Jesus Christ is the Good Shepherd

By izartirta

As the Bible recorded; Jesus acknowledged Himself as the Good Shepherd to reveal how He would act to protect His sheep. Jesus’ way is much different from the false teachers who tend to leave their sheep when danger comes.

A sheep is a weak creature. They are easily killed by predators and are very vulnerable to any small danger. They don’t have any weapon like claws or horns to protect themselves from the coming danger. Even their sight is so limited that they cannot see something clearly at the distance. A sheep therefore is very dependent on its shepherd.

When the night falls, sheep are often gathered into a sheep pen to protect them from thieves, weather or predators. The sheep pen could be a cave, sheds or open areas surrounded by walls made of stones or branches.

Usually a good shepherd sleeps in the pen to protect those sheep. This kind of shepherd really cares for his sheep. On the contrary, the hired men don’t really care for the sheep. They do the job only for money. If danger came in, they would just run away for their life and left the flocks behind scattered and killed by wild animals.

I am sure that Jesus took the relationship between sheep and its shepherd as a model of our relationship with Him for nothing but a good reason. Just like a weak sheep depends on its shepherd; Jesus intended us to depend ourselves only upon Him.

John 10:11-18 clearly stated:

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me just as the Father knows me and I know the Father and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life only to take it up again. No one take it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”

From these verses we can learn about the characteristic of Jesus’ service for us as the good shepherd.

As the good shepherd, Jesus:

Lays down His life

No other religion founders ever gave their life for the sake of their followers. Even if there were, their sacrifice will never be the same with what Jesus has done. Jesus died for us not because He was too weak in facing Roman Empire or the evil power of this world. As Jesus Himself said, “I lay down my life only to take it up again.” He did that on purpose, that is our own good. Then Jesus continued, “No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again.” Jesus did die for us on His own free willingness. He did that on His own authority. Surely He did that because He loves us and cares for us.

Knows His flocks

As we can read in verse 14 there is a strong relationship between us and Jesus. He knows us and we know Him. It is pretty obvious to me that Christianity is not like other religion in the world. World’s religions build their faith on good deeds and hoping those deeds would help them saved from bad condition, hell for instance. Christianity on the other hand builds its faith on the new private relationship with Jesus Christ. We know Jesus as much as He is revealed in the Bible; and we are expected to keep our relationship with Him. Christianity is about relationship with God and with other people.

Brings the flocks to the pen

Jews think that they are the only chosen nation which will be specially saved by God. In verse 16, Jesus revealed that there will be another flocks to bring into the relationship with Him. Those other flocks represent other nations existing on this earth. Jesus’ salvation is not merely for one nation but for everybody God has chosen to be saved from any nations. The message in this verse is also clear to me that Jesus will play the active role by bringing us into His home. This is not because we are strong enough or good enough to enter His home. Only because of what He’s been doing that we could be in such relationship.

Gives eternal life

As we can read in verse 28, Jesus lays down His life to give us the eternal life. No one in this world can do this to anyone because no one in this world has the same authority with God. Jesus is God and He has the authority upon life and death. Jesus is eternal and therefore He is able to give us the eternal life. Other religion’s founders died and never came to life just like Jesus did. They don’t have authority at all over their life.

Holds His sheep in eternal life

Some people think that we still may loose our chance for eternal life even though we are saved by Jesus. In verse 28, Jesus clearly stated that our salvation is once and for all because Jesus guarantees it with His hand. Jesus has promised us that “no one can snatch them out of my hand.” And He also added, “My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.” Our eternal life is guaranteed by Jesus’ hand and word. If we are counting our eternal life on ourselves, we may find it loose. But as Jesus said, even His Father cares for us and holding on our eternal life. We should be sure that we will never loose it.

Jesus is the good shepherd. No body can be compared to Him.

Come to Jesus right away as He loves you very much.

The teaching of Jesus Christ:

Our relationship with God reflects in our relationship with others

By Izar

I have mentioned in my previous posting about the danger of having hatred in our heart, for it is also considered the same in danger as murder.

In here I want to show what Jesus has taught us about the importance of having good relationship with others for the way we relate to others also reflects the way we maintain our relationship with God. Both are considered as equal.

Broken relationships can hinder our relationship with God. If we have a problem or grievance with a friend, we should resolve the problem as soon as possible. According to the Bible, it seems impossible for us to say that we love God while in the same time we hate other people. The way we act to others tells the way we relate ourselves to God.

Jesus Christ clearly said:

“If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift.” (Matthew 5:23)

It is not enough to give our regular offerings at the church we must also have right relationships with God and others.

