Sounds About Right
I'm posting this and then diving into my bunker.
Hog on Ice speculates that if The Lord returned today:
Hog on Ice speculates that if The Lord returned today:
He comes back, and He goes on TV and says, "Okay, homosexuality is wrong. Sex outside of marriage is wrong. Stop watching porn. Quit smoking dope. And by the way, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and all the other non-Christian religions are wrong, so stop practicing them." Every fat lesbian activist in San Francisco would be out in the street, running around topless and waving a sign reading,"Kill Jesus NOW!" Jesse Jackson would condemn Him. Cindy Sheehan would demand a meeting. Liberals would start calling him JesusHitler.Don't try to call me, I'm not answering my phone.
Presented for your delectation by the Gentleman Farmer at 6:15 AM
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post a commentOf course they'd yell "Kill Jesus now". It's the same reaction He inspired the first time. See Mark 15:13-14 = Luke 23:21 = John 19:6, 15.
That's ridiculous. We are far more advanced today than at the time "Jesus" supposedly lived. Of course, someone spouting intolerant, bigoted slogans cannot be permitted to spew such hate. But Jesus was a wise philosopher who preached love and acceptance, something we understand today, but that was not understood 2000 years ago.
and what about Jesus. didn't he preach love and acceptance? or is that selective?
Dear Confused,
Love, yes. "Acceptance"? That depends on what you mean. To say that He "preach[ed] love and acceptance" does feel selective.
However, you have every reason to be confused. The name "Jesus" is widely applied to a mythical Ghandi-like vegetarian pacifist figure who sought to lift the world's self-esteem and taught that God just wants us to be happy. You have probably been exposed to this figure in the popular media and in some pulpits. This figure bears little relation to the person of the same name who lived in First Century Palestine.
Fortunately, there is a decisive cure for such confusion: The text of the New Testament--in particular, the four "Gospels" (the first four books, four little biographies of Jesus, which are the sum total of absolutely everything we jknow about His life and teaching).
A reading of one or more of these Gospels will disclose all sorts of things that would surprise someone who thought of Jesus as unqualifiedly meek and mild. Jesus denounced the scribes and Pharisees as a "brood of vipers". He turned over the tables of the money-changers and drove them out of the Temple with a whip of His own making. He gave us the teaching on Hell that is by far the most vivid and terrifying of anything in the Bible. He pronounced "woes" right and left. He said that people who commit sins (you know, like adultery) won't go to heaven. And so on.
Jesus most certainly did assure us that anyone can be "accepted". See, e.g., John 6:37: "Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." This is the Good News. But His point was that one must come to Him--you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him (Luke 9:23).
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It depends, I supposed, upon whether one believes in the faith once for all delivered to the saints, or whether one believes that the truth changes over time. It would seem to me odd that the Creator and Judge of the universe would deliver a message suitable only for a particular time and place. And rather a backward and out-of-the-way place, at that.
liberals may yell kill him now, but it would certainly be a conservative administration that passed the death penalty legislation permitting his ultimate execution.
and at any rate, i think we can all agree that liberals tend to view the act of killing people out of intolerance as a generally negative thing.
"your flag decal won't get you into heaven anymore / it's already overcrowded from your dirty little war..."
...sorry, i've had that song stuck in my head all week.
wait, are we talking about jesus, that laid-back bearded cat who used to hang out with prostitutes and theives, and who helped get that adulteress off the hook at the weekly frenzied-mob-stoning? i must be thinking about another guy.
this guy sounds like he doesn't even have a beard and he's probably one of those people that just sort of harsh your mellow whenever they're around.
vestryman, sounds like you need a beard and a good strong laxative.
Alas, Justin, I can hardly grow a beard at all--a pitiful scraggly thing. And thanks for your concern for my gastrointestinal health, but happily I can report that my bowels are regular. For now.
Ignatius, you seem to have delivered installment #42 in an ongoing debate you're having with someone--a person who has said quite a few things I didn't and wouldn't.
Yes, yes, people can have different opinions about what is true, and you've given us 4 possibilities. I'm not in favor of killing (or even torturing) the adherents of any of those 4.
