Recently at the grocery store I noticed that even at this time of year you can buy half of lots of fruits, like watermelon and cantaloupe. This helps you judge something about the ripeness of the fruit, if not the taste.
That reminds me of a woman who went to a grocery store and asked to buy half a great fruit. The clerk asked her to wait while he checked on that possibility. He went to the back of the store and said to the manager, “There is some nut here who wants to buy half a great fruit.” Then he glanced over his shoulder and noticed that this woman had followed him to the back of the store, so he said, “And this gracious lady is willing to buy the other half.” The manager was much impressed by the quick wit of this young clerk. So, later he said to him, “You could have a bright future in the business. You might end up owning a number of grocery stores. By the way, where are you from?” The young man said, “I am from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the home of ugly women and great hockey teams.” The manager frowned and said, “My wife is from Lancaster, Pennsylvania,” and the young man replied, “And what hockey team did she play for?”
Half of a fruit can be a good thing to have, but half of a gospel is a disaster. That was the problem in the early church. Some false teachers were traveling around dispensing half-a-gospel. The false teachers were called “Gnostics,” a term that meant “the intellectual ones.” They believed that Jesus could not have been God’s Son because God would not allow himself to be contaminated by this sinful world.
St. Paul’s letter to the Colossians was written to refute these Gnostics. And a key reason for the development of the Apostles Creed was to eliminate these false teachings about Jesus.
Most people today would agree that Jesus was a great teacher and a brilliant philosopher, but many are unwilling to call him Savior and Lord. But if he was just another human being, even a very bright or inspired one, then he was no different from Socrates, Buddha, Mohammed, or Abe Lincoln. Such a Jesus would be incapable of being your Savior and Lord. Beware of those who dispense half-a-gospel.
In order to get a full picture of what the Bible teaches and the church has always believed about Jesus, let’s look at the first part of the Creed that speaks of Jesus. First, we are given his name and his title. I BELIEVE IN JESUS CHRIST.
God selected Jesus’ name. Then, before Jesus was born, God sent angels to both Joseph and Mary with specific instructions about that name. In the Old Testament Hebrew language, “Jesus” is translated as “Joshua.” It means literally “The Lord saves.”
The word “Christ” is not Jesus’ last name. In fact, it is not a name at all. It is a title. It means “the anointed one” or “the Messiah.” Throughout the Old Testament period, the Jews were taught that the Messiah was coming.
People the world over are fascinated by Jesus. George Gallup’s pollsters asked people, “What historical figure would you most like to spend a day with?” Two out of three named Jesus. Even among those with no church affiliation, 37 percent chose Jesus. (1)
The next description of Jesus in the Creed is this: HIS (GOD’S) ONLY SON. The angel described to Mary the Son she would bear: “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” (Luke 1:32) This affirmation sets us apart from all other religions. The very idea that God Almighty would take up residence on planet earth and take the form of a human being was beyond radical. It was and still is unthinkable for other major faiths in our world. Yet Jesus clearly and openly announced that he was God’s Son. Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.” (John 10:30)
Notice that the Creed declares that Jesus is God’s only Son. This statement was in reaction to some false teachers who said that all believers are adopted as children of God and therefore Jesus was no different from the rest of us. The Creed and the Bible make it clear that Jesus’ sonship is different from ours. In John’s gospel Jesus is described as “the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14) And in that great verse that many of us have memorized, Jesus’ uniqueness is affirmed: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)
St. Paul declared in his letter to the Colossians that Jesus and God are of one essence. He wrote, “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him (Jesus).” (Col. 1:19) He was just affirming Jesus’ statement: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” (John 14:9)
Occasionally when I’m visiting in homes, I notice a family portrait hanging on the wall. Usually it is easy for me to see the resemblance between the portrait and that family, but occasionally I’m tempted to ask, “Who in the world are these folks in the portrait?” I’m reminded of the woman who paid $1000 to have her portrait painted. She went by the studio on the day it was to be ready. When she saw it, she was horrified. She said to the artist, “I’m not going to pay you for that painting. It does not do me justice.” He replied, “What you need, madam, is not justice but mercy.”
St. Paul and the Apostles Creed tell us that in Jesus we see an exact picture of God the Father. Jesus is as much of God as we are capable of receiving. The great English scholar Maltby expressed it this way: “When the disciples said their prayers to God at night, there was a face on the screen of their minds; they fell asleep thinking of Jesus.”