Our offerings can be useful for the church in serving people and implementing Jesus’ love for the people. However as the subject of this good deed we should also have the right motivation. We should understand that in a way giving an offering is just a symbolic way of our relationship with God. God is not so poor that should beg us for money. He can create universe just by saying things. It is not difficult at all for Him to complete His works in this world. But He wants us to take part with His jobs. Further more He even wants to use us as His tool of loving for this world.

Our money is also just a tool in front of God and God wants His tool is pure. The money should come from pure resources and the giver should also be pure in motivation.

How good is your relationship with God lately?

How about your relationship with others? Is there anyone that you hate?

Consider what Jesus is saying to us through this teaching.

What would Jesus Christ think about murder?

By izartirta

If we look further on the way Jesus think about something and comparing it to our own way, we would see that there is a gap or even a huge difference.

I’m going to show you here one example about how different our way of seeing thing than that of Jesus. We think that if we have never killed someone then we are a good person, at least better than a murderer. We live our way while having a good image about ourselves. We see someone who ever killed somebody as a bad person (he is a bad person actually!) and see ourselves as good one. What would Jesus think about this?

Jesus’ opinion about this was recorded in Matthew 5:21:

“You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.

In this verse we see how Jesus explains us the actual meaning and motivation behind the laws of Moses. People usually feel satisfy whenever they think they have obeyed one rule without seeing further to the actual meaning and motivation or even main purpose of that rule. This verse here clearly exposes that situation. There is misunderstanding in everybody’s mind about this rule. Therefore Jesus teaching them and giving them proper meaning.

For Jesus, it is not enough to avoid killing but we must too avoid anger and hatred. The one who says Raca to his brother is also subject to judgment. Raca is an Aramaic term of contempt. By saying this word to anyone we are despising him intentionally and this act is clearly exposing our hatred heart to him. Do we ever think about their feeling after hearing our word to them? Even if they don’t feel hurt for what we have said or even if we don’t say this word right before their face, the existence of hatred in our heart is undeniable. And Jesus considers this as sin. Hatred is not better than murder. If we think that a murderer is a bad person, now we must realize that the one who hates is no better than a murderer. We should also realize that the root of murder in the hate in our heart.

I have never killed anyone in my life but honestly I can’t 100% clean myself from the feeling of hate. It just appears in my heart, sometimes I don’t even realize it until that feeling consume me or even destroy me. I have to admit that – seeing from Jesus’ point of view – I’m not a good person and subject to punishment because of this.

I’m not trying to judge you or anyone but I think this problem is not just happening with me. I think, and I’m quite sure about this, that this is the problem that all human is facing, off course according to their own spiritual level and capacity. That is why I believe that no one is good enough to enter heaven. Instead, we all deserve hell because of our sin (Remember that I was just talking about one example here; that is murder. The Bible pointed out many problems like this just to give us the picture of our spiritually dead condition). We have sinned more badly to God than we could even realize or imagine it.

However, as the one who belief in Jesus Christ I also know that I have hope to enter heaven. This is not just an empty hope because the Bible has told us that in Jesus Christ there will be no punishment.

I know I will go to heaven but this is not because I consider myself as a perfect man but merely because I know that Jesus Christ has died for my sin.

Through His redemption alone I know that I’m loved and accepted and someday He will let me enter His dwelling place in heaven forever. Thank you Jesus you are the Lord and my Savior.

My friend, come to Him while you still can, Jesus Christ loves you.

Jesus, the meaning of His name

By izartirta

The name Jesus means “The LORD saves.” He came to earth to save us because he knew that we can’t save ourselves from sin and all its consequences.

Unlike the other religion’s point of view, we – as the follower of Jesus Christ - are taught that no matter how good we are, we still won’t be able to eliminate the sinful nature within our very humanity. Only Jesus can do such thing because He is not an ordinary human being but God Himself. As apostle John has put it: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1)

Jesus didn’t come to help people save themselves; instead He sacrificed Himself for the penalty of our sin.

As we can read in Jesus’ Gospel according to Matthew: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel which means, God with us.” (Mat 1:23) This is not something that any human could make up, because this very nature of the birth of Jesus has already predicted by the prophet Isaiah seven hundred years earlier.

Jesus was God in the flesh; thus God was literally among us, “with us.” Through the Holy Spirit, Christ is present today in the life of every believer. Perhaps not even Isaiah understood how far-reaching the meaning of “Immanuel” would be.

