bible says so that's also traditional even though usually when you hear ministers or Christians talk about sin they just strictly talk about the law put it this way sin is not just doing bad things according to the Bible sin is turning good things into ultimate things family is a good thing career is a good thing so if you think sin is only doing bad things broaden your understanding sin is also turning good things and other things that will lead to breakdown and will lead you to doing bad things and when you think about what the Bible says about sin it's very comprehensive it's very deep it's very profound I think it has great explanatory power and I hope what I just said is convincing but you might want to look at listens the whole talk on Wednesday night nice to be probably got time for one more question said the other night so all who did receive him to those who believed in his name how do I do that I was going to get to that in the epilogue should take one last question then when I was around you it seems like once what we could go out on that I see somebody your misspellings will be in front of everybody not if you misspell Oxford University now it's been about formatting so why can one not be just indifferent to the existence of God I'll take it up with I didn't say it he said it's I think I don't know how you can be indifferent why can one not be just a different the existence of God if you define the existence of God if you think of God is just an impersonal force of some sort Thomas Naugle I think is right in saying that that it probably is and I think this is a this is a fair comeback when Thomas Naugle says I don't want there to be a god you know all this Huxley says something about that too he said I didn't want there to be a God because I wanted to live my life the way I wanted to now you can actually decide I believe in God but I believe in a God that actually is an impersonal God sort of a force of love or cosmic life and has no particular that guy has no particular bearing on my choices but I think what Thomas Nod was trying to say is that the God of the Bible you can being different the traditional God you cannot be indifferent to because you will in a sense lose control of your life and won't be able to live the way you want to and therefore nobody is really a different or objective that's I think that's probably what you meant I said really sorry we didn't get to a question and please keep asking there's a couple of ways immediately talking you can do that Tim and his wife Kathy will be down the frontiers and you can speak to those and also right at the back in the corner there's a question point with a bunch of guys who'd be happy to talk things through with you as well I had a Nintendo forbidding confusion sure there's two last words I'd like you to consider that are in the text we listen to or we read tonight one is brothers Jesus says to his disciple I brothers you notice he doesn't say go tell those a miserable deserters and why didn't he I mean the last time Jesus saw them he only saw the back of their heads the tail they were running they denied him they betrayed him they fled and they all abandoned him he saw them at their worst and now he calls them brothers there's a story about the Tsar I don't even know which of the Russian Czars for the story of his are who had a beloved officer in his army that was dying at some terminal disease and this are said you have been a faithful servant of mine what can I do for you and these are the said I have a son a young son and he will be without parents and would you look after him and the Tsar promised to do that a man died and his art brought the boy into the palace and raised it and and gave him an education and eventually he went off to military school and he got commissioned and became an officer in the Russian army but he had a gambling problem and because of his gambling problem we began to go to debt and because of the debt he began to invest because he had a position in that his particular regiment in which he had access to the money of the funds and he began to embezzle in order to make good his debts but he added more and more and more and finally one night he realized that jig was up that he was going to be found out that it wouldn't be long before with maybe within hours that people would descript would discover the auditors would discover what was happening so he sat down over the books realized that it was up at the end was near and he was drinking and drinking and drinking because he knew he had to kill himself and he was trying to go further and he had the gun but he drank a little bit too much to give him the softener and he passed out now the Tsar that particulars are had a a habit he had a practice in which he would dress up as an enlisted man so no one knew he was the Czar it would dress up in the big coat and a uniform of enlisted man and he would walk about inside his troops to see what the morale was like to see what people were saying and it's actually a pretty good little bit of leadership wisdom but he came into the tent where his foster son had passed out and he walks over and he sees the books and he figures it out and he sees the gun and he knows what was going on and later a young man wakes up and there in front of him is a sealed letter that says I will make good the debt and the seal is ours on I will make good the debt the Tsar Jesus Christ is God comments an enlisted man he came into this world he looked into your heart he looked into my heart he looked into this cycles heart and he saw darkness he saw self-centeredness he saw anxiety fearfulness he just he saw he saw all of the other the other he saw a mess and he still loved us he made her the dead he doesn't call us deserters he calls his brothers he calls his sisters not amazing the other word I wanted to see is the word Mary I I don't even know quite what to tell you about this I'm always all my life I have been moved by the way that Jesus didn't say hey look it's me or I don't know what he would have said instead in order to get through to her he said Murphy he knows her he names her and actually in the end that's one of the main wheat reasons the main bits of evidence like Christianity is true when you first give yourself to Christ when you first take that step of faith when you first make that commitment there's almost it's gotta be there has to be doubts you can't you can't there's never enough evidence to completely absolutely prove actually anything we talked about that before can't prove anything and when you first get in there you know that you've got selfish motives and you know he's still got doubts but as time goes on he will name you he will show you he knows who you are and you will find that you didn't know who you were until he named you as it were until it's in relationship with him that you will come to know yourself Mary Annie tiller to a surprise wedding American author she wrote ticket pillar wood thicker Creek a terrific book Andy Dillard one place wrote this I'd been my whole life Abell but I never knew it until I was lifted up and wrong but Jesus Christ lift you up and bring you show you who you are show you what you're made for now let me just close and prayer this way said this last night sometimes people say what does it mean to say you believe on him and you receive him I would still say ABC admit your need that you need a Savior there's a lot of ways to get to that place we talked about is idolatry there's some particular sin I don't it's it's trying to find the water of life and in men or with or career you admit you need a Savior you say that you believe that Jesus Christ has died for you and then you start to rely on he has done rather on your moral efforts for a relationship with God and then you commit yourself 10 ABC we talked about that last night if you are willing to pray firm about the pray if you want to pray that prayer with me you can check the second box on that card when our host comes up to tell you how to use the card let's close a prayer pray with me our Father we do with it our need for a savior we have tried to be our own saviors we try to be our own masters that is not worked we have done wrong and we need forgiveness we build our lives on other things we need to be reorient and we need a Savior we admit our knee we turn away from that life and all that secondly we believe in Jesus Christ we believe in what he did on the cross he died those for us and begin right now relying on what he did for relationship with you and fathers lastly we commit ourselves to you and we thank you for a finished work that Jesus Christ accomplished on the cross and we say show us now how to live for you we admit we believe we commit we pray all this in Jesus name Amen

Channel: OICCU

Views: 16,733

Rating: 4.7333331 out of 5

Keywords: resurrection, Mary Magdalene, OICCU, Jesus, This is Jesus, Oxford University, Tim Keller, Gospel of John, Resurrection Of Jesus, Gospel Of John

Id: 7P4fdu4tlAU

Length: 62min 58sec (3778 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 13 2012