If you want to see the fullness of God, look at Jesus. If you want to see God’s power, watch and listen as you read of Jesus hushing a stormy sea with just a word. If you want to see God’s wisdom, imagine yourself seated with that vast throng on a grassy Galilean hillside as he delivered his Sermon on the Mount. If you want to see God’s righteous indignation, watch this fiery Jesus kicking over the tables of the money-changers in the Temple, protecting the sanctity of worship and the poor people from exploitation. If you want to see God’s compassion, watch Jesus weep with grieving friends over the death of his friend Lazarus. Or watch him touch the lepers whom everybody else ran from. Or watch him defend a terrified, guilty adulterous woman. Or see him notice poor blind Bartimaeus whom everybody else considered just a part of the landscape. If you want to see God’s forgiveness, see Jesus as he hangs in agony on a cross, looking down on those who had hammered stakes through his flesh and had gambled for his clothes; and instead of cursing them, he cries out, “Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they’re doing.” (Luke 23:34)
This is what God is like. And if this Jesus cannot reconcile people to God and to each other, there is no power on earth that can.
The next two words in the Creed describe a Christian’s reaction to Jesus. For us he is OUR LORD. When the first Christians said, “Jesus is Lord,” their fellow citizens thought they were crazy, dangerous subversives, for if Jesus is Lord, Caesar is not. There can be only one Lord in a person’s life.
In pre-World War II Germany, the great Lutheran pastor Martin Niemoller preached a sermon entitled, “Christ is my Fuhrer,” and Hitler jailed him because of it. (2)
Just think what you are saying when you affirm in the Creed that Jesus is Lord! You are saying that Jesus is your towering truth, your dominating desire, your pre-eminent purpose, and your core conviction. You are saying with St. Paul, “For me to live is Christ.” (Phil. 1:21)
The late evangelist Wallace Chappell used to say, “In some people’s lives, Christ is present. In some people’s lives, Christ is prominent. But in the life of a Christian, Christ should be preeminent.”
Shortly after American astronaut Neil Armstrong made his historic trip to the moon, he visited the nation of Israel. As a devout Christian, he wanted to see the Holy Land. He was taken on a tour of the Old City of Jerusalem by an Israeli archaeologist, Meir Ben-Dov. When they got to the Hulda Gate, which is at the top of the stairs leading to the Temple Mount, Armstrong asked Ben-Dov whether Jesus had actually walked in that exact area. Ben-Dov replied, “Certainly. Jesus was a Jew. These are the steps leading to the Temple, so he must have walked here many times.” Armstrong then asked if these were the original steps, and Ben-Dov confirmed that they were. “I have to tell you,” said Armstrong, “I am more excited stepping on these stones than I was stepping on the moon.” (3)
That’s the way one feels when one declares from the heart that Jesus is Lord.
To say “Jesus is Lord” requires a decision on our part. Now, when you ponder how God created the world, you may be puzzled but you don’t have to decide anything. When you ponder the problem of evil in the world, you may yearn for answers but you don’t have to decide anything. When you ponder why other people have such mixed reactions to Jesus Christ, you may be grieved for some of them, but you don’t have to decide anything.
But face to face with Christ, you are forced to decide. Judgment day is not just sometime in the future. It is today and it is simply a matter of what you do with Jesus. There are only two choices—to accept him or reject him. Some people think they can postpone that decision, but Jesus did not agree. Jesus said, “Whoever believes in the Son is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” (John 3:18) To fail to decide is to reject him today, not knowing if there will be a tomorrow. Jesus wants to be your Savior, but he demands a response. He will be either your Savior or your judge. The decision is yours. (4)
I’m sure that there are some in this room who have not yet given their hearts to Jesus Christ and called him “Savior and Lord.” I dare you to really expose your inner life to Jesus, to read a portion of John’s gospel prayerfully each day, inviting Jesus to make himself real to you. I guarantee that before you have finished the Gospel of John, Jesus will have introduced himself to you personally and will have changed you profoundly.
Perhaps today is the day you will decide to accept Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. Perhaps that is why God drew you to this place today.
I invite you to listen to a beautiful solo entitled, “Give Me Jesus.” As you listen to the words of the song, perhaps those words will become the desire of your heart. (Solo is sung- “Give Me Jesus.”)
(1) Hunter, George G., III, How to Reach Secular People, (Abingdon: Nashville,1992), p. 94.
(2) Howell, James C., The Life We Claim, (Abingdon: Nashville, 2005), p. 41.
(3) Friedman, Thomas L., From Beirut to Jerusalem.
(4) Jones, E. Stanley, a Song of Ascents, (Abingdon: Nashville, 1968), p. 93.