Thank Jesus for his death on the cross for our sin and thank Him for being with us from now to eternity. God Bless You.

Jesus and the beginning of creation

By izartirta

It is not a coincidence if the Book of Genesis placed at the first book in the Bible because the Genesis itself means “beginnings” or “origin.”

This first book reveals the beginning of the world, the process of how the world was created, the beginning of human history, the first family, the beginning of civilization and also the beginning of salvation. And these are not all, because the most important aspect is not on its process but rather on the origin of everything.

Some scientist think that the Bible has nothing to do with the actual event occurred in our physical world. According to these kinds of scientist, this world is just a product of blind chance and probability, but it certainly took a bigger faith to believe it than believe that there is a Creator of the universe.

The Biblical view of creation is not in conflict with science; rather, it is in conflict with any worldview that starts without a Creator. The most important aspect of the continuing discussion is not the process of creation, but the origin of creation. The world is not a product of blind chance and probability; God created it.

Apostle John revealed the truth when he pointed at Jesus as the Creator of the universe. John declared: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” (John 1:1-3)

Jesus indeed the Creator of every thing ever existed in our material and non material world. Someday each one of us should come before Him.

Jesus Christ Is Real God

By izartirta

When I was still a teenage I used to think that Jesus was only one of many holly persons which taught people who lived in his time to be a good person. I didn’t realize Jesus’ uniqueness among the others. I didn’t even know what the significance of his claim about himself during his work on this planet was. I just thought that those realities has happened sometime in the past and have nothing to do with my life today. But then I know I was wrong.

Here I put Lee Stroble’s thinking of Jesus’ claim about himself. And I also put some of my comments, placed in a bracket. I hope that we too can be sure that Jesus is real God and if he is God, then everything that he said is actually God’s word.

Lee Stroble gained his Master degree of Law from Yale Law School. He also was a journalist graduated from University of Missouri. He was once a skeptical to any spiritual subject of discussion. But then God turned this once-an-atheist person to someone who fights for Jesus. He then uses his knowledge of law and journalism to trace the identity of Jesus Christ. His spiritual journey from an atheist into a keen believer is documented in his book: The Case for Christ.

So, here he is…

Did Jesus Ever Claim To Be God?

By Lee Strobel

I hear the objection all the time: Jesus never really claimed he was the Son of God; instead, this belief was superimposed on the Jesus tradition by overzealous Jesus’ follower years after his death. The real Jesus saw himself as nothing more than a rabbi, a sage, an iconoclastic rabble-rouser – anything but God. Or, at least, this is what critics claim. But this is not what the evidence clearly shows. The truth was summarized by Scottish theologian H.R.Macintosth: “The self-consciousness of Jesus … is the greatest fact in history.”

Kevin Vanhoozer, research professor of systematic theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, put the issue this way; “Jesus understood himself to be the beloved Son of God, chosen by God to bring about the kingdom of God and the forgiveness of sins. Our understanding of who Jesus was must correspond to Jesus’ own self-understanding. If we do not confess Jesus as the Christ, then either he was deluded about his identity or we are.”

(Our confession of Jesus as the Christ is so important and I think this is the basis which his church built upon. – addition from izartirta)

At least ten factors point toward Jesus as believing he was the one and only Son of God.

First

There was the way he referred to himself. No scholar doubts that the most common way Jesus referred to himself was “the Son of Man” which he applied to himself more than four dozen times, including in Mark, generally considered the earliest gospel. While some critics mistakenly believe this is a mere claim of humanity, the scholarly consensus is that this is a reference to Daniel 7:13-14, where the Son of Man is ushered into the very presence of the Almighty, has “authority, glory and sovereign power,” receives the worship of “all peoples,” and is someone whose dominion is everlasting.

(As far as I know, the Bible never mentioned someone who fears God willing to receive the worship from any other beings. Except for those who -falsely- think that he is god. Even an angel from God refused to receive such action from John at Patmos Island. One question may arise from my statement here is that “Did Jesus falsely think that he is god?” In this case, we should observe other evidence of Jesus as never think falsely. – addition from izartirta)

“The Son of Man was a divine figure in the Old Testament book of Daniel who would come at the end of the world to judge mankind and rule forever,” said theologian an philosopher William Lane Craig. “Thus the claim to be the Son of Man would be in effect a claim to divinity.”

Vanhoozer adds an interesting sidelight: “The curious thing about Jesus’ use of the title … is that he linked it not only with the theme of future glory by also with the theme of suffering and death. In doing so, Jesus was teaching his disciples something new about the long-awaited Messiah, namely, that his suffering would precede his glory (e.g., Luke 9:22)

Second

Vanhoozer points out that Jesus also made a claim of divinity when he applied the “I am” saying to himself, at one point declaring, “I tell you the truth, before Abraham was born, I am!” (John 8:58). This obvious allusion to God’s words to Moses put of the burning bush was such an unmistakable declaration of equality with God that his audience picked up stones to hurl at him for blasphemy.”

Third

Jesus made a divine claim when he forgave the sins of the paralytic in Mark 2. “The only person who can say that sort of thing meaningfully is God himself, because sin, even if it is against other people, is first and foremost a defiance of God and his laws,” observed theologian D.A Carson.

Fourth

There was a transcendent claim made by the way Jesus selected his disciples, according to Ben Witherington III, author of The Christology of Jesus. “If the Twelve represent a renewed Israel, where does Jesus fit in?” he asked. “He’s not just part of Israel, not merely part of the redeemed group, he’s forming the group – just as God in the Old Testament formed his people and set up the twelve tribes of Israel. That’s a clue about what Jesus thought of himself.”

Fifth

A clue about Jesus’ self understanding comes through the way he taught. “Jesus begins his teachings with the phrase “Amen I say to you.” Which is to say, “I swear in advance to the truthfulness of what I’m about to say, “This was absolutely revolutionary,” Witherington said.

He went on to explain:

In Judaism, you needed the testimony of two witnesses … but Jesus witnesses to the truth of his own sayings. Instead of basing his teaching on the authority of others, he speaks on his own authority.

So here is someone who considered himself to have authority above and beyond what the Old Testament prophets had. He believed he possessed not only divine inspiration, as King David did, but also divine authority and the power of direct divine utterance.”

Sixth

Jesus used Aramaic term Abba, or “Father dearest,” when relating to God. This reflects an intimacy that was alien in ancient Judaism, in which devout Jews avoided the use of God’s personal name out of fear they may mispronounce it.

Dr. Witherington made this observation:

The significance of “Abba” is that Jesus is the initiator of an intimate relationship that was previously unavailable. The question is: what kind of person can initiate a new covenantal relationship with God?

Jesus is saying that only through having a relationship with himself does this kind of prayer language – this kind of “Abba” relationship with God – become possible. That says volumes about how he regarded himself.

Seventh

A seventh indicator of Jesus’ self-understanding can be seen in his post-resurrection encounter with the apostle Tomas is John 20. Responding to Jesus’ invitation to personally check out the evidence that he had really risen from the dead, Thomas declares in verse 28, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus’ reply was telling. I would have been the height of blasphemy for him to have knowingly received Thomas’s worship unless Jesus really was God. Yet instead of rebuking him, Jesus said in verse 29, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Jesus’ choice to receive Thomas’s worship clearly means he believed he was God and thus worthy of that homage. Similarly, when Simon Peter answered Jesus’ question, “Who do you say I am?” by saying, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Jesus’ reaction was not to correct him but rather to affirm that this was revealed to him by the Father himself (Matthew 16:15-17)

Eighth

Jesus clearly believed that the eternal destiny of people hinged whether they believed in him. “If you do not believe I am the one I claim to be,” he said in John 8:24, “you will indeed die in your sins.” In addition, he said in Luke 12:8-9: “I tell you, whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God. But he who disowns me before the angels of God,”

William Lane Craig put the implication this way: “Make no mistake; if Jesus were not the divine Son of God, then this claim could only be regarded as the most narrow and objectionable dogmatism. For Jesus is saying that people’s salvation depends on their confession to Jesus himself.”

Ninth

Jesus declared in John 10:30 “I and the Father are one.” There is no question about whether his listeners understood that Jesus was saying that he and God are one in substance. Promptly, they picked up rocks to attach him “for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God” (verse 33).

Tenth

A tenth factor that should be weighed in assessing Jesus’ belief about his identity is his miracles, which will be discussed in the next section. Jesus stressed that his feats were a sign of the coming of God’s kingdom: “If I drive out demons by the finger of God, then the Kingdom of God has come to you” (Luke 11:20). Ben Witherington observed that even though others in the Bible also performed miracles, this statement showed that Jesus didn’t merely regard himself as a wonder-worker: “He sees himself as the one in whom and through whom the promises of God come to pass. And that’s a not-too-thinly veiled claim of transcendence.”

As we can see at least there are ten argumentations about the deity of Jesus Christ. These are strong evidences about Jesus’ way of regarding himself. There is no more doubt that Jesus is real Christ and real God. (izartirta)