However, one cannot have an opinion, really, about what Jesus taught. I mean, it's all right there in the Gospels. He taught what He taught. Jesus simply did NOT teach I'm OK you're OK. He didn't teach that sexual immorality is a matter of indifference. He offered boundless grace and forgiveness to sinners--but only if they would repent, and He said "Go and sin no more." Nor did he teach that all religions are basically the same. Rather, He said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man comes to the Father except by me" (something that, from anyone else, would be megalomaniacal).
So you can believe whatever you believe. But you can't attribute it to Jesus unless He actually taught it. Make up your own religion, but don't mislead others by claiming Jesus as an ally.
And if you do decide to market your own religion, I recommend Jesus' method: Write no books, never leave your own country, pick twelve people (including some losers and traitors) and teach them your philosophy, and then die violently in shame and disgrace at age 33. And change the world. (Rising from the dead would surely help your chances.)
well said, vestryman. and greatest amongst His teachings: "judge not, lest ye be judged"
Justin: I can't tell exactly where you're coming from. Maybe what I'm about to say doesn't really apply to you.
You quoted Matthew 7:1, which is commonly assumed to mean, "Don't ever come to any negative conclusions about anyone else, so that God will similarly avoid thinking ill of you. That is, if you will be indifferent to the behavior of others, then God will be indifferent toward you."
This interpretation would not survive a reading of the entire 7th chapter of Matthew, much less all four Gospels. See, e.g., 7:6, 7:15, 7:20.
i've never heard of that particular reading. sounds kind of obtuse. i'd always understood Jesus' words to mean "it isn't man's place to sit in judgement of his brothers and sisters. it's the job of God the Father. and you'd better be careful running around passing judgement on your fellow man, because it'll be your turn to go soon enough and all men are sinners."
at any rate, i tend to doubt Jesus would be so keen on us pretending to know the mind of God (or God's only son) on issues of pornography, homosexuality or hinduism. most condemnations of those things i've heard are drawn from the old testament. Jesus' teachings in the gospels seem pretty bent on getting everyone to be tolerant of, and even nice to each other - particularly the poor, the oppressed and even the sinners.
We couldn't possibly know the mind of God about anything unless God revealed it to us. Jesus taught that the mind of God is revealed in the Scriptures. Followers of Jesus will therefore accept that truth.
Jesus wasn't so dismissive of the Old Testament as you seem to be. He insisted that no "jot" or "tittle" would pass from the law, "till all be fulfilled," and He warned against "teach[ing] others to ... break[] the least of these commandments" (Matthew 5:18-19).
It therefore isn't hard to know (by Jesus' lights) the mind of God on, to pick from your examples, homosexuality. See Genesis 18:20, 19:4-7; Leviticus 18:22, 20:16. Sexuality is a subject He seems to have cared about very much. He taught that "adultery [and] sexual immorality ... make a man 'unclean'" (Matthew 15:19-20). To reject a degraded view of marriage, He repeated that "at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female'" (Matthew 19:4-6).
But unlike Jesus you don't care much for the Old Testament, so try this from the new: Romans 1:26-27; 1 Corinthians 6:9-10; 1 Timothy 1:9-10; 2 Peter 2:6-8.
Another of your examples--pornography--isn;t a close question for the follower of Jesus. He taught that even entertaining lustful thoughts is tantamount to adultery. (Matthew 5:28. See also Exodus 20:17.) Entertaining oneself with the immodest erotic beauty of someone other than one's spouse is wrong, even if no overt sex act follows. (See Job 31:1; Leviticus 20:17; Psalm 101:3-4.) A man is to devote himself to his wife alone; he should cultivate an appreciation of her erotic beauty, and hers alone, and must avoid anything that would distract him from this fidelity. (Proverbs 5:18-19.)
Jesus certainly did set an example of mercy toward sinners. We call Him the "Friend of sinners", and for good reason. But to the sexual sinner in particular (as to all sinners), he said, "Go and sin no more." (John 8:11.)