Lots of people admire Jesus and what he said without believing he’s the Son of God, as Christians do.
But whether Jesus was God or not, I think there’s an important question:
What happened to the followers of Jesus after he died?
There’s a bit of a puzzle in history that deserves to be thought through a bit. Lots of people admire Jesus and what he said without believing he’s the Son of God, as Christians do. But whether Jesus was God or not, I think there’s an important question: What happened to the followers of Jesus after he died?
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This Friday, our school will come together to install a treaty medal, and afterwards there will be a community celebration of food and dance to honor the moment. We are all invited, because we are all treaty people. You probably know how the First Nations and those who came from nations in Europe entered into treaties with each other to create a new partnership on this land, one that respected everyone’s contribution and represented promises that would endure. Blessed are the peacemakers, said our Lord Jesus Christ, for they will be called children of God. Seemed pretty straightforward to me. I like peace. Peace is good. Simple. Then, over the last couple weeks or so, a few things I experienced built up to disturb my peace. Images on my magic rectangle. Good friends in the toughest times. And the need to protect a learning community that calls itself family. All of a sudden, I saw violence all around me, crazy and senseless, and I wondered, How can I possibly make peace out of all this? What can one person do in the face of violence, fear and suffering? If a person could make peace, I guess, that person would certainly be a lucky dog. Is that what you meant Jesus? That humanity was such a stranger to peace that it was Vegas-odds against bringing it into the world?
I've been working on my historical-critical method for the past bit now, and I've still reached the startling conclusion. It does not make sense for the Resurrection not to have happened. There's lots of reasons why. I'm going to stick with just the witness argument: how else can a reasonable historian explain why hundreds of backwoods peasants traveled thousands of miles to give testimony on pain of humiliating and painful death, except that they had really seen a dead body come to life in a glorified way? Even more convincing for me is that these witnesses, with no textual, physical, or authoritative evidence but their own word, managed to convince peoples throughout the Ancient Mediterranean, just by their own testimony. Before the Gospels were written, philosophers and slaves and merchants and military believed that the God of all creation - the only god, mind you - came as a human being to... What? Get nailed naked to wood as a disgusting billboard of brutal Imperial violence? What a ridiculous story! Imagine hearing it for the first time, maybe having seen crucified bodies on your way into town. What could have possibly convinced you that it were true, to such a point that you'd die rather than deny it? |
AuthorRyan LeBlanc, B.A., B.Ed., M.A, is a career classroom teacher, learning leader, and workshop facilitator. Now, his cutting-edge educational methods and years of practical experience with thousands of learners are available through his comprehensive online courses. Categories
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