Examine the evidence for yourself

Christmastime can bring up doubt and uncertainty. While singing Silent Night or O Little Town of Bethlehem, you can begin to wonder about the man behind the songs and celebration. Who was this Jesus? Is it all just a leap of faith to believe that he was who he said he was?

Historians of various religious backgrounds and perspectives all agree on some basic information on the life of Jesus. Besides the Bible, we have records of Jesus from other sources, especially from people who were not Christians. Both the Roman historians Tacitus and Suetonius wrote about Jesus, as did the Jewish historian Josephus. There are in fact, a total of 39 sources which talk about him, 17 of which were written by non-Christians. All of the sources agree that the Romans executed a Jew named Jesus around the year 29.

Whatever else we may think of him, historic evidence means that coming to terms with the Jesus of history means coming to terms with these facts: 1) Jesus was a real man, a Palestinian Jew who was born, lived and died in Israel; 2) The Romans executed him as a threat to security; and, 3) Jesus’ followers continued following him after his death.

Who did Jesus think he was anyway? You may hear some people tell you that Jesus was a good teacher and that he never claimed to be God. There is one problem with this idea. Jesus may have been a good teacher, but he also taught that he was God's Son. His good friend John wrote that Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life” and “I am the resurrection and the life.” Could Jesus have been a good teacher when one of his central teachings was that he was actually God in the flesh? The renowned writer CS Lewis outs it this way:

A man who was merely a man and said the sorts of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic, on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg, or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse . . . but let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

How could we know if Jesus was really God’s son? First, if Jesus were God we would expect him to do many godly things, powerful things. That's where miracles come in. But we are skeptical. Sure Jesus could pull something over on the people of his day, but we can’t be fooled.

The big miracle of course, is how Jesus rose from the dead. We know for a fact that a man named Jesus died on a cross. Some will tell you that the disciples faked his death. But on the day he was crucified he had been beaten 39 times with a leather whip, and forced to carry a heavy weight so long that finally another man had to help him carry it. He had gone without food and water for a full day, and had long nails driven through his wrists. Jesus then hung on the cross in the hot sun for hours and was finally stabbed in the side with a spear.

None of the ancient accounts dispute that he was put in the grave, or that, on Sunday morning, his grave was empty. If the disciples had stolen his body, they would have known the whole thing was a fake and would hardly have given their lives to protect a lie. Jesus’ disciples admit that they abandoned him at the time of his death. Later, these same people went out into the streets to proclaim that he was and is God’s son. The difference was the resurrection. After seeing Jesus resurrected, the disciples boldly proclaimed Jesus as Lord.

Then, there is a sort of fingerprint evidence. We find God’s fingerprints all over Jesus’ story. Jesus fulfilled the prophecies, written hundreds of years earlier in the Old Testament. There are almost prophecies pertaining to where the Messiah would be born, how he would live, what he would be called, and how he would die. Many of the prophecies about the Messiah dealt with how he would die and what would happen to him after he was dead—things over which Jesus had little or no control. As a fingerprint identifies a person, so these prophecies identify Jesus as the only person in history who fulfilled God’s plan.

But, the final evidence, the true test, comes from your own experience of that babe in the manger. You can test Jesus story out in your own life. What if you lived as if the whole story is true? You would then have your own experiences as proof. By trusting in God and trying him out honestly, you will find God always ready to offer you a sense that he is near you and at work in your life. Open your heart up to really trying out God’s promises for yourself. Then you will taste and see that God is good.

(The Rev. Frank Logue is pastor of King of Peace Episcopal Church in Kingsland.